Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Meleardil on October 03, 2008, 11:39:24 am
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I find it utterly ridiculous that every time someone "dares to mention" Jews or Israel, the topic must start with apology that he is "not racist or something". How come that such apology is not necessary when you mention any other religions or countries? And those who object against such "blasphemy" are mostly not even Jews or from Israel.
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I simply said it because I didn't want to be misenterpreted.
The word "Diaspora" reminds tragic aspects of Israeli history, I thought it was the case to clarify that mine was a pure reference with no racism.
:)
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Yeah...you were perfectly clear, and lightyears from being offensive. :)
My note was addressed to the fact that you worried about being misinterpreted.
Diaspora is a Greek word, with the meaning of "spreading the seeds" (or swarming out). It is very general. Can be applied on either tragic or happy events, depending on the actual depression level of your nation.
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"Spora" stands for "seeds" :nod:
Yep, Diaspora is Greek...and in Italian it keeps the same pronunciation...that's why I perfectly know how to pronounce it ;)
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The name is used in a large number of sci-fi books to denote the departure of humanity from Earth after some kind of war.
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That's why it fits perfectly with BSG, right? :)
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I find it utterly ridiculous that every time someone "dares to mention" Jews or Israel, the topic must start with apology that he is "not racist or something". How come that such apology is not necessary when you mention any other religions or countries? And those who object against such "blasphemy" are mostly not even Jews or from Israel.
What I find ridiculous is that people seem to think "Jew" is a race. It's not. "Semite" is the name for a member of the closest thing to a 'Jewish race' -- "Jew" is a member of a religion. Likewise, Christian is not a race, nor is white a religion.
Anywho... I agree with the guy who's agreeing with me.
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What are you saying? Races don't even exist...claiming the existance of races automatically means declaring himself a racist...the only differences between populations of humans is the way they adapted to different environments...there are no races... :)
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Okay guys, we're getting a little off track here.
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Right...
But I guess you're going to see other similar discussions in the future due to the mod's name...maybe you should clarify everything in the Diaspora FAQ.
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What are you saying? Races don't even exist...claiming the existance of races automatically means declaring himself a racist...the only differences between populations of humans is the way they adapted to different environments...there are no races... :)
Yet in your sig you have lists of Italians and Americans.
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Those are countries. Countries are not races are not religions are not countries.
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Just for the record. Dia - spora has nothing to do whith seeds. "Spora" here stands for spreading. :)
The word Spora do means seeding but whith the prefix "Dia" has a totally defrend meaning.
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I had no idea Italian and American were countries.
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I had no idea Italian and American were countries.
Don't play dumb with me. You know what I meant (or you should): that Italian and American were adjectives denoting a country of origin or descent.
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Oh, of course - no discrimination on 'race', but it's ok if it's based on them being from another country.
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No, actually they're all equally stupid.
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Oh, of course - no discrimination on 'race', but it's ok if it's based on them being from another country.
Then criticize colecampbell666's list of Canadians on his sig... :P
Just for the record. Dia - spora has nothing to do whith seeds. "Spora" here stands for spreading. :)
The word Spora do means seeding but whith the prefix "Dia" has a totally defrend meaning.
I must have been confused by the fact that "spora" reminds "spore".
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Then criticize colecampbell666's list of Canadians on his sig... :P
He isn't the one calling it racist.
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Race(which doesn't exist) and nationality are two separate things. I "might" be nationalist but I'm not a racist.
Of course, one is arbitrarily separating people based on differences in appearance; the other is arbitrarily separating people based on where they happened to be born relative to arbitrary map drawing decisions.
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Um... nationalism is not discriminating from people of specific nations... just thinking that your nation is better in some way than everyone else's.
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Damn Sagittarians!
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Um... nationalism is not discriminating from people of specific nations... just thinking that your nation is better in some way than everyone else's.
Can you describe a way in which that actually differs from discrimination?
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Good discussion, but, uh, thread split?
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I'll leave the topic here a day or so then move it to Gen Dis if it is still active.
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What are you saying? Races don't even exist...claiming the existence of races automatically means declaring himself a racist...the only differences between populations of humans is the way they adapted to different environments...there are no races... :)
What are you talking about? Humans are a single species. Right. On the other hand races do exist. There are physiological and psychological differences among humans as a result of adapting to different environments, difficulties and cultures. Humans are not generally equal. They cannot be! You cannot treat the same way healthy people, blind people or another with Alzheimer, yet nobody screams racism there. Admitting that races exist and that people are different is not racism!
