Race is Real?

[Bells]

Does other ethnic groups can produce albino, or only the black group ?

Any person can "produce" an albino off-spring. It is not tied to one's ethnicity.

Albinism occurs in all species of vertebrates, including Homo sapiens.

So races are equal on all traits or it's "White supremacism"? What if a Chinese man agrees race is a valid biological construct defined by ancestry (not skin color) and races differ in average (not solely in one group) genetic mental ability? Is he a "White supremacist" too?

Read what I said again..

I will make it even clearer for you..

Supremacism based on the colour of one's skin and arguing what is tantamount to woowoo science for "racial supremacism", will see the supremacist banned.

Now, stop trolling.

 

[David Mendlesohn]

Any person can "produce" an albino off-spring. It is not tied to one's ethnicity.

Albinism occurs in all species of vertebrates, including Homo sapiens.


Read what I said again..

I will make it even clearer for you..

Supremacism based on the colour of one's skin and arguing what is tantamount to woowoo science for "racial supremacism", will see the supremacist banned.

Now, stop trolling.

Why didn't you answer my question?

 

[iceaura]

That's true, there are no important genetic differences among humanity.

There are. The ones involved in lactose tolerance and flu resistance and skin melanin, for starters.

What if a Chinese man agrees race is a valid biological construct defined by ancestry (not skin color) and races differ in average (not solely in one group) genetic mental ability?

Then he's wrong too. No "race" in the US is defined by ancestry, and none of them are valid biological taxons, and the differences in average mental ability among them have no discovered genetically controlled mechanism.

There probably are a couple, you know? It's just that they are likely to be something like extra sensitivity to heavy metal poisoning or Vitamin D shortages during gestation. When you don't have a mechanism, you're lost in the weeds.

On a science forum, you are expected to understand that. Especially when arguing claims famous for being cornerstones of wrongs such as racial bigotry, handwaving will not do - you need more and better evidence and argument to back such a traditionally mistaken claim, not less and poorer, not this nothingburger of spurious correlations and invalid extrapolation we get from the likes of "The Bell Curve"

 

[Bells]

Why didn't you answer my question?

I did answer your question. Multiple times.

 

[parmalee]

Supremacism based on the colour of one's skin and arguing what is tantamount to woowoo science for "racial supremacism", will see the supremacist banned.

How about this?

David Mendlesohn said:
All of the variables you've listed have been tested and eliminated. Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the literature. Even assuming you were right, which you aren't, since you are arguing from a position of ignorance can we take it that you don't know the effects of these variables making a genetic etiology possible in your view?

as a response to this:

iceaura said:

None of their IQ test correlations are corrected for lead exposure, epigenetic effects of gestational stress, diet and vitamin D issues, stereotype threat, any of that stuff. They offer no mechanism whereby this or that genetic factor influences IQ (via lead exposure?). And so forth. The whole thing is slipshod.

referring to Hernnstein's and Murray's Bell Curve.

So "ALL of the variables...have been tested and eliminated" but even if they haven't ("assuming you were right")... Really?! Science by conjecture and the "we couldn't possibly know the effects of such anyways; but apparently we can draw conclusions regardless" line of argument.

 

[Bells]

How about this?


as a response to this:

referring to Hernnstein's and Murray's Bell Curve.

So "ALL of the variables...have been tested and eliminated" but even if they haven't ("assuming you were right")... Really?! Science by conjecture and the "we couldn't possibly know the effects of such anyways; but apparently we can draw conclusions regardless" line of argument.

It was what motivated me to issue the warning, which he has now spent around 2 pages whining about..

One thing to note, parmalee, white supremacists can only rely on conjecture, because they have nothing else. Hard science is ignored or taken out of context to support their ideology. Why do you think he has been unable and unwilling to answer any direct questions about the science behind his claims, requests that he tells us what genes are involved, what genetic traits that exist solely in one group but not in the other, that makes them superior. When challenged, they will then automatically turn to conjecture and give vague responses like "behavioural traits".. Because they do not have any valid science to support their position.

