Does Race Exist? The continuum fallacy and the fallacy of convergent evolution

[Duke Leto]

Why is this garbage not in Pseudoscience or Elsewhere?

 

[ApostateAbe]

Why is this garbage not in Pseudoscience or Elsewhere.

I suggest you simply add me to your ignore list, and that will solve your personal problem.

 

[fromderinside]

have you ever looked at a scientific article? There is most always a straw man set up to be destroyed by findings. So it is with the straw man of race.

My meaning in my previous post was toward the scientific utility of the discussion which has become nil.

If the argument is less about the ACCURACY of a science and more about the UTILITY of it, then I think it encourages too much myopia, and I don't think that is where the debate should be, given the choice. Regardless, the study of human races ties into human genetic diversity generally. The most obvious immediate use of the science of race is to guide medical doctors toward accurate diagnoses. Family history, age and behavior patterns of the patient all have intermediate affects on disease frequencies, and so does race. Much of the debate is focused on sickle-cell disease among black Africans or Tay-Sachs disease among Jews, but there is actually a long list of diseases that are significantly more common among whites. Here is such a list:

http://www.ranker.com/list/caucasian-race-diseases-with-this-risk-factor/reference

As a useful and meaningful indicator a phenotype like race is probably as meaningful as is morphological intelligence, in other word ultimately not useful at all. Concentrate on genetic indicators. One doesn't need a phenotype to find the genes or even a phenotype related gene pattern.

- - - Updated - - -

Why is this garbage not in Pseudoscience or Elsewhere.

I suggest you simply add me to your ignore list, and that will solve your personal problem.

Naw its better to put topics on the ignore list.

 

[Duke Leto]

Why is this garbage not in Pseudoscience or Elsewhere.

I suggest you simply add me to your ignore list, and that will solve your personal problem.

Naw its better to put topics on the ignore list.

Sadly impossible. But ApostateAbe and Trodon are definitively on my ignore list, just wondering why the mods aren't acting on the threads.

 

[Trausti]

time for pseudoscience or elsewhere......

Unlikely, as this really is social science, even if you don't agree with it. If PBS can tolerate both the correct side and the incorrect side of a scientific debate, without pushing the correct side into a poisoned well, then there is a possibility you can too, if only slight.

Oh, come on Abe. You know very well ideology trumps science on this forum. It's okay to ridicule a christian for denying evolution or natural selection; but to say that evolution and natural selection applies to humans is just heresy. Heresy!

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Why is this garbage not in Pseudoscience or Elsewhere.

I suggest you simply add me to your ignore list, and that will solve your personal problem.

On ignore or not, this thread should be in pseudoscience.

 

[Togo]

The PBS website has a page titled, "Does Race Exist?" (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/does-race-exist.html), that presents two sides of the race debate (in contrast to its 2003 debacle "Race: The Power of an Illusion," that was purely one-sided in favor of the wrong side). The antagonist is the anthropologist C. Loring Brace, and the proponent is the forensic anthropologist George W. Gill. I agree with everything written by George W. Gill, and I will discuss my points of disagreement with C. Loring Brace, summarized in two fallacies. If you disagree with George W. Gill, then I am happy to hear your explanations of disagreement.

I agree with Gill, and disagree with you. I'd like to take issue with the parts where you disagree with Gill. Is that ok?

Gill writes:

Yet I do see why many other physical anthropologists are able to ignore or deny the race concept. Blood-factor analysis, for instance, shows many traits that cut across racial boundaries in a purely clinal fashion with very few if any "breaks" along racial boundaries. (A cline is a gradient of change, such as from people with a high frequency of blue eyes, as in Scandinavia, to people with a high frequency of brown eyes, as in Africa.)
...
So, serologists who work largely with blood factors will tend to see human variation as clinal and races as not a valid construct,

He goes onto to discuss how this does not apply in his own work, with bones, where phenotypical differences are less gradual.

Do you agree with Gill that where differences are clinal, race is a not a valid or useful construct?