We do discrimination on purpose! For example someone who cannot qualify for driving license is forbidden to drive. Is that discrimination? Of course it is, and a good one. Shall you get your master degree on the university, if you fail all your exams? No??? Another discrimination? The hell yes! Based on physiologic, mental and cultural conditions. So, please, don't fall for magic buzzwords.
Racism is different. Racism is when you claim superiority based on simply being in one race, and declare that everybody else is inferior. I think you have a semantic problem here, a problem created on purpose... saying it more plainly: for political purpose.
To say a rather stupid example: dogs are one species, they can interbreed, and have the same general qualities. Would you declare that all dogs are exactly the same, no matter if one is a Saint Bernhardshund and the other is a Chihuahua? You can't claim that one is any superior to the other, but differences shall be obvious.
I don't feel the pressure being politically correct when I say the truth. Political correctness is the invention of politicians for safely setting taboos for the general population. If you have doubts, than read, learn, use your mind and common sense, but for God's sakes don't repeat the popular catchwords without criticism.
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I'll leave the topic here a day or so then move it to Gen Dis if it is still active.
I'll give it a close watch.
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What are you saying? Races don't even exist...claiming the existence of races automatically means declaring himself a racist...the only differences between populations of humans is the way they adapted to different environments...there are no races... :)
What are you talking about? Humans are a single species. Right. On the other hand races do exist.
I like the spirit of what you're trying to say, but you're wrong a fundamental (but difficult) point: races don't exist.
This is because the biological differences within races are greater than the biological differences between races. So everyone blends together into one grand spectrum; there are no distinct groups.
You can have a world without race without resorting to delusions of political correctness. All you need is scientific fact.
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LULZ RACISM SRS BUSINESS!!!!!!
The reason why I think Diaspora is such a ****ty name for this is because they would use the word once per minute back in the good ole days of Yugoslavia going to ****, so the fact that we were all splitting up was some kind of a diaspora (when the people were moving to the regions that were claimed for them) which resulted in the morons on TV using the word excessively in order to sound like they deserved their jobs (which they didn't).
But that's no fault of the word or name per-se. Just the asshattery of my childhood. When you take that out, it's probably a good find.
But that doesn't make me hate you less. I still hate you pretty hard.
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You can have a world without race without resorting to delusions of political correctness. All you need is scientific fact.
That whole biological definition is pretty much undefined. Or lets say in other words: the definitions are fluid.
Just one example: Seagulls. Have you heard about the Atlantic barrier? If you start from Europe and slowly go east, the genome of the species slowly changing, but the gulls can breed with each other. Until you reach the other side of Atlantic. Those cannot breed with the European version. From one point of view they are the same species, from another they are not. and it is not even the definition of races, but species!
What I was talking about previously is the difference between talking about races and being a racist.
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Right, I'm saying that races aren't defined biologically because they don't exist.
What you're talking about with regard to the gulls is called ring speciation.
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If you put it that way, than you are right of course. Just one question: is there a proper terminology to point out subspecies, if the usage of race is forbidden? :D I am willing to learn the proper words.
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When you say that "race doesn't exist," though, that kind of glosses over the fact that there are well-documented medical variations between people whose ancestry arises from different portions of the world. For example, just in this country alone, studies have shown that African-American males seem to be more genetically disposed to heart disease than Asian-American or Caucasian males; I would assume that this could be attributed to the natural variations in genetic makeup that resulted from disparate populations of people interbreeding over hundreds of years. You certainly can't deny that people who have an ancestry completely confined to Southeast Asia don't have notable genetic differences from those whose ancestry lies in sub-Saharan Africa, and that both of them aren't likewise different from a person whose ancestors were natives of Central America for thousands of years. As superficial as it may seem, physical appearance does tell a genetic story, which is why people from fairly insular cultures with little outside marriage tend to share certain common (though not ubiquitous) physical traits. In a way, the culture of the modern world has started to reverse this process; with the explosion of global commerce and the natural population movements that follow, different genetic ancestries start to be blended together back into the one big "melting pot" that we all branched out from in the first place.
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I don't know where this thread came from, but it's one giant facepalm.jpg.
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I don't know where this thread came from
From the Diaspora board.
Still, funny stuff.
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People sooooooo love overreacting to things it's not even funny anymore.
there's absolutely nothing wrong with noticing differences or grouping/describing people based on those differences.
Heck, if someone called me white (whitey or any derivation thereof), or christian why would I be offended? I am those things!
So what's will all the overreacting.
Saying someone is black or a jew is not racism. (not unless you claim that all blacks or jews are stupid, inferior or similar crap).
