I only took first-year genetics and biology many years ago, so if anyone wants to clarify the arguments I try to make below, please do. Sickle cell, Tay-Sachs and other ailments can be tied directly to parts of the DNA. So can several phenotypical variations among peoples. However, 1)these phenotypical differences (hair texture and color, the so-called nasal index, skin color, etc) do not vary sufficiently concordantly to sustain the coherence of racial classification and 2)these superficial phenotypical differences, much like the relation of one's big toe to its neighbor (is it bigger or smaller?),do not point to deep differences between the races which have defined in terms of these superficial phenotypic differences (in his admirable *Reconstructing Biology: Genetics and the New World Order*, John Vandermeer refers to this as the ideology of deep difference which he subjects to criticism). That the criteria used for racial classification do not point to or even suggest the existence of deep differences beyond themselves renders it impossible therefore for race to control the inheritance of any property such as intelligence (whatever that is) not tied to its definition (in *Race in the Making*, Lawrence Hirschfeld makes this important point which was ignored in *The Journal of Economic Literature* critique of the *Bell Curve*, by the way). Moreover, there is greater genetic variation within races than between them, underlining that superficial phenotypic differences which are tied directly to parts of our DNA do not point to deep racial differences among us. For some reason, Herrnstein and Murray, Dinesh D'Souza, James Q Wilson, etc. ad nauseum never really take up the present knowledge of genetic differences among human beings: they are psychologists, political scientists and hacks after all. They like to argue instead with Richard Lewontin over what twin studies show about the heritability of intelligence (though what the tests show is the mutability of so-called IQ, given the higher scores adoptees have than their biological parents--suggesting that even if the so-called intelligence measured by IQ were heritable, it can still be improved in a different environmental context). And they like to insist that the famed racial gap in IQ simply cannot be explained away as due to differences in parental socio-economic status. That is, they insinuate that there must be biological differences between the races which control for inheritance of intelligence because, as they see it, environmental differences cannot explain the racial IQ gap. D'Souza, who attempts to provide a cultural explanation for the IQ gap and other racial inequalities, grants the reasonableness of the biological theory on the ground of Occam's Razor. In short, these scholars do not systematically investigate the implications of what we really do about genetic variation among human beings. But this raises another question. If racial classification is incoherent (the criteria used for classification do not vary concordantly, even those criteria only point to skin-deep differences), then why are we so interested in the racial gap in IQ; what makes this an interesting fact? Some scholars argue that this is proof of a caste-like oppression of racialized minorities and a similar gap appears in other nations where there is such caste-like oppression (see Claude Fischer, et al. Inequality by Design: Cracking the Bell Curve). But let me pose another question about racial differences. The US Army is known to have conducted exams on which rural Southern whites scored lower than urban Northern blacks--despite the putative caste-like situation of blacks. Why isn't this the gap which needs to be explained? Isn't the national puzzlement, panic and perhaps handwringing over the racial gap in IQ not end up as nothing but a piece of propanganda, perhaps the basis for Kenneth Arrow's statistical discrimination against minorities? And then there could be some positive feedback: subjected to discrimination, minorities then endure poverty which undermines the opportunity for their children to acquire certain skills, the lack of which then disadvantages them further in the labor market in addition to the statistical discrimination they confront. I think Gunnar Myrdal referred to some such effect as cumulative causation...without any affirmative action now even possible to challenge it. Rakesh Grad student Ethnic Studies UC Berkeley >Hi folks, > >In the context of a discussion today of the social construction of race, >a student brought up the myth of differences in musculature between >Africans and Europeans, insisting that in fact there were real >and significant differences. > >This came in at the end of class, so next time I want to pursue it >along the lines of: "do all Africans have this alleged difference? ie, >South African Bantu speaking folks, as well as Northern desert dwellers >or eastern Somalis, and does this difference in muscle structure stop at >the Nile?" > >But beyond this, does anyone have an authoritative source on the genesis >of this belief, so I can set him (and the class) straight? > >Eban >_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ > >Eban Goodstein email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Department of Economics phone: 503-768-7626 >Lewis and Clark College fax: 503-768-7379 >Portland, OR 97219