You then raise this point:

(1) Continuum fallacy. This fallacy is otherwise known as the "fallacy of the beard," and the example goes like this: "If the stubble on your chin grows another micrometer, does that make it a beard? Suppose it grows another micrometer, and then another micrometer. Can you choose any one of those growth points as the point where your facial hair went from mere stubble to a beard? Yes? Then there is only the tiniest difference between stubble and a beard. No? In that case, beards are impossible. They don't exist.

It seems like you're raising a straw man. here. Both scientists describe the problem of gradual variations defeating the utility of race. Neither one argues that the fact of gradual variation means that racial labels are 'impossible', as you imply. Instead the point is that in a gradual continuum, categorising people into races becomes arbitrary and useless.

Gill goes into this point in some detail, using the practice of dividing people into age bands, and then making generalisations about them. He states:

As a middle-aged male, for example, I am not so sure that I believe any longer in the chronological "age" categories that many of my colleagues in skeletal biology use. Certainly parts of the skeletons of some 45-year-old people look older than corresponding portions of the skeletons of some 55-year-olds. If, however, law enforcement calls upon me to provide "age" on a skeleton, I can provide an answer that will be proven sufficiently accurate should the decedent eventually be identified. I may not believe in society's "age" categories, but I can be very effective at "aging" skeletons

Gill regards age categories as imperfect and potentially meaningless, because they are arbitrary classifications along a graduated scale. There's no scientific basis to use 30-45 as opposed to 40-50. The categories themselves are bunk. But that doesn't mean there are no age differences between people.

Similarly most scientists, who discard race as a useful concept, are not somehow denying genetic differences between individuals, nor are they saying it's impossible to stick racial tags on groups of people. They're just saying it's bunk - there's no scientific basis for the labels, which exists purely to divide a continuum into arbitrary sections.

The problem with that conclusion, one reached by both of the scientists that you quote, is that it renders your conclusions invalid. It means that you can't meaningfully say that black people in aggregate get one score, or Asians in aggregate another, because the aggregations have no scientific basis for the trait you're claiming to measure, or the genetics you believe underlie it.


I couldn't find either scientist talking about convergent evolution, or using the fallacy you describe.

And yes, can we please move this discussion to pseudoscience, where it belongs.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Unlikely, as this really is social science, even if you don't agree with it. If PBS can tolerate both the correct side and the incorrect side of a scientific debate, without pushing the correct side into a poisoned well, then there is a possibility you can too, if only slight.

Oh, come on Abe. You know very well ideology trumps science on this forum. It's okay to ridicule a christian for denying evolution or natural selection; but to say that evolution and natural selection applies to humans is just heresy. Heresy!

Here is an idea. Why not have one of these genetic race folks look over a random set of genetic test results and then they can tell us which race each set belongs to.

 

[ApostateAbe]

I agree with Gill, and disagree with you. I'd like to take issue with the parts where you disagree with Gill. Is that ok?

Gill writes:

Yet I do see why many other physical anthropologists are able to ignore or deny the race concept. Blood-factor analysis, for instance, shows many traits that cut across racial boundaries in a purely clinal fashion with very few if any "breaks" along racial boundaries. (A cline is a gradient of change, such as from people with a high frequency of blue eyes, as in Scandinavia, to people with a high frequency of brown eyes, as in Africa.)
...
So, serologists who work largely with blood factors will tend to see human variation as clinal and races as not a valid construct,

He goes onto to discuss how this does not apply in his own work, with bones, where phenotypical differences are less gradual.

Do you agree with Gill that where differences are clinal, race is a not a valid or useful construct?


You then raise this point:

(1) Continuum fallacy. This fallacy is otherwise known as the "fallacy of the beard," and the example goes like this: "If the stubble on your chin grows another micrometer, does that make it a beard? Suppose it grows another micrometer, and then another micrometer. Can you choose any one of those growth points as the point where your facial hair went from mere stubble to a beard? Yes? Then there is only the tiniest difference between stubble and a beard. No? In that case, beards are impossible. They don't exist.

