6 ms·

> Taleb isn't painting himself in a very flattering light with these attacks. They're very weird and bitter. This is his default style as a polemicist and it d

> Taleb isn't painting himself in a very flattering light with these attacks. They're very weird and bitter. This is his default style as a polemicist and it distracts indeed from the points he is trying to make. > And I can't tell what his actual point is! The first 3 bullet points are his actual message. The rest is a reaction to some preceding drama on twitter. His point is basically that Africans were a statistically insignificant subgroup among Romans in Brittain, and by adding them so prominently in a short animated cartoon for school children (who hardly know anything about antiquity) the BBC is performing historical revisionism. He also casts doubt on the assumption that these Africans were black, pointing out that Northern Africa was inhabited by Berbers and Phoenicians. > He furiously complains that the BBC and Mary Beard are "bullshitters" but I can't figure out exactly what corrections he wants made. He wants scientific rigor to prevail over political correctness.

foldr 9y ago
We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black". We have good historical evidence that there were Romans present in Britain who we'd these days describe as black (e.g. an Ethiopian soldier garrisoning Hadrian's wall). For 101 reasons, the genetic evidence is not very informative, and certainly can't be used to justify that claim that Africans were a "statistically insignificant subgroup" (which by the way doesn't even make sense as a statistical statement). As Beard points out, even Norman DNA is not very well represented in the modern population, and we know for sure that plenty of Normans came over as a result of the Norman invasion.
- patrickg_zill 9y ago
  In the depicted cartoon case of an Ethiopian that has a local Briton or Celt wife, who has multiple children with her, there is the valid question of seeing what is in the genetic record, though, wouldn't you agree? The reaction, and Beard's answer, was specifically about the family shown and not the narrow question of whether or not an Ethiopian conscript would have ever set foot in Roman Britain.
  - foldr 9y ago
    I'm not sure why you assume he would have been a conscript. There is no reason to think that a few interracial marriages in Roman times would have left much of a trace in the modern genetic record. Surely no-one would get so up in arms about a cartoon that showed a Saxon married to a Norman, but we have no modern "genetic record" of this either. We know with a reasonable degree of certainty that interracial marriages existed in Roman Britain, often involving soldiers. Talk about the "genetic record" might seem sciency sounding, but its really the historical evidence that's much more informative in this instance.
    - patrickg_zill 9y ago
      I think we are not far from each other in what we understand... the issue raised between Beard and Taleb seems to revolve around the meaning of "typical" . Beard seems to say, "it was possible that it could have happened, here are a few Ethiopians for instance that we know were in Roman Britain, for example". Taleb seems to say "typical means what is likely to have happened 50% or more of the time; since there was no chance that Roman Britain had 50% of marriages with children that involved Ethiopians/Berbers/etc. thus Beard is very wrong"
      - foldr 9y ago
        Beard's point is that we really have no idea what "typical" ethnic backgrounds were for Roman families in Britain. There's just no reliable data, and it most likely would have varied enormously between different parts of the country.
  - vidarh 9y ago
    Beards answer points out among other things that there are exceedingly few traces of Normans in the genetic record as well, and gives a plausible suggestion that most might simply have left, like the Normans did. She also points to more examples than a single Ethiopian conscript. So the reality is that we know there has been people here that are poorly reflected in the genetic record, and that makes it rather pointless to point to the genetic record to demonstrate the family in question is implausible. In any case, what troubles me much more than whether or not the depiction is plausible is just how incredibly unprofessional and rude Talebs reaction was. If he wants honesty and a focus on the science, he should grow up and act professionally.
- bergoid 9y ago
  > We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black". We have good historical evidence that there were Romans present in Britain who we'd these days describe as black (e.g. an Ethiopian soldier garrisoning Hadrian's wall). That "evidence" consist of one fleeting mention in a biography about Septimius Severus. > For 101 reasons, the genetic evidence is not very informative, and certainly can't be used to justify that claim that Africans were a "statistically insignificant subgroup" The lack of evidence (genetic or historical) puts an upper bound on the proportion of subsaharan Africans in Roman Britain that is several orders of magnitude lower than the BBC animated cartoon suggests. > As Beard points out, even Norman DNA is not very well represented in the modern population, and we know for sure that plenty of Normans came over as a result of the Norman invasion. For the presence of the Normans there is plenty of historical evidence. For the presence of subsaharan Africans there is just about nothing. So we should stick to the null hypothesis.
  - foldr 9y ago
