Talk:Carleton S. Coon/Archive 1

message: Text adapted and expanded from emuseum.mnsu.edu, a non-copyrighted source. User:JDG.
Intent to edit: I am preparing a major rewrite of the third paragraph of this entry. The existing text fails to capture the overwhelming rejection of Coon's racial theories by anthropologists, regardless of how "meticulous" his work may have been. If anyone is following this page and feels some stake in the work, let's have some discussion about it. --Norvell 20:19, 7 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Good grief..."Tiwi...smallest braincases on the planet...could probably educate..." As a matter of fact, there are Tiwi doctors, educators, businesspeople, even politicians. Less of the speculation and inexorable "transition into sapien grade", more work on this rather badly-constructed and confusing article, is what we need here...--cjllw | TALK 05:34, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

text: It is not a fact, it is an assertion, predicated on a host of contested assumptions, including the very utility of "race" as a proxy for genetics and functional differences.  And yes, it is a racist comment, although there are differences between maliciously racist comments, and simply incidentally racist comments. --JereKrischel 14:21, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Earlier comments

message: I have found references to another C. S. Coon, specifically the one described at <http://www.studentworldassembly.org/coon.htm> and at <http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/po/com/11057.htm>. Note the spelling variations, which might just be internet typos (?). Anyways, the other Mr. Coon was a career Foreign Service Officer and ambassador to Nepal 1981–1984.
This article here <http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/information/biography/abcde/coon_carlton.html> seems to confuse the two. Should we post some sort of disambiguation, even a short one? I myself spent some time trying to refute that eMuseum claim. (cf. the date of Prof. Coon's death and the term of Ambassador Coon) Mang 08:36, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Confusion over a different C. Coon at MNSU's eMuseum

message: "Racial theories" deliberatedly misquotes coon to make him a racist. By "european types" he meant that, european types; types common in europe, his works were not politically inclined although many use him to refute nordicism.  Section reviewed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:Finalaval (talk • contribs) .
*While I agree that section should be "reviewed", I do not think it should just be deleted wholesale. If you have suggestions as to how to make it better, please feel free to give them. I saw nothing in the text you deleted that corresponded with your statement on here. An example of something misquoted would be helpful, if you can provide it. --Fastfission 01:31, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You will need to be clearer on which bits constitute POV in your assessment. How exactly does "racial theories" (ie, theories about race) constitute POV? If Coon didn't see his work as a theory, then as what? As per Fastfission above, instead of just deleting the text with the misleading "section reviewed" comment, the onus would be on you argue and point out in which respects the text is deficient. And BTW, switching to edit under an anon IP after your account has been blocked for 3RR is not really the way to go about things either.--cjllw | TALK 03:11, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Terrible POV and malicious deliberated difamation

