Talk:Historical race concepts

Consumer genetics and WP:DUE

@999eggs999: before reverting again, you might want to read WP:DUE and WP:EW. --Rsk6400 (talk) 18:48, 17 April 2021 (UTC)

@999eggs999: Your repeated edits have some problems: WP:DUE basically says that you can't answer to the declaration of an international body of scientists (AAPA) using a source by a single scientist and another one by a private company. MOS:INTRO says that the lede should summarize the body of the article, while your edits introduce an idea that is not covered in the body. Furthermore, the article is about historical concepts, not about the current debate on races. And, maybe most important: WP:BRD says that you have to join the discussion here to avoid an edit war. Please click on the links I gave to see the relevant guidelines of Wikipedia. If you repeat your changes, I will take the case to WP:AN/3RR. --Rsk6400 (talk) 05:12, 18 April 2021 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: You started the edit war and should have created a talk entry to express your disagreements after your initial revert. WP:DUE says nothing of the sort, this is your personal opinion. Since the article concerns historical racial concepts, then a contemporary statement from the AAPA (which is not once mentioned in the body of the article) should not be included, period. If it is included, then an opposing contemporary statement from a reliable source, such as the Harvard Reich Lab, should be included to maintain neutrality. The introductory statement that With the rise of modern genetics, the concept of distinct human races in a biological sense has become obsolete is particularly misleading and is not supported by the quote from the AAPA, which discusses the social consequences of historical racial concepts. Furthermore, at least one third of this article is dedicated to modern debunking of historical race concepts. If you wish to be this stringent, then this section should be placed in a separate article titled Criticism of Historical Race Concepts, just as the Moon Landing Conspiracies article is separate to the Moon Landing article. If not, readers should be presented with a neutral point of view that better reflects the current debate within the scientific community, which is far more nuanced than is implied by this article, as documented by contemporary studies, such as Fuerst (2015) (p.84). -- 999eggs999 (talk)

See this edit for an updated version of introduction with no references to contemporary sources. This is a fair and neutral compromise (for the introduction); it better summarizes the content of the article and includes many useful additional links. Do not reincorporate inappropriate contemporary sources that are not mentioned in the article body. -- 999eggs999 (talk)

WP:DUE says Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all .... That's why you can't trump AAPA with Reich. Of course, the AAPA is important because the debunking by modern genetics is the end of the history of those race concepts. You were right, AAPA was missing in the body of the article, that's why I added it. You should really read the AAPA text, because its focus is not the discussion of the social consequences, but of the genetic reasons why races in the biological understanding of the word don't exist. That's the reason why the narrative "UNESCO was denying the existence of races for reasons that are un-scientific" doesn't work. Regarding the edit war, I'd like to remind you that it was me who started this discussion. --Rsk6400 (talk) 18:01, 18 April 2021 (UTC)

The Harvard Reich Lab is not a "tiny minority." Modern genetics have not debunked the concepts, in fact modern genetics have validated many aspects of such historical concepts, as confirmed by Reich and many leading geneticists, including large global leading organizations (e.g., 23andme). Any modern racial concepts included on a Wiki regarding historical racial concepts should include the full spectrum of modern racial concepts, which are by no means as biased against the existence of racial groups as this page implies, as demonstrated by numerous comprehensive studies. There was no claim that UNESCO was denying the existence of races for reasons that were unscientific, merely that a scientific debate began after the Second World War and that it was driven by sociopolitical motives - an undeniable fact. Moreover, UNESCO did not deny the existence of biological races, which you would know, if you had read their statements. I am very familiar with the work and stances of the AAPA, they exhibit the same overt biases as yourself, as identified by your own user page. You have a personal political agenda and aim to withhold and distort information from readers. -- 999eggs999 (talk)

@999eggs999: I'm wondering why you said that my user page exhibits "overt biases". Are you referring to the profound dislike of all forms of racism that I claim to have acquired ? --Rsk6400 (talk) 09:48, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

NPOV issues in terms of anthropology around the world?

