Race, Culture and Biology

Is Race like, a thing?

Kind of. In essence, race has cemented itself as a social construct, but ultimately does not have any basis in biology. No one can find someone’s race with a DNA test. Whether it should be done away with or has a function in society is for you to decide, and I won’t be talking about today. What I will be talking about differences between “races” and such. So, how do we explain differences, like how smart we are, or even our differing skin tones?

 

Differences in Culture

              
First off, many of these differences can be attributed to the culture we grew up in. For example, stereotypically, Chinese people get better grades. However, this can be attributed to the way education is in China, which focuses more on grades and exam results, while western education places its focus on critical thinking. Many differences in intellect or athleticism fall in the same vein.

 Genetics and Clines

             

        

Now, you might be thinking, “what about physical traits, like height or hair color?” Well, all of this can be explained using clines! Clines describe variance in the commonality of a trait amongst a species across different environments. Even though traits like lactose intolerance are hereditary, this is most likely because there was never a need for extra milk in those regions. Or how Southern-ish Asians tend to have black hair, but that’s because of the sunnier climate, which provides more cover from UV radiation. But can’t these genetic differences be detected in a DNA test? Yes, they can, but the difference is miniscule, and cannot be attributed to a certain race either. So that’s why it can’t be determined in a DNA test. Well, that’s all I’ve got to say for today.