message: Already the beginning (not to mention the title, are political sounding and name calling disgraces).
1)"Carleton Coon believed different racial types fought for domination and annihilation of other racial types. He believed Europe was the refined product of a long history of racial progression." 
So as trying to make him look like some sort of nazi or at least a strong darwinian right winger or nationalistic. That statement is not only a complete lie, it is totally malicious and politically oriented. The purpose is of course, that the reader dismisses Coon as "a racist". Coon all over his works pointed out the mixture of peoples and the different racial types that resulted (an example being his travel to north africa or to Montenegro to study the dinaric race , a mixture of mediterraneans and alpines). This mixtures were often subject of his studies. His position is that types mix if they live in a similar enviroment rather than stick together and try to eliminate the other. History proves he is right. Coon even proposes and is hated by some for asserting Upper Paleolithic survivors are a mixture of Neanderthals and Sapiens. Coon believed the racial stuation of Europe to be the result of mixtures, or as he himself said "At any rate, the main conclusion of this study will be that the present races of Europe are derived from a blend of (A), food-producing peoples from Asia and Africa, of basically Mediterranean racial form, with (B), the descendants of interglacial and glacial food-gatherers, produced in turn by a blending of basic Homo sapiens, related to the remote ancestor of the Mediterraneans, with some non-sapiens species of general Neanderthaloid form. The actions and interactions of environment, selection, migration, and human culture upon the various entities within this amalgam, have produced the white race in its present complexity. "
2)"according to his book The Races of Europe, The White Race and the New World. He believed the "maximum survival" of Europeans was increased by their replacement of the indigenous peoples of the "New World".(The Races of Europe, The White Race and the New World) He believed the history of the White race to have involved "racial survivals" of the different White subraces. (The Races of Europe, Chapter II Sec 12"
Here is what Coon said "
The Mediterraneans who peopled the New World were of two principal varieties, Nordics and small, or Ibero-Insular (in Deniker's sense), Mediterraneans. The Nordics went to North America, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand, the Mediterraneans proper to Central and South America. Wherever the Nordics went, they found lands occupied by scattered tribes of hunters and gatherers, or of riverside agriculturalists who were too few to offer them successful resistance. The wars with the Blackfeet and the Sioux were long and bloody, but the Blackfeet and the Sioux have lost their racial hold on their land as completely as have the Arunta. Dispossession and gradual extinction has been the fate of those who opposed the English and the Dutch, whether their opponents were Bushmen or Tasmanians or Beothuks. 
The Spanish, on the other hand, went mostly to countries where a dense native population lived close to the soil, and where mighty empires had already arisen; their colonization was largely a matter of conquest and subjugation, and in all the American countries of Spanish settlement, excepting Argentina and Chile, the Indian farmer has reemerged, and the Spaniard forms but an upper crust. The Portuguese, carving out, in Brazil, a vast empire of river and forest, found but little land suitable for the habitation of whites, and into this they brought black men from Africa whose descendants are now the chief possessors of the soil. 
The expansion of the Mediterraneans, using the word in the larger sense, into the New World, was an extension of their earlier expansion into Europe. North America became, by the nineteenth century, the greatest Nordic reservoir in the world. But the century which saw the erection of this reservoir also witnessed the beginnings of its change in character; the tide of immigration brought with it members of all the other races cat Europe. The people who came to America, from the time of the Pilgrim Fathers to the imposition of the laws restricting immigration, were selected; none were fully representative of the countries from which they came. In America they were subjected to environmental forces of a new and stimulating nature, so that changes in growth such as their ancestors had not felt for centuries produced strange, gangling creatures of their children, In America we have before our eyes the rapid action of race-building forces; if we wish to understand the principles which have motivated the racial history of the Old World, it behooves us to pay careful attention to the New"
It is somewhat unclear what the writer he means with that, Coon states in that section that where the indians were reduced in numbers, populations largely did not mix, whereas to where they largely survived, populations mixed. This is a consecuence of what I said of Coon before and his belief wich was proved right by the mestization of latin america. It is common sense and not "theory" although this is deliberatedly written to make people believe Coon supported the elimination of indians. I invite everyone to read that chapter of the book.
3) "Carleton Coon did not embrace the Caucasoid racial identity he defined; he instead embraced a White racial identity. In his book the Races of Europe he mentions the term Caucasoid only in passing. He mentions the White race as more a primary identification. In his introduction of the Races of Europe he states the "concern (of his book) the somatic character of peoples belonging to the white race"
This is not only bulgar and ignorant, it is disgusting and purpousedly decieving. Coon used the term "white" all over the book as a sinonym of "caucasian" if you look at his graphic where he shows the different types and the main divison of the white race, you will see that middle eastern types are considered "white". The purpouse of the writer, however, is to make Coon look like some sort of proponent of White Nationalism.
4)"In other sections of his Races of Europe book he mentions people to be "European in racial type" and having a "European racial element" (Races of Europe, Chapter 7 Turks and Mongols) He did not consider studying non-White races to be of high importance. He advised studying the superior versions of European racial types seen in the quote from his book Races of Europe, "What is needed more than anything else in this respect is a thoroughgoing study of the inhabitants of the principal and most powerful nations of Europe".Carleton Coon believed Whites followed a separate evolutionary path from other humans. He believed "The earliest Homo sapiens known, as represented by several examples from Europe and Africa, was an ancestral long-headed white man of short stature and moderately great brain size." and "the negro group probably evolved parallel to the white strain" (The Races of Europe, Chapter II)"
Again more childish agitation. The book dealt with the white race, and so as to the subject of the book, further studies of whites are relevant. Coon even laments there are too few surveys of crania from europe and more from north africa and he thinks this is because european anthropologists find it more exotic and atractive to do it far away from their homelands. The writer however, wants to decieve you into thinking Coon wants more european crania examined because he would be "a racist". Read the section yourselves. Malicious and deliberate, there are no other words for that. 
Again here is what Coon says 
"For many years physical anthropologists have found it more amusing to travel to distant lands and to measure small remnants of little known or romantic peoples than to tackle the drudgery of a systematic study of their own compatriots. For that reason the sections in the present book which deal with the Lapps, the Arabs, the Berbers, the Tajiks, and the Ghegs may appear more fully and more lucidly treated than those which deal with the French, the Hungarians, the Czechs, or the English. What is needed more than anything else in this respect is a thoroughgoing study of the inhabitants of the principal and most powerful nations of Europe. 
Much more badly needed, however, than data on the living is the publication of skeletal material of all cultural periods in European prehistory and history. European museums and private collections abound with skulls and long bones, only a small proportion of which have as yet been made available through the literature. Most of these are of Neolithic or later date; when a skull of alleged or real glacial age is discovered, it is, as a rule, soon published. "
Political correctness and hatemongering against scholars like Coon have no place in an objective Encyclopedia. I will not remove this, I want you all to see it now that my review is written. --201.231.161.9 04:02, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Here i will expose this malice for what it is furthermore: 

