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>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 term

>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. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/23/opinion/sunday/genetics-race.html 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 https://sackett.net/reich_who_we_are_and_how_we_got_here.pdf

AlotOfReading 6mo ago
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. [0] https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/bfopinion/race-genetics-david-reich https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/bfopinion/race-genetics...
- dmitrygr 6mo ago
  > race intersect with genetics in a very complicated way Please explain the complications. Use scientific terms only.
  - tsimionescu 6mo ago
    The biggest complication is that the current notion of human race is largely based on skin color (with a few adjacent physical traits), which has very little to do with population genetics. In particular, black skin color is a dominant genetic trait, meaning that you can easily have individuals and even entire subpopulations that are black skinned, but have much more genetic similarity to traditionally white skinned populations (being descendents of a few black skinned individuals who married into a larger white skinned population) - while they would still be categorized as "black" in terms of race. Conversely, genetically isolated black skinned populations are also often lumped together as "the black race". Another major complexity is that some races are defined more by genealogic ancestry than by genetic ancestry or easily identifiable physical characteristics. For example, people are normally considered Jewish if they have a Jewish mother. This leads to many genetically disparate subpopulations being lumped together as a Jewish race.
- MontyCarloHall 6mo ago
  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, as studies like the subject of this discussion demonstrate. 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. With respect to population structures and ancestry, Reich is indeed an expert. 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.
jltsiren 6mo ago
I haven't read much from Reich, so I don't know his position. But I've understood that the current best practice in human genetics is to explicitly justify the population descriptors chosen for each study, rather than using any fixed set of descriptors given from the outside. There are two main types of genetic descriptors: those based on genetic similarity and those based on ancestry groups. Genetic similarity is quantitative, and individual samples often have multiple labels attached to them. Ancestry groups are discrete categories based on quantitative measures. If it's appropriate to use descriptors based on genetic ancestry groups in a study, it's usually also appropriate to drop samples that don't fit neatly in any single group. Sometimes it's more appropriate to use descriptors based on environmental factors, such as ethnicity or geography. Environmental descriptors tend to be correlated with genetic descriptors, but they are not the same.

AlotOfReading 6mo ago

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. [0] https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/bfopinion/race-genetics-david-reich https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/bfopinion/race-genetics...

dmitrygr 6mo ago
> race intersect with genetics in a very complicated way Please explain the complications. Use scientific terms only.
- tsimionescu 6mo ago
  The biggest complication is that the current notion of human race is largely based on skin color (with a few adjacent physical traits), which has very little to do with population genetics. In particular, black skin color is a dominant genetic trait, meaning that you can easily have individuals and even entire subpopulations that are black skinned, but have much more genetic similarity to traditionally white skinned populations (being descendents of a few black skinned individuals who married into a larger white skinned population) - while they would still be categorized as "black" in terms of race. Conversely, genetically isolated black skinned populations are also often lumped together as "the black race". Another major complexity is that some races are defined more by genealogic ancestry than by genetic ancestry or easily identifiable physical characteristics. For example, people are normally considered Jewish if they have a Jewish mother. This leads to many genetically disparate subpopulations being lumped together as a Jewish race.
MontyCarloHall 6mo ago
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, as studies like the subject of this discussion demonstrate. 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. With respect to population structures and ancestry, Reich is indeed an expert. 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.

jltsiren 6mo ago

I haven't read much from Reich, so I don't know his position. But I've understood that the current best practice in human genetics is to explicitly justify the population descriptors chosen for each study, rather than using any fixed set of descriptors given from the outside. There are two main types of genetic descriptors: those based on genetic similarity and those based on ancestry groups. Genetic similarity is quantitative, and individual samples often have multiple labels attached to them. Ancestry groups are discrete categories based on quantitative measures. If it's appropriate to use descriptors based on genetic ancestry groups in a study, it's usually also appropriate to drop samples that don't fit neatly in any single group. Sometimes it's more appropriate to use descriptors based on environmental factors, such as ethnicity or geography. Environmental descriptors tend to be correlated with genetic descriptors, but they are not the same.