    There's quite a bit more evidence than that: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-may-be-descended-from-Africans.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-... >The lack of evidence (genetic or historical) puts an upper bound on the proportion of subsaharan Africans in Roman Britain It does no such thing. Can you point to any reputable scholar who is prepared to state such an "upper bound"?
    - bergoid 9y ago
      > There's quite a bit more evidence than that: > http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-may-be-descended-from-Africans.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-... A unit of "Moors". Again, Mediterranean looking North Africans. Despite the misleading title. > It does no such thing. Can you point to any reputable scholar who is prepared to state such an "upper bound"? Of course not. The evidence is so thin it wasn't even up for useful scholarly debate.
      - foldr 9y ago
- gaius 9y ago
  We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black" We do however know how far into Africa the Romans ventured (what is now Sudan) and what the ethnicity of the people living there was.
  - foldr 9y ago
    Beard addresses that point in her article. (Take home message: don't take lines on maps too seriously.)
- mc32 9y ago
  If peoples from far flung regions had been present in numbers and those people tended to have rank (garrisoned, etc), one would imagine we'd have more bone evidence (from burial sites, given their ranks). But as portrayed, it looks like there were more people from far flung areas than there were picts in the north. In any event, it's interesting ironic in that its seen as progressive that an occupying force might have been slightly multi-ethnic, and this celebrated. The English in South Africa were also much more multi-ethnic in that they brought peoples from the Indian subcontinent and other places; let's celebrate that too, then.
  - foldr 9y ago
    >If peoples from far flung regions had been present in numbers and those people tended to have rank (garrisoned, etc), one would imagine we'd have more bone evidence. We don't have many human remains from that period. So not really. >But as portrayed Portrayed where? Not sure what you mean by this. >and this celebrated. Who's celebrating it? I'm confused by your comment.
- coldtea 9y ago
  >We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black". We have good historical evidence that there were Romans present in Britain who we'd these days describe as black (e.g. an Ethiopian soldier garrisoning Hadrian's wall). Ethiopians were black. The majority in ancient Rome were not like that, not even the majority of people in the northern Africa countries.
  - foldr 9y ago
    We don't have figures on skin tone for North Africa over two thousand years ago. As far as I know. If we do, then by all means post them here.
    - coldtea 9y ago
      We don't need some magical list of figures to know the general distribution. We have descriptions, from many sources, even before Herodotus, of what this or that country's people looked like. We also have actual depictions of populations in the various hellenistic, then Roman and Byzantine provinces in mosaics and other painted scenes.
      - foldr 9y ago
        Feel free to link to some relevant data or source if you have something. As far as I'm aware, historical data on skin color demographics are extremely scanty. Even in the case of major historical figures like Cleopatra, we just don't know for sure.
        kirghiz 9y ago
        Considering the family tree of the Ptolemies, I think we have a good idea
        foldr 9y ago
        There is no historical consensus on Cleopatra's skin color. Plenty of people have their own favorite speculations about it, but there's no hard evidence.
walshemj 9y ago
He also seems to ignore the fact that a large part of the roman army in Britain would have been auxilia troops at lot of whom where non white. And arguing about whether north Africans where "black" or not seems just odd is he gong to say Sub saharan African actors should not play Othello.
- patrickg_zill 9y ago
  North Africans at that time were not "black" ; I thought that this was already well known? Was Libyan leader Gaddafi, black?
  - foldr 9y ago
    It's not obvious to me that the cartoon character is unambiguously black rather than brown. Berbers and other North African groups that were well-represented in the Roman army have brown skin. In any case, Beard points to instances of Romans in Britain who were either described as having black skin ("Ethiopean") in the historical record, or whose skeletal morpholgy suggests Sub Saharan ancestry. Also, nothing is "well known" about the skin color of populations thousands of years ago, for obvious reasons.
    - bloak 9y ago
      Can't you deduce skin colour from chemical analysis of bog bodies, or is melanin unstable in those conditions? Also, can't we deduce skin colour from analysis of DNA (and from the climate: sunlight affects skin colour)? Perhaps the problem is that scientists are not particularly interested in skin colour, for which I wouldn't blame them.
      - foldr 9y ago
        Not sure about bog bodies, but there's so few of them that it's unlikely to be useful information. There is no way to determine skin color via DNA analyses of ancient remains, so far as I'm aware.
mrow84 9y ago
What position in the distribution is suitably "scientifically rigorous"? Should all children's cartoons represent only the population mean? Or perhaps the median - at least that is guaranteed to actually exist. Maybe the mode would be better - but what if there is more than one? We could be willing to be a bit more relaxed, and allow anything within the middle two quartiles. Or, perhaps, we should just remember that there is a distinction between material produced for children and the academic consensus.