message: *"biological anthropology" - 4580 hits
*"physical anthropology" - 22,100 hits
It seems a minor point to get hung up on - I've found google scholar is often a good neutral measure to use to judge the popularity of a term. --JereKrischel 05:22, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Physical" v. "Biological" anthropology 

message: *I see a lot of personal attacks here. Please note that this is contrary to Wikipedia rules and can get you banned from editing. Comment on article content, not contributors.
*Please sign  your posts to the discussion page with four tildes: ~~~~
See the header to this page for links about these and other guidelines regarding article discussion. KarlBunker 11:22, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  A couple of points 

message: I'm sorry Finalnow, I strongly disagree with your characterization of anti-racialist scientists as being "proved biased".  You have absolutely no way to assert that. --JereKrischel 19:03, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: read mismeasure of gould and lewontin fallacy. Coon was also a scientist by the way, and they didnt demonsrtate anything. --Finalnow 19:07, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Finalnow, are you simply stating that if a book exists claiming bias on the part of someone, that it is therefore proven and true? --JereKrischel 19:10, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Who is to judge whether or not bias was effectively demonstrated?  Just you? --JereKrischel 19:19, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: no you could read the books as i have and decide, but my guess is you didnt --201.231.161.9 19:23, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you guess that simply because I disagree with your decision?  I'm afraid that's an awfully narrow-minded point of view, to assume that if you decided something, that everyone else with the same evidence you've seen must also agree with your conclusions. --JereKrischel 19:40, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: In regards to proving Coon's theories incorrect, please see Recent single-origin hypothesis, and the work of Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza. --JereKrischel 19:19, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Of course it is a hypothesis - however, it is one that isn't contradicted by any evidence as of yet.  The multi-regional explanation has been contradicted by genetic evidence. --JereKrischel 19:38, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Let me be perfectly clear - Coon's primary assertion in Origin of Races, that asserted a multiregional theory, has been decisively proven incorrect by the genetic evidence linking us all back to a single mitochondrial Eve.  Cranial analysis does not hold up against the genetic evidence.  Even prominent racialists like Rushton agree on this point now. --JereKrischel 19:48, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Let me turn this around, Finalnow - how are you going to show me evidence that proves bias on the part of anti-racialists?  What evidence do you think I should consider irrefutable?  Maybe if you can come up with that definition, then I can provide you with the same type of evidence on the single-origin theory.  Again, though, you seem very emotional about this - please, try to calm down and we can work together on making this a better article.  Assume good faith. --JereKrischel 20:08, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: And yes, Finalnow, I read your section on "unmasking malice", and I think you're overreacting.  You seem to lose your train of thought half-way through, and don't effectively address the real issue. --JereKrischel 20:09, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Proved bias?

