Thyunda said:
I didn't HAVE to look it up, dumbshit, I looked it up afterwards to see if I was accurate.
Ha ha ha ha ha... ha ha ha ha... Yeah, that's it. Use that argument. It's not an oxymoron or anything.
Oh. And not sure how to tell you this, but it's hard to see faces from the stands. So you can't count it as a win, because it's simply not one. I even outlined why he's Polish before I looked him up. Anyway, what about James Ceasar? He intrigued me because I couldn't decide between Mediterranean and Israeli. Care to tell me on that one?
Do I have to? I picked 5 pale-skinned men off of Google. You couldn't positively identify any without either reassuring yourself or looking them up. They weren't from minor African nations or esoteric regions of India. I didn't ask for your opinion on the origins of guys from South America or various Polynesian islands.
They were Americans, a Pol, and a Frenchman. Nationalities that have exposure everywhere that you've grown up with your entire life.
Yeah, I have no problem acknowledging that culture can dictate the attractiveness of certain physical traits - and since all physical traits have a genetic component, there isn't any denial from me that after several dozen generations a population could purposefully select for that trait. It happened. Less and less these days due to Globalization, but in the past the populations of villages and countries were pretty small.
However, to use the selected traits as a basis to determine significant physiological differences? Absurd. Human populations do vary, but the differences present between populations are not that significant.
The most impactful, by FAR, in any sort of recent history has been lactose tolerance. It opened up an entirely new source of calcium and caloric acquisition past childhood - which is why it was swept to fixation in the vast majority of European populations over a VERY short amount of time. It's so beneficial it actually evolved twice; the aforementioned European population, and once more via an entirely different mutation in an African population. Every other difference - slightly more efficient oxygen absorption, slightly less subcutaneous fat, slightly less susceptible to malaria, increased Vitamin D production, slightly increased or decreased metabolisms, slight variances in carbohydrate or alcohol metabolisms - don't come into play except under enormous amounts of training or evolutionary pressure. Worse yet, there aren't single nations that have exclusivity to any of them.
Not every Kenyan will out-run Canadians. Not every Aborigine will suffer Vitamin D deficiency in wintery climates. Not every Asian is short and thin. Not every American is white and fat. Not every... not every... not every...You get my point.
Every Swedish person is born with the ability to maintain lactase production, when most of the world cannot. In a handful of generations, given how much we're mingling, that advantage will be part of the global human population as well. Is lactose tolerance enough to define it as a separate race from the intolerant? More so than any other phenotype variant you or anybody else can see. At least it's somewhat exclusive to Caucasians and Africans (and their offspring)... for now.
Read the second edition of "Population Genetics" by Guillespie, look at the evidence for the various theories and how humanity grew out of a single population. I believe he also touches on epigenetic factors and the very significant impacts simple environmental changes can have on genetic expression. After that, feel free to give me your opinion on why you believe that a "Russian" deserves a different bonus in a video game than a "German" or an "American" (or why nationalities apply to races at all), and I'll be happy to engage you.
Until them, I'm out!