foldr 9y ago

We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black". We have good historical evidence that there were Romans present in Britain who we'd these days describe as black (e.g. an Ethiopian soldier garrisoning Hadrian's wall). For 101 reasons, the genetic evidence is not very informative, and certainly can't be used to justify that claim that Africans were a "statistically insignificant subgroup" (which by the way doesn't even make sense as a statistical statement). As Beard points out, even Norman DNA is not very well represented in the modern population, and we know for sure that plenty of Normans came over as a result of the Norman invasion.

patrickg_zill 9y ago
In the depicted cartoon case of an Ethiopian that has a local Briton or Celt wife, who has multiple children with her, there is the valid question of seeing what is in the genetic record, though, wouldn't you agree? The reaction, and Beard's answer, was specifically about the family shown and not the narrow question of whether or not an Ethiopian conscript would have ever set foot in Roman Britain.
- foldr 9y ago
  I'm not sure why you assume he would have been a conscript. There is no reason to think that a few interracial marriages in Roman times would have left much of a trace in the modern genetic record. Surely no-one would get so up in arms about a cartoon that showed a Saxon married to a Norman, but we have no modern "genetic record" of this either. We know with a reasonable degree of certainty that interracial marriages existed in Roman Britain, often involving soldiers. Talk about the "genetic record" might seem sciency sounding, but its really the historical evidence that's much more informative in this instance.
  - patrickg_zill 9y ago
    I think we are not far from each other in what we understand... the issue raised between Beard and Taleb seems to revolve around the meaning of "typical" . Beard seems to say, "it was possible that it could have happened, here are a few Ethiopians for instance that we know were in Roman Britain, for example". Taleb seems to say "typical means what is likely to have happened 50% or more of the time; since there was no chance that Roman Britain had 50% of marriages with children that involved Ethiopians/Berbers/etc. thus Beard is very wrong"
    - foldr 9y ago
      Beard's point is that we really have no idea what "typical" ethnic backgrounds were for Roman families in Britain. There's just no reliable data, and it most likely would have varied enormously between different parts of the country.
- vidarh 9y ago
  Beards answer points out among other things that there are exceedingly few traces of Normans in the genetic record as well, and gives a plausible suggestion that most might simply have left, like the Normans did. She also points to more examples than a single Ethiopian conscript. So the reality is that we know there has been people here that are poorly reflected in the genetic record, and that makes it rather pointless to point to the genetic record to demonstrate the family in question is implausible. In any case, what troubles me much more than whether or not the depiction is plausible is just how incredibly unprofessional and rude Talebs reaction was. If he wants honesty and a focus on the science, he should grow up and act professionally.
bergoid 9y ago
> We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black". We have good historical evidence that there were Romans present in Britain who we'd these days describe as black (e.g. an Ethiopian soldier garrisoning Hadrian's wall). That "evidence" consist of one fleeting mention in a biography about Septimius Severus. > For 101 reasons, the genetic evidence is not very informative, and certainly can't be used to justify that claim that Africans were a "statistically insignificant subgroup" The lack of evidence (genetic or historical) puts an upper bound on the proportion of subsaharan Africans in Roman Britain that is several orders of magnitude lower than the BBC animated cartoon suggests. > As Beard points out, even Norman DNA is not very well represented in the modern population, and we know for sure that plenty of Normans came over as a result of the Norman invasion. For the presence of the Normans there is plenty of historical evidence. For the presence of subsaharan Africans there is just about nothing. So we should stick to the null hypothesis.
- foldr 9y ago
  There's quite a bit more evidence than that: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-may-be-descended-from-Africans.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-... >The lack of evidence (genetic or historical) puts an upper bound on the proportion of subsaharan Africans in Roman Britain It does no such thing. Can you point to any reputable scholar who is prepared to state such an "upper bound"?
  - bergoid 9y ago
    > There's quite a bit more evidence than that: > http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-may-be-descended-from-Africans.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-... A unit of "Moors". Again, Mediterranean looking North Africans. Despite the misleading title. > It does no such thing. Can you point to any reputable scholar who is prepared to state such an "upper bound"? Of course not. The evidence is so thin it wasn't even up for useful scholarly debate.
    - foldr 9y ago
gaius 9y ago
We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black" We do however know how far into Africa the Romans ventured (what is now Sudan) and what the ethnicity of the people living there was.
- foldr 9y ago
  Beard addresses that point in her article. (Take home message: don't take lines on maps too seriously.)
mc32 9y ago
If peoples from far flung regions had been present in numbers and those people tended to have rank (garrisoned, etc), one would imagine we'd have more bone evidence (from burial sites, given their ranks). But as portrayed, it looks like there were more people from far flung areas than there were picts in the north. In any event, it's interesting ironic in that its seen as progressive that an occupying force might have been slightly multi-ethnic, and this celebrated. The English in South Africa were also much more multi-ethnic in that they brought peoples from the Indian subcontinent and other places; let's celebrate that too, then.
- foldr 9y ago
  >If peoples from far flung regions had been present in numbers and those people tended to have rank (garrisoned, etc), one would imagine we'd have more bone evidence. We don't have many human remains from that period. So not really. >But as portrayed Portrayed where? Not sure what you mean by this. >and this celebrated. Who's celebrating it? I'm confused by your comment.
coldtea 9y ago
>We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black". We have good historical evidence that there were Romans present in Britain who we'd these days describe as black (e.g. an Ethiopian soldier garrisoning Hadrian's wall). Ethiopians were black. The majority in ancient Rome were not like that, not even the majority of people in the northern Africa countries.
- foldr 9y ago
  We don't have figures on skin tone for North Africa over two thousand years ago. As far as I know. If we do, then by all means post them here.
  - coldtea 9y ago
    We don't need some magical list of figures to know the general distribution. We have descriptions, from many sources, even before Herodotus, of what this or that country's people looked like. We also have actual depictions of populations in the various hellenistic, then Roman and Byzantine provinces in mosaics and other painted scenes.
    - foldr 9y ago
      Feel free to link to some relevant data or source if you have something. As far as I'm aware, historical data on skin color demographics are extremely scanty. Even in the case of major historical figures like Cleopatra, we just don't know for sure.
      - kirghiz 9y ago
        Considering the family tree of the Ptolemies, I think we have a good idea
        foldr 9y ago
        There is no historical consensus on Cleopatra's skin color. Plenty of people have their own favorite speculations about it, but there's no hard evidence.