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When you say that "race doesn't exist," though, that kind of glosses over the fact that there are well-documented medical variations between people whose ancestry arises from different portions of the world. For example, just in this country alone, studies have shown that African-American males seem to be more genetically disposed to heart disease than Asian-American or Caucasian males; I would assume that this could be attributed to the natural variations in genetic makeup that resulted from disparate populations of people interbreeding over hundreds of years. You certainly can't deny that people who have an ancestry completely confined to Southeast Asia don't have notable genetic differences from those whose ancestry lies in sub-Saharan Africa, and that both of them aren't likewise different from a person whose ancestors were natives of Central America for thousands of years. As superficial as it may seem, physical appearance does tell a genetic story, which is why people from fairly insular cultures with little outside marriage tend to share certain common (though not ubiquitous) physical traits. In a way, the culture of the modern world has started to reverse this process; with the explosion of global commerce and the natural population movements that follow, different genetic ancestries start to be blended together back into the one big "melting pot" that we all branched out from in the first place.
Yes, yes, all true, but the differences within these groups are larger than the differences between them.
So no meaningful barriers can be drawn.
So, in the end, race doesn't exist after all, in spite of these concentrations of ailments or traits.
People sooooooo love overreacting to things it's not even funny anymore.
there's absolutely nothing wrong with noticing differences or grouping/describing people based on those differences.
Heck, if someone called me white (whitey or any derivation thereof), or christian why would I be offended? I am those things!
So what's will all the overreacting.
Saying someone is black or a jew is not racism. (not unless you claim that all blacks or jews are stupid, inferior or similar crap).
So long as these superficial physical descriptors (black, white) are not tied to any deeper meme complexes, I agree with Trash.
In fact, I prefer the term 'black' to 'African-American' because it seems more equal to 'white'.
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I hate it when people redefine terms to make them something that they're not.
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Yes, yes, all true, but the differences within these groups are larger than the differences between them.
So no meaningful barriers can be drawn.
So, in the end, race doesn't exist after all, in spite of these concentrations of ailments or traits.
Not to doubt you, but do you have a source on that? I mean, I'm not saying that genetic diversity doesn't also exist within one geographical group, but the fact that you have pronounced physical and physiological differences between members of disparate cultural groups would seem to me to reflect correspondingly disparate specific genetic paths.
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They're not actually different. The spread within groups is greater than the spread between groups.
Think of them like pools of paint that have all run together. You can say 'hmm, this patch is a little shinier, this patch is a bit more brown...but there aren't really any individual pools.'
My source? Erm, off the top of my head, the cover article in Discover, National Geographic, and Scientific American a couple times in the past few years. Lemme check JSTOR and see if I can dig up a few articles on that.
Ah, here we go! Beautiful:
The straightforward biological fact of human variation is that there are no traits that are inherently, inevitably associated with one another. Morphological features do vary from region to region, but they do so independently, not in packaged sets. "I tell my students that I could divide the whole world into two groups: the fat-nose people and the skinny- nose people," says Norm Sauer. "But then I start adding in other traits to consider, like skin color, eye color, stature, blood type, fingerprints, whatever. It doesn't take long before somebody in the class gets the point and says, 'Wait a minute! Pretty soon you're going to have a race with only one person in it.' "
Indeed, despite the obvious physical differences between people from different areas, the vast majority of human genetic variation occurs within populations, not between them, with only some 6 percent accounted for by race, according to a classic study done in 1972 by geneticist Richard Lewontin of Harvard. Put another way, most of what separates me genetically from a typical African or Eskimo also separates me from another average American of European ancestry.
From Discover Magazine, 1994. (http://discovermagazine.com/1994/nov/termsofestrangem445)
And no it's not dated because it's from 1994. This is a pretty stable field.
Now, if you read the article carefully, you'll find the answer to the common objection that some races are medically different -- i.e. blacks have higher rates of sickle-cell anemia. This is not because of race but because of geographical clusters of single allele differences.
And no, a single gene change does not mean 'race' even when it's linked to skin color, again for reasons in the article. Please read it before responding!
EDIT: didn't mean to aim any snark or confrontational attitude at you, Mongoose; you were very polite.
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Okay, okay, I believe you. :p I honestly had no knowledge at all about this topic, other than what I remembered of genetics from my high school biology class (i.e., not much). That's a rather fascinating study, if only because the results are rather counterintuitive.
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I'm sorry if I came off as too aggressive; I was trying to preempt arguments from a hypothetical, hostile crowd, not from you.
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There's also this (http://www.pbs.org/race/000_About/002_04-background-02-09.htm) little article, if anyone likes anthropology.
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yes, people who have a common localized set of traits actually don't, black people aren't black asian people aren't asian, its all just a white man conspiracy.
