From: mday@jukebox.lcs.mit.edu (Mark Day)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.asian.american
Subject: Re: Genetic question misunderstood
Date: 28 Sep 92 01:47:02 GMT
Organization: MIT Laboratory for Computer Science


   claypool@seas.gwu.edu (Hyok H. Lee) writes:

     mday@jukebox.lcs.mit.edu (Mark Day) writes:
   : You have to consider what proportion of a population seriously
   : considers professional sports as a viable economic possibility before
   : you start getting carried away with genetic ideas.  In today's
   : America, a white basketball player has to be REALLY REALLY REALLY good
   : (or from Indiana :-)) to convince himself and others that he'd be
   : better off trying to play pro basketball than getting some more normal
   : job.  With fewer job opportunities and generally lower wages at those
   : jobs, a black basketball player at the same skill level has much less
   : trouble convincing himself and others that he should go for pro sports
   : as a career.

   I think you are wrong.  The prospect of playing professional sports is
   almost every boy's dream.  If you were to ask a group of boys what they
   wanted to be when they grew up, I'll bet almost half would say football
   player.  The reason there are  more blacks in the NBA is because they are
   the best players, not because whites chose not play.  

I'm sorry, but this is nonsense.  I'm not talking about fifth-grader's
dreams, I'm talking about the process whereby some people decide to be
(say) pro basketball players and others decide to be (say) lawyers.
You apparently believe that whites decide to (try to) become lawyers
in greater proportions than blacks because they're genetically
superior lawyers, and that blacks decide to (try to) become pro
athletes because they're genetically superior athletes.  

   What you seem to be saying is that races do not actually exist.

Bingo.

   Scientifically, racial categories do exist.  

Fine.  Now provide me some evidence of this.  I challenge you to find
me any meaningful scientific evidence (e.g. a published paper that is
still cited, that appeared in a refereed journal) that supports the
notion of a fixed, objective set of racial categories.  Remember, I
demand that the definitions be such that two independent observers
will always assign the same "race" to the same people (that is, there
has to be an implementable algorithm for racial classification).  

   I believe scientists have identified 12 distinct racial groups.  Race
   is a valuable tool in tracking human history, migration patterns and
   genetic history.

You can believe anything you want to believe, but I think you'll find
that the "races" identified by Japanese "scientists" have little
relationship to the "races" identified by American "scientists."  I
don't find scientific definitions very compelling if they change at
national boundaries.  I would like some examples of how "race" has
been a valuable scientific tool, but I don't want to distract you from
the main question of whether there is any scientific evidence for
racial categories.

   It just seems to me that with my original post, I have ferretted out
   people who are closeted racists.  The same type of people who, years
   ago, would say to a successful black, "You're a credit to your race."
   Now these closet racist attempt to hide themselves by denying any
   differences between races.

This is a weird complaint.  How can denying the existence of "race" be
racist?  And if I'm reading you right, I think you're claiming that I
would have (in past years) said to a successful black, "You're a
credit to your race."  What have I said or done that would give you
that impression?

My sense at this point is that your thinking is so confused that it's
not worth discussing things with you any more, but perhaps I'm
misjudging you or misreading you.

--Mark Day

mday@lcs.mit.edu
Newsgroups: soc.culture.asian.american