Every time I read about ancient DNA work, it's about Reich's research. Can anyone expert in the field shed light on that? He certainly seems to have a successful research group. And he's a good communicator, I got a lot out of his 2018 book. Who else should I be reading or reading about?
Is there any species, other than humans, that is found all across the globe (i.e. geographically separated), and has not differentiated into subspecies? Wolves, elephants, tigers, bears, and foxes have all been categorized into multiple subspecies each, distinct but able to interbreed.
The definition of what constitutes a species is a human construct.
Two birds living in the same locale but divided by a mountain range therefore not naturally breeding with each other would classify as a different species, even if they could breed with each other.
I mean people won't like the idea but that's not my point; what you describe variety in superficial traits while maintaining common traits
Applied to humans; skin color, eyes, dwarfism, hypertrichosis... can still interbreed
When it comes to categorization and taxonomy in leaky abstractions like languages the boundaries get a bit hand wavy and usually land on whatever fits the prevailing social desirability bias of the day
The same selection pressures that produced the variety of "superficial" traits also act on "non-superficial" traits - nature does not recognize this distinction.
Not many. Part of why we are like this is extreme mobility. Even before modern times we were always good at getting around and seem to have a desire to roam. Or at least enough of us do to mix up those gene pools.
This distinction seems more arbitrary over time. Growing up I was taught different species couldn’t interbreed. But what about Neanderthal and Sapiens?
I don't think you could have chosen a worse example. Dogs are themselves a subspecies, and are split into many different breeds, of wildly different character and physiology: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog#Taxonomy
Not that surprising when you consider, as the paper does, the explosion of very meaningful traits such as the ability to digest lactose and various anti-malaria adaptations e.g. Sickle Cell and the Duffy-null mutation.
It's just controversial for obvious reasons. The notion that human groups may have meaningfully evolved in different ways over the past 10,000 years, and may still be evolving, is an unpopular one on both ends of the political spectrum.
The reason no one wants to talk is that these discussions are always co-opted by racists wanting to affirm their beliefs, regardless of the underlying science. Reich in particular is borderline deliberate about attracting those sorts with his lab's research, because of how badly he chooses to handle the topic and terminology of race.
>Reich in particular is borderline deliberate about attracting those sorts with his lab's research, because of how badly he chooses to handle the topic and terminology of race.
Sorry, do you have any examples? His views that I've read [0, 1] are scientifically rigorous and terminologically precise, deftly navigating the politics that some consider extremely controversial. To wit, one of my favorite passages from [1], which deals specifically with terminology:
But “ancestry” is not a euphemism, nor is it synonymous with “race.” Instead, the term is born of an urgent need to come up with a precise language to discuss genetic differences among people at a time when scientific developments have finally provided the tools to detect them. It is now undeniable that there are nontrivial average genetic differences across populations in multiple traits, and the race vocabulary is too ill-defined and too loaded with historical baggage to be helpful. If we continue to use it we will not be able to escape the current debate, which is mired in an argument between two indefensible positions. On the one side there are beliefs about the nature of the differences that are grounded in bigotry and have little basis in reality. On the other side there is the idea that any biological differences among populations are so modest that as a matter of social policy they can be ignored and papered over. It is time to move on from this paralyzing false dichotomy and to figure out what the genome is actually telling us.
This particular passage is on p. 253 of [1], but everything in Chapter 11 ("The Genomics of Race and Identity," pp. 247-273) is well worth the read.
It's unfortunate that the URL happens to be buzzfeed, but there was an open letter to Reich by other academics about his terminology in the book you're quoting [0]. The short of it is that social categorizations we believe in like race intersect with genetics in a very complicated way. Reich is a world-class expert in genetics. He simply commits the same error as many other other experts in discounting the complexity of subjects he's adjacent to, but not directly an expert in.
I get that this is a high standard to hold him to (and I sure as heck don't meet it myself), but he should do better given his visibility in public discourse.
The crux of that letter is the "need to recognize that meaningful patterns of genetic and biological variation exist in our species that are not racial." This is true. However, this does not mean that there aren't also meaningful patterns of genetic and biological variation that do stratify according to ancestry (not race!). The letter tries to handwave this away, claiming that "[f]or several decades billions of dollars have been spent trying to find such differences. The result has been a preponderance of negative findings despite intrepid efforts to collect DNA data on millions of individuals in the hope of finding even the tiniest signals of difference." This is simply not true.
The letter also states that "[t]he public should not cede the power to define race to scientists who themselves are not trained to understand the social contexts that shape the formation of this fraught category." Also true! This is exactly why Reich explicitly avoids discussing "races" but rather populations and ancestries, which are rigorously defined strictly in terms of genetics.