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...it must be white man conspiracy too, when they give different kind of medicine to black people than to the white.
Told you it was a semantic trap.
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This is going better than most :yes: keep it up :nod:
My take on the chat, is that culture and genetic heritage aren't always mutually exclusive, for example; someone from japan isn't going to become a massive anime fan and spend all day singing karaoke. I live in England but we don't all stop work for afternoon tea and crumpets every day ;) you're not confined to whatever way of life you happen to be born into.
My sentiment is that race is a term used. Where as culture is a lifestyle you can aim at.
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I know, lets cange the definitions of other words to fit cute political ideologies and pretend we're better than the masses for figuring it out. oh I know 'war' will now be a conflict in which one side suffers no defeat, yeah, we now live in a world without war! or oh I got it let's change IQ so it is now divided by the amount of education a person has had, GREAT now some half dead kid in ethiopoi who doesn't even know fully how to speak his own language is now smarter than Steven hawking, EVERY ONE'S A WINNER! oh, and let's completely decouple the concept of gender from any and all references to actual physical sexual capabilities and/or traits, you can be whatever gender you want to be and anyone who tells you different is ignorant of our new samrter world!
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Race has never been well-defined. You're the only one making this an adversarial project. No one is suggesting that you forget about race. Quite the opposite, the fact that it's socially constructed makes it all the more important that we pay attention to how it affects contemporary politics and society. It has nothing to do with finger-pointing, elitism, or settling some historical score. It's just something of which we're in desperate need of a better understanding.
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if it was purely social then I would not be able to easily identify a person of another race if they were fully integrated into my social group, as in raised by white parents went to 'white' schools got a 'white' job, if it was purely a social thing then you would not be able to tell a fully integrated individual apart. clearly there are physical traits which identify what are known as races.
a race is a population of individuals with a widely shared set of physical traits inherited from common heredity. how is that for a definition? it doesn't matter if there is a large amount of variety within that portion of the population or not, what matters is that there is a much higher probability of a complex combination of traits than in the larger population and that this higher probability is due to heredity. the definition is useful in that it allows one to recognize trends of that subset of the population, such as vulnerability to disease or common genetic defects, knowing someone is black can help in making diagnoses of heart disease stroke and everyone's favorite genetic disorder sickle cell anemia.
now of course you are going to come back and imply that those similarities are culturally induced. yes a large amount of the commonalities, particularly medical commonalities, could very well be induced by nurture over nature, but if you are going to ignore the fact that subsets of the population share a large number of common physical traits, I don't see how you are going to figure out which ones are which.
as for 'social constructed' give me one word that is not, the whole language is a social construct.
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I know, lets change the definitions of other words to fit cute political ideologies and pretend we're better than the masses for figuring it out. oh I know 'war' will now be a conflict in which one side suffers no defeat, yeah, we now live in a world without war!
...totally agree. I heard a story once. When political correctness infected Pentagon, they started major renaming in the name of democracy, liberalism and tolerance. In one of the meetings after some ridiculous renaming Carrier Battle Group formation to Carrier Strike Group one of the die hard admiral had an outburst:
"...why the f*ck must be an organization, which kills people for living, politically correct???"
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f*** political correctness. It's aritificial, forced, overblown and stupid.
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Mellow guys, mellow cool and calm........
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do not listen to the weak one, feel your anger, let it run through you, it is your strength, only then will you know true POWER!
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I've got the power to lock this thread....It's pretty quiet now anyway.
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a race is a population of individuals with a widely shared set of physical traits inherited from common heredity. how is that for a definition? it doesn't matter if there is a large amount of variety within that portion of the population or not, what matters is that there is a much higher probability of a complex combination of traits than in the larger population and that this higher probability is due to heredity. the definition is useful in that it allows one to recognize trends of that subset of the population, such as vulnerability to disease or common genetic defects, knowing someone is black can help in making diagnoses of heart disease stroke and everyone's favorite genetic disorder sickle cell anemia.
Just wanted to point out, Bobbau, that if you actually go into the population genetics -- as described in that article -- this does not occur.
There is no 'much higher probability of a complex combination of traits' occuring in the subpopulation as compared to a larger population.
You really can't make a firm statistical, genetic, or biological argument for race. If the human race is a big pool of paint, you can say 'hmm, this zone is particularly blue, but it bleeds smoothly into this red zone, so I can't find any boundary.'
You can point to an individual and say 'ah, he is a black man' easily enough; but if you start going through all his pedigrees you'll have a tough time deciding whether his relatives, ancestors, and descendants are black too, or where to draw the line.
