Answering Common “Criticisms” of the Theory of African American Offending
4150 words
Introduction
Back in September I published an article arguing that since the theory of African American offending (TAAO) makes successful novel predictions and hereditarian explanations don’t, that we should accept the TAAO over hereditarian explanations. I then published a follow-up arguing that crime is bad and racism causes crime so racism is bad (and I also argued that stereotypes lead to self-fulfilling prophecies which then cause the black-white crime gap). The TAAO combines general strain theory, social control theory, social disorganization theory, learning theory, and low self control theory in order to better explain and predict crime in black Americans (Unnever, 2014).
For if a theory makes successful novel predictions, therefore that raises the probability that the theory is true. Take T1 and T2. T1 makes successful novel predictions. T2 doesn’t. So if T1 and T2 both try to explain the same things, then it’s only logical to accept T1 over T2. That’s the basis of the argument against hereditarian explanations of crime—the main ones all fail. Although some attempt at a theory has been made integrating hereditarian explanations (Ellis’ 2017 evolutionary neuroandrogenic theory), it doesn’t make any novel predictions. I’ve recently argued that that’s a death knell for hereditarian theories—there are no novel predictions of any kind for hereditarianism.
But since I published my comparison of the successes of the TAAO over hereditarian explanations, I’ve come across a few “responses” and they all follow the same trend: “What about Africa, Britain, and other places where blacks commit more crime? Why doesn’t racism cause other groups to commit more crime?” or “So blacks don’t have agency?” or “Despite what you argued against hereditarian explanations what about as-of-yet-to-be-discovered genes or hormonal influences that lead to higher crime in blacks compared to whites?” or “What about IQ and it’s relationship to crime?” or “What control groups are there for TAAO studies?” or “The black-white crime gap was lower during Jim Crow, how is this possible if the TAAO is true?” or “Unnever and Gabbidon are just making excuses for blacks with their TAAO” or “The so-called ‘novel predictions’ you reference aren’t novel at all.” I will answer these in turn and then provide a few more novel predictions of the TAAO.
“What about Africa, Britain, and other places where blacks commit more crime? Why doesn’t racism cause other groups to commit more crime?“
For some reason, TAAO detractors think this is some kind of knock-down questions for the TAAO and think that they disprove it. These are easily answered and they don’t threaten the theory at all.
For one, the theory of AFRICAN AMERICAN offending is irrelevant places that… Aren’t America. It’s a specific theory to explain why blacks commit crime at a higher rate IN AMERICA, therefore other countries are irrelevant. There would need to be a specific theory of crime for each of those places and contexts. So this question doesn’t hurt the theory. So going off of the first question, the answer to the second question also addresses it—it’s a theory that’s specifically formulated to explain and predict crime in a certain population in a certain place.
For two, why would a theory that’s specifically formulated to explain crime using the unique experiences of black Americans matter for other American groups? Blacks went through 400 years of slavery and then after that went through segregation and Jim Crow, so why would it mean anything that other groups face discrimination but then don’t have higher rates of crime compared to the average? Since the theory has specific focus on understanding the unique experiences and dynamics of crime in the black American population, it’s obvious that asking about other groups is just irrelevant. Other racial and ethnic groups aren’t the primary focus—since it aims to address historical and contemporary factors that lead to higher crime in the black American population. It’s in the name of the theory—so why would other racial groups matter? Unnever and Gabbidon (2011: 37) even explicitly addressed this point:
Our work builds upon the fundamental assumption made by Afrocentists that an understanding of black offending can only be attained if their behavior is situated within the lived experiences of being African American in a conflicted, racially stratified society. We assert that any criminological theory that aims to explain black offending must place the black experience and their unique worldview at the core of its foundation. Our theory places the history and lived experiences of African American people at its center. We also fully embrace the Afrocentric assumption that African American offending is related to racial subordination. Thus, our work does not attempt to create a “general” theory of crime that applies to every American; instead, our theory explains how the unique experiences and worldview of blacks in America are related to their offending. In short, our theory draws on the strengths of both Afrocentricity and the Eurocentric canon.
“So blacks don’t have agency?”
The theory doesn’t say that blacks lack agency (the capacity to make decisions and choices) at all. What the theory does say is that systemic factors like racism, socioeconomic disparities, and historical and contemporary marginalization can influence one’s choices and opportunities. So while individuals have agency, their choices are shaped by the social context they find themselves in. So if one has a choice to do X or ~X but they physical CAN’T do X, then they do not have a choice—they have an illusion of choice. The TAAO acknowledges that choices are constrained by poverty, racism, and social inequity. So while blacks—as all humans do—have agency, some “choices” are constrained, giving the illusion of choice. Thus, constraints should also be considered while analyzing why blacks offend more. This, too, is not a knock-down question.
“Despite what you argued against hereditarian explanations what about as-of-yet-to-be-discovered genes or hormonal influences that lead to higher crime in blacks compared to whites?”
Over the years I’d say I’ve done a good job of arguing against hereditarian theories of crime. (Like testosterone increasing aggression and blacks having higher levels of testosterone, the AR gene, and MAOA.) They’re just not tenable. The genetic explanation makes no sense. (Talk about disregarding agency…) But one response is that we could find some as-of-yet-to-be-discovered genes, gene networks, or neurohormonal influences which explain the higher crime rates in black Americans. This is just like the “five years away” claim that hereditarians love to use. We just need to wait X amount of years for the magic evidence, yet five years never comes since five years away is always five years away.
“What about IQ and it’s relationship to crime?”
Of course the IQ-ists love this question. The assumption is that lower IQ people are more likely to commit crime. So low is means more crime and high IQ means less crime. Ignoring the fact that IQ is not a cause of anything but an outcome of one’s life experiences, we know that the correlation between IQ and crime is -0.01 within family (Frisell, Pawitan, and Langstrom, 2012). So that, too, is an irrelevant question. The relationship just isn’t there.
“What control groups are there for TAAO studies?”
Other than the first question about why don’t other groups who experience racism commit more crime and what about blacks in other countries, this one takes the cake. The TAAO doesn’t need control groups in TAAO tests since it focuses specifically on understanding the unique factors that contribute to crime in America. So instead of comparing different racial or ethnic groups, the TAAO seeks to identify and analyze specific historical, social, and systemic factors which shape the experiences and behaviors of black Americans within the context of American society.
“The black-white crime gap was lower during Jim Crow, why? How is this possible if the TAAO is true?”
Between 1950 and 1963, non-whites made up 11 percent of the US population, 90 percent of which were black. In 1950 for whites the murder rate was 2 to 3 deaths per 100,000 while for non-whites the rate was 28 deaths per 100,000 (28 times the US average) which then fell to 21 per 100,000 in 1961 which was still about 8 times that of the white murder rate while the rate raised again between 1962 and 1964 (Langberg, 1967). Langan (1992) showed a steady increase in the incarcerated black population from 1926 (21 percent) to 1986 (44 percent). But demographic factors account for this, like increases in the sentencing of blacks, the increase in the black population, and increase on black arrest rates—furthermore, there is evidence for increased discrimination between 1973 and 1982 that would explain the 70s-80s incarceration rates (Harding and Winship, 2016). Harding and Winship also showed that differential population growth can account for one-third of the increase in the prison population difference while the rest can be accounted for by differences in sentencing and arrest rates between 1960 and 1980. So the black population increased more in states that had higher incarceration rates. Nonetheless, the TAAO isn’t supposed to retroactively explain trends.
Therefore, the disparity between whites and blacks remained, even pre-1964. This question, too, isn’t a knockdown for the TAAO either. These questions that are asked when one is provided with the successful novel predictions of the TAAO are just cope since hereditarian explanations don’t make novel predictions and their explanations fail (like the ENA theory).
“Unnever and Gabbidon are just making excuses for blacks with their TAAO.”
This is not what they’re doing with their theory at all. A theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural word that’s based on observation, empirical data, and evidence. They provide testable hypotheses that can be empirically tested. They also make predictions based on their proposed explanations. Predictive capacity is a hallmark of scientific theories. And it’s clear and I’ve shown that the TAAO makes successful novel predictions. Therefore the ability of a theory to make predictions—especially risky and novel ones—lends credibility to the validity of the theory.
The claim that the TAAO is a mere excuse for black crime is ridiculous. Because if that’s true, then all theories of crime are excuses for criminal activity. The TAAO should be evaluated on its predictive power—it’s ability to make successful novel predictions. Claims that the theory is a mere “excuse” for black crime is ridiculous, especially since the theory makes successful novel predictions. It’s clearly a valuable framework for understanding black crime in America.
