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Genetic ancestry tests are a multi-billion dollar industry. In exchange for a sample of genetic material, one receives charts and figures mapping them onto popular concepts of race. The problem with this approach is that although there are minor genetic differences that allow geneticists to trace population migrations, these differences don't support the idea that one can sort races on genetic differences alone. Social scientists have argued that given how race definitions have changed over time and place, that race classifications are more a social construct defined more in terms of geographic proximity and cultural norms than they are based on genetics. At the other end of the spectrum is the concept of genetic essentialism. This views the concept of race as being exclusively defined in terms of genetic makeup and how these differences imbue different races with different inherent abilities or liabilities. Genetic essentialist views promote the concept of genetic exclusivity and reinforces racial stereotypes, underpinning negative policies such as eugenics and apartheid.
The problem with genetic ancestry testing, apart from the privacy issues that we typically see stories about here, is the inconsistency of analysis and popular misconceptions of what the results mean. With tens of millions of people taking these tests every year, an open question has been what effect these results have on people's concepts of race. Some have argued that they are likely to reinforce a genetic essentialist view of race because the results are broken down into distinct groups and people interpret the results as being objective and authoritative. Others have argued the opposite in that people have a more social construct idea of race when the results do not confirm their experience ("All my life I thought I was German, but I found out I'm actually Italian!").
Researchers from the University of British Columbia attempted to answer this question with a paper published in the open access journal Plos One. They conducted a randomized controlled trial where they assembled a group of people who were willing to take a genetic ancestry test and provided half of them with a test. The group was then evaluated to gauge the extent that they supported genetic essentialism ideas. In addition, at the outset the group was also quizzed on their general knowledge of genetics. What the researchers found was that, on average, getting these test results did not change one's views on genetic essentialism; however, when considering a person's overall level of genetics understanding, they found that genetic essentialism ideas were strengthened in people who had lower knowledge of genetics after they received their ancestry test results. "Taking a test thus has a polarizing effect, magnifying differences in essentialist beliefs even further between those with weaker and stronger understandings of the science behind them."
Roth WD, Yaylacı Ş, Jaffe K, Richardson L. (2020) Do genetic ancestry tests increase racial essentialism? Findings from a randomized controlled trial. PLoS ONE 15(1): e0227399. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0227399
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 10 2020, @07:10PM (3 children)
The situation with dog breeds is actually quite illustrative of what *actually* happens with the interaction between race and genetics. Dog breeds have been bred for specific traits, and those traits correlate with their appearance, but not necessarily in a causative way. Collies are intelligent, but that's not because they are small-medium size with a long muzzle and a long, textured coat. You could start with mongrel dogs, breed them into something that looks just like a collie over a few centuries, and they wouldn't be any more intelligent than any other dog, unless by chance. Greyhounds, on the other paw, are fast and that's clearly associated with their physical shape. Other dog breeds, like whippets, that resemble greyhounds are also fast.
Similarly human races are also associated with traits, but not in any particular causative way, unless the adaptation directly affects appearance. Tibetans and Peruvians are adapted for high altitude, and there are real genetic changes that help this happen. But that affects their blood and doesn’t have anything to do with their appearance. Africans, on the other hand, are less likely to sunburn, and that makes their skin darker. That's a real genetic change that affects both fitness and race.
Except what happens is that people start claiming "race X is superior in Y way" when Y doesn't have anything to do with the actual conditions that created race X. And cultural effects still dominate. In the Olympics, Norwegians always win the skiing events and Kenyans always win the track events, but if either was "physically superior" they'd win *all* the events. This even happens within a country and on short timescales. 40 years ago there were a lot of African-American players in major league baseball. Now there are many fewer. Genetics didn't change - they *can't* change that fast - but what did happen is that inner city kids quit playing baseball and started playing basketball.
It's ironic that most of the time the race-essentialists seem to think that Europeans are "more intelligent." But Europe is a pretty safe place and has been for centuries. It's easy to survive and reproduce in Europe without being very bright. In Africa, if you aren't on your toes, you might get eaten by a crocodile. European conditions, with the safe environment and well defined social order, are analogous to domesticated animals, and domestic animals are usually less intelligent than their wild counterparts. If race really caused differences in intelligence, it probably wouldn't be the Europeans that benefit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 10 2020, @08:53PM (2 children)
Your assumption of one form of "physical superiority" is illogical. For instance it's not just 'Africans' or even 'Kenyans' that win track events. It's tiny specific ethnic subset of Kenyans. Of all places there was oddly enough an excellent article [theatlantic.com] published on this topic in the Atlantic some years back.
Even more interesting are the studies where they took non-professional high school boys from the Kalenjin tribe (the aforementioned ethnicity within Kenya) and had them train and then compete against life-long professional runners from other nations such as Denmark and Sweden. The high school boys crushed them. The researchers observed numerous ingrained genetic advantages for the Kalenjin boys: high red blood cells, different musculature/bone structures more favorable to running, etc.
You can also find similarly interesting studies on the 'baseball question' such as this [sabr.org] one! In particular modern baseball has changed in a pretty dramatic way. Now the majority of players on any given team are pitchers - a 30% increase from what it was back just in 1990. Black players were generally not pitchers, but outfielders where raw speed and agility are key. Of course you're correct that environmental factors play a role, but it's equally obviously absurd to discount the rather extreme effect genetics has on everything. At this point I feel as though it's akin to those that held onto the idea that the sun (and everything else) was revolving around the Earth, even as obviously observable data proved such a belief plainly false.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 10 2020, @11:22PM (1 child)
" I feel as though it's akin to those that held onto the idea that the sun (and everything else) was revolving around the Earth, even as obviously observable data proved such a belief plainly false"
It's exactly that.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday February 11 2020, @05:11PM
The axis of evil denotes anisotropies in the cosmic background radiation centered in the earth, funnily enough.
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