It seems that while American and many (but not all) Western European anthropologists don't find validity in racial categories, the same cannot be said of those in other regions and countries—starting with Russia and Eastern Europe, plus China and other Asian countries. Just a brief survey of the scholarship reveals this to be true—see here for one obvious example, in which it's made clear that: "Race, once the central concept in physical anthropology worldwide, now varies in the degree of support it receives in different regions." Curious if those with more expertise have concern about the article failing to include non-Western perspectives. Thanks! Elle Kpyros (talk) 19:15, 28 April 2021 (UTC)

That's not an issue - your source is nearly 17 years old. Also, it's a matter of biology, not of perspective. --Rsk6400 (talk) 19:23, 28 April 2021 (UTC)

This article cites the American Anthropological Association in the lead as the definitive view—and certainly anthropology has had more effect on historical race concepts than the relatively much-newer contributions of genetics. And even Wikipedia itself, on the subject of race, acknowledges significant variation in the views of present-day anthropologists. How familiar are you with the race concept in anthropology in Chinese or other non-Western societies? And in terms of genetics, there's no mention of new information that is challenging the current "orthodoxy" on group differences—what about the work of David Reich and others? Elle Kpyros (talk) 22:32, 28 April 2021 (UTC)

This kind of discussion has a tendency to go on until the heat death of the universe, e.g. Talk:Race_and_intelligence#"Current"_scientific_consensus, so please excuse me from answering the same kind of question for the one thousand and first time. --Rsk6400 (talk) 05:04, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

Edit on Darwin's views on race

1."Darwin was, after all, a man of his time, class and society. True, he was committed to a monogenic, rather than the prevailing polygenic, view of human origins, but he still divided humanity into distinct races according to differences in skin, eye or hair colour. He was also convinced that evolution was progressive, and that the white races—especially the Europeans—were evolutionarily more advanced than the black races, thus establishing race differences and a racial hierarchy." https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2672903/

2.First, although Darwin may indeed have opposed slavery, he did not believe in racial equality. In the Descent of Man (1871) he cited the work of his generation’s leading ethnologists — J. Barnard Davis and Paul Broca — in linking cranial capacity with racial and ethnic hierarchies. Darwin was quite clear on the matter; “science” demonstrated that craniometrics allowed for the ranking of intellect accordingly: "The belief that there exists in man some close relationship between the size of the brain and the development of the intellectual faculties is supported by the comparison of skulls of savage and civilized races, of ancient and modern people, and by the analogy of the whole vertebrate series. Dr. J. Barnard Davis has proved [emphasis added], by many careful measurements, that the mean internal capacity of the skull in Europeans is 92.3 cubic inches; in Americans 87.5; in Asians 87.1; and in Australians only 81.9 cubic inches." http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?itemID=F937.1&viewtype=text&pageseq=238

3.Darwin would tell the Reverend Charles Kingsley in a letter dated February 6, 1862, “It is very true what you say about the higher races of men, when high enough, replacing & clearing off the lower races. In 500 years how the Anglo-saxon race will have spread & exterminated whole nations; & in consequence how much the Human race, viewed as a unit, will have risen in rank.” https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-3439.xml

4.Divergence in mental and social characteristics, Darwin proposed, was due to the environmental conditions in which groups lived, and advancement in civilization was a by-product of competition among groups. Further, the harsher the environment, the more inventiveness was required for survival. https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/a0013502--Katya72918 (talk) 06:12, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

@Katya72918: Thanks for responding positively to my message on your talk page. Unfortunately, there seems to be a misunderstanding: This talk page is not for providing sources, but for discussing how to improve the article. The sources should be added to the article itself in the form of references, see Help:References. Since at least one of your 4 sources is a primary source, you might also want to look at WP:PSTS. Finally, I think text based on your sources should not be added to the section Historical_race_concepts#Disproof_by_modern_genetics, but it might be possible to add it to the section Historical_race_concepts#Charles_Darwin_and_race (which I didn't check, so I'm not sure about that). --Rsk6400 (talk) 11:16, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: But Isn't that single line is coming from your interpretation and cherrypicking of a primary source(Darwins Book).--Katya72918 (talk) 13:09, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

To be honest, I didn't see that before. But I don't think it's a real problem, since the section focuses on the arguments for the rejection of distinct races by modern biology. And the sentence about Darwin and Blumenbach only states that one of the central arguments was already observed by them. --Rsk6400 (talk) 16:33, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