“The so-called ‘novel predictions’ you reference aren’t novel at all”
We need to understand what the TAAO actually is. It’s a theory of crime that considers the African American “peerless” worldview. “Peerless” means “incomparable.” They have the worldview they do due to the 400 years of slavery and oppression like Jim Crow laws and segregation. Therefore, to explain black crime we need to understand the peerless African American experience. That’s a main premise of the theory. So the TAAO has one main premise, and it’s from this premise that the predictions of the TAAO are derived.
The peerless worldview of African Americans This premise recognizes the unique historical, contemporary, social, and cultural experiences of African Americans including their experiences of racial discrimination, social marginalization, and racial identity. This premise, then, lays the key groundwork for understanding black crime. This core premise of the TAAO then centers the theory within the context of the African American experience. Each of the predictions below are derived from the core premise of the TAAO—that of the peerless worldview of African Americans without relying on the predictions as premises used for the construction of the theory. Each of the predictions follows from the core premise, and they reflect how the African American experiences of racial discrimination, social marginalization and racial identity influence their likelihood of experiencing racial discrimination. Unnever and Gabbidon gave many arguments and references that this is indeed the case. The predictions, then, weren’t used as premise to construct the TAAO but they indeed are derived from—indeed they emerge from—the foundational experiences of African Americans and then serve as testable hypotheses which are derived from that understanding.
Thus, the predictions follow from the TAAO and they are derived from the foundational premise of the TAAO, without being used in the construction of the theory itself, qualifying as novel predictions according to Musgrave (1988): “a predicted fact is a novel fact for a theory if it was not used to construct that theory — where a fact is used to construct a theory if it figures in the premises from which that theory was deduced” and Beerbower: “the purpose of science is to enable accurate predictions and that, in fact, science cannot actually achieve more than that...The test of an explanatory theory, therefore, is its success at prediction, at forecasting. This view need not be limited to actual predictions of future, yet to happen events; it can accommodate theories that are able to generate results that have already been observed or, if not observed, have already occurred...it must have some reach beyond the data used to construct the theory“
More novel predictions of the TAAO
Therefore, since the TAAO has success in its predictions and hereditarian ones don’t (they don’t even make any novel predictions), it’s only rational to accept the theory that makes successful novel predictions over the one that doesn’t. The only reason one would accept the hereditarian explanations over the TAAO is due to bias and ignorance (racism), since the TAAO is a much more robust theory that actually has explanatory AND predictive power. So the issue here is quite clear—since we know the causes of black crime due to the successful novel predictions that the TAAO generates, then there are clear and actionable things we can do to try to mitigate the crime rate. This is something that hereditarian theories don’t do, most importantly because they don’t make any novel predictions. Since the TAAO makes successful risky novel predictions—predictions that, if they didn’t hold, they would then refute the theory—and since the predictions hold, then the theory is more likely to be true than not. The TAAO not only accommodates, but it makes predictions, and we can’t say the same for hereditarianism.
The issue is that so-called “race-neutral” theories of crime need to assume that racial discrimination isn’t a cause of black American offending because this would then limit it only to black Americans. Therefore race-neutral theories of crime don’t have the same predictive and explanatory power as a race-centric theory of crime—which is what the TAAO is. It’s clear that: the TAAO makes successful novel predictions, the predictions aren’t used as premises in the TAAO, the TAAO is a race-centric, country-specific theory of crime (and not a general theory of crime), racism and stereotypes don’t explain offending for non-African Americans, the theory doesn’t say that blacks lack agency, IQ doesn’t explain crime within families, and cope from hereditarians that one day we will find genes or neurohormonal influences which lead to crime in black Americans is just cope. It’s clear that the TAAO is the superior theory of crime because it does what scientific theories are supposed to do: successfully predict novel facts of the matter, something that hereditarianism just does not do which is why I’m justified in calling it a racist movement. Basically since there are unique characters of a demographic that require perspectives that are solely related to that group, then we need group-centric theories of crime due to the unique experiences of thsg group, and this is what the TAAO does.
Now that I’ve answered common criticisms of the TAAO, I have a few more successful novel predictions of the theory. In my original article I cited 3 novel predictions, how they followed from the theory, and then the references that confirmed the predictions:
(Prediction 1) Black Americans with a stronger sense of racial identity are less likely to engage in criminal behavior than black Americans with a weak sense of racial identity. How does this prediction follow from the theory? TAAO suggests that a strong racial identity can act as a protective factor against criminal involvement. Those with a stronger sense of racial identity may be less likely to engage in criminal behavior as a way to cope with racial discrimination and societal marginalization. (Burt, Simons, and Gibbons, 2013; Burt, Lei, and Simons, 2017; Gaston and Doherty, 2018; Scott and Seal, 2019)
(Prediction 2) Experiencing racial discrimination increases the likelihood of black Americans engaging in criminal actions. How does this follow from the theory? TAAO posits that racial discrimination can lead to feelings of frustration and marginalization, and to cope with these stressors, some individuals may resort to committing criminal acts as a way to exert power or control in response to their experiences of racial discrimination. (Unnever, 2014; Unnever, Cullen, and Barnes, 2016; Herda, 2016, 2018; Scott and Seal, 2019)
(Prediction 3) Black Americans who feel socially marginalized and disadvantaged are more prone to committing crime as a coping mechanism and have weakened school bonds. How does this follow from the theory? TAAO suggests that those who experience social exclusion and disadvantage may turn to crime as a way to address their negative life circumstances. and feelings of agency. (Unnever, 2014; Unnever, Cullen, and Barnes, 2016)
(Prediction 4) Black people who experience microaggreesions and perceive injustices in the criminal justice system are more likely to engage in serious and violent offending. How does this follow from the theory? Experiences of racial discrimination and marginalization can lead to negative emotions like anger and depression among black people. These negative emotions, which are then exacerbated by microaggreesions and perceptions of injustice in the criminal justice system, may increase the likelihood of engaging in serious and violent offending as a coping mechanism or means of asserting power. But, again, those with a stronger racial identity may be more resilient to the effect of discrimination (Isom, 2015).
(Prediction 5) Black Americans who perceive a lack of opportunity for socioeconomic advancement due to systemic barriers are more inclined to engage in criminal activity as a means of economic survival and social mobility. How does this follow from the theory? Perceptions of limited opportunities and systemic injustices can drive individuals to engage in criminal behaviors as a response to inequality (Vargas, 2023).
The fact that the TAAO generates these novel and successful predictions is evidence that we should accept the theory.
We also know that perceptions of criminal injustice predict offending (Bouffard and Piquero, 2013), we know that blacks are more likely than whites to perceive criminal injustice (Brunson and Weitzer, 2009) and we know that there are small differences among blacks and their perception of criminal injustice (Unnever, Gabbidon, and Higgins, 2011). So knowing this, more blacks should offend, right? Wrong. The vast majority of blacks don’t offend even though they share the same belief about the injustices of the criminal justice system. So how can we explain that? “Positive ethnic-racial socialization buffers the effect of weak school bonds on adolescent substance use and adult offending” (Gaston and Doherty, 2018). So the discrimination that black Americans have erodes their trust in social institutions like the school system, and then these weakened school bonds then increase the risk of offending.
Supporting a major tenet of TAAO and prior research on the protective ability of ethnic-racial socialization, the analyses showed that Black males who received positive ethnic-racial socialization messages in childhood develop resilience to the criminogenic effect of weak school bonds and face a lower risk for offending over the life course. (Gaston and Doherty, 2018)
One factor that is salient in the TAAO is racial subordination. We know that black people don’t commit crime because they are black, but we know that their offending is related to socio-environmental context like poverty, bad schools (while racism and stereotypes weaken school bonds blacks have, which makes them more likely to offend), broken families, and lead exposure (Butler, 2010) of which the TAAO addresses. We also know that there is no such thing as a “safe” level of lead exposure and that the relationship between lead and crime is robust and replicated across different countries and cultures. We also know that blacks were used as an experiment of sorts, where they were knowingly exposed to lead paint in subsidized homes.
This environmental racism (Washington, 2019), then, is another aspect of the racial subordination of blacks. And from 1976 to 2005, blacks were 7 times more likely than whites to commit murder. The fact of the matter is, the black-white murder gap has been large for over 100 years. And in discussing environmental racism, Unnever and Gabbidon (2011: 188) are explicit about the so-called genetic hypothesis of crime: “We want to be perfectly clear that our argument in no way is related to the thesis that there is a genetic cause to African American offending.” Therefore, this question doesn’t strike the heart of the TAAO and is just an attempt at evading the successful novel predictions the theory generates.
