Re: This used to be on disease and immunity
Gerold Firl (geroldf@sdd.hp.com)
22 Jul 1996 20:47:01 GMT
In article <4socl0$44k@bone.think.com>, brunner@mandrake.think.com (Eric Brunner) writes:
|> Gerold Firl (geroldf@sdd.hp.com) wrote:
|> ...
|> : Translation: you know full well that _red earth, white lies_ is
|> : chock-full of nonsense, errors, and transparent blunders, but as long as
|> ...
|> Umm, last time there was a RE/WL thread I couldn't find a single person in
|> all of the x-posted news groups, other than myself, who actually went to the
|> bother to read the work. Before continuing this, is it too much to ask if
|> anyone has read the work in question?
Excerpts were posted, sufficient to show that there is no point to
reading it, unless one wanted to catalog some amazingly bogus claims.
Personally, I was embarrassed to see vine deloria touted as a "major
spokesman" for native americans - ouch. If a crackpot like deloria is
your spokesman, you've got troubles.
Deloria claimed to have identified amerindian myths and oral tradition
which described the "red, shaggy fur" of the stegosaurus; evidence that
biological evolution and scientific archeology were all wrong. The man
is a crackpot and a loony, but you can't admit that, though you have no
problem using the most vitriolic criticism against Others.
|> : To get back to the issue, you claim that humans have not made any
|> : biological adaptations in the "post-holocene" time frame; anyone with
|> None of relevance to the subject, Contact Period demographics and their
|> causal mechanisms.
How do you explain the fact that the haida tribe show a frequency of
50% for HLA-B27? Among japanese the frequency is more like 1%, while
among europeans it's found in about 8%. Do you claim that the extremely
high frequency observed among the haida is the result of natural
selection? Would that be pre- or post-contact selection? Or is it a
founder-effect? In any case, the genetics of the amerindian immune
system looks very different from old world populations. And yet, you
deny that this is indicative of differential genetic resistance - why?
|> : MB Williams informs me that she has some background in evolutionary
|> : biology; maybe she can explain it to you.
|> Some? A student of Doug Charles just has "some background" in that area?
|> Some one is offering understatement.
Sarcasm, actually. In spite of her acedemic credentials, mb williams is
remarkably ignorant about how evolutionary processes effect
populations. There is something of a tradition of hostility between the
"social-science" advocates within anthropology and the hard sciences
which I find very unfortunate; when it leads to willful ignorance it's
tragic.
--
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=---- Gerold Firl @ ..hplabs!hp-sdd!geroldf
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