just kill me...,
2005-06-24 14:55:07
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"Steve King (R-IA) referred to...,
2005-06-27 10:42:30
human selection:
there are some recent news items about ashkenazic genes where European Jews experienced a high selectivity for "commerce" and heart medication for those of "self-identified" african decent, related to selectivity for resistance to malaria. If there are any facts of the matters the first suggests the extreme brutality of anti-semitism in pre-modern Europe - detectable differences for "commerce" actually coming out ahead of correlated suseptibilities to disease - and the other the extremely brutal effects of malaria on populations over some thousands of years.
Let's assume the facts of the matter are in favor of these group genetic variances, which may not be entirely unreasonable. Heredity was discovered as scientific fact and that will eventually be the end of that. Arguments against bigotries and racism cannot be and never have been founded on the idea that there is no genetic variance in the population, but that such variance should, for numerous reasons, be cause for celebration for the survivability of the species, of which we are all one race. Arguments for bigotry have been rationalized on the idea that genetic variance in populations pre-supposes one or the other's "superiority", often encapsulated in the selective environment of a particular "civillization", in many cases an imagined intra-civillization, which is of likewise "superiority". Such superiority usually exists as a particularly racist condition, bearing tactical advantages for one group over others from environmental, cultural, societal, economic, institutional, etc., forces. Racism, QED, is fact. As all such superior civillizations learn sooner or later such conditions can unexepectedly and suddenly change. The racist condition afflicting much of the West is only one such example, and among the harshist. Racism, QED, is false.
The case of European Jews, were it true, is particularly interesting because it suggests, amidst arguments about global warming that negative selective forces can be anthropogenic. I say "negative" because I assume that human happiness and accomplishment are not particularly dependent upon capacity for "commerce", whereas they are particularly dependent on not being afflicted with incapacitating diseases. I suppose one could argue with that assumption. One could argue with the assumption that survivability of the species should be of primary concern, too, but I'm not sure how, never having encountered it.
Whether preserving genetic diversity and preventing our development into a species of bald, tan, genetic copies of one another is a worthwhile venture I'll leave for the time when forces of cultural conservativism and the nation state disolve utterly and handsome sex-worthy singles are teleporting to exit wounds to foreign nations looking for hot mates.
I do casually wonder whether stories of these sorts create a divide between anti-evolution racists/god hates africa and their pro-evolution/eugenics counterparts. I don't suppose I'll find out because it'll never be raised as an issue between them in a country that still doesn't know how to talk openly about it.