Conclusion
I’ve shown that the common “criticisms” of the TAAO are anything but and are easily answered. I then gave more successful predictions of the TAAO. It’s quite clear that one should accept the TAAO over hereditarian explanations. We also know that black isolation is a predictor of crime as well—even in 1996 blacks accounted for over 50 percent of murders and two-thirds of robberies (Shihadeh and Flynn, 1996). In 2020, blacks were six times more likely to be arrested for murder than whites. We also know that the belief by blacks in the violent stereotype predicts their offending and their adherence to the stereotype predicts crime and self control (Unnever, 2014). Therefore, a kind of stereotype threat arises here and has effects during police encounters like wkth height (Hester and Gray, 2018)(Najdowski, Bottoms, and Goff, 2015; Strine, 2018; Najdowski, 2012, 2023) , with one argument that race stereotypes track ecology, not race, (Williams, 2023) (just like for IQ; Steele and Aronson, 1995; Thames et al, 2014). We know that stereotype threats weaken school bonds and that weakened school bonds are related to offending, therefore we can infer that stereotype threats lead to an increase in crime (Unnever and Gabbidon, 2011).
Unnever and Gabbidon were quite clear and explicit in their argument and the hypotheses and predictions they made based on their theory. So when tested, if they were found not to hold then the theory would be falsified. But the theories held under empirical examination. Unnever and Gabbidon (2011: 98) were explicit in their theory and what it meant:
Put simply, we hypothesize that the probability of African American offending increases as blacks become more aware of toxic stereotypes, encounter stereotype threats, and are discriminated against because of their race. Our theory additionally posits that these forms of racism impact offending because they undermine the ability of African Americans to develop strong ties with conventional institutions. The extant literature indicates that stereotype threats and personal experiences of racial discrimination negatively impact the strength of the bonds (attachment, involvement, commitment) that black students have with their schools (Smalls, White, Chavous, and Sellers, 2007; Thomas, Caldwell, Faison, and Jackson, 2009). And, the research is clear; weak social bonds increase the probability of black offending (Carswell, 2007).
The worldview shared by black Americans is a consequence of the experience they and their ancestors had in America. This then explains their offending patterns, and why they commit more crime than whites. The socio-historical context that the TAAO looks to explain black crime is robust. Since the TAAO is successful in what it sets out to do, then, I wouldn’t doubt that there should be other race-centric theories of crime that try to explain and predict offending in those populations. The empirical successes of the TAAO’s predictions attest to the fact that other theories of crime for other races would be fruitful in predicting and explaining crime in those groups.
Hereditarians dream of having a theory that enjoys the empirical support that the TAAO has. The fact that the TAAO makes successful novel predictions and hereditarianism doesn’t is reason enough to reject hereditarian explanations and accept the TAAO. Accepting a theory that makes novel predictions is rational since it speaks to the theory’s predictive power. So by generating predictions that were previously unknown or untested and them confirming them through empirical evidence, the theory therefore shows its ability to predict and anticipate real-world phenomena. This then strengthens confidence in the theory’s underlying principles which provides a framework for understanding complex phenomena. Further, the ability of a theory to make such predictions suggests that the theory is robust and adaptable, meaning that it’s capable of accommodating new data while refining our understanding over time.
Hereditarians would love nothing more than to reduce black criminality to their genes or hormones, but reality tells a different story, and it’s one where the TAAO exists and makes successful novel predictions.
Can Racist Attitudes Be Reconciled with Christian Beliefs? On the Hypocrisy of Racist Christians
2050 words
Introduction
I’ve recently come across a lot of Christians who have “Christ is King” in their bio on Twitter. When you begin looking at their tweets, you can see that they’re not practicing what Jesus preached, since you can see some very racist beliefs they hold. What would Jesus think about that? Why are Christians more racist than non-Christians? We know that Puritan beliefs and IQ are similar. So let’s start there, and then let’s try to figure out why Christians are so racist, seemingly going against Christ’s teachings. Because by looking at the Bible and what Jesus said about treating people who are different to ourselves, we can see that Christians who hold to such beliefs on race and who hold such racist attitudes are contradicting themselves, and there is no way to reconcile the contradiction. It seems that, to these Christians at least, their race is their religion as their race comes first, not their religion, since some of them would not accept a non-white in their congregation.
Racism and religion
Christians are more likely to hold racist beliefs than non-Christians. White Christians are also more likely to deny that structural racism exists. Attending church doesn’t make white Christians less racist (See this article.) We know that there is a correlation between people identifying as Christian and believing that blacks lack willpower and also that economic differences between whites and blacks aren’t due to discrimination (Applegate and Maples, 2021). We also know that “warmth toward conservative Christians are not related to favorable racial attitudes among black Americans” (Yancey, 2024). There are also forms of implicit racism in Christianity (Bae, 2016). Why may this be?
“Paradoxically”, white supremacism has historical roots in Christianity. There is a Pew poll which has asks whether there is racism where none exists or people overlook racism where it exists. Fifty-three percent of Americans stated that people not seeing racism where it doesn’t exist is a problem while 45 percent said seeing racism where it doesn’t exist is more of a problem. But white Christians were more likely to believe that racism was seen where it didn’t exist—72 percent of white evangelicals, 60 percent of white Catholics, and 54 percent of white mainline protestants. But 10 percent of black protestants, 35 percent of unaffiliated Americans, and 31 percent of non-Christian religious Americans stated that seeing racism where it didn’t exist was a bigger problem. However 88 percent of black Protestants, 69 percent of non-Christian religious Americans, and 60 percent of “Hispanic” Catholics stated that not seeing racism where it did exist was a problem while 27 percent of white evangelicals, 44 percent of white mainline Protestants, and 39 percent of white Catholics held the belief. (See the WaPo article on the Pew poll.) At the end of the day, white Christian theology is “infected with racism” (Norris, 2020). Though some have argued that white supremacy matters more than religion and Christianity became the “white religion” (McMahon, 2022).
Eugenics and Christianity are also linked. Eugenics itself also has theological foundations, as does hereditarianism. Dozono (2023) writes:
The link between eugenics and modernity was further intertwined through Christian thought,1 exemplified in Hegel’s framing of Christian Europe as the highest principle. Keel (2018) traced the roots of racial science to Christian thought, asserting that modern science’s universal narratives of human development concealed their foundation in Christian European beliefs.
We also know that hereditarianism has its roots in Puritan ideology, and that the “intelligence men” were influenced by the religious beliefs around them.
People could intertwine their cultural beliefs and identity with their religious identity and have their prejudiced, biased ideals mesh with their religious ideals. They also could see their religious identity as inseparable from their cultural background which then has them persist in their racist beliefs despite the teachings of their religion. Some could also experience cognitive dissonance in that they hold contradictory beliefs of hate for other groups while espousing values like “Christ is King.”
So what would Jesus think about people who say “Christ is King” while spouting some virulent racism?
The phrase “Christ is King” refers to the Christian belief that Jesus is the ruler over all of creation. Jesus said he remembers what it was like with God (John 8:38-42) so this would imply that Christ would indeed be ruler over all creation. So how would Jesus feel about the fact that there are people who say he is King while professing such hateful rhetoric about His other children? What would happen if Jesus came back tomorrow and saw and confronted these people who hold these two contradictory beliefs?
Jesus would more than likely strongly oppose racism and prejudiced views. I think it’s quite obvious—based on His teachings—that He would strongly oppose such hypocrisy and the use of His name while such hate was espoused. His teachings and actions espoused loving and accepting people regardless of their background. In the Gospels, Jesus showed compassion to people who were considered outcasts of society, sinners, Samaritans, and gentiles. Jesus’s encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well is a good example of this.
In John (4: 1-42) Jesus came across a Samaritan woman at a well. Samaritans and Jews hated each other at the time, which traced back to Babylonian times. Although there are a few theories on the origin of Samaritans, like them not being Israelites but descendants of Mesopotamians to descendants of Judes who didn’t go into exile, at the time Jesus was alive, there was a clear divide between the two groups. So Jesus went through Samaria and got to a well. At the well, Jesus asked a Samaritan woman for a drink from the well, to which the woman stated “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” Talking with a woman in public at the time was restricted, and men didn’t talk to women in public especially when they were alone. So by initiating a conversation with not only a Samaritan but also a woman Jesus broke down cultural norms. He then let her know that He was the Messiah which showed Jesus’s willingness to engage with outcasts of society. The parable demonstrates the inclusivity of heaven, and that despite cultural/ethnic barriers, Jesus extended salvation through Him to all people.
Matthew (8: 5-13) also demonstrates the inclusivity of God’s kingdom in heaven. Jews viewed Roman’s as oppressors and themselves as the oppressed during Jesus’s time, yet despite the cultural divide the Roman centurion still approached Jesus to heal his servant. Jesus just uttered the words and his servant was healed. This is yet another instance of cultural barriers being broken and Jesus going against social norms of the time.
