Re: BELL CURVE CRITIC EXPOSED?
David A. Johns (djohns@grove.ufl.edu)
28 Jan 1995 10:46:01 GMT
In article <1995Jan27.190248.23571@adobe.com> wtyler@mv.us.adobe.com (William Tyler) writes:
# >#
# ># String comes in various lengths. The variation in length
# ># is continuous. Therefore it's meaningless to describe a
# ># piece of string as long or short.
# >#
# ># That's just nonsense.
# >
# >Of course it's nonsense. But it's your nonsense, not mine.
#
# The analogy is exact, and you make it more so below in your
# 'walking' example.
Why did you delete the part where I compared your claim to
trying to figure out where the left end of the string ended and
the right end began? *That* is the proper analogy to your
racial classification of Arabs and Japanese.
# >And while you can easily distinguish Japanese from Arabs (or
# >Swedes from Nigerians, etc., as previous victims of this
# >argument have suggested), you could walk and row from Riyadh to
# >Tokyo and see one type gradually turn into the other along the
# >way.
#
# Right. Just as I can see a piece of string go from short at 1/16
# of an inch to long at 10 miles, but I can't say when it changed
# from one to the other. You're making my argument.
If you think so, you don't understand the argument.
# >Furthermore, since "races" consist of a lot of individual
# >characteristics, and these characteristics don't have the same
# >geographical limits, you couldn't even find a place to make an
# >arbitrary division.
#
# Huh? I can ALWAYS find a place to make an ARBITRARY division.
Correct. I should have said a *meaningful* division.
# >Race is a folk concept, nothing more.
#
# If you really believe this, then what do you call the thing or
# things that allow you to figure out, of the two people you have
# just met, who is most likely from Nigeria and who from Sweden?
# (You did say you could do this.)
Non sequitur. No one said that traits don't vary. The point is that
a racial classification system has to account for all people, not just
arbitrarily chosen groups.
David Johns
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