walshemj 9y ago

He also seems to ignore the fact that a large part of the roman army in Britain would have been auxilia troops at lot of whom where non white. And arguing about whether north Africans where "black" or not seems just odd is he gong to say Sub saharan African actors should not play Othello.

patrickg_zill 9y ago
North Africans at that time were not "black" ; I thought that this was already well known? Was Libyan leader Gaddafi, black?
- foldr 9y ago
  It's not obvious to me that the cartoon character is unambiguously black rather than brown. Berbers and other North African groups that were well-represented in the Roman army have brown skin. In any case, Beard points to instances of Romans in Britain who were either described as having black skin ("Ethiopean") in the historical record, or whose skeletal morpholgy suggests Sub Saharan ancestry. Also, nothing is "well known" about the skin color of populations thousands of years ago, for obvious reasons.
  - bloak 9y ago
    Can't you deduce skin colour from chemical analysis of bog bodies, or is melanin unstable in those conditions? Also, can't we deduce skin colour from analysis of DNA (and from the climate: sunlight affects skin colour)? Perhaps the problem is that scientists are not particularly interested in skin colour, for which I wouldn't blame them.
    - foldr 9y ago
      Not sure about bog bodies, but there's so few of them that it's unlikely to be useful information. There is no way to determine skin color via DNA analyses of ancient remains, so far as I'm aware.

mrow84 9y ago

What position in the distribution is suitably "scientifically rigorous"? Should all children's cartoons represent only the population mean? Or perhaps the median - at least that is guaranteed to actually exist. Maybe the mode would be better - but what if there is more than one? We could be willing to be a bit more relaxed, and allow anything within the middle two quartiles. Or, perhaps, we should just remember that there is a distinction between material produced for children and the academic consensus.