I'll add that very few of the signatories of that letter have any experience, let alone expertise in genetics. Here are the first few:
Jonathan Kahn, James E. Kelley Professor of Law, Mitchell Hamline School of Law
Alondra Nelson, Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies, Columbia University; President, Social Science Research Council
Joseph L. Graves Jr., Associate Dean for Research & Professor of Biological Sciences, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Section G: Biological Sciences, Joint School of Nanoscience & Nanoengineering, North Carolina A&T State University, UNC Greensboro
Sarah Abel, Postdoc, Department of Anthropology, University of Iceland
Ruha Benjamin, Associate Professor, Department of African American Studies, Princeton University
Sarah Blacker, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin
Catherine Bliss, Associate Professor, Social and Behavioral Sciences, UC San Francisco
Out of the 67 signatories, I counted approximately 5 who might have sufficient genetics expertise to offer a meaningful scientific counterpoint to Reich's work (this is being charitable, as I included titles like "professor of Biological Sciences," which is no guarantee.) The rest were in fields like anthropology, sociology, law, and history.
People keep wondering why trust in scientific findings is in free fall. A big part of it is because many scientists have become comfortable lying when they feel it’s for a noble cause.
I really don't care if the people around me have physiological differences from me. It would be wonderful to explore that and such differences. But as OP pointed out the discussion gets co-opted by people who would kill others over physiological differences. How is such a viewpoint conducive to a peaceful society where millions of people with physiological differences exist?
For good reason, the wider community isn't able to have a productive conversation about it. I wouldn't even call that a noble reason, but a necessary one, unless you would be okay with inviting people that want you dead into discussion on scientific consensus.
> people who would kill others over physiological differences
Most of them just want to enforce borders. And then the dogma that we are all the same is co-opted by people who would see their ethnic group wiped out, as they are told that they don't even exist except as a meaningless social construct, and their desire for ethnic self-preservation is therefore illegitimate - there is nothing to preserve!
"To supercharge the search, Reich, Ali Akbari, a computational geneticist at Harvard Medical School, and their colleagues amassed the largest-ever collection of genomic data from ancient humans — from a total of 15,836 individuals from western Eurasia — including more than 10,000 newly sequenced genomes."
Without commenting on the content of this sentence or article, I will say that it is refreshing to see sentences like this in the wild after being regularly and constantly subjected to LLM slop.
It’s not quite all across the globe but pretty close, and is so adapted that it is not considered invasive any more in most places.
Two birds living in the same locale but divided by a mountain range therefore not naturally breeding with each other would classify as a different species, even if they could breed with each other.
So your question is hard to answer.
I mean people won't like the idea but that's not my point; what you describe variety in superficial traits while maintaining common traits
Applied to humans; skin color, eyes, dwarfism, hypertrichosis... can still interbreed
When it comes to categorization and taxonomy in leaky abstractions like languages the boundaries get a bit hand wavy and usually land on whatever fits the prevailing social desirability bias of the day
The same selection pressures that produced the variety of "superficial" traits also act on "non-superficial" traits - nature does not recognize this distinction.
What is a subspecies and species is random gibberish of the living humans
If our modern world continues for thousands of years eventually our differences will start to dissolve.
It's just controversial for obvious reasons. The notion that human groups may have meaningfully evolved in different ways over the past 10,000 years, and may still be evolving, is an unpopular one on both ends of the political spectrum.
Sorry, do you have any examples? His views that I've read [0, 1] are scientifically rigorous and terminologically precise, deftly navigating the politics that some consider extremely controversial. To wit, one of my favorite passages from [1], which deals specifically with terminology:
This particular passage is on p. 253 of [1], but everything in Chapter 11 ("The Genomics of Race and Identity," pp. 247-273) is well worth the read.[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/23/opinion/sunday/genetics-r...
[1] https://sackett.net/reich_who_we_are_and_how_we_got_here.pdf
I get that this is a high standard to hold him to (and I sure as heck don't meet it myself), but he should do better given his visibility in public discourse.
[0] https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/bfopinion/race-genetics...
The letter also states that "[t]he public should not cede the power to define race to scientists who themselves are not trained to understand the social contexts that shape the formation of this fraught category." Also true! This is exactly why Reich explicitly avoids discussing "races" but rather populations and ancestries, which are rigorously defined strictly in terms of genetics.
I'll add that very few of the signatories of that letter have any experience, let alone expertise in genetics. Here are the first few:
Out of the 67 signatories, I counted approximately 5 who might have sufficient genetics expertise to offer a meaningful scientific counterpoint to Reich's work (this is being charitable, as I included titles like "professor of Biological Sciences," which is no guarantee.) The rest were in fields like anthropology, sociology, law, and history.Please explain the complications. Use scientific terms only, with no references to anyone being offended, since that is irrelevant.
People keep wondering why trust in scientific findings is in free fall. A big part of it is because many scientists have become comfortable lying when they feel it’s for a noble cause.
For good reason, the wider community isn't able to have a productive conversation about it. I wouldn't even call that a noble reason, but a necessary one, unless you would be okay with inviting people that want you dead into discussion on scientific consensus.
Most of them just want to enforce borders. And then the dogma that we are all the same is co-opted by people who would see their ethnic group wiped out, as they are told that they don't even exist except as a meaningless social construct, and their desire for ethnic self-preservation is therefore illegitimate - there is nothing to preserve!
The same rhetoric targeting Palestinians: https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/perpetuating-the-myth-of-a-p...
Without commenting on the content of this sentence or article, I will say that it is refreshing to see sentences like this in the wild after being regularly and constantly subjected to LLM slop.