message: Although you are correct, Finalnow, that Coon did not write specifically about Race and Intelligence, you cannot deny that his work prominently figures in the controversy.  His assertions and study of crania size are cited and referenced over and over again by racialists like Rushton, Lynn, etc.  Putting his page in that category does not assert that he was a proponent of any particular intelligence correlation to race, but simply that his work figures prominently in that field. --JereKrischel 19:51, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Coon has no control on what others may do, this point is beyond absurd --Finalnow 19:54, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Why are you personalizing this?  Coon's work figures prominently in the Race and Intelligence controversy, no matter if his primary work was not in that field.  The category label is not saying that he was a primary proponent of any race and intelligence theory, but simply that his work figures prominently on the topic.  Sun Tzu may not have fought in WWII, but his theories and work still are prominent in the field of modern warfare.  You seem to be very emotional about any possible correlation between Coon's work, and controversy - why is that? --JereKrischel 20:05, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: It seems that perhaps english is not your first language, 201.231.161.9.  I appreciate your attempt to work on this article that clearly isn't in a language you are very familiar with.  Let me assure you that nobody here is trying to promote anything "anti-Coon" - we are simply attempting to build a NPOV article that clearly paints the man's history, works and influence in a sympathetic light.  Nobody is starting a conspiracy when they quote Coon directly.  On the other hand, the insistence that Coon has nothing to do with discussions of racialism seems a bit unreasonable.  It also seems unreasonable to assert that your "hunch that they lie" is the only valid point of view to be had. --JereKrischel 21:02, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Why do you think they are being taken out of context?  What context would you add that would help explain them better? --JereKrischel 01:43, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Race and intelligence controversy

message: He names belgium as an example of the nordic race. I am Belgian and i should only take a look out of the window to see that is NOT the case. And i am not living amongst immigrants.
He probably named "us" nordic because the language we speak, but you can see clearly people look rather alpine/dinaric.
:Not true, Coon claimed that nordic, alpine and dinaric people were all present in Belgium. So you could only claim that he got the % wrong. Coon never claimed that any nation was composed of merely one of his subraces, in fact I don't think that he ever even claimed that any nation in Europe had >50% of any subrace.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.229.27.11 (talk) 02:41, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Coon is wrong about the distribution of Caucasoid subraces

message: I may be completely off-base, but www.snpa.nordish.net seems suspect. Although it claims not to have a political or racist POV, and I didn't find anything on there that appeared racist outside of the copy of Coon's work, I did find some discussion board posts on places like Stormfront which seem to be saying there used to be a racist forum there. Perhaps, even if that's true, the site no longer has an agenda, but it smells fishy to me. 71.82.214.160 23:03, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. The site is devoted to the concept of race, which is now basically rejected by mainstream science, and it claims that "no significant studies on the topic have been made since the 50s" (I quote by memory). The very concept of "nordish" appears to be widely used by white nationalists. --91.148.159.4 14:59, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The concept of race is not "basically rejected by mainstream science" unless by "mainstream science" you really mean "the Marxist/post-Marxist revisionist junta currently dominating anthropology." The rejection of the notion of race as a physical phenomenon  becomes more and more common the further one gets from the hard sciences - that is, most biologists accept race as a physical phenomenon whereas most cultural anthropologists reject it. Be careful with what you say: it's because of people like you that the real bigots are gaining popularity via poking holes in all your fallacious revisionist claims. Myrkkyhammas 15:03, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, about 80% of biologists reject the notion of race as anything else than a cultural construct, and that number goes up to 89% for physical anthropologists (according to Lieberman in his paper from 2001), so I would say yes, it is rejected by most of mainstream science as a useful way to subdivide human genetic diversity.--Ramdrake 19:30, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yep. Compare also what Britannica has to say, as well as our own article on race. Myrkkyhammas seems to adhere to an extreme minority view, and to be very emotional about it, too, judging from his wording above. I don't edit in this field, but I would recommend that more people should take a look at this, so as to avoid undue weight / a POV slant. --91.148.159.4 19:48, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

text: First, that 80%/89% statistic is highly suspect - what exactly are you citing? Second, I said nothing of "genetic diversity." I was talking about race as a physical phenomenon in general and while yes, DNA is an example  of a measureable, physical entity, it is not the only one. Others include skin pigmentation, hair form, stature, skull form etc. - all of which are very real are physical entities. I, for one, am convinced that they have no influence on the meaningful aspects of humanity (e.g. intelligence, creativity, criminality etc.) but to deny that they exist altogether is dishonest and perhaps even dangerous. Myrkkyhammas 18:10, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: To answer your question, the reference can be found in Lieberman (2001), an article called: How Caucasoids got such big crania and why they shrank - From Morton to Rushton. However suspect you may think it is, I didn't invent it.--Ramdrake 18:35, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