It seems like you're raising a straw man. here. Both scientists describe the problem of gradual variations defeating the utility of race. Neither one argues that the fact of gradual variation means that racial labels are 'impossible', as you imply. Instead the point is that in a gradual continuum, categorising people into races becomes arbitrary and useless.

Gill goes into this point in some detail, using the practice of dividing people into age bands, and then making generalisations about them. He states:

As a middle-aged male, for example, I am not so sure that I believe any longer in the chronological "age" categories that many of my colleagues in skeletal biology use. Certainly parts of the skeletons of some 45-year-old people look older than corresponding portions of the skeletons of some 55-year-olds. If, however, law enforcement calls upon me to provide "age" on a skeleton, I can provide an answer that will be proven sufficiently accurate should the decedent eventually be identified. I may not believe in society's "age" categories, but I can be very effective at "aging" skeletons

Gill regards age categories as imperfect and potentially meaningless, because they are arbitrary classifications along a graduated scale. There's no scientific basis to use 30-45 as opposed to 40-50. The categories themselves are bunk. But that doesn't mean there are no age differences between people.

Similarly most scientists, who discard race as a useful concept, are not somehow denying genetic differences between individuals, nor are they saying it's impossible to stick racial tags on groups of people. They're just saying it's bunk - there's no scientific basis for the labels, which exists purely to divide a continuum into arbitrary sections.

The problem with that conclusion, one reached by both of the scientists that you quote, is that it renders your conclusions invalid. It means that you can't meaningfully say that black people in aggregate get one score, or Asians in aggregate another, because the aggregations have no scientific basis for the trait you're claiming to measure, or the genetics you believe underlie it.


I couldn't find either scientist talking about convergent evolution, or using the fallacy you describe.

And yes, can we please move this discussion to pseudoscience, where it belongs.

Thanks for thoughts on this, Togo. I will answer your questions.

"Do you agree with Gill that where differences are clinal, race is a not a valid or useful construct?"

I do not agree with that statement, nor do I agree with the assertion that Gill made such a claim (he was referring to what others will "will tend to see"). Even if races are gradual (and I assert that they are), it does NOT follow that racial categorizations are useless, for the reason I described (continuum fallacy). I think Gill's point about the difference in perspectives between forensic anthropologists (who look at bones) and serologists (who look at blood) is that one set of patterns follows consistent geographic boundaries and another set of patterns is more randomized, where the boundaries could be anywhere. The difference is NOT that one sees gradations and the other does not. In fact, all boundaries are fuzzy.

"It seems like you're raising a straw man. here. Both scientists describe the problem of gradual variations defeating the utility of race. Neither one argues that the fact of gradual variation means that racial labels are 'impossible', as you imply. Instead the point is that in a gradual continuum, categorising people into races becomes arbitrary and useless."

That is an odd opinion to attribute to BOTH writers. Please review this statement of Gill again, and tell me again that he thinks that categorizing people into races is "arbitrary and useless":

I have been able to prove to myself over the years, in actual legal cases, that I am more accurate at assessing race from skeletal remains than from looking at living people standing before me. So those of us in forensic anthropology know that the skeleton reflects race, whether "real" or not, just as well if not better than superficial soft tissue does. The idea that race is "only skin deep" is simply not true, as any experienced forensic anthropologist will affirm.​

"Gill regards age categories as imperfect and potentially meaningless, because they are arbitrary classifications along a graduated scale. There's no scientific basis to use 30-45 as opposed to 40-50. The categories themselves are bunk. But that doesn't mean there are no age differences between people."

This is what Gill wrote about age:

As a middle-aged male, for example, I am not so sure that I believe any longer in the chronological "age" categories that many of my colleagues in skeletal biology use. Certainly parts of the skeletons of some 45-year-old people look older than corresponding portions of the skeletons of some 55-year-olds. If, however, law enforcement calls upon me to provide "age" on a skeleton, I can provide an answer that will be proven sufficiently accurate should the decedent eventually be identified. I may not believe in society's "age" categories, but I can be very effective at "aging" skeletons.​

Read it again: "As a middle-aged male, for example, I am not so sure that I believe any longer in the chronological 'age' categories..." Maybe it isn't so obvious to everyone, but he was telling a joke! And you seemed to be interpreting it perfectly literally! He is giving an argument against the continuum fallacy, not denying the importance of age categories, but the opposite!

