41–50 of 100 posts
For such a flimsy concept, race is surprisingly stubborn and resilient. Already a few people saying yeah it's not perfect but it's a rough approximation. No, that's the whole point, it's not. It's astrology level science. There's no there there.
"Race" is about as real as :) is a face.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
“Race” is significantly more fuzzy than “species”. There are edge cases where people will argue where to draw lines between species. However, it’s profoundly challenging to draw lines between “races” in the first place.
Can you quantify how significant the fuzziness has to be before it should not be subject to analysis? Species is a lot fuzzier than you think.
As someone who, as a child, read books on the history of taxonomy and how taxonomy has changed over the centuries, I would love to hear you list what mistaken beliefs about species you claim that I have.
Seriously, though. I am not interested in being the topic of conversation, so please do not make me the subject of your comments.
> Rather, human genetic variation is the result of many forces—historical, social, biological—and no single variable fully represents this complexity. Would it not be correct to state that "race" is a social construction intended as a stand-in to identify sets of interconnected factors which impact a particular population, such as historical, social, and biological? Is the issue that the word "race" has too much bagg…
For such a flimsy concept, race is surprisingly stubborn and resilient. Already a few people saying yeah it's not perfect but it's a rough approximation. No, that's the whole point, it's not. It's astrology level science. There's no there there.
No it isn’t, it allows us to make accurate predictions about health. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=35182504&goto=item%3Fi...
That’s real science, saying it doesn’t exist is astrology level pseudoscience.
This is a bit ridiculous. It's well known in medicine that members of different ethnic groups have different risks and complications. This article describes how members of different ethnic groups have different complications in pregnancy. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7290488/ Here is a review about how race affects Adverse Drug Experiences (In response to commonly prescribed drugs), published in the j…
Emphasis added. Race != ethnicity; TFA argues against using the former and suggests using the latter (with other things).
> Some of the key recommendations focus on getting rid of the use of race and instead focusing on what the report terms "population descriptors." These can be things like ethnicity, region of residence, and so on.
This is a bit ridiculous. It's well known in medicine that members of different ethnic groups have different risks and complications. This article describes how members of different ethnic groups have different complications in pregnancy. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7290488/ Here is a review about how race affects Adverse Drug Experiences (In response to commonly prescribed drugs), published in the j…
Race is in the eye of the viewer. You can choose your race, but it has no value unless other people recognize it. Ultimately, though, race is defined by skin color, which is a quick way to identify people. This article seems to be creating an argument, where one was never needed. Sometimes society does things to help organize itself.
> Rather, human genetic variation is the result of many forces—historical, social, biological—and no single variable fully represents this complexity. Would it not be correct to state that "race" is a social construction intended as a stand-in to identify sets of interconnected factors which impact a particular population, such as historical, social, and biological? Is the issue that the word "race" has too much bagg…
Look at Native Americans, where the median household income is almost double for some subgroups compared to others. For Asians, the income difference is more than double between Indians and Bangladeshis. American Turks seem to do extremely well, while I expect the numbers for German Turks would be a fair bit lower.
So if you're trying to analyze things, whether for medicine (blood pressure), or sociology (impacts of racism, benefits of economic intervention), racial groups are a pretty poor categorization, vulnerable to Simpson's paradox.
One classic conservative argument against reparations is that it lumps in rich Nigerian immigrants with poor African-American descendants of slavery. Seems like their logic could actually be used to support this change.