I think you're worried that ignoring race is simply a politically correct delusion, when in fact it's not; it's a scientific issue, in that no one can figure out exactly what a race is.
yes, people who have a common localized set of traits actually don't, black people aren't black asian people aren't asian, its all just a white man conspiracy.
The issue is, again, that there are no common localized sets of traits; there's more in common between locations than there is within locations.
Asia is a particularly good example, because the diversity within the racial group 'Asian' is huge.
Just read the article, it's cool!
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do not listen to the weak one, feel your anger, let it run through you, it is your strength, only then will you know true POWER!
You're preaching to the Dark Lord of the Sith... I also happen to be Lucifer's nephew. So it's kinda wasted on me....
Black are black, white are white, yellow are yellow, red are red and green are green..or whatever.
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f*** political correctness. It's aritificial, forced, overblown and stupid.
And not to mention incorrect.
Mentally retarded, mentally disabled, mentally challenged, developmentally delayed, developmentally challenged (and the list goes on and on) are all very different things, but it's only PC to use the term developmentally challenged.
But it is also a necessary evil. People don't say negroid when referring to sub-species classifications, because it sounds too much like nigger.
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My brother is autistic, but intelligent, he is therefore not retarded, but in some ways he is developmentally delayed. To call him retarded would be a fallacy, because he is of average intelligence.
So yes they are all different, and the reason "developmentally challanged" is used is because it's the broadest possible category, including kids who are completely catatonic, and extremely smart kids who's parents believe their kids have ADD.
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My youngest sibling is autistic and gets higher grades than the kids in his class that are normal. But he still has trouble with his speaking and communication skills.
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Don't they all :)
I was very pissed when my high school psychology teacher said that autism was very low intelligence. She, as a phyc teacher, should know these things.
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so, as I said in my first post, black people are not black?
the premise of the article is that there is a greater diversity of traits in the subset than the whole (which seems logically impossible, is would have to be at most equal to, but I guess he's using a specific definition of greater than here), what traits was he measuring? all of them? well that doesn't matter then, cause I said a (small) set of specific traits not that they were over all more genetically similar than anyone else, but that there were specific traits with a higher incidence.
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The idea is that if you tried to start defining a bundle of characteristics that identifies 'black people', you'd find yourself getting more specific, narrowing down to a smaller and smaller group...until you finally arrived at a race of one person.
Black people, in other words, aren't black; except as a common social, rather than biological, identity.
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IIRC there are something like eight genes which code for skin pigment which are different in 'black people' than most of the rest of the population, that seems like a good place to start, I'm sure there are plenty of other more usefull commonalities. I never claimed a race would have a solidly defined boundary.
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The idea that the color of one's skin determines a number of other characteristics is false. There are cultural races: how "black" someone is is not determined so much by the color of skin and genetics, but what culture one was raised in.
Eight genes out of how many useful genes that humans have? Yes, those genes are passed on, but they aren't an indication of what else was or was not passed on. To say that a black person has a specific set of unrelated characteristics is to say that blonde people with blue eyes have certain characteristics. How often do you hear brunettes are smart these days? Not a lot, because it's obviously a false claim
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what was your point?
the whole argument here is centered around somepeople saying races do not exsist, when they clearly do.
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Please define race, in your own thoughts.
Race as a social concept is real
Race as a biological entity is not
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what was your point?
the whole argument here is centered around somepeople saying races do not exsist, when they clearly do.
But as the article stated, they don't, at least not genetically. There may be a few physical features that define someone as "black," but those same physical features can be found in different combinations and varying intensities among disparate populations all around the world. When you get down to the level of DNA, there are more variations in genetic code amongst the members of a certain vaguely-defined "race" than there are between average members of different races. The whole idea that you can separate people by certain vague groups of physical characteristics and extend that across the entirety of a person's genetic makeup is a falsehood, one which I fell victim to as well before reading about the research that's been done.
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But as the article stated, they don't, at least not genetically. There may be a few physical features that define someone as "black," but those same physical features can be found in different combinations and varying intensities among disparate populations all around the world. When you get down to the level of DNA, there are more variations in genetic code amongst the members of a certain vaguely-defined "race" than there are between average members of different races.
I think you identified the flaw in the reasoning well.
it is specifically the combination and intensity that are the relevant components.
The whole idea that you can separate people by certain vague groups of physical characteristics and extend that across the entirety of a person's genetic makeup is a falsehood, one which I fell victim to as well before reading about the research that's been done.
this is nice, and very telling of what is going on in your mind, at what point did I EVER say that the collection of traits that defined a race should be extended beyond what they were?