 

[spidergoat]

There are. The ones involved in lactose tolerance and flu resistance and skin melanin, for starters.

I call those minor differences.

 

[parmalee]

One thing to note, parmalee, white supremacists can only rely on conjecture, because they have nothing else. Hard science is ignored or taken out of context to support their ideology. Why do you think he has been unable and unwilling to answer any direct questions about the science behind his claims, requests that he tells us what genes are involved, what genetic traits that exist solely in one group but not in the other, that makes them superior. When challenged, they will then automatically turn to conjecture and give vague responses like "behavioural traits".. Because they do not have any valid science to support their position.

What I often see is a really simplistic conflation of heritability and genetics, or genetic determinism--especially with respect to "behavioural traits." My understanding is that environmental factors are every bit as much "heritable" as are genes, yet there are those who are to willing to completely dismiss, or downplay, the significance of environment, i.e., "all variables... tested and eliminated." How the fuck do you eliminate--to use iceaura's examples as a for instance--stereotype threat or gestational stress?!

 

[parmalee]

Which reminds me of the other thing for which Charles Murray is perhaps best known, beside The Bell Curve: his contention that males are--genetically!--superior to females at abstract thinking, whereas females are more disposed to thinking within the empirical domain. Though he at least (I think?) acknowledges that this is more a speculative contention, and his sole "evidence" is that there are no (according to him) notable female philosophers.

 

[sideshowbob]

Well I must be because apparently I'm a "White supremacist"....

Instead of speculating, why not just answer the question? What colour are your eyes?

 

[billvon]

Instead of speculating, why not just answer the question?

He doesn't do that. He just attacks other people.

 

[parmalee]

He doesn't do that. He just attacks other people.

Well, he has little patience for all this Marxist sophistry! "Marxist" has quite an extensive, and almost exclusively American, history as a term of disparagement, but "sophistry"? When and how did that term come to describe basically any sort argument that is not appealing to right wingers? I feel like I'm seeing a lot more of it than even just six months or so ago.

 

[iceaura]

I call those minor differences.

By legitimate estimate, they killed 90% of the population living in the Americas in 1492.

When and how did that term come to describe basically any sort argument that is not appealing to right wingers? I feel like I'm seeing a lot more of it than even just six months or so ago.

The vocabulary of the righty contribution to the public discussion is under overtly organized management, and has been since Fox and talk radio signed on with Newt Gingrich's program - the iconic "beginning" moment was the GOPAC memo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GOPAC#GOPAC_memo_of_1994

 

[spidergoat]

By legitimate estimate, they killed 90% of the population living in the Americas in 1492.

But practically an invisible variation when it comes to judging an individual.

 

[James R]

Moderator note: David Mendlesohn has been permanently banned.

This member was invited several times to set out his views on the topic of the thread. He deliberately avoided expressing any view, but instead chose to be combative with both a moderator and other members. Any new member who starts off his time on the forum by referring to other members as pieces of shit, while deliberately avoiding answering straightforward questions that are put to him and seeking to provoke an argument about a non-issue is not somebody we need to keep around. Such a person is a troll.

It also turns out that David has been here before, and quickly got himself banned last time as well. So, this ban is also in accordance with our policy against allowing sock puppets of previously-banned users.

I note that Bells and others gave David every opportunity to act like a reasonable human being and to discuss the thread topic. However, David's interests lay elsewhere.

 

[James R]

Maybe we can discuss the video in the opening post now.

It's a dangerous one, I think, because it deals in half-truths. I don't know the background of the girl in the video, but she makes a lot of points that have been discussed at some length on sciforums in the past. I also don't know what she used as a source, but her talking points sound like ones that white supremacists often use, and have tried to put as valid arguments here from time to time.