 

[Togo]

I agree with Gill, and disagree with you. I'd like to take issue with the parts where you disagree with Gill. Is that ok?

Do you agree with Gill that where differences are clinal, race is a not a valid or useful construct?

(1) Continuum fallacy. This fallacy is otherwise known as the "fallacy of the beard," and the example goes like this: "If the stubble on your chin grows another micrometer, does that make it a beard? Suppose it grows another micrometer, and then another micrometer. Can you choose any one of those growth points as the point where your facial hair went from mere stubble to a beard? Yes? Then there is only the tiniest difference between stubble and a beard. No? In that case, beards are impossible. They don't exist.

It seems like you're raising a straw man. here. Both scientists describe the problem of gradual variations defeating the utility of race. Neither one argues that the fact of gradual variation means that racial labels are 'impossible', as you imply. Instead the point is that in a gradual continuum, categorising people into races becomes arbitrary and useless.

Gill regards age categories as imperfect and potentially meaningless, because they are arbitrary classifications along a graduated scale. There's no scientific basis to use 30-45 as opposed to 40-50. The categories themselves are bunk. But that doesn't mean there are no age differences between people.

Similarly most scientists, who discard race as a useful concept, are not somehow denying genetic differences between individuals, nor are they saying it's impossible to stick racial tags on groups of people. They're just saying it's bunk - there's no scientific basis for the labels, which exists purely to divide a continuum into arbitrary sections.

The problem with that conclusion, one reached by both of the scientists that you quote, is that it renders your conclusions invalid. It means that you can't meaningfully say that black people in aggregate get one score, or Asians in aggregate another, because the aggregations have no scientific basis for the trait you're claiming to measure, or the genetics you believe underlie it.

And yes, can we please move this discussion to pseudoscience, where it belongs.

Thanks for thoughts on this, Togo. I will answer your questions.

"Do you agree with Gill that where differences are clinal, race is a not a valid or useful construct?"

I do not agree with that statement, nor do I agree with the assertion that Gill made such a claim (he was referring to what others will "will tend to see").

Specifically, what Serologists (blood scientists) will tend to see, because the differences they are measuring are clinal. He does discuss this in some detail, and stresses that they are not wrong to see things as they do.

The point about clinal variation is not that it's randomised, where the boundaries could be anywhere, but that there are no boundaries. Given that none of the research you describe establishes boundaries (quite the reverse), and that IQ differences tends to be clinal, do you agree will Gill that it is legitimate to see measures of difference, such as IQ, as not bounded by non-clinal categories, such as race? If not, why not?

Even if races are gradual (and I assert that they are), it does NOT follow that racial categorizations are useless, for the reason I described (continuum fallacy).

No, that's not a reason. The continuum fallacy is about people denying the existence of a phenomenon because the category is ill-defined. So, in this case, denying the existence of beards because it's not clear where a beard ends and stubble begins. What we're discussing is not whether genetic variations exist, but rather whether or not arbitrary categorisation is useful. Thus we can have beards without beard in itself being a useful categorisation of facial hair length, age of bones without 35-45 being a useful categorisation of age, and genetic variation without different 'races' being a useful categorisation of genetic difference.

What you're trying to assert is that because of the continuum fallacy, arbitrary categorisations must be useful, and that doesn't follow at all, because the fallacy doesn't deal with utility.

[I think Gill's point about the difference in perspectives between forensic anthropologists (who look at bones) and serologists (who look at blood) is that one set of patterns follows consistent geographic boundaries and another set of patterns is more randomized, where the boundaries could be anywhere. The difference is NOT that one sees gradations and the other does not.

Gill specifically calls out serology as a discipline in which there is clinal variation.

"It seems like you're raising a straw man. here. Both scientists describe the problem of gradual variations defeating the utility of race. Neither one argues that the fact of gradual variation means that racial labels are 'impossible', as you imply. Instead the point is that in a gradual continuum, categorising people into races becomes arbitrary and useless."