One of the most famous stories in the Bible is that of the good Samaritan (Luke 10: 25-37). Jesus was talking to a lawyer, and the lawyer asked him “Who is my neighbor?” and Jesus replied “What is written in the Law?“, to which the lawyer replied “Love your neighbor as you love yourself“, to which Jesus answered in the affirmative. The lawyer then asked “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus then told a story about a man going to Jerusalem from Jericho who was then attacked by robbers, stripped naked and left for dead. Both a priest and a Levite saw the man but passed by him. Then a Samaritan riding on a donkey saw him, gave him some oil and wine and took him to an inn. He paid the innkeeper and then said to him that he would come back and pay him any extra costs he would incur over the time spent taking care of the man. Jesus then asked the lawyer to tell him which of the three men was a neighbor to the beaten man? Jesus then told the lawyer to go and do likewise. So the message here is to be kind to everyone even if they have a different background from you. The message here is “Love your neighbor as you love yourself” (Mathew, 22: 39).
In Acts 10, a Roman centurion converted die to being visited by an angel. Peter was then shown a vision and the Spirit told him that three men would be looking for him. After the Roman explained his vision, Peter stated “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right.”
Finally we have Matthew (15: 21-28). Some have read this as Jesus being a racist, since he refers to the Caananite woman as a “dog.” But based on the sincerity of the woman’s faith, Jesus was willing to heal the woman’s daughter. This parable shows Jesus: willingness to confront his own prejudices.
These five passages have a few things in common. They talk about the importance of being inclusive, not being prejudiced, recognizing Jesus’s authority, and breaking down social barriers.
American society is racist, the church is part of the society, ergo, the church has problems with race. (The Left Behind: Why Are White American Christians So Racist?)
The above argument is a transitive property. Here it is spelled out more fully.
American society (A) causes racism (B). Racism (B) causes problems with race in society like church (C). Problems with race in society like church (C) cause internal racial issues/conflict (D). American society (A) causes internal racial issues/conflict in church (D). This argument highlights the systemic nature of racism and it’s various impacts on society, including of course the church.
Conclusion
I have discussed religion, racism, and societal attitudes. People who hold racist beliefs may identify as Christian and there are many reasons for the phenomenon, like selective interpretation of scripture, cultural influence, politics, and the historical legacies of racism. Further, there is a known relationship between Christian beliefs and racist attitudes.
I then analyzed some Bible passages which have similar messages of inclusivity, compassion, and the offer of salvation no matter ones lot in life or their racial/ethnic background. These stories show that Jesus sought to love people, not to viciously hate as some Christians do. These stories call on us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. But some Christians hold racist beliefs so how can that be reconciled? They can’t—they are contradictory beliefs.
In fact, Galatians (3: 28) states “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” This means that in Christ we are all the same—we are all equal to one another. So how can the racist Christian reconcile these two quite clearly contradictory beliefs? Again, they can’t. This verse espouses the belief in equality of all believers in Christ. So why, then, are Christians such racists, even towards people who hold the same or similar beliefs? Clearly they are just “cafeteria Christians“—where they pick and choose which scripture to follow and which they won’t. I then gave an argument that since American society is racist so too are it’s institutions, of course one of which are churches.
There are racial differences in the belief of an afterlife, and blacks are more likely to believe in heaven compared to whites. Some have claimed that racial phenotypes would exist in heaven and hell, while others claim that it’s an open question as to whether or not races will exist in heaven (Placencia, 2021).
But at the end of the day, it is a contradiction to believe in Christ so hard, believe his is King, believe in heaven but then hold to racist beliefs and attitudes towards different people. Even when Jesus himself helped others of different backgrounds and told stories of helping your neighbor and treating your neighbor as you want to be treated. All in all, this hypocrisy from some Christians cannot be reconciled with what is in the New Testament. The views are clearly contradictory and only cognitive dissonance allows one to hold the dissimilar views in the first place.
So if someone holds Christian beliefs, then they cannot hold racist attitudes. Therefore if someone holds racist attitudes then they cannot hold Christian beliefs. It’s a contradiction to hold Christian beliefs and profess racist attitudes.
Abolishing Whiteness Doesn’t Entail Abolishing White People
1450 words
Introduction
In recent years the concept of “whiteness” has been talked about more and more. With the rise of whiteness studies, this has gotten into the lens of the alt-right, and seem to take offense at the phrase “Abolish whiteness”, taking it to mean that they must mean they want to abolish whites. But this is a confusion based on what whiteness means and it’s relationship to white people. Contrary to these misconceptions, abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing white people. It, instead, seeks to deconstruct the social constructs and privileges which are tied to the concept whiteness. So by exploring a thought experiment, I will show why abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing white people. It’s quite clear that, once the concept of whiteness is understood and how it is distinct from white people themselves, this is just based on a scare-tactic.
Why abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing white people
I’ve seen what is obviously a fake quote from Noel Ignatiev going around a lot recently, which states:
If you are a white male, you don’t deserve to live. You are a cancer, you’re a disease, white males have never contributed anything positive to the world!
I searched for any reference I could but I couldn’t find it… Weird, almost as if it’s fabricated. Nonetheless, Ignatiev was a co-founder of the magazine Race Traitor, and it’s tagline was “Treason to whiteness is loyalty to humanity.” Bernstine Singley, in his book When Race Becomes Real: Black and White Writers Confront Their Personal Histories, writes:
The goal of abolishing the white race is on its face so desirable that some may find it hard to believe that it could incur any opposition other than from committed white supremacists.
Whoa, case closed, right? Not at all. Because the next paragraph is explicit by what is meant by “Abolish whiteness”:
Our standard response is to draw an analogy with anti-royalism: to oppose monarchy does not mean killing the king; it means getting rid of crowns, thrones, royal titles, etc….
That makes more sense. Because “Abolishing whiteness” doesn’t entail “Abolishing whites.” The two passages taken in context entails that the goal is abolishing the concept and privileges associated with the white race, not the abolishing of white people.
Monarchy symbolizes hierarchical power structures, and so to does whiteness—it represents a system of privilege that confers advantages to certain groups while marginalizing others. Clearly, the comparison with anti-royalism, where opposition of the monarch doesn’t entail the murder of individuals, but it refers to dismantling the structures and symbols associated with it. Therefore, in the context of race, it suggests challenging the social constructs and systems which perpetuate racial hierarchies, rather than targeting individuals and genociding a group. So it’s about challenging and abolishing systems of oppression.
Now white privilege is an apt concept to talk about here, but we need to be specific and talk about white class privilege. So by acknowledging this concept, it shifts the focus to encompass broader systems of inequality. White privilege refers to the unearned advantages and benefits that white people experience in virtue of their racial identity. White privilege intersects with other forms of privilege to shape an individual’s experiences and opportunities within a society. So recognizing white privilege is imperative in abolishing the concept of whiteness.
A simple thought experiment will explain why abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing white people.
Imagine a world where skin color and other racial traits are randomly assigned at birth, effectively eliminating the color/racial distinction for racial designations. So everyone, regardless of their family or ancestral background, can be born with any combination of racial traits, including skin color hair texture, facial features, and other physical characteristics traditionally associated with racial groups. This will show that abolishing the concept of whiteness would lose its social and historical significance.
In this society, racial identity is entirely arbitrary, and it has no correlation with one’s ancestry or generic heritage. People may be born with traits traditionally thought of as “white”, “black” “Asian”, “Native American”, or “Pacific Islander” traits, or any combination of them, irregardless of their actual family background. So in this society, “whiteness” completely loses its traditional meaning since there is no longer a fixed group of people who possess exclusively “white” racial traits. Instead, anyone from any background can potentially possess these traits, which then blurs the line between racial categories.
But despite reassigning and shuffling racial traits, the existence of people with “white” traits remains unchanged. These people may have fair skin, certain facial features, or other physical characteristics traditionally associated with the white racial group, even though these traits are now randomly assigned to individuals.
But what significantly changes is the social and cultural significance given to those traits. In a society where racial traits are randomly assigned, no longer would there be a hierarchy or system of privilege based on racial identity. Thus, the concept of whiteness no longer carries the same weight or privilege it used to because racial traits aren’t correlated with superiority or inferiority.
Therefore, abolishing whiteness in this thought experiment doesn’t entail abolishing white people. It instead involves dismantling the social constructs and structures which have historically been associated with the concept of whiteness. It’s about challenging the inequities perpetuated by racial hierarchies rather than targeting or eliminating individuals on the basis of their racial identity. So abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing white people.
