> I expect that our concepts of "race" will conform to some real diversity in
> the human gene pool and perhaps reflect some historic regional themes in
> physical appearance. It is important to note however, that there is as yet no
> reason to believe that these obvious physical themes should conform in any
> appreciable manner to any further underlying genetic themes beyond the obvious
> physical features. Unless there are reproductively discreet genetic races
> there is no reason to believe that these would be anything more than physical
> themes with no further underlying genetic basis.
>
This is conjectuere, I would say that the differences run the gambit effects, from
the physical, to the intellectual.
> One of the important things to remember about genetics in sexually reproducing
> populations, is that other underlying genes can and will attatch and detatch
> themselves from the more obvious genetic manifestations with a complete ease
> that can only be detected through DNA testing.
>
> A short way of explaining this: Sexual reproduction means that the genetic
> deck gets shuffled every generation. Cultural selection (without the aid of
> DNA testing) may be able to keep part of that deck from shuffling as much
> (those genes that determine obvious appearances), but none of these cards are
> necessarily glued together, and the rest of the deck has surely been shuffled
> beyond any recognizable culturally based racial distinctions.
>
> Once again, we can't really begin to understand this until we start over
> ignoring these cultural distinctions. Once we have a better answer based
> solely on DNA, it might be interesting to revisit these cultural distinctions
> to better understand how genes and memes interact, but until then, they will
> only distract us. "Race" is still culturally generated and not a real genetic
> concept. As long as people keep obsessing about it and bringing it up in what
> should be a genetic study, our progress will be hampered.
>
> -Jake
BTW, I did read that article some was refering to about different cognitve
skills in relation to genetics. It was pretty convincing but was not based on DNA.
It was in Scientific American - June I think.
Sodom