Re: [Air-L] racist comments by James Watson?
It's been suggested that more variation exists "within so-called racial groups than between them" and that race (which comes form the Italian razza and seems to have come into English in the 16th century) isn't that productive a scientific category. The website I'm quoting from also carries a link to the New York Times piece reporting on James Watson's "retraction" of his comment. Thats http://www.racismreview.com/blog/?p=73 and it also includes what I found to be an interesting link on whether race is a scientifically worthwhile category. In a text I read a long time ago (I seem to recall) was a comparison of race with class, or race discussed as *a* class in the sense of category. Sorry that the text's lost in the mists of time, as well as physically from my library, but maybe someone who works more closely than I do with biology and sociology will have info on thazt. ovibiously I have to be very careful to guard against or ciriticize arguments promoting eugenics/genocide. That was my original idea in posting what I did. for what it's worth, I got to the address I mentioned above by writing lewontin on racism into a major search engine and it also acquainted me with something I didn't know about called lewontin's fallacy, a statistical take. Personally I think Watson and hopefully many others, me included, have become more aware in part because of his mistake which, as I say, he's recognized. But I feel a graeat deal of anger at the situation in Jena, Louisiana not to mention that particular specific case of out-on-the-street life endangering racism. Too much anger, I emeant to write. To the suggestion that racist groups might use the comments of a very highly accomplished scientist to promote racism, well, that is only part of the danger, but yes, of course, that is the danger. Best regards, William William Bain PhD Student Comparative Literature Department of Spanish Philology Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
Race is a completely useless concept for conducting science. So says the American Anthropological Association. I'm sure their very informed statement about this on their website. --Christian Nelson On Oct 21, 2007, at 3:16 AM, William Bain wrote:
It's been suggested that more variation exists "within so-called racial groups than between them" and that race (which comes form the Italian razza and seems to have come into English in the 16th century) isn't that productive a scientific category. The website I'm quoting from also carries a link to the New York Times piece reporting on James Watson's "retraction" of his comment. Thats http://www.racismreview.com/blog/?p=73 and it also includes what I found to be an interesting link on whether race is a scientifically worthwhile category. In a text I read a long time ago (I seem to recall) was a comparison of race with class, or race discussed as *a* class in the sense of category. Sorry that the text's lost in the mists of time, as well as physically from my library, but maybe someone who works more closely than I do with biology and sociology will have info on thazt. ovibiously I have to be very careful to guard against or ciriticize arguments promoting eugenics/genocide. That was my original idea in posting what I did. for what it's worth, I got to the address I mentioned above by writing lewontin on racism into a major search engine and it also acquainted me with something I didn't know about called lewontin's fallacy, a statistical take. Personally I think Watson and hopefully many others, me included, have become more aware in part because of his mistake which, as I say, he's recognized. But I feel a graeat deal of anger at the situation in Jena, Louisiana not to mention that particular specific case of out-on-the-street life endangering racism. Too much anger, I emeant to write. To the suggestion that racist groups might use the comments of a very highly accomplished scientist to promote racism, well, that is only part of the danger, but yes, of course, that is the danger. Best regards, William
William Bain PhD Student Comparative Literature Department of Spanish Philology Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http:// listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Subject: Re: [Air-L] racist comments by James Watson?
Race is a completely useless concept for conducting science. So says the American Anthropological Association. I'm sure their very informed statement about this on their website.
I've heard it said that race is a political delineation, not a scientific one. --e
Exactly. On Oct 22, 2007, at 1:32 PM, elw@stderr.org wrote:
Subject: Re: [Air-L] racist comments by James Watson?
Race is a completely useless concept for conducting science. So says the American Anthropological Association. I'm sure their very informed statement about this on their website.
I've heard it said that race is a political delineation, not a scientific one.
--e _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http:// listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Bien!Absolute! Guillermo! Well said! -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of William Bain Sent: Sunday, October 21, 2007 3:17 AM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-L] racist comments by James Watson? It's been suggested that more variation exists "within so-called racial groups than between them" and that race (which comes form the Italian razza and seems to have come into English in the 16th century) isn't that productive a scientific category. The website I'm quoting from also carries a link to the New York Times piece reporting on James Watson's "retraction" of his comment. Thats http://www.racismreview.com/blog/?p=73 and it also includes what I found to be an interesting link on whether race is a scientifically worthwhile category. In a text I read a long time ago (I seem to recall) was a comparison of race with class, or race discussed as *a* class in the sense of category. Sorry that the text's lost in the mists of time, as well as physically from my library, but maybe someone who works more closely than I do with biology and sociology will have info on thazt. ovibiously I have to be very careful to guard against or ciriticize arguments promoting eugenics/genocide. That was my original idea in posting what I did. for what it's worth, I got to the address I mentioned above by writing lewontin on racism into a major search engine and it also acquainted me with something I didn't know about called lewontin's fallacy, a statistical take. Personally I think Watson and hopefully many others, me included, have become more aware in part because of his mistake which, as I say, he's recognized. But I feel a graeat deal of anger at the situation in Jena, Louisiana not to mention that particular specific case of out-on-the-street life endangering racism. Too much anger, I emeant to write. To the suggestion that racist groups might use the comments of a very highly accomplished scientist to promote racism, well, that is only part of the danger, but yes, of course, that is the danger. Best regards, William William Bain PhD Student Comparative Literature Department of Spanish Philology Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
participants (4)
-
Christian Nelson -
elw＠stderr.org -
Heidelberg, Chris -
William Bain