life is good said:
Asians who play poker often have absolutely -- beyond god-awful breath.
Is that racial, genetic?
I would say no, but cultural. Can they not brush their teeth? Yes of course. Can they put better things into their body? Yes of course. The difference of our views would seem to be that you are saying that it is because of genetics that these things occur -- I disagree completely, and say that it's cultural things.
No, that is an in incorrect assessment. First of all, as I will demonstrate, it's not always an either or. Secondly, your example of Asians having bad breathe could be the result of a myriad of causes. Assuming it is purely "cultural" in this instance, that still in no way proves that all group differences are only cultural. There are obviously differences between different cultures, for example Americans and Canadians have different ways of pronouncing the word "out". Do Canadians say "oot" because of their different genetics? I doubt it. It's the environmental influence that causes Canadians to speak with such funny accents.
However, the fact our environment shapes us does not mean it is the only factor that shapes us and genetics play no role. That's why I said, it's not necessarily either or. Some differences, such as the American vs Canadian accent we can guess have more to do with environment than genetics, while other differences, such as the physical differences between Eskimos and Sub-Saharan Africans, are clearly rooted in genetics. In many cases it could also be a combination of both. For example, take the example Intentional pointed out about Asians behaving "systematically". I would agree that Asians tend to collectivist and value conformity to group values. Obviously that's influenced by culture. If you raised a Chinese baby in an American family that valued individualism I'd wager that that Chinese baby would be less likely to adhere the collectivist mindset that often characterizes Asian societies. However, that does not mean there is not also a genetic influence at play that predisposes Asians toward creating collectivist cultures. On the contrary, I would ask why you think genetics and culture have no influence on each other? For example, if the Japanese happen to frown on rebellious individualist types and punish non conformity severely (for example, harsh punishments for criminal behavior) than I think it stands to reason that those people whose genes predispose them toward this kind of behavior would have less breeding opportunities and thus tend to be selected out of the gene pool.
It's like the question of why are Asians so successful in school. Many people will want to claim it is merely because of Asian culture, which values education. While it is indeed true that many Asians value education and pressure their kids to do well in school, you have to consider the possibility that one of the reasons they do that is because they are genetically intelligent. Do you think a nation consisting of extremely dumb people would be just as likely to create a culture that placed great value on intellectual pursuits as a nation consisting of highly intelligent people? Do you think it's possible that in a culture that valued intellectual pursuits highly intelligent people might have more breeding opportunities than people of low intelligence? Culture, environment and genetics are interrelated.
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I don't know, in the end it's a pretty uninteresting conversation. Why would I want to talk about Asians who have bad breath? No reason.
Now, you are not talking about poker playing Asians, but for instance simply black people.
You say they do not own dogs as much as white people.
Why would you think genetics is the cause for this, as opposed to the over-riding cultural factor -- centuries of first slavery, and then continued mal-treatment and suppression.
What's that got to do with owning dogs? Are you aware that there are black people in other countries besides the US where they were never enslaved and did you know that there is still slavery in Africa? I have no idea about the number of whites vs blacks that own dogs and I am not saying slavery couldn't impact it, but I think the first step in answering that question would be to compare data on the rate of dog ownership in countries where blacks weren't enslaved. My point is that assuming slavery is the reason that blacks own fewer dogs (if that's even true, I don't know) is just as unfounded as assuming it's genetics. For all we know, it could be a combination of factors. In this kind of scenario, more research is needed.
Group differences are real but it's not always easy to pinpoint their exact nature and causes. Unfortunately it has become almost impossible to discuss these differences in current America because of the taboo nature of the topic. Whenever a minority group is under-perferming in a certain area for example, the assumption is always that it must be because of racism and oppression because it simply couldn't be that that particular group simply isn't as good in that area. Of course there's also a double standard in the sense that you rarely hear people complaining that there are too many blacks in the NBA or NFL. I recently heard Sam Harris make this exact point, and while I am not a fan of Sam Harris overall I did think he did a good job explaining this concept. He said some are now saying that if blacks make up 13% of the population then 13% of cardiologists should be black, otherwise it's racism and that's ludicrous. You will actually see articles making claims like this in the mainstream media and I think this angers a lot of people because when they push back they are accused of racism. Again, that's not to say that racism couldn't be the reason or a reason for fewer black cardiologists but you can't simply assume it.
