It really does, that's what makes it interesting to read.

So to summarize it all, would it be fair to say that a race is a loosely defined set of physical traits, of which the the traits themselves are genetic but the grouping of which traits belong to which race is social? Can we agree on that?

All the new and important sounding terminology like social construct, SJW, Bigotry has distracted people from facts that mattered to facts that does not mattered.

Genetics make it easy for someone to be a certain race, but difficult to be another race.

Similarly genetics make it easy for someone to be a man or women, but make it difficult to be the other sex.

It is advisable for people to follow the easy way and save a ton of tears, but if another individual want to take the hard path, it is their freedom. However said individual has no moral right to convince others to pursue the hard path too, because it easily make others life miserable.

It is the moral choice to convince people against hurt and hardship. However if the convincing induce the same amount of hurt and hardship, then maybe we should not pursue conviction on said unique people.

It is impossible for modern man to discuss these issues without competition and politics to enter it. The best compromise I could make for the issue of race science would be yes, there are genetic differences between the different 'sub-groups' of human beings on Earth, but I don't see why we can't study this part of ourselves without trying to use the knowledge we learn to control and/or destroy those we see as our enemies.

That's why we're truly fucked as a race of life in the universe. We simply cannot remove the desire to win/compete/conquer/destroy. It's inherent in all of us to want to BE God... or at least a Demi-God with really kick ass powers. And even if we attempted to remove those traits forcefully using technology, such as the Transhumanists and Technocrats have been trying, we'd just be introducing yet another level of control and aggression on others. Humanity cannot escape the inevitable lust for knowledge and power.

So don't believe for a second that guys in white lab coats are studying shit in a petri dish so you're grandkids won't have to worry about cancer or poverty. No, they might think they are as individuals, but ultimately they're studying ways of controlling people using science as a weaponized form of information sharing. The government/military/corporation/defense contractor companies demand it. Any form of human knowledge that can be bottled up and sold to treat illness or cure disease can also be bottled up in a bomb and dropped on cities.

Sad thing is our brightest minds are really the only ones that seem to 'get it.' When you read quotes about technology or science, usually some of those most cautious about human advancement were guys like Einstein, Asimov, and Sagan. Genetics, eugenics, biotech, it seems so amazing... everything we could ever want from the genome fruit tree. But when we bite into that golden apple, there's always a worm.

Maybe I'm just naive on this point, but I really don't think that the opposition to the large immigration currents has anything to do with "racial harmony". Mixing very different genes is quite healthy for the gene pool and many people naturally find attractive what is completely different from themselves (me included).
The real reason for opposing this usually is the cultural aspect coming with it like lots of language barriers and especcially the vastly different ethical grounds mostly between humanist seculars and old fashioned religious people but other traditions they bring with them come into play here too.

Where I live, I've naturally encountered all kinds of ethical backgrounds in all kinds of ethnic groups (which are seldomly minorities here since it's a melting pot) and while it's often interesting if some communication is possible at all (which it mostly isn't due to language barriers and lots of racism on their part), I am shocked on a regular basis when it comes to their stance towards equality of the sexes for example, which in really many groups is mostly a total opposition to the very idea, which is weird, because they usually have their opposite (=far left feminists) backing them.

In terms of genetics, it is really not so much about physical traits at all as it is about common ancestors. Wikipedia (yes, yes, I know) explains it most simply with: So it could also just so happen that a person who you'd call "white" would share geographic ancestry with someone you might consider black, or two people you'd consider "mongoloid" would have a different geographic ancestries.

But saying 'This person is 'black' (the race) because they have dark skin, thick lips and tight wiry hair" has more to do with social constructs then genetics.

PS: I'm not seeing any hostility at all here, at least in the recent pages.

Common ancestors would typically mean common physical traits, though. That's what genetics are about, are they not? People who have dark skin, thick lips and tight wiry hair will have children with those same traits, and when a big enough number of people share those traits, specially when they share geographic ancestry, I feel it's fair to call that a race. The distinction may be fuzzy at times, and less clear cut than in tose species which had strict selective breeding for centuries (such as horses or dogs), but it's there. Generalizations aren't true 100% of the time, far from it, but we are statistically likely to fall into quite a few of the characteristics atributed to the groups we belong to.

I don't know, I feel like we all agree deep down and we're just arguing semantics. I don't think there's a "black gene" or a "white gene", which you either inherit or don't. It's murkier than that, but it is still there. Which physical traits you are born with is down to genetics, and the race you belong to depends on those traits; even if the link of which traits belong to which races is mostly social. I'm not talking superior nor inferior, just different. And difference is good IMO, it makes it worth going out and seeking new things.

For instance, I heard that asian people have some difference producing some enzyme or whatnot and therefore have a harder time digesting beer. I heard it when offered a belgian beer to an asian guy and the reply was: "are you kidding me? I'm Chinese! I can't drink that stuff. We get all red on the face and can't handle it well". I did notice that Japanese people I drank with seemed to tolerate cocktails worse than I and my friends did, but that may be circumstancial. hedwards would know better since he lived in China for a time IIRC. But I never botheed properly fact checking the assertion this one Chinese person told me. Point is, I now typically am careful before inviting an asian people to a (heavy) beer, would that make me racist?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aX_mqibwfUQ

Birthday video.

Yes it does. You're racist and you're a Neonazi white supremacist doncha know? No doubt you hate kittens, puppies and gay wedding cake (Hmm ... gay wedding cake? Sounds vaguely like a euphemism for something obscene). X-D

Excuse me, I already stated that I like dogs, including puppies. Both boiled in a stew and fried.

But it is an irrelevant and as meaningless a difference as a "race" of hairy bald people or a race of fat people (I think you were in fact the one that made this comparison before?). There are dark-skinned, thick-lipped, wirey haired people who aren't african or "black", there are fair skinned, light-haired people who aren't "white", and these aren't just exceptions to a generality.
It gets even more confusing when terms like "asian" are used, because it just means a continent, one which has a huge variety of vastly different looking people.
Taking for example something I'm more familiar with, here are some examples of the "common physical traits" of pathans (probably unfortunately most famous outside of South Asia for making up the major component of what is known as the Taliban), a Pakistani/Afghani group that some Pakistanis might even call or treat as a "race", since they share common ancestors and geography:

Imran Khan, Aftab Ahmad Sherpao, Sharbat Gula, Yusuf Pathan, Some guy, Some model

All of these people share common ancestors, a common geography, but not so much physical traits. Are they the same race? Are one of them "asian" and one of them "white" and one of them "black"? To compound the hilarity and confusion, Pathans also share "genetic heritage" with jewish populations. Does that make them semite?
This is what I meant when I said that race is a societal construct, rather than genetic.

See, we basically agree. You can take any one set of (inheritable) physical traits and call a race those who fit them, but it's not particularly useful to do so. Plus, it gets really confusing around the edges and there are exceptions to the rule.

And I'm going nowhere with this. Race is a term that can be applied to human beings, but it's pretty pointless and (trusting hedwards, as I haven't looked into his claims in the end) scientifically incorrect. Yay.

I know I'm a "mutt" & is not the least bit bothered by it. that in of itself doesn't make me worse or better than anybody else IMHO

Glad this one didn't have someone jumping out of the cake. But yeah; one since it began and around 6 months since I jumped in. And an end I do not see. I wonder what all will be going down this time next year. Here's to surviving!

Also; good to see some back and forth in here!

Syrian Girl and Paul Joseph Watson chat about Gamergate back in April. Never seen it before - maybe you missed it too?

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