I think you misunderstand the purpose of the scientific semantics.
What scientific semantics? Again race isn't really a word scientists use. It's used by social scientists and humanists.
It isn't to say what we consider race to be non-biological, it's more that our definitions of race aren't something you can draw proper lines with and define with any strict definition.
Sure, I think some strict platonic definition isn't particularly helpful. I'd prefer a socially operative one based on what actually is going on when people use it. I don't think anything I've said in this thread is arguing for a strict definition of it at all actually.
Saying clearly "race isn't biological" in this discussion is using the common definition for race and making a false statement with it.
What's the false statement? That's not clear in the rest of this post.
What the rest of us consider to be race, or rather, racial differences is certainly determined by our DNA as it can't be determined by anything else.
What people in this thread are doing is taking certain genetic and phenotypical traits and essentiallizing them to race yes. I've never said I thought genes play no role whatsoever. One's race is absolutely not
determined , extra emphasis because that's the key word, by ones's DNA though. The reason we associate those phenotypical traits with specific cultural groups is totally social because those groups only exist
socially. Genes play a role in these phenotypes yes, but our understanding of how they are expressed and what that means socially, including grouping them, is clearly totally social.
At the very least, in a thread about such tests like 23andme it is obvious what everyone means.
Did you not see my first post? What I'm saying is what everyone means is a bad way to look at this. Race and ethnicity are not genetic even if the expression of certain genes plays a role in how we place people into categories.
If you want to talk about scientific semantics
I don't like it when people on GAF, and lay people generally, use the word semantics because it has become somewhat of a pejorative. The stakes here are very real. Understanding race as a scientific thing, and again I'm arguing against it being scientific, is the very fundamental premise of scientific racism. It's not a good thing. In a less problematic sense it's also blatantly positivistic.
it's less that race is definitely a social-construct but more that our groupings for race is hilariously insufficient -- possibly to the point of it meaning nothing.
I'm not sure what you're saying here. race is definitely a social construct. Ask 100 biologists if races exist within biology, at least 99 will say they don't.
And again this is more positivism. Race clearly means a lot because it plays a massive part in social interaction. Just because something isn't scientific doesn't mean it means nothing. Class isn't scientific, but that plays a huge role in social interaction as well.
I mean, look at the Splatoon in MK thread where people were arguing what makes someone "black". Of course, our understandings are too simplistic, but that isn't to say that it isn't controlled by our genetics.
The fact that people were arguing about cartoon squid/kids that don't have genetic material should be indicative of the fact that it isn't controlled by genetics. This is a social category.
You're going to find certain DNA from populations recently originating from certain areas on Earth.
You're going to find trends of certain genes appearing more frequently in certain places. That is it. It's a correlation between gene frequency and geographical location and people we associate with geographical location.
That's basically the purpose of these tests, to try and pinpoint our heritage.
Well the purpose of these tests is to make a quick buck off of people that have a problematic understanding of race and ethnicity. Look at the guy posting about this from a geneticist's perspective in this very thread.
Again none of this is cutting edge. This is how every contemporary scholar of race, and the vast number of other scholars whose work touches on race, that I know of thinks of the category.