Yes, it is a big problem. First you are interpreting a primary source incorrectly. Besides there is a huge difference between Darwin's argument about race and modern anthropology.I think it should be removed or added more context.--Katya72918 (talk) 12:14, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

The interpretation given in the text (not by me, though) is The fact that there are no sharp distinctions between the supposed racial groups ... Please explain why that should be wrong. --Rsk6400 (talk) 13:06, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

@Rsk6400:Because that is not book says.The exact wording is "It may be doubted whether any character can be named which is distinctive of a race and is constant". This is not equal to "there are no sharp distinctions between the supposed racial groups" .Your interpretation of Darwin sentence directly contradicts his view on difference between races on cranial capacity and intelligence(as I quoted above).What he probably means that there are variations within races even for characteristics that are popularly believed to be belong to certain race--Katya72918 (talk) 17:25, 26 September 2021 (UTC)s.

@Rsk6400:PLease reply why you still haven't edited it back. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Katya72918 (talk • contribs) 20:11, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

@Katya72918: Thanks for your observation and sorry for replying late. I was distracted both by real life and by other problems here on WP. I still hold that Darwin should be discussed in his own section, but I changed the critical sentence to what I think can be based on the given reference. If you see more problems, feel free to improve the article and / or to discuss. --Rsk6400 (talk) 07:43, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

Judaism and race

The section on the Middle Ages uncritically endorses the view that anti-Black racism originates from the Talmud, which is a view that not even the cited source endorses. I think that section badly needs a re-write and additional sources. Bohemian Baltimore (talk) 04:56, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Some material from Curse of Ham#Racism and slavery section can be inserted as they see fit. --WikiLinuz {talk} 14:13, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Part of a series ?

@Biohistorian15: I removed the template "Part of a series on Historical race concepts" again for four reasons: (1) It was added without any explanation in June[1]. (2) We already a navbar in the footer. (3) The very strange way of selecting items for that template from Template:Historical definitions of race was already discussed at Wikipedia:Fringe_theories/Noticeboard#"Historical_race_concepts"_sidebar. (4) It is not used at any other page (although you are trying to add it to certain pages where it is IMHO either irrelevant or superfluous). So, there's no series. Finally, you might want to claim that it is part of the stable version here, but until your recent changes to the template, especially the addition of the picture, it had much less prominence. Rsk6400 (talk) 06:18, 9 October 2024 (UTC)

@Rsk6400. These notions do not make a lot of sense and have been directly addressed in my edit summaries. Besides, if you had concerns about selective coverage, you could have simply started editing the template yourself.

Please do not complain about a newly minted template not yet being transcluded in lots of places and then simultaneously go around removing the template on relatively vague grounds. You are, as far as I can tell, WP:GAMING THE SYSTEM here, hoping some negligent admin deletes it without due process... Biohistorian15 (talk) 06:23, 9 October 2024 (UTC)

I'd suggest you either strike that one comment of yours over at FT/N or you self-rv your removals; you can't reasonably ask to have it both ways. Biohistorian15 (talk) 06:42, 9 October 2024 (UTC)

More illustrations?

Some illustrations I randomly found on Wikimedia Commons in the last few weeks:

BML Le Lointain partie 2 62 SJ G 101 21 Anthropographie 01

From the book Indigenous Races of the Earth

Asiatiska folk, Nordisk familjebok

No replies required; maybe somebody wants to add one of these in the future. Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:34, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

Unsourced biographies

There are several sections that give profiles of certain thinkers (all white guys) and their views, but lack in-line citations. Some these guys, like Gabineau, are relatively obscure and it's not clear why they're being highlighted specifically when major figures like Cuvier are not. These aren't necessarily bad inclusions, but they read like mini-essays and without knowing their sources, it's hard to check for original research, pov, and undue weight. The Darwin section has some of the same issues -- he's obviously notable, but where is the analysis coming from? I've added some Citation Needed tags, but it feels like we need a deeper conversation about weight and the range of perspectives represented. Duxbag (talk) 02:05, 31 October 2024 (UTC)