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History of the debate
John Locke's An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690) is often cited as the foundational document of the "blank slate" view. Locke was criticizing RenΓ© Descartes's claim of an innate idea of God universal to humanity. Locke's view was harshly criticized in his own time. Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury, complained that by denying the possibility of any innate ideas, Locke "threw all order and virtue out of the world", leading to total moral relativism. Locke's was not the predominant view in the 19th century, which on the contrary tended to focus on "instinct". Leda Cosmides and John Tooby noted that William James (1842β1910) argued that humans have more instincts than animals, and that greater freedom of action is the result of having more psychological instincts, not fewer.[19]
The question of "innate ideas" or "instincts" were of some importance in the discussion of free will in moral philosophy. In 18th-century philosophy, this was cast in terms of "innate ideas" establishing the presence of a universal virtue, prerequisite for objective morals. In the 20th century, this argument was in a way inverted, as some philosophers now argued that the evolutionary origins of human behavioral traits forces us to concede that there is no foundation for ethics (J. L. Mackie), while others treat ethics as a field in complete isolation from evolutionary considerations (Thomas Nagel).[20]
In the early 20th century, there was an increased interest in the role of the environment, as a reaction to the strong focus on pure heredity in the wake of the triumphal success of Darwin's theory of evolution.[21]
During this time, the social sciences developed as the project of studying the influence of culture in clean isolation from questions related to "biology". Franz Boas's The Mind of Primitive Man (1911) established a program that would dominate American anthropology for the next fifteen years. In this study he established that in any given population, biology, language, material and symbolic culture, are autonomous; that each is an equally important dimension of human nature, but that no one of these dimensions is reducible to another.
The tool of twin studies was developed as a research design intended to exclude all confounders based on inherited behavioral traits.[22] Such studies are designed to decompose the variability of a given trait in a given population into a genetic and an environmental component.
John B. Watson in the 1920s and 1930s established the school of purist behaviorism that would become dominant over the following decades. Watson is often said to have been convinced of the complete dominance of cultural influence over anything that heredity might contribute, based on the following quote which is frequently repeated without context:
"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select β doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors." (Behaviorism, 1930, p. 82).
You can believe what you want, but for many people, the obviousness of this view is profound.
I suppose, the obviousness of distinctness of "race" based on genetics, is equally deep for you.
I am no geneticist but I think recent research is contradicting this view. Yes, obviously environment plays an incredibly important role in an individuals development and you can train people to behave in ways that even go against their natural tendencies. However, the fact remains that our genetic makeup also plays a major role in how we develop as unpalatable as some people may find this fact.
You might be able to train people of low intelligence to become doctors and lawyers but that does not mean they will perform equally well as those with high intelligence. You might be able to teach an average person to have a strong chess game but that does not mean they will be able to hold their own against Magnus Carlson. When I was in school I remember there were some very bright kids. One guy got a perfect score on the SAT and pretty much everything else. We all grew up in similar environments and went to the same schools with the same teachers and yet some kids vastly out performed others. I even took an SAT training class, not because I needed it but more out of curiosity I wanted to see if the claims were true that the course could significantly boost my score. I took several practice tests in the course and my score varied almost 200 points from best to worst, but it did not improve from the beginning of the class to the end. Now other people may have had different experiences and I certainly think its possible that some people are making reasoning and/or test taking mistakes that lower their scores and could be remedied by such a course but it also seems as though the SAT measures some sort of innate reasoning ability which cannot be easily learned. I think there is clearly a genetic component to intelligence and this explains why some kids were able to score 1600 with relative ease, while other students struggled to score 1,000 despite similar preparation times. It's genetic.
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The path of the herbalist is to open ourselves to nature in an innocent and pure way. SHe in turn will open her bounty and reward us with many valuable secrets. May the earth bless you. - Michael Tierra
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