Please define race, in your own thoughts.
a race is a population of individuals with a widely shared set of physical traits inherited from common heredity.
to further refine that, it's not that all members of a race have all the traits, but of the traits that define the race the members have a higher chance of having them (to the point where they all have a good portion of them). I used the eight genes for skin color as an example because it was the only thing I could remember off the top of my head with a specific number.
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do not listen to the weak one, feel your anger, let it run through you, it is your strength, only then will you know true POWER!
Only a Sith deals in absolutes!
Anyways, people who say that "races" do not exist, because it is impossible to clearly define a set of genes that make one black or white or Asian, are wrong.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzzy_logic
I'm no expert on the matter, of course. But consider: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorites_paradox
A person isn't considered "black" because of one single gene. They are considered black because to one degree or another they fit a sort of general pattern, a set of characteristics. This includes skin colour, facial features and arrangement thereof, hair colour, and perhaps more of which I am unaware. People who resemble this set of characteristics are considered "black". This is not to suggest that there is some sort of archetypical black person, of course. Instead it means that there is no precise definition of what makes up a certain race, but on the other hand, it is usually easy to identify a person as belonging to a certain race.
EDIT: Oh, I see I've failed to read the last two posts. Hmm. Let me think of something to write so this post isn't a complete waste.
Please define race, in your own thoughts.
Race as a social concept is real
Race as a biological entity is not
On the contrary. I think we define race purely as a biological concept, or we try to. In being "colour-blind", we make an attempt not to distinguish between people of different genetic makeup or backgrounds, in the overall environment of society. We separate mind from body, we call the minds equal even when the bodies are clearly not the same. Thus, in the context of society, race disappears and is replaced by "culture", which is the collectively-held beliefs, traditions, tendencies, and practices of a group. It just so happens that geographical areas have their own culture, and even though international migration has been made easier in recent years, individual "races" retain their own sense of culture. I think you confuse "culture" with race.
Race as a biological entity, however, is indisputable.
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Race as a biological entity, however, is indisputable.
Good God, please read the article I linked to, which shows that scientists dispute it -- and, in fact, negate it -- in some depth.
Race does not exist biologically, as several posts have now argued (quite conclusively.) It is a cultural construct.
And I think Bobbau is actually agreeing with us. Bobbau's argument seems to be 'well, there are certain clusters of traits which you can identify as 'race.'' Sure there are, if you say 'everyone with this group of genes is black/Asian/Hispanic'.
Only, the results you'll get won't match what we perceive to be any existing races. They'll be just as valid as saying that everyone with a widow's peak is one race and everyone without is another.
Race does not exist on a biological level. Genetically, the human race is a spectrum, and there are no notches or gaps where we can clearly chop things up. We can set boundaries, but they are arbitrary and socially constructed.
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The lines are not clearly drawn (if at all), but if a person has darker skin, more matted hair, sensitivity to salts, leaner muscle mass, larger reptilian brain, and features that are more prevalent than most other beings, it'd be plainly obvious he's part of the negroid subspecies. Meanwhile, if a person has lighter skin, thicker hair, sensitivity to fats, bulkier muscle mass, larger mammalian brain, and features that are more prevalent than most other beings, it's somewhat safe to say that he's part of the caucasoid subspecies.
Races exist. It is indisputable. Period. What is disputable, however, is where the boundaries are.
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Oh, yes, I see what you mean now. Thanks for clearing that up.
Now, we're using different definitions of "exist" and "biological level". (or perhaps "race" and "on". I just know we're using different definitions somewhere.)
Sure, race doesn't exist on a genetic level; in that there is no gene that makes a person black or white or Asian or Native American. But the term "race" is used for a collection of attributes and traits that typically appear together. It's a cultural construct in the same way that "blue" is a cultural construct. An object's colour is an inherent physical attribute of that object, or at least of the atoms on its surface. What is "blue"? Who can tell? It's a group of wavelengths on the visible spectrum. Yet the term describes something that exists indisputably in nature. There are blue objects and green objects. It's hard to tell precisely where one begins and one ends, but you can clearly see the polar extremes in the middle of each region.
Race exists on the biological level in that there's no other possible level for something so inherently biological to exist on. Race is a group of genetic characteristics that tend to occur together. That's it. Biological characteristics. Society may have formed the concept of race, but race exists. Geographic congregations of humans, at least historically, shared the same genetic traits. That's it. Biological. A set of genetic traits shared among a certain population. The genes are there. Even if it's hard to determine which genes are part of the overall category of the race, the category still exists.
