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Ethnicity and evolutionJC Garelli (gare@PSY1.SATLINK.NET)Tue, 18 Oct 1994 13:42:15 -0400
Message forwarded by Professor Will Pflaum ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >Path: psy1!satlink!patora!a2i!sgiblab!spool.mu.edu!howland.reston.ans.net >!EU.net!uunet!newstf01.cr1.aol.com!newsbf01.news.aol.com >From: willep9@aol.com (WillEP9) >Newsgroups: sci.anthropology >Subject: NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 10/16 >Message-ID: <37sfo6$o1u@newsbf01.news.aol.com> >Date: 16 Oct 1994 20:16:06 -0400 >Sender: news@newsbf01.news.aol.com >Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) >Lines: 91 >NNTP-Posting-Host: newsbf01.news.aol.com Sunday, October 16, 1994 Editor New York Times Book Review 229 West 43rd Street New York, NY 10036 Dear Sir or Madam; Some will consider Malcolm Browne's recent review of The Bell Curve , Race, Evolution and Behavior, and The Decline of Intelligence in America politically faulty , and I am sure you will receive many letters criticizing the politics of both the reviewer and the authors reviewed. My criticism comes from a different point of view. I see little in this review to suggest that either Browne or the writers he considers understand some basic principles of evolution. First of all, why would anyone expect a genetic difference between races? Until about 150 years ago the vast majority of all continents were illiterate subsistence agriculturists. The modern era has not existed long enough to cause genetic change, only a few generations. For the majority, pre-modern conditions, both social and environmental, did not require different levels of intelligence. Also, the tiny pre-modern literate elites were not independent breeding populations. In short, there is no reason to expect genetic difference between the large populations identified by Browne and the writers he reviews. Secondly, the concept of ethnicity - as when Browne notes the comparison in The Bell Curve between Whites, Asians, and Blacks in the United States - is not a useful category for breaking down evolutionary change. A breeding population - a group of people who have bred with each other for a long time - can have unique characteristics. "Asians," "Whites," and "Blacks" are not necessarily breeding populations. It is a mistake to assume these groups share any genetic characteristics. In fact, a person from Northern China may be much less likely to share a common ancestor with, say, a Laotian than a Greek is too share an ancestor with an Angolan. Furthermore, Blacks from genetically unrelated parts of Africa, to name one ethnicity, did not become a separate Black breeding population upon they arrival in the New World. The advent of America is too recent in genetic time and the rates of inter-racial breeding are too high to assume that African Americans form a distinctive breeding population in genetic terms. In other words, Browne and possibly the writers he reviews have failed to consider the time scale of evolution and the pre-modern breeding patterns of either Old World or New World populations. Analysis of the mitochondria DNA can help identify a breeding population and can help determine how separate genetically that population is from another population. Appearance and arbitrary differences - skin color, nose shape, hair texture - cannot help determine the separation of breeding populations. Botanists stopped classifying flower populations by color in the eighteenth century. Sometimes what you see is not what you get. If these writers claim racial differences do exist I want to know HOW such differences could possibly arise - in what time scale, in what geographic regions. I want to know WHY such changes might arise - what long standing social or environmental differences might differentiate populations. Lastly I want the proponents of racial differences to justify WHO they are talking about from a genetic point of view - why they believe cultural or folk category like "Black" or "White" might have any biological validity for cognition in the first place. Don't give me statistics to prove something is true (and don't give a book cataloguing these statistics a positive review) until you convince me that the point you are trying to prove is within the realm of scientific possibility. There may be some subtle genetic differences between the cognition of some breeding populations. There is absolutely no reason to expect differences in intelligence between the macro populations colloquially called "race" from an evolutionary basis. It seems that Browne and writers he has reviewed have built their world view on the basis of a number of as yet unsubstantiated assumptions, at least from an evolutionary point of view. Sincerely, Will Pflaum Professor of Anthropology Medgar Evers College City University of New York 1650 Bedford Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11225 ****************************************************************************** Juan Carlos Garelli, MD Attachment Research Center Juncal 1966, 6B, 1116 Buenos Aires, Argentina E-mail: gare@psy1.satlink.net Fax: +54-1 812 5432
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