Conclusion
As can be seen from this discussion, abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing white people. Such delusions comes from white nationalists and reading into “Abolish whiteness” and inferring that it must mean “Abolishing white people.” This then can be likened with the so-called “great replacement theory“, where abolishing whiteness is being carried out through, great replacement. So the phrase “Abolish whiteness”, along with the fabricated Ignatiev quote and fears of an intentional great replacement, serves to radicalize white people to hating Jews (becoming anti-Semites). Some may see the fabricated quote and say something like “Oh of course a Jew is saying that about Whites.” But this fails to understand race in America, since Jews are white (along with MENA people).
All in all, this stems from the paranoia of being intentionally replaced by migrants with higher TFRs, and implicating Jews and other elites into the plan to eradicate whiteness. But as I’ve shown here, there is no entailment that abolishing whiteness means abolishing white people. It’s the same with the so-called great replacement—there’s no entailment from the 2 accepted premises to the conclusion.
Nonetheless, by actually reading what people write and the surrounding context without quote-mining, you’ll be able to see the argument they’re making and be able to understand the argument being made. That’s a novel concept I know, but some need to hear this.
I don’t even think such an endeavor is achievable and possible since race is so engrained in the fabric of American life. No matter where we go, we see race, we hear about race, and it’s observed through one’s phenotype due to the social construction. But my goal here was to show that when one says they want to abolish whiteness it doesn’t entail that they want to abolish white people.
3/12/24 Addendum: “RR, what about abolishing blackness, Jewishness, Italianess and other ‘nesses’? Doesn’t that entail X, Y, Z?” There is one key difference here: As I argued, whiteness has been socially constructed to confer power, privilege, and superiority in the West. This construction has been used to justify countless acts of systemic oppression. Consequently, these other groups lack the power to confer such systemic oppression. Whiteness is deeply intertwined with systems of privilege, but abolishing the aforementioned identifies doesn’t have the same implications for systemic inequalities. Whiteness is a social construct based on racial identity, whereas the aforementioned “nesses” have distinct cultural, identifies with their own languages, cultures, and traditions. So saying that accepting the argument I made here entails the abolishing of the aforementioned identities entails erasing or suppressing those identities which is fundamentally different from arguing to abolish the concept of whiteness. Finally, trying to argue that accepting the argument I made entails that we should also abolish the aforementioned identities infringes on one’s right to religious/cultural freedom and self-determination while also eventually leading toward cultural erasure. Therefore, since abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing whites as I argued—only abolishing systems of oppression—then abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing the identities of the aforementioned groups (who are also white themselves).
(P1) If advocating for the abolition of whiteness means advocating harm against white people, then abolishing whiteness entails abolishing white people.
(P2) Abolishing whiteness doesn’t entail abolishing white people.
(C) Thus, advocating for the abolition of whiteness doesn’t entail advocating abolishing white people.
Personality Changes and Organ Transplants
2200 words
Introduction
People who have received organ transplants have reported stark changes in their personalities. Some (truly outrageous) stories claim that people who receive organs from people then get some of their donor’s personality traits. There are a few explanations like cellular memory, psychological, physiological, neurological,, immunological, DNA/RNA/epigenetic explanations. I think that the cases of personality change post-transplant are the same as twin studies, reporting only where there is remarkable similarity. Nonetheless, I’m skeptical of such claims. And I don’t think that, even if they’re true, that dualism is harmed. I will conclude with a discussion of my cognitive interface dualism and how even if the proposed mechanisms to explain observed personality changes in organ transplant receivers would hold it wouldn’t undermine my theory of dualism.
Proposed explanations for personality change post-transplant
Psychological explanations—The psychological impact of receiving a new organ could lead to a change in behavior. They may feel a sense of gratitude or connection to the donor which could change their behavior. The emotional experience of having a transplantat could profoundly affect the patient’s personality before and after surgery. If people receive a heart from someone who was outgoing or adventurous and they then become adventurous, this is then attributed to the organ transplant, specifically in a kind of cellular memory (reviewed below). So the chain goes like this: transplant -> connection to donor -> change in personally
Physiological explanation—Medication used to prevent organ rejection could affect personality in virtue of affecting brain chemistry. People who are to undergo a transplant are given immunosuppressive medication, to prevent the rejection of the transplanted organ. These medications suppress the recipient’s immune system which then could have various effects on the body. Some could also pass the blood-brain barrier. Certain medications, too, could also influence neurotransmitter production like serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine. Having an organ transplant is a major surgery, and the body becomes inflamed after. So the physiological response to stress could affect organ systems after the transplant. So along with the stress on the body of organ transplantation along with immunosuppressive medications, both of these could lead to changes in hormonal levels and signaling pathways. The trauma of surgery and recovery could also affect a person’s mental states. Here’s the chain: immunosuppressive medication -> altered brain functioning -> brain chemistry/function changes could alter personality
Neurological explanation—Organ transplants can lead to trauma of surrounding tissue. The transplantation process along with the medications one had to take can then influence neurochemical activity in the brain. Surgical, pharmacological, immunological and psychological factors could interact to cause personality change. Here’s the chain: after transplantation, signals from organ interact with recipient nervous system -> the signals could affect neural networks associated with specific traits/memories -> over time these interactions compound to change personality.
Immunological explanation—Bidirectional communication between the immune system and CNS—known as neuroimmune crosstalk (Tian et al, 2012)—could also be responsible. Organ transplants and immunosuppressive medication could disrupt this crosstalk. Further, inflammation could also affect neural functioning. Here’s the chain: suppressed immune system so organ isn’t rejected -> immune cells could interact with CNS -> immunological interaction could make changes to brain physiology which leads to personality change.
There are quite a few explanations for why personality changes occur that don’t rely on cellular memory. Each of the proposed explanations offers potential mechanisms to explain observed personality changes. Whole the psychological explanation emphasizes the emotional and psychological aspects of organ transplantation, while the physiological explanation focuses on the broader physiological effects of transplantation on the recipient’s body. The neurological explanation goes into the direct effect of transplantation while the immunological explanation highlights the role of immune-mediated processes in influencing brain physiology.
Cellular memory—This is where organs, cells or tissues retain memories or information from their previous host which then influence the behavior of the new recipient of the organ. Of course this is a very speculative idea and there isn’t really much scientific evidence for the claim. I can see someone trying to say that the neurons in the transplanted organ somehow had an effect on the personality change.
Based on anecdotal reports along with case studies of organ recipients who claimed to have acquired new skills, personalities, or preferences following their transplants, such stories capture the imagination of people. Such reports often involve cases in which the recipient exhibits behaviors or preferences that are seemingly unrelated to past personal experiences but are related to their organ donor. (I will quote some people below on this and their experiences.) So these cases have pushed along the claim that cellular memories can be transferred along with transplanted organs.
One hypothesis is neural network transfer. Memories or information stored in the brain of the organ donor could be transferred to the recipient through neural connections which are established through the transplantation process. So neural networks associated with memories or learned behaviors could be preserved within the transplanted organ leading to an influence in the recipient’s brain functioning.
A small number of donor cells could persist in the transplanted organ, which then could involve microchimerism. The donor cells could then interact with the recipient’s tissues and cells and then influence behavioral or physiological characteristics.
Epigenetic modifications which regulate gene expression without a change to the genome could play a role in cellular memory. Changes in gene expression patterns could persist in the recipient which then leads to behavioral changes.
Finally, psychological changes like the placebo effect and expectations could contribute to the perception of cellular memory. They could unconsciously or consciously adopt behaviors of the organ donor due to psychological or social influence.
But the anecdotal reports of cellular memory fall prey to post hoc rationalization, the placebo effect, and selective reporting. Moreover, neural network transfer and microchimerism lack evidentiary support to substantiate their role in the behavioral changes in the donor. There is a lack of a causal relationship between recipient experiences and donor characteristics. Factors like the recipient’s pre-existing beliefs, psychological adjustment to transplantation and social support networks more than likely play a significant role in shaping the post-transplant experiences of the donor.
One study found that 3 patients reported changes in their personality post-heart transplant (Bunzel et al, 1992). One online survey of 47 transplant recipients (23 heart and 24 organ) found that 89 percent of the donor’s experienced personality changes (Carter et al, 2024) (which was substantially higher than that of the results of Bunzel et al).
One white man was given a heart from a black kid who was gunned down in a drive-by shooting, and he loved classical music. After the man’s transplant, he began liking classical music after previously hating it. He stated that he know it wasn’t his heart because “a black guy from the ‘hood wouldn’t be into that’…and now [classical music] calms my heart” (Christopher, 2024). The recipient’s wife then said that the donor was socializing more with black coworkers at work and he began to love classifical music post-transplant. She said “He even whistles classical music songs that he could never know. How does he know them? You’d think he’d like rap music or something because of his black heart.”