To sum up: as has already been agreed upon, you can't determine race on a gene-by-gene basis. "Race" refers to a collection of genes associated with a given population, some of which are subject to wide variation and some of which are subject to relatively little variation.
Actually, I don't think it's Bobbau that's agreeing with you, it's me. I don't think there's anything we're arguing over except the definition of the term itself.
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By arguing about the definition of the term itself we all have the ability to disagree in many, many ways.
The lines are not clearly drawn (if at all), but if a person has darker skin, more matted hair, sensitivity to salts, leaner muscle mass, larger reptilian brain, and features that are more prevalent than most other beings, it'd be plainly obvious he's part of the negroid subspecies. Meanwhile, if a person has lighter skin, thicker hair, sensitivity to fats, bulkier muscle mass, larger mammalian brain, and features that are more prevalent than most other beings, it's somewhat safe to say that he's part of the caucasoid subspecies.
Except there are so many exceptions to these broad generalizations, it's not an effective method for any type of categorization. Race, that people perceive every day has literally nothing to do with anything but the color of one's skin. Generally speaking, people aren't categorized together by careful examination of their response to salts, ratio of Reptilian to Mammalian brain and measure of fat levels in their bodies. In our culture(s) a fat black person is no less black, and a muscular white person is no less white. This is because the concept or race has nothing to do with anything you just mentioned, it depends entirely on skin color and occasionally on other aspects of outward appearance.
To say someone with black skin most certainly has a smaller mammalian brain is clearly false. Such "theories" were introduced to justify the subjection of millions of people, not created off of any observable scientific data. The higher incidence of athletes in the "black" population can easily be explained by the fact that society as a whole and black society as its own entity rewards strong black kids more than it rewards smart black kids.
To be clear, there is a definite cultural difference, however, it is not strictly based on anything but skin color.
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You do realize race and culture are two entirely different things, right?
It's not a good thing to believe they are even closely related, unless you like to think like Adolf Hitler, David Duke, or Al Sharpton.
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Oh, yes, I see what you mean now. Thanks for clearing that up.
Now, we're using different definitions of "exist" and "biological level". (or perhaps "race" and "on". I just know we're using different definitions somewhere.)
Sure, race doesn't exist on a genetic level; in that there is no gene that makes a person black or white or Asian or Native American. But the term "race" is used for a collection of attributes and traits that typically appear together. It's a cultural construct in the same way that "blue" is a cultural construct. An object's colour is an inherent physical attribute of that object, or at least of the atoms on its surface. What is "blue"? Who can tell? It's a group of wavelengths on the visible spectrum. Yet the term describes something that exists indisputably in nature. There are blue objects and green objects. It's hard to tell precisely where one begins and one ends, but you can clearly see the polar extremes in the middle of each region.
Race exists on the biological level in that there's no other possible level for something so inherently biological to exist on. Race is a group of genetic characteristics that tend to occur together. That's it. Biological characteristics. Society may have formed the concept of race, but race exists. Geographic congregations of humans, at least historically, shared the same genetic traits. That's it. Biological. A set of genetic traits shared among a certain population. The genes are there. Even if it's hard to determine which genes are part of the overall category of the race, the category still exists.
To sum up: as has already been agreed upon, you can't determine race on a gene-by-gene basis. "Race" refers to a collection of genes associated with a given population, some of which are subject to wide variation and some of which are subject to relatively little variation.
Actually, I don't think it's Bobbau that's agreeing with you, it's me. I don't think there's anything we're arguing over except the definition of the term itself.
I think we're almost in agreement.
The only point I'd quibble with is the idea that "the term "race" is used for a collection of attributes and traits that typically appear together." It's a seductive definition, but, in fact, no such clusters of attributes can be found or agreed upon.
Weird, huh? Mars also did an excellent job of addressing that point.
And yes, Scuddie has a very valid point.
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Race does not exist on a biological level. Genetically, the human race is a spectrum, and there are no notches or gaps where we can clearly chop things up. We can set boundaries, but they are arbitrary and socially constructed.
(http://wfc3.gsfc.nasa.gov/MARCONI/images-basic/spectrum.jpg)
orange does not exsist.
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Bobbou, that argument is flawed because Battua's argument was flawed. It's not so much a matter of differences not existing, it's a matter of this: the color of one's skin is not an effective indicator of those differences. Skin color does not in any way demonstrate other genetic traits. No analogy can really be used to effectively illustrate the difference. To say black people are on average stronger than white is similar to saying people with green eyes are smarter than people with brown; these are unrelated things, and to claim they're related is a fallacy.
Although there may be a statistical example that yes, green eyed people are smarter, it doesn't have any real relevance in the end, people are smart because they're smart, not because they have green eyes. People are strong because they're strong, not because they're black.