That is an odd opinion to attribute to BOTH writers. Please review this statement of Gill again, and tell me again that he thinks that categorizing people into races is "arbitrary and useless":

ok. Gill thinks that, in a gradual continuum, categorising into groups (such as race) is arbitrary and useless.

I have been able to prove to myself over the years, in actual legal cases, that I am more accurate at assessing race from skeletal remains than from looking at living people standing before me. So those of us in forensic anthropology know that the skeleton reflects race, whether "real" or not, just as well if not better than superficial soft tissue does. The idea that race is "only skin deep" is simply not true, as any experienced forensic anthropologist will affirm.​

Here Gill is looking at a discipline where there is not a gradual continuum.

This is what Gill wrote about age:

As a middle-aged male, for example, I am not so sure that I believe any longer in the chronological "age" categories that many of my colleagues in skeletal biology use. Certainly parts of the skeletons of some 45-year-old people look older than corresponding portions of the skeletons of some 55-year-olds. If, however, law enforcement calls upon me to provide "age" on a skeleton, I can provide an answer that will be proven sufficiently accurate should the decedent eventually be identified. I may not believe in society's "age" categories, but I can be very effective at "aging" skeletons.​

Read it again: "As a middle-aged male, for example, I am not so sure that I believe any longer in the chronological 'age' categories..." Maybe it isn't so obvious to everyone, but he was telling a joke! And you seemed to be interpreting it perfectly literally! He is giving an argument against the continuum fallacy, not denying the importance of age categories, but the opposite!

No, specifically denying the importance of age categories, while keeping the importance of age. Similarly one can deny the importance of genetic categories (race) while keeping the importance of genetic variation.

 

[Bomb#20]

I suggest you simply add me to your ignore list, and that will solve your personal problem.

On ignore or not, this thread should be in pseudoscience.

Oh, come on Abe. You know very well ideology trumps science on this forum. It's okay to ridicule a christian for denying evolution or natural selection; but to say that evolution and natural selection applies to humans is just heresy. Heresy!

Here is an idea. Why not have one of these genetic race folks look over a random set of genetic test results and then they can tell us which race each set belongs to.

Why have you decided in advance that a question is unscientific even though you can think of a way to settle it by experiment, and even though your proposed experiment has not yet been carried out?

 

[fromderinside]

Seems to me a moot experiment. Unknowing ones evaluating something they don't know should yield what one would expect. GIGO.

 

[ApostateAbe]

Oh, come on Abe. You know very well ideology trumps science on this forum. It's okay to ridicule a christian for denying evolution or natural selection; but to say that evolution and natural selection applies to humans is just heresy. Heresy!

Here is an idea. Why not have one of these genetic race folks look over a random set of genetic test results and then they can tell us which race each set belongs to.

Tang et al, "Genetic Structure, Self-Identified Race Ethnicity, and Confounding in Case-Control Association Studies," 2004.

Abstract:

We have analyzed genetic data for 326 microsatellite markers that were typed uniformly in a large multiethnic
population-based sample of individuals as part of a study of the genetics of hypertension (Family Blood Pressure
Program). Subjects identified themselves as belonging to one of four major racial/ethnic groups (white, African
American, East Asian, and Hispanic) and were recruited from 15 different geographic locales within the United States
and Taiwan. Genetic cluster analysis of the microsatellite markers produced four major clusters, which showed
near-perfect correspondence with the four self-reported race/ethnicity categories. Of 3,636 subjects of varying race/
ethnicity, only 5 (0.14%) showed genetic cluster membership different from their self-identified race/ethnicity. On
the other hand, we detected only modest genetic differentiation between different current geographic locales within
each race/ethnicity group. Thus, ancient geographic ancestry, which is highly correlated with self-identified race/
ethnicity—as opposed to current residence—is the major determinant of genetic structure in the U.S. population.
Implications of this genetic structure for case-control association studies are discussed.​

If you would like the full study, send me your email address in a private message.