In another case, a 19 year old woman was killed in a car accident. She was also a vegetarian and owned a health food restaurant. As she was dying, she said to her mother that she could feel the impact of the car hitting her. So the organ recipient was a 29 test old women who reported two things occurring post-transplant—she said she could feel the impact of the accident on her chest and she began hating meat after her surgery, saying that “now meat makes me throw up” (Christopher, 2024). Before her transplant she was a lesbian and then after, she was into men.
A 3 year old died in an accident at a family pool. The recipient—a 8 year old—loved the water before his surgery but after it, according to his mother, he was “now deathly afraid of water” (Christopher, 2024).
A 14 year old girl died in a gymnastics accident, and per her mother she had a “silly little giggle”. She was also kind of anorexic with food. Her recipient was a 47 year old man. After his surgery, the recipient’s brother states that he was acting “like a teenager” and that he’s “like a kid.” He also reported that when they went bowling he “yells and jumps like a girl” and that he “had a girls laugh.” He was also nauseous all the time and his doctor had a concern about his Wright (Christopher, 2024).
In the last case Christopher (2024) discussed, a cop was murdered by a drug dealer after being shot in the face. In his mug shot, the cop’s wife stated that the drug dealer looked like some depictions of Jesus. After the heart transplant, the donor stated that he would have dreams of seeing a “flash of light right in my face and my face gets real, real hot. It actually burns. Just before that time, I would get a glimpse of Jesus. I’ve had these dreams and now daydreams ever since: Jesus and then a flash” (Christopher, 2024). Finally a girl received a transplant from a teenage boy who died in a motorcycle accident. After her surgery her mother stated that she began liking KFC, “walking like a man“, and she wanted to drink beer. Come to find out, these were some things the boy who died liked to do. There is also a recent article on Psychology Today talking about cellular memory.
All of these cases could simply be an artifact of selective reporting or coincidence.
Conclusion
While these cases are no doubt interesting and if true means that we need to propose different mechanisms of the like as in with cellular, DNA/RNA, epigenetic and protein memory (Pearsall, Schwartz, and Russek, 2000), I think current evidence points it to be just coincidences or post hoc rationalization. Now of course, if these cases were proven to be genuine then we should revisit them and think about mechanisms like the above in this paragraph.
As can be seen, anecdotal reports and studies suggest the possibility of behavioral changes that mirror, in some cases, that of the donor. But the concept of cellular memory is currently speculative and lacks empirical evidence. We could have controlled studies on animal models to see whether behavioral or physiological traits associated with the donor are transferred to the recipient. We could also analyze gene expression, epigenetic modification, RNA expression, DNA methylation, and protein levels within transplanted tissues or organs from donors to recipients. We could then male comparisons between tissues and organs from donors and recipients to ascertain any kind of differences or similarity which could be indicative of memory transfer. These are but a few empirical tests I can think of that we can begin to carry out to test this if it’s more than coincidence or post hoc rationalization.
Lastly, in August of 2023 I formulated a theory of dualism I call cognitive interface dualism which argues that action potentials are the interface that Descartes was looking for. (I had an A&P professor state that out of the whole textbook he taught out of that muscle movement was some of the only conscious activity that could be done. Then that dawned on me and I formulated my dualist framework.) Dualism posits that mind and body are two separate, substances with mind being irreducible to body/brain. So even if there is a personality change, that doesn’t entail that the mind has changed. In cognitive interface dualism, interactions between the mind and body occur through action potentials (APs). Personality changes could occur through the interface of the interactions, but changes in physical organs like the brain do alter the fundamental nature of the immaterial mind. (Of course damage to the brain can influence the mind since the brain is a necessary pre-condition for human mindedness, but that’s different.) Even if a person’s personality undergoes changes after a transplant, their underlying sense of self, consciousness, and subjective experiences remain intact. It doesn’t necessarily imply a direct alteration of mind,
The other explanations I discussed above are also on different levels of explanation than dualism. Dualism is about ontological explanation whereas the other explanations operate at the physiological and molecular levels. Cellular mechanisms could influence certain aspects of behavior or experience, but it doesn’t undermine the existence of a separate, irreducible mental realm. Dualism and biology can also be complimentary, where biology would address any possible mechanisms like cellular memory, RNA/DNA/epigenetic expression while dualism addresses questions of consciousness, the nature of the mind and subjective experience. Even if cellular memory would be shown to be true this wouldn’t undermine my theory, since the core aspects of one’s consciousness, self, and subjective experiences remain intact. So these would offer complimentary perspectives.
In sum, while this is an interesting area to look at, I am a skeptic. I won’t completely discount it being true, but I have proposed some empirical tests to see if it does hold. And if it does, it doesn’t have any implications for dualist theories, including my cognitive interface dualism.
Evaluating Heritability in an Imagined Metabolic Ward Study of Twins
2000 words
Introduction
For the better part of 100 years, twin studies have been used to prove that there is a genetic influence to all traits. The claim is that “all human traits are heritable”, which is the “first law of behavioral genetics” as stated by Turkheimer. Using twin, family, and adoption studies, it is claimed that some traits are “more genetic than others”, especially IQ. But a meta-analysis 10 years ago found that heritability was 49 percent for all traits (Polderman et al, 2014; see here for critique). However due to the falsity of the EEA—which holds that environments are similar for both MZ and DZ twins—the so-called heritability is shared environment (h2=c2). (See Joseph, 2014 for arguments against twin interpretations and Joseph 2022, 2023 for arguments against Thomas Bouchard’s twin studies. See Bouchard 2023 for response to Joseph 2022, and Joseph 2023 is Joseph’s response.)
But imagine we could bypass such devestating issues for twin studies that invalidates them for their stated aims. What would we find? Here, I will create a thought experiment in which 100 MZs and 100 DZs were placed in a metabolic ward immediately after birth. In this scenario, every single aspect of the environment is meticulously controlled—as is the case in animal breeding studies—which would then eliminate shared environmental influences and therefore would give us a “real look” into the (obviously context-dependent) heritability of traits.
However unethical this study is, though, even if it were possible there are a slew of conceptual and empirical issues that would still invalidate the estimates. The issues include the limitations of assuming additive genetic effects, the presence of GxE, the non-representative nature of twins, and the missing heritability problem. The argument I will mount here will show that even with perfectly controllable environments, we still wouldn’t be able to “estimate heritability” and furthermore due to the interaction problem that this study still wouldn’t overcome, that would further make any such results meaningless.
The unethical twin metabolic ward study
A metabolic ward is a controlled environment which is usually found in a hospital, research facility or clinic in which the participant’s can be closely monitored and their metabolic processes studied under tightly regulated conditions. Researchers can control diet, diet quality, sleep, physical activity, and environmental influences to investigate nutrient absorption, energy expenditure, hormone regulation and metabolic disorders. Controlled settings like this allow researchers to get precise measurements, ensure that a participant is following a diet correctly as to study their metabolic processes on that diet, and understand the physiological mechanisms better. (See Hodges and Bean, 1960.)
Now imagine all of that but imagine that 100 MZ twins and 100 DZ twins were—after birth—immediately whisked away to a metabolic ward and from that moment on, they were in a tightly regulated environment as to attempt to minimize or completely eliminate shared environmental influences. What would happen?
We could learn about the genetic influence of genetics on metabolic processes, like the influence of genes on nutrient absorption, energy expenditure, hormone regulation and metabolic disorders. So by comparing MZ and DZ twins on the similarity and differences in these traits, we could then ascertain the genetic influence that underlies the variability between them. This would also allow researchers to completely control sleep, eating, physical activity levels and other environmental exposures which would then allow researchers to tease a part the relative influenced of genes and environment. This would also allow us to see how GxE affects a trait. We could learn about how genetic predispositions interact with dietary factors or how lifestyle choices modulate metabolic health outcomes and disease risk. It could also give us insights into individual variability so we can give individualized metabolic approaches.
However, even if IRB can be passed, there are of course potential psychological and social implications for those studied. The issue is, we have minds and we therefore react differently to things independently of our genetic makeup. So although we could potentially learn some interesting things about human metabolic processes, when it comes to psychological ones, due to the unrepresentative environment, these will be less valid than metabolic processes.