text: The website may seem fishy but I have a copy of Coon's text and they seem to have it copied word for word. Myrkkyhammas 15:03, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If so, the book itself should be cited, rather than the fishy website.--91.148.159.4 19:48, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. Myrkkyhammas 18:10, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

text: The text of TRoE on the SNPA site is complete, no sections are missing. I have the book, and have checked. But the site should not be cited in citings from the text, as the racialist connotations are tangible.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.92.146.74 (talk) 19:56, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use of www.snpa.nordish.net as a source 

message: Different types of Human IE Carcasions and (for want of better words) Negroes and Mongoloids. Im guessing these aren't designated as separate species, are these classed as being a different Genus? BTW I'm not a white supremacist of nothing, I have black family and I'm part Jewish, I'm just interested.
Not even genus, I wouldn't have thought. At the VERY most, subspecies perhaps.
Tamrhind 17:20, 19 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Human species. 

message: A reference is made to Proceedings of the NAS in 1999, regarding the finding of the skeleton in Portugal. The paper referenced does not say what the editor implies, however.--Parkwells (talk) 21:13, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Multiregional model and racial hierarchies

message: This article is lacking substance. The Criticism section needs to be supplemented so that people can understand what late 20th c and contemporary thinkers concluded about Coons. I don't think it's there yet, even though the abstract of an article on the reception of his 1962 book was copied.--Parkwells (talk) 21:39, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Criticism

message: It is pitifully biased and unfair to use as the opening paragraph that Coon was "an...anthropologist noted for books on race in which he proposed the superiority of Europeans". That is an oversimplification and to generalize about his career using what is, in contemporary discourse, an inflammatory and political statement, only belittles his career as a scientist. The "superiority" of certain or other races may have been an implication of his studies and writings, but he was an anthropologist first and foremostP, and people forget that pre-WWII, anthropology was the study of race. This was perfectly respectable and the norm at the highest levels of academia. All of this shifted radically with the wave of political correctness that swept campuses in the decades after the war.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.254.15.238 (talk) 19:51, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why not rewrite it so it makes more sense - refer to his time and ours.--Parkwells (talk) 17:49, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Apart from that it is highly arguable that it is even factually correct. "Superiority" is more or less being used as a weasel word here. What specifically did he believe that is supposed to amount to a belief in "superiority"? In the same way that James Watson apologising for his statement on race and intelligence by saying that Africans are not inferior to Europeans said nothing to repudiate the factual content of what he actually said the use of "superiority" in this article says nothing much about Coon's actual beliefs either, particularly in the context of an academic scholar. It is a rhetorical device.80.229.27.11 (talk) 01:39, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Opening sentence of Coon's entry 

message: I have a special claim to authority on this subject as I am Carleton Coon's son. I grew up with him. He firmly believed that race is a legitimate field of scientific inquiry, in that subspecies have evolved and that differences between them can affect not only normative physical features, but also behavior. He detested adversaries like Ashley Montagu and most of the Boas school that decided ex cathedra that race doesn't exist, and he could express himself quite strongly when he got on the subject. But he never agreed that racial stereotypes could legitimately be applied to individuals. In fact he prided himself on the fact that his friends and correspondents were distinguished representatives of all racial groups. Here's what he had to say in his article, "What is Race?", in the December, 1957 issue of the Atlantic Monthly:
"...in most if not all races men of superior intelligence are born from time to time. In the past it was rarely possible for many of them to meet and exchange ideas, and even in social situations where they were accepted, much of their individual brainpower was wasted. Thanks to the new techniques of transport and communication of our century, world-wide meetings of the intellectual elite of all races are becoming common. In them it has often been observed that the world's most intelligent men find it completely natural to forget about race, for the mutual stimulation of intellectual exchange creates in such a group a new level of equilibrium, in which looking alike is of no importance.
"It seems safe to predict that the frequent association of the world's top minds in various disciplines can turn out to be the equivalent of that step in biological evolution for which many have been waiting:the appearance of a new and superior race based on a new adaptation, not to a special physical environment, but to the need of solving special problems which men have themselves created. As it will be drawn from many races, no master-race behavior need be feared."
In other words, my father was an elitist but not a racist, not in the present pejorative sense. But how about that opening reference to "most if not all races"? I am quite confident, on the basis of my recollection of my discussions with him, that he did not mean to include all negroes, or Congoids, or sub-Saharan Africans, as a blanket category incapable of producing superior minds. Africa being the cradle, there is probably at least as much racial variation within the region as outside it, and generalizations about race within the region always troubled him. (I recall his commenting on the large cranial capacity of the Ibo, for example). I infer that his phrase "most if not all races" referred to subgroups, perhaps some very minor groups, not to any of his five major categories.
That last point is arguable but with the increasing homogenization of the global gene pool it may also be becoming moot. Race as a whole, however, will never become moot. In his passion for analyzing its particulars, my father was not behind his times. I feel confident that future generations will look back on the record and judge that he was ahead of them.
Carl Coon (talk) 11:57, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It must be difficult to have such a controversial father. I recall a short discussion I had with either a colleague or student of his, who claimed to have heard explicitly racist comments from him. Many in academia consider(ed) him a racist.  just as examples. Doug Weller (talk) 13:14, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the info. WP:COI is relevant so the best way to improve the balance is by showing good references on the talk page for incorporation into the article. Which brought me here –  gives an interesting analysis. . . dave souza, talk 08:08, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

