[Taxacom] Race and taxonomy

[Thomas G. Lammers]

At 07:51 AM 10/7/2008, Richard Jensen wrote:
>Unfortunately, that's not what is being argued. Very simply, his
>position is that there is no biological validity to the concept of human
>races because there is no biological basis for recognizing, under any
>circumstances, such groups. This view, and I am paraphrasing here, is
>essentially that when Linnaeus and Blumenthal (and, later, Coon)
>described human races, they did so because they were motivated, either
>implicitly or explicitly, by the desire (need?) to establish positions
>of superiority/inferiority according to their own socially-driven
>interpretations.

Well, that may very well be true, they were men of their times and 
societies after all, but that would not necessarily, in and of itself, 
undermine the possibility that there was biological significance to 
race.  True facts can be used for ignoble ends; that doesn't make them less 
true.


Thomas G. Lammers, Ph.D.

Associate Professor and Curator of the Herbarium (OSH)
Department of Biology and Microbiology
University of Wisconsin Oshkosh
Oshkosh, Wisconsin 54901-8640 USA

e-mail:       lammers at uwosh.edu
phone:      920-424-1002
fax:           920-424-1101

Plant systematics; classification, nomenclature, evolution, and 
biogeography of the Campanulaceae s. lat.

Webpages:
http://www.uwosh.edu/departments/biology/Lammers.htm
http://www.uwosh.edu/departments/biology/herbarium/herbarium.html
http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/ShowRatings.jsp?tid=297234
http://www.kewbooks.com/asps/ShowDetails.asp?id=615
http://www.uwosh.edu/colleges/cols/StaffBooks/lammers.htm
http://www.geocities.com/TheTropics/Resort/7156/lammers.html
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