We technically do “measure” heritability of traits now, but they’re heavily confounded, and even though—intuitively—it may seem like such an experiment would be valid and show “true heritability” (whatever that means), we know that h2 is context-dependent and not useful for individuals. Such a study would be about perfectly controlling every aspect of the environment as best we could to decrease whatever environmental effect would bias the h2 upwards. But I think a slew of conceptual issues would still even then invalidate such interpretations.
Cattle and humans are quite obviously different in their propensities, and even then, if we could pass IRB ethics and lock 100 MZs and 100 DZs in a metabolic ward and perfectly control every aspect of the environment, the issue there would be our experiences in society and our interactions with others are extremely meaningful to how we develop as humans. So if that kind of experiment were possible, then the h2s would be way lower than twin, family and adoption studies give us (we see this in animal breeding studies—way lower h2 in those traits than for IQ, see Schonemann, 1997).
There are also further conceptual issues like the falsity of the addivitiy assumption, GxE, GxG (Zuk et al, 2011), psychological distress, and the fact that we become human and gain our minds through our interactions with people in broader society would also further confound such interpretations. Furthermore, since the EEA is false, h2 equals c2, meaning the heritability is shared environment. That’s the best interpretation we have of twin studies. And the missing heritability issue that plagues GWAS and other molecular approaches to trait heritability further throws a wrench in this, since it’s completely possible that GxE (and other interactions) contribute to trait variance, and this—along with epigenetic and non-genetic factors—aren’t accounted for by h2 estimates (since they assume additive independent genetic effects). So even if such an experiment were possible and the conceptual issues I raised weren’t an issue, that alone would invalidate the study.
One big issue is the fact that twins aren’t representative of the population at large. For example we know that twins have a higher chance of having low birth weights, are more likely to be born premature than non-twins (Isakkson, Ruchkin, and Ljungstrom, 2023). Low birth weight is also predictive of health outcomes in adulthood (Hassan et al, 2021). Twins are also more likely to experience complications during pregnancy and childbirth like preterm birth, intrauterine birth restriction and childbirth trauma. The intrauterine birth restrictions could also influence their metabolic development and responses within the ward, which This then would influence their outcomes in adulthood compared to non-twins. We also know that there are a slew of environmental effects that increase the chance for DZ twinning between groups (MZ twinning is relatively the same between them). Moreover, due to the complications that twins face before, during, and after childbirth, this could then affect their metabolic health and responses within the metabolic ward. Therefore, while this thought experiment proposes ways in which researchers can use a metabolic ward to study the relative influence of genes and environment on traits (assuming that there are no other conceptual issues with such an endeavor), researchers would still need to take into account the ways in which twins differ from the general population which would then influence the results that would be observed in the metabolic ward study.
Joseph (2009) proposed an interesting thought experiment:
Finally, we could conduct a thought experiment on political behavior and social attitude correlations among reared-apart MZ twin pairs who, while genetically identical, grow up in truly uncorrelated environments in different eras. Suppose one male MZA twin is placed at birth in an aristocratic Japanese family in 1802. The other male MZA twin is placed at birth in a poor peasant family living in the highlands of El Salvador in 1965. Unlike previous TRA studies, inwhich the investigators calculate correlations among partially reared-apart twins sharing many cultural influences, in our thought experiment we eliminate cultural influences such as family (which most MZAs share to some extent), mutual association and influence (which most MZAs also share to some extent), nation, region, ethnic, religion, economic class, and birth cohort (of course, they would still be the same sex).75 I conclude this thought experiment by posing the following question: Would we expect a study of genetically identical pairs of this type to find sizable correlations for political behavior and social attitudes?
The correct conclusion to draw here is that although the twins share genetic makeup (to whatever degree they do), but they are raised in different environments and different time periods, the divergence in their experiences shows that heritability can’t fully capture the role of environment in capturing in shaping not only these traits but all traits studied by twin researchers.
Conclusion
In the end, if such a study were logistically possible and ethical, it wouldn’t show h2 anywhere near twin, family and adoption studies. We’ve basically reached an upper bound on molecular h2 estimates. And of course twins aren’t representative of the general population at large (since they have lower birth weights/injuries and a higher mortality rate). And even then, twins in these studies aren’t even representative of all twins. This is, yet again, a conceptual failure of hereditarianism—the assumption that twin studies will tell us anything about “the genetic architecture” of traits merely due to genetic similarity and being so-called “reared apart.”
Even if such a study were possible, there would be a lack of generalizability due to the fact that the observations occurred during rightly controlled conditions. Such a study is fraught with conceptual, empirical and ethical issues. Biases in sample selection, the health differences between twins and non-twins, prenatal and peri-natal factors, psychological and social dynamics and the lack of generalizability highlight why twins aren’t a representative of the population at large. Moreover, the complexity of metabolic traits and the assumption of genetic independence further complicate interpretations in the ward setting—especially since DNA interacts with all other developmental resources (Noble, 2012).
But even in a possible world where such limitations can be addressed and made meaningless, there are still inherent limitations of heritability estimates as a measure of the genetic determination of traits (in the popular culture, see Moore et al, 2016 for a critique if the heritability concept). Heritability estimates are context-dependent and subject to numerous confounding factors.
But disregarding this thought experiment and looking to the real world, we know that there is no way to estimate interactions in population studies. The so-called solution is to assume that there are NO gene-environment and gene-gene interactions, and this therefore biases such estimates upwards (Ho, 2013). This shows that the assumption of additive effects and no GxG or GxE interactions would still pose a problem—an insurmountable one. Thus, even estimates from this study would still be subject to upward bias due to the nature of the assumptions of heritability. This shows that even in a perfectly controlled environment that measuring h2 is impossible due to the disregarded biological facts inherent in the heritability formula. Joseph and Richardson (2024) also show that Herrnstein and Murray (1994) didn’t give any valid evidence that genes influence IQ scores within groups.
So the conclusion here is very simple—since heritability studies can’t tell us anything about the relative contributions of genes and environments due to the inherent nature of the heritability formula which disregards interactions, and due to the whole slew of other conceptual and empirical issues raised here, even in a perfectly controlled environment we still wouldn’t be able to get “true h2” estimates of any kind of trait in the metabolic ward. So the goal of behavioral genetics is an impossible one.
Race and Racial Identity in the US
2300 words
Introduction
The concept of RACE is both a biological and social construct. In the US, there are 5 racial groups, and every 10 years the Census Bureau attempts to get a tally of the breakdown of racial identity in the US. The Census defers to the OMB, who in 1997 updated their racial classification. So race is identities culturally, socially, and historically. But racial identity goes beyond the US Census survey and encompasses one’s experiences, beliefs and perceptions which shape their identity and how they understand themselves and the society in which they live.
In the US we have whites, blacks (or African American), East Asian (or Asian), Native American or Alaskan Native, and Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander. Each of these racial categories represents not only a demographic group, but also an amalgamation of historical, social, and cultural contexts which then influence how an individual navigates and forms their racial identity. Here, I will discuss which groups fall under which racial categories in the US, why Hispanics/Latinos and Arabs (MENA people) aren’t a race and the relationship between the self and racial identity.
Race in the US
The Census Bureau defers to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) on matters of race. In 1997, the OMB separated Asians and Pacific Islanders and changed the term “Hispanic” to “Hispanic or Latino” (OMB, 1997). But in this discussion, they stated that there are 5 races: white, black, Native American, East Asian and Pacific Islander. The US Census Bureau has to defer to the OMB, and the OMB defines race as a socio-political category. Below are the 5 minimum reporting categories (races) as designated by the OMB.
White – A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa.
Black or African American – A person having origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa.
American Indian or Alaska Native – A person having origins in any of the original peoples of North and South America (including Central America) and who maintains tribal affiliation or community attachment.
Asian – A person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander – A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific Islands. (About the Topic of Race)
Race in America is based on self-identification, and the OMB allows one to put that they are of one or more racial groups. They also allow write ins of “Some Other Race”, which I will get to below. For now, I will elaborate on each racial category, and begin with the—controversial to white nationalists—definition of “white” that designates MENA people as white.