 

[Juma]

Here is an idea. Why not have one of these genetic race folks look over a random set of genetic test results and then they can tell us which race each set belongs to.

Tang et al, "Genetic Structure, Self-Identified Race Ethnicity, and Confounding in Case-Control Association Studies," 2004.

Abstract:

We have analyzed genetic data for 326 microsatellite markers that were typed uniformly in a large multiethnic
population-based sample of individuals as part of a study of the genetics of hypertension (Family Blood Pressure
Program). Subjects identified themselves as belonging to one of four major racial/ethnic groups (white, African
American, East Asian, and Hispanic) and were recruited from 15 different geographic locales within the United States
and Taiwan. Genetic cluster analysis of the microsatellite markers produced four major clusters, which showed
near-perfect correspondence with the four self-reported race/ethnicity categories. Of 3,636 subjects of varying race/
ethnicity, only 5 (0.14%) showed genetic cluster membership different from their self-identified race/ethnicity. On
the other hand, we detected only modest genetic differentiation between different current geographic locales within
each race/ethnicity group. Thus, ancient geographic ancestry, which is highly correlated with self-identified race/
ethnicity—as opposed to current residence—is the major determinant of genetic structure in the U.S. population.
Implications of this genetic structure for case-control association studies are discussed.​

If you would like the full study, send me your email address in a private message.

What in "random genetic set" is hard to understand?
That phenotype can be traced back to genes is not something you really have to show....

 

[ApostateAbe]

Tang et al, "Genetic Structure, Self-Identified Race Ethnicity, and Confounding in Case-Control Association Studies," 2004.

Abstract:

We have analyzed genetic data for 326 microsatellite markers that were typed uniformly in a large multiethnic
population-based sample of individuals as part of a study of the genetics of hypertension (Family Blood Pressure
Program). Subjects identified themselves as belonging to one of four major racial/ethnic groups (white, African
American, East Asian, and Hispanic) and were recruited from 15 different geographic locales within the United States
and Taiwan. Genetic cluster analysis of the microsatellite markers produced four major clusters, which showed
near-perfect correspondence with the four self-reported race/ethnicity categories. Of 3,636 subjects of varying race/
ethnicity, only 5 (0.14%) showed genetic cluster membership different from their self-identified race/ethnicity. On
the other hand, we detected only modest genetic differentiation between different current geographic locales within
each race/ethnicity group. Thus, ancient geographic ancestry, which is highly correlated with self-identified race/
ethnicity—as opposed to current residence—is the major determinant of genetic structure in the U.S. population.
Implications of this genetic structure for case-control association studies are discussed.​

If you would like the full study, send me your email address in a private message.

What in "random genetic set" is hard to understand?
That phenotype can be traced back to genes is not something you really have to show....

I don't have a study with a random genetic set, but I think we already agree on the science. Yes, we really can identify races based on genes alone.

 

[Juma]

What in "random genetic set" is hard to understand?
That phenotype can be traced back to genes is not something you really have to show....

I don't have a study with a random genetic set, but I think we already agree on the science. Yes, we really can identify races based on genes alone.

No, you can just identify phenotypes from genes which is bloody obvious. There are no races.

 

[ApostateAbe]

I don't have a study with a random genetic set, but I think we already agree on the science. Yes, we really can identify races based on genes alone.

No, you can just identify phenotypes from genes which is bloody obvious. There are no races.

The study of Tang et al identified races based on genotypes (cluster analysis), not phenotypes, but, whatever the case, they are identifying races based on genes. This is established science. It is denied only by changing the meanings of words so that "race" doesn't mean "race." Political races with cut and dry discrete boundaries are not biological, but human "races" as Darwin (and the long tradition of evolutionary biology that followed him) understood the word most certainly are biological.

 

[Duke Leto]

You'll have to excuse ApostateAbe's obtuseness.

He's been in a bad way ever since his boyfriend stopped talking to him after he qualified for the Lincoln County Fair Junior Market Swine Show.

Figures if he shares a venue with Rodney Atkins AND Easton Corbin, then he can do better than some guy who spends too fucking much time trying to convince strangers that his racism is scientifically valid.