There are a number of video responses to her video on youtube, though I've only watched fragments of them so far. I'd recommend that anybody viewing this video also consult one or more of the response videos to get another side to this story.

I don't want to get into debunking each point she makes one by one. It would take too much time and effort. But one thing to note is that each time she posits an explanation for the "raw data" she presents, it is simplistic and it ignores many important confounding factors. And therein lies the danger. None of her "statistics" speaks for itself. All require interpretation and analysis of causal factors, even where the statistics are accurate. But mixed in there also are mistakes and what can only be deliberate distortions or ignorances.

To be charitable, maybe she made a video on a topic that she has no real understanding about, and it just ended up reflecting her own unconscious (?) racist prejudices. Maybe she consulted the wrong sources, and just happened to source stuff from far right sites. Or, less charitably, maybe she has white supremacist sympathies herself. As I say, I don't know her background or what she usually puts out there, so can't say whether this is part of a pattern or an abberration.

The video is dangerous though, because a person watching it uncritically might well come away with the impression that she has made a good argument for "black people" being more violent and less intelligent that "white people".

The far right persistently deals in falsehoods that can be attractive for their apparent simplicity. But underneath that, there's a layer of duplicity. They tell only a fraction of the full story, and all of the missing evidence and explanation skews the entire argument in only one direction - that of trying to make racism sound respectable and reasonable. It's insidious.

 

[spidergoat]

She's an idiot. The "word" racism allows affirmative action to exist? How about the fact of racism means that affirmative action is a valid means of correcting past injustice? We are told white people are the reason Africa is not developed? (No we aren't). Blacks participated in the slave trade and a few white people were slaves too so where's the white people affirmative action? What brand of stupid is she smoking? What about how blacks were treated for hundreds of years in white dominated society? Ug, I can't watch this Nazi bitch (not a Nazi just for being German).

And it doesn't say much about Bowser, who pretends to be JUST ASKING QUESTIONS. I know he believes this shit. YouTube racists and their YouTube responders represent the lowest form of dialogue, there isn't a chance that any of them will be kicked off it, as if YouTube has any standards.

 

[James R]

And it doesn't say much about Bowser, who pretends to be JUST ASKING QUESTIONS.

Yes. I suspect Bowser's motives on this one, too.

Maybe Bowser himself can clarify what his opinions are on the content of that video, but, sadly, I expect to hear nothing from him.

 

[Write4U]

I call those minor differences.

In the northern hemisphere we call sickle cell anemia a disease, but in the tropics it is a defense against malaria.

Sickle cell anemia causes pain, fatigue and delayed growth, all because of a lack of enough healthy red blood cells. And yet genetic mutations that cause it-recessive genes for the oxygen-carrying hemoglobin protein-have survived natural selection because they also seem to provide a natural defense against malaria.

 

[spidergoat]

The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life.

Why Is Charles Murray Odious?

"People who see Charles Murray being violently hounded off college campuses might wonder what the fuss is about, and why left-wing protesters become so viscerally angry with Murray rather than dealing with his arguments. But while I am strongly opposed to the tactic of shutting down speakers on campus, it’s important to realize that the rage at Charles Murray is entirely justified. For it can be very easily proven that Murray is a man with a strong racial bias against black people, insofar as he fails to respect them as equal human beings and believes them to be, on average, inferior to white people in matters of intelligence, creativity, and inherent human worth. Any serious inquiry into Charles Murray’s actual body of work must conclude that, if Murray is not a racist, the word “racist” is empty of meaning. I do not necessarily believe Charles Murray thinks he is a racist. But I do believe that a fair review of the evidence must necessarily lead to the conclusion that he is one. Efforts to keep him from speaking on college campuses are, while in my opinion wrong both in principle and strategically, are entirely understandable. For Murray’s intellectual project does involve passing off bigotry as neutral scholarship, and people who worry about “legitimizing” prejudice by giving it a platform should very much be worried about giving Charles Murray a platform."