White racial designation—I showed the 5 minimum reporting categories (racial groups) above, and there has been discussion of adding a MENA minimum reporting category per the Federal Register. Such a move would be because they don’t identify as white, they aren’t perceived as white (Maghbouleh, Schachter, Flores, 2022) and and don’t have the same lived experiences as white Europeans. But we know that in OMB racetalk, white isn’t a narrow group that refers only to Europeans, it’s a broad group that refers to the ME/NA (yes, even Ashkenazi Jews). For instance, in the 2000 Census, 80 percent of Arabs self-identified as only white (de la Cruz and Brittingham, 2003). Obviously, Arabs intend to use the white category in the same ah that the OMB uses it. Even then, we know that the aftermath of 9/11 hasn’t changed the self-reported race of around 63 percent of Arab Americans (Spencer, 2019). Further, know that those who feel that the term “Arab American” doesn’t describe them are more likely to identify as white and that some Arab Americans both report strong ethnic ties, identify as white, and reject the Arab American label (Ajrouch and Jamal, 2007). They aren’t afforded minority status in the US even though they account for 2 to 6 percent of the US population, and this is because of their designation as white. This isn’t to deny, though, the fact that they do experience discrimination and that they do have health inequalities (see Abboud, Chebli, and Rabelais, 2019), I just don’t think that they comprise a racial group, and at best they are an ethnicity in the overall white race—the fact that Arab Americans are discriminated against doesn’t justify their being a separate racial category (Jews, the Irish and Italians were also discriminated against upon arrival to the US but they were always politically and socially white; Yang and Koshy, 2016.) Arab Americans (and all MENA people) are simply like Italians, Irish British, Jews, and Poles in America—there is no need for an Arab/MENA racial category; the fact that they’re discriminated against and have differences in health from whites is irrelevant, because you can find both of these things in other ethnic groups labeled as white yet they don’t deserve a special racial status.
Of course, the term white in America also refers to people of European origin like Italians, Germans, Russians, Fins, and others and this designation has stayed relatively the same. Thus, the white race in American racetalk is designated for European and MENA people. (This would also hold for some “Hispanics/Latinos, see below.)
Black or African American racial designation—This category refers to black Americans (“African American”, AfAm “Foundational Black Americans” FBA, or “American Descendants of Slavery”, ADOS). For instance, the overlap between US race terms in the OMB and Blumenbacian racial designations is 1.0 for black or African (Spencer, 2014). Spencer (2019) noted one problem with the OMB’s definition of black or African American—that it would designate all people as black or African American since it says “A person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa.” But this can be avoided if we say they the way the OMB uses the term race is just it’s referent—it’s a set of categories or population groups (Spencer, 2014). So this racial designation just means any individual who can trace their ancestry back to Africa—which would comprise, say, Cubans/Puerto Ricans/Dominicans and other “Hispanics/Latinos” with African ancestry, black Americans, and immigrants from Africa who have sub-Saharan African ancestry.
American Indian or Alaskan Native racial designation—About 5.2 million people in America identify using this category (Nora, Vines, and Hoeffel, 2012). (This fell to 3.7 million in 2020.) This designation captures not only American Indians, but people who have Native ancestry from Central and South America, like the Maya, Aztec, Inca (which is referred to as “Latin American Indian”) and others. This also includes Alaskan Natives such as Yup’ik, Inuit, and other Natives such as Chippewa and Indians living on reservations. When it comes to American Indians, one must be able to prove their tribal affiliations, by showing that they or an ancestry had tribal affiliation, has an established “lineal ancestor“, or providing documentation that they have a relationship to a person using vital records.
Asian racial designation—This encompasses the far East, the Indian subcontinent and South East Asia. Before 1997, Asians and Pacific Islanders (PIs) were grouped together. For instance, in 1977 the OMB had 4 racial classifications since Asians and PIs were grouped together (and they still noted “Hispanics” as an ethnicity, with the option to identify as Hispanic or non-Hispanic). Thus, if one has ancestry to East Asia, South East Asia and the Indian subcontinent, they are therefore Asian.
Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander racial designation—As noted above, this group was split off from a broader “Asian or Pacific Islander” category. This designation refers to people Native Hawaiians and Oceanians. We know that the overlap between “Pacific Islander” and “Oceanian” is 1.0 (Spencer, 2014). Australian Aboriginals also fall under this category. Along with designating Native Hawaiians and Australian Aboriginals in this category, it also refers to people from other Pacific islands Samoa and other Pacific Islands like Melanesia, Guam, and Papua New Guinea (OMB, 1997). So the breaking up of the “Asian and or Pacific Islander” category is valid.
The question of “Latinos/Hispanics”—Back in August of 2020, I argued that “Latinos/Hispanics” were a group I called “HLS” or “Hispanics/Latinos/Spanish” people (OMB notes that these terms are and can be used interchangeably). This is because, at least where I grew up, people referred to Spanish speakers as one homogenous group, irregardless of their phenotype. So they would group together say Puerto Ricans and Salvadorians with Argentineans, Chileans and Cubans. However, these countries have radically different racial admixtures and culture based on what occurred there after 1492. But the issue is this—HLS isn’t a racial group. To me, it’s a socio-linguistic cultural group, since they share a language and some cultural customs. The category “Latin American is a social designation. But the thing is, the OMB rightly notes that” Hispanics or Latinos “are not a racial group, they are an ethnic group. In 1997 the OMB changed “Hispanic”to “Hispanic or Latino.” The OMB stated that the definition should be unchanged, but that the “Latino” qualifier should also be added. This category would comprise Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, Central and South Americans and other Spanish culture or origins REGARDLESS OF RACE. Indeed the Census (who defer to the OMB) is quite clear: “Hispanics and Latinos may be of any race…People who identify their origin as Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish may be of any race.” Further, as noted above, the category “American Indian or Alaskan Native” also encompasses Latin American Indians (which some think of when they think of “Latinos or Hispanics”).
Furthermore, Spencer (2019: 98) notes that “Conducting a linear regression analysis shows that the average Caucasian ancestry of a Hispanic American national origin group positively and highly correlates (r=+0.864) with the proportion of that group that self-reported ‘White’ alone on the 2010 US Census questionnaire. Quite clearly, “white Hispanics” exist, and this is because as noted by the OMB, Hispanics aren’t a racial group. Forty percent of Central Americans identified as “some other race”, while 85 percent of Cubans, 53 percent of Puerto Ricans, and 35 percent of Dominicans identified as white in 2010; both Puerto Ricans and Dominicans were also more likely to identify as black or report multiple races (Ennis, Rios-Vargas, and Albert, 2011). HLS is clearly not a homogeneous group.
Therefore, phrases like “white Hispanic”, “Afro Latino/a” aren’t a contradiction of terms.
Throughout this discussion, I have shown that there is a relationship between racial identity and one’s self-identification. We also know—consistent with the TAAO—that moderate racial and ethnic identification for blacks and Asians acts as a buffer for racial discrimination while for whites, American Indians and Latinos it exacerbates it (Woo et al, 2019).
One final consideration leaves me with clustering studies. When K is set to 5, there are 5 clusters (Rosenberg et al, 2002). These are what Spencer calls human continental populations or Blumenbacian partitions. These clusters correspond to whites, blacks, Asians, Native Americans and Pacific Islanders. But “Hispanics”, being a recent amalgamation of admixed groups clustered in between other clusters and didn’t form their own cluster (Risch et al, 2002). Defenses of this study to show the biological reality of race can be found in Spencer (2014, 2019) and Hardimon (2017).
Conclusion
I have discussed what race means in the American context (it’s version of racetalk), it’s definition as defined by the OMB, and changes to the categories over the years. I don’t think they MENA people should be a separate racial category, since many of them identify as white, and although some do identify as Arab American and some are discriminated against, this isn’t relevant for their status as a racial category since Jews, the Irish and Italians were discriminated against upon their arrival to America and they also have a qualifier as well; this category also refers to European descendants. Black and African Americans refer to people with ancestry to Africa, so this could encompass many people like American blacks, certain Brazilians, Dominicans, and Puerto Ricans.
Native American or Alaskan Native refers to not only North American Indians and people native to Alaska but also Latin American Indians (Maya, Pima and others). Asian and Pacific Islanders were split in 1997, since before then (in 1977) there were only 4 racial groups per the OMB. The Asian category refers to South East Asia, East Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander category refers to people native to Hawaii along with other Pacific Islands like Guam, Samoa and Papua New Guinea. Lastly, HLSs are not a racial designation and can be of any race. I showed that while many Caribbean Hispanics identify with different racial groups, they don’t themselves designate a separate racial group from their self-identification. Hispanics or Latinos can be of any race (like for example the former president of Peru Alberto Fujimori who had Japanese ancestry but was born in Peru, he’d be Hispanic as well, but his race is Asian).
I then showed that there are defenses of what is termed “cluster realism” (Kaplan and Winther, 2009), and that Hispanics aren’t in these clusters. This is a stark difference from hereditarians like Charles Murray who merely assume that race exists without an argument.
Therefore, since racial pluralism is true, there are a plurality of race concepts that hold across time and place (like with how race is defined in Brazil and South Africa). But for the context of this discussion, in America, race is a social construct of a biological reality and there are 5 racial groups and all theories of race are based off of the premise that race is a social construct. Spencer’s racial identity argument is true.
NotPoliticallyCorrect 