text: "What is Race?" Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 200, No. 4, 1957, pp. 103-108. I have no reason to disbelieve the discussion I had, nor the statements of other academics. Obviously a large part, perhaps most, of his generation was also racist. Dougweller (talk) 14:13, 16 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Coon was not a racist in the pejorative sense 

message: Based on the following summary and the lack of any new reports in this century about Lagar Velho child I feel the paragraph about it should be removed from this article. 
http://www.pnas.org/content/96/13/7117.full Hominids and hybrids: The place of Neanderthals in human evolution   1. Ian Tattersall*,† and  2. Jeffrey H. Schwartz‡
In summary, the analysis by Duarte et al. of the Lagar Velho child’s skeleton is a brave and imaginative interpretation, of which it is unlikely that a majority of paleoanthropologists will consider proven. The archaeological context of Lagar Velho is that of a typical Gravettian burial, with no sign of Mousterian cultural influence, and the specimen itself lacks not only derived Neanderthal characters but any suggestion of Neanderthal morphology. The probability must thus remain that this is simply a chunky Gravettian child, a descendant of the modern invaders who had evicted the Neanderthals from Iberia several millennia earlier. However, in this contentious and poorly documented field, any new data are eagerly sought, and Duarte et al.’s courageous speculations will doubtless spur much-needed new research. Further I'm taking Boaz out of the group new researchers since Boaz preceded Coon and Coon's work was in part an effort to refute the Boaz school of thought. Finally I'm changing Middle East to Greater Middle East for clarity; I believe Coon meant from Afghanistan across North Africa. Nitpyck (talk) 21:29, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  multiregional  evolution  

message: I noticed that the criticism section says that pretty much he was not liked; however, all criticism seems to be unspecific as it does not mention why his works were disputed, and on what grounds, just that they were. Where was his thesis criticized? Which of his concepts? And why? And were the other "more advanced" theories better at explained what he "failed" to explain? I say this because criticism sections aren't welcomed in the first place here on Wikipedia, let alone be ambiguous. --136.183.240.185 (talk) 14:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I disagree, criticism sections are common on controversial wikipedia articles, especially if there is a significant amount, which there is here - his views did not find acceptance, and I think this section does a good job of explaining with references to point one in the right direction as to why. Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 15:34, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I did not advocate taking down the criticism section; all I asked was to provide actual criticism of where he was wrong -- no where in the section is explained, so it does not do a "good job of explaining with references to point one in the right direction as to why". --136.183.240.185 (talk) 22:54, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

text: Coon was criticized in large part because many of his specific ideas were contrary to findings of other researchers. If we turn to the most  reliable sources, we find that few of the ideas that Coon originated have stood the test of time. That should be reflected in the article, because articles on Wikipedia are to be  verifiable and  neutral in point of view. This article, and many more, still needs to be updated in light of better sources. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 13:06, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Criticism 

