Kevin Wayne Williams wrote:
> Curt Fischer wrote:
> 
> 
>>The scientific argument against the concept of race that I have seen was
>>that there are smooth variations in many traits (skin color, nose shape,
>>etc.) instead of discrete jumps.  Since these traits vary from person to
>> person in a smooth, continuum-type way, assignment of a person to a
>>given class based on those features is arbitrary and has no special
>>scientific meaning.
>>
> 
> That logic has always struck me as faulty. Just because there are colors
> that we could never agree as whether it was purple or blue doesn't mean
> that there isn't such a thing as "color", and that classifying things
> according to it is useless.

Well, a couple of points:

1. I said "no special scientific meaning".  The doesn't mean useless. 
It just means that whatever categories of race that we create are not 
useful for reaching scientific understanding about the nature of genetic 
and physiological diversity among homo sapiens.  They might be very 
useful for other applications.

2. I was just repeating what I'd read elsewhere.  Personally, I have a 
difficult time swallowing that argument, too.  I've read too many 
reports of diseases such as anemia and stomach cancer being linked to 
race to believe that the concept has no usefulness.

-- 
Curt Fischer