You do realize race and culture are two entirely different things, right?
It's not a good thing to believe they are even closely related, unless you like to think like Adolf Hitler, David Duke, or Al Sharpton.
You realize that race is almost entirely defined by culture, right? As I said before, the idea of race is a societal construct, something that humans invented in their own minds to make themselves feel better about how they were treating other people.
There are separate cultures that exist, mostly distinguished by skin color, and it's undeniable. This is mostly because there are so many white people who refuse to associate with black people, whether they admit it or not. The Two Towns of Jasper is an excellent documentary on just this I think, people won't move outside their own spheres, and so in the end everyone loses.
It is not good to believe that having black skin makes you stronger and stupider. It is precisely this kind of thinking that perpetuates the lies of racial superiority and inferiority.
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Race does not exist on a biological level. Genetically, the human race is a spectrum, and there are no notches or gaps where we can clearly chop things up. We can set boundaries, but they are arbitrary and socially constructed.
(http://wfc3.gsfc.nasa.gov/MARCONI/images-basic/spectrum.jpg)
orange does not exsist.
Exactly!
You can point to the exact middle of 'orange' and say 'this is orange.'
Then you can drift a few NM to each side and say 'this is still orange.'
After a while you'll start hemming and hawing, and then you'll have to say, 'well, huh, this is yellow now. The line is..arbitrarily right here.' You could even find an exact halfway point -- though in this case you're dealing with only a change in a single variable, after all.
On a physical level, orange doesn't exist; it's just a very imprecise label. And so it is with race!
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That sounds like the start of a jumping off the slippery slope for colors do not exist, yet, we know they exist, because we have spectrographs that recognize things' composition based on their color.
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Orange does exist. When there is twice as much red illumination as there is green, and an absence of blue light, it creates the color we all like to call "orange". It's there. Do not try to deny it, because you will just make yourself look like a fool. In much of the artistic model, orange is still orange within a certain deviation of the reference point (often 20%). Beyond that, lies yellow orange, orange yellow, and eventually yellow. Where a person draws deviation is subjective, but to say that it does not exist is blatantly stupid.
Something may be orange, but more yellow than red. How far the eye of the beholder deviates from pure orange is up to him, but to say that orange does not exist because the difference between orange and yellow is not split at precisely this location is absurd.
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I'm haveing a hard time remembering who is on which side of this argument.
so just for the record, I am on the side that says race exsists.
my post was there to ilistraight how even if something has fuzzy boundaries it can still be an accurate label for something. I like to use Reductio ad absurdum sometimes.
I'm haveing a hard time remembering who is on which side of this argument.
so just for the record, I am on the side that says race exsists.
my post was there to ilistraight how even if something has fuzzy boundaries it can still be an accurate label for something. I like to use Reductio ad absurdum sometimes.
the color of one's skin is not an effective indicator of those differences. Skin color does not in any way demonstrate other genetic traits. No analogy can really be used to effectively illustrate the difference. To say black people are on average stronger than white is similar to saying people with green eyes are smarter than people with brown; these are unrelated things, and to claim they're related is a fallacy.
Although there may be a statistical example that yes, green eyed people are smarter, it doesn't have any real relevance in the end, people are smart because they're smart, not because they have green eyes. People are strong because they're strong, not because they're black.
It is not good to believe that having black skin makes you stronger and stupider. It is precisely this kind of thinking that perpetuates the lies of racial superiority and inferiority.
are you hearing voices or something?
You realize that race is almost entirely defined by culture, right? As I said before, the idea of race is a societal construct, something that humans invented in their own minds to make themselves feel better about how they were treating other people.
maybe if you keep saying it over and over it will make it more true?
aside from the fact that "race" is a word of the English language, and words have what ever meaning the people of a culture decide to give them. your argument has basically been "no it isn't you white supremacist who says that separate but equal if fine. it's not! and your bad for thinking it is!" this whole thread, which just leaves the rest of us wonder what in the **** you are talking about.
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I was responding to Scuddies assertion that there is a "negeroid subspecies" and that race and culture are entirely separate, as well as his rebuff that thinking otherwise somehow likens me to Hitler.
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Fine then. Congoid. Point still stands. Thousands of years of adaptation and different paths of evolution have yielded different characteristics for a general distinction between subspecies (since race apparently doesn't exist). It's elementary anthropology. Look it up.
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:lol:
This barrel looks full.
Interesting fishing topic to predictably devolve into semantics.
I noticed the Monkey system has been brought up.....
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Since Monkeyings been brought up, i may as well minimise casualties...