message: Legitimate use of square brackets in excerpted material is limited to saving the reader's time (usually by reducing text) while providing information about the intent of the source's author (Jackson in this case) that no reasonable reader of the source would dispute. But in this case our editing colleague saved
: segregationist [and Coon relative] Carleton Putnam, 
inserting the bracketed three-word phrase into the otherwise verbatim quotation of the Jackson's complete abstract (p. 247) of the 39-page paper that is the editor's stated source.    It is true that Jackson put some significance on the information that Coon and Putnam were relatives. The untitled introductory section ends with two paragraphs (p. 250) that each mention Putnam. One 'graph presents "[interest] in the activities of" Putnam, within the first of his paper's three goals, and presents the second goal as
: trac[ing] Putnam’s relationship with Carleton Coon [ -- ] a relationship I will argue is much closer than previously thought. 
Those two 'graphs set the stage for the first titled section, 
: Carleton Putnam and the "Equalitarian Dogma"
which begins 
: The scion of an established New England family (and a cousin to Carleton Coon), Carleton Putnam ....
It would be easy (the more so if one read little or none of what follows that) to construe his interest as lying in nothing more nor less than that cousinhood (whose number of generations of remoteness goes unspecified by Jackson). Nevertheless, what follows only undercuts that construction. Jackson offers no suggestion that Putnam's solicitations to Coon were premised on their genetic relationship, but plenty that the congruence of their views made sense of Coons assistance to Putnam's project.    Jackson's more detailed comment, at p. 255, 
: Coon’s response was to invite Putnam to his home to discuss the matter [of Putnam's writings on race] as well as to see some antiques that had once belonged to their mutual ancestor, Revolutionary War General Israel Putnam....
does not rule out his finding that their genetic link compounded the explicit covertness of their cooperation.  But the early mention is of a "cousin", which technically includes anyone with a common ancestor other than a one or both parents (any other human, we now realize!), and he means "a cousin via a traceable common ancestor". And 1904-1718= 186 years suggests Izzy Putnam would have had around 500 descendants in Coon's generation -- if his line reproduced only enough to replace themselves (but didn't marry 1st thru 19th cousins). His failure to go beyond mentioning the fact that the Coon papers implicitly mention that link makes it unlikely that he found it much more than a coincidence; on the other hand, his detailing of forms of assistance of Putnam by Coon and his being satisfied to omit mention of the genealogy in the abstract, make that assistance the obvious object of his concern about the closeness of the relationship.     Nevertheless, our colleague has "second-guessed" Sawyer, suggesting an editorial insight that that author intended the genetic relationship to be a major point in the paper, and has abused the reader by implicitly claiming that that unlikely view is essentially a mere rewording, for clarity or grammar, of the abstract.   Mention of the genealogy, appropriately subordinated, would IMO be valuable.  Mention in the colleague's fashion is a serious error and an instance of OR, and damages the article. I will provide some kind of revision remedying the damage.--Jerzy•t 21:25, 10 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quote in "Posthumous reputation" secn 

message: Ugh! I started trying to relieve the vagueness about TOoR in the Bio secn, without realizing that discussion of Coon's views is scattered in several sections.   My draft may be of some value, but I'm not willing to undertake the bigger task of figuring out whether and how to refactor. Its text, following, may help some interested colleague, or not:
: In his "Introduction", he recounted "decid[ing] that the framework for the study of fossil man should be built in two dimensions, time and space", in contrast to "most other writers", whom he saw as having "ignored or neglected geography." He contrasted them to Franz Weidenreich (died 1948), who had studied what was then called Sinanthropus, and concluded that (in Coon's wording) "From the evolutionary point of view, [he] was more primitive than any known living population [while] racially he was Mongoloid." Coon acknowledged that prevailing professional views saw races as subdivisions of homo sapiens that could arise only after the species itself had evolved, but had drawn on views he attributed to Ernst Mayr, G.G. Simpson, and others, to conclude that - - - 
That's based on the Intro, and perhaps fragments of the early pages of the first chapter, which i expected to suffice to elucidate what i understand as a model of "racial characteristics persisting thru each race's evolutionary acquisition, at vastly different times, of the same constellation of traits that constitute a H.-erectus-to-H.-sapiens change of species".   Happy editing!--Jerzy•t 04:33, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Biography" secn and related potential refactoring 

message: The photo putatively of Carleton S. Coon is that of Alfonso Ribiero.
Was the page vandalized?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by TLauckBenson (talk • contribs) 16:23, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Photo is not Carleton S. Coon