December 21, 2013

Nicholas Wade's 2006 "Before the Dawn"

A lot of commenters are interested in long-time NYT genetics reporter Nicholas Wade's upcoming book on race and genetics: A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race, and Human History.

So here's my review of Wade's 2006 book Before the Dawn in VDARE.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_Water_Dog

Looks like the British were not the last to actively breed dogs for specific functions:

Fascinating account of how soviets were breeding dogs after WWII especially in contrast to the famous tame foxes.

The Moscow Water Dog seems justifiably extinct judging by this conclusion:

"They were developed as a water rescue/lifesaving dog, but according to O. Krasnovskaya, "That was not a good idea as [they] were not willing to save drowning people, but mostly were looking to bite them so this breed was never developed".

Wonder what the chinese are cooking up??

Sorry for off-topic - I'll read your Taki review now with pleasure.

Jorn said...

Along with 'people nerds' you need to accommodate 'literature nerds' like Roget and Dewey-Decimal Dewey and Polti and the folks at TVTropes.org... again overwhelmingly male and convinced that the universe of concepts can only be systematised via analysis of story-plot elements.

Anonymous said...

http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/181322/

sunbeam said...

Anonymous wrote:

"Wonder what the chinese are cooking up??"

Animals just don't seem to be their thing. Mongols and their ponies for sure, but not the Han.

Just Another Guy With a 1911 said...

Steve, hey, have you ever considered of doing what instapundit does,i.e., linking to Amazon when you review a book, movie, classic 1960's toys, etc? It might bring in some additional revenue for you. Heck, Glenn does it with every pulpy Johnny Ringo (who, I am convinced, has written some of his books while strung out on coke, lagavulin, and Xenophon) libertarian military sci-fi novel that is "in the mail."

It occurred to me because I bought a used copy of "Before the Dawn" on amazon based on your Wade post the other day.

My plan, after reading it, is to give it to a history professor I know who usually teaches a section on "World History" which has some coverage of the "before the dawn" time period. Of course, he is a fairly doctrinaire liberal when it comes to the issue of race. However, if I give him the book and invoke the magic words "NYT Science Editor" along the required Church of PC litany "those damn creationists, it will blow their puny little minds", well then, it will be like selling crack to a crack addict, but this crack will adulterated with some HBD ideas and he'll end up strung out - strung out on the truth!

"Wonder what the chinese are cooking up??"

Extra tasty Chongqing dogs?

Also - the evolution of handguns ended with the 1911. That is all. Kidding! Gun nut bait!

use tide detergent soap said...

If race is bogus and there are no genetic differences among human groups, how can they study the history of human evolution by studying the DNA?

Wouldn't it be impossible to distinguish one group of people from another across time and space since there are no racial differences among all the groups of mankind?

ATBOTL said...

The use of the word "troublesome" in the title suggest that the book will will be full of PC genuflecting and efforts to tone down the truth.

Uncle Elmer said...

"Wonder what the chinese are cooking up??"

Dogs. I a serious. It's what's for dinner.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

Loved that book. I keep trying to lend it out.

sunbeam said...

Anonymous wrote:

"This is so idiotic. This is not "race". This is genetic clustering. This has nothing to do with "race".

We don't deny that genetic clustering exists, but this is not the same thing as "race". I mean really, why can't a blood group be a "race"? Why not tall people?

All modern humans are members of one sub-species, homo sapiens sapiens, hence race can't exist."

Ok, I'll bite. How are races not genetically clustered, as you put it?

You are either really knowledgeable, or don't know what you are talking about. If knowledgeable I think we might be smelling semantics or a technical term you have been taught to assign a certain meaning.

Or you don't know what you are talking about.

So explain what you just said. You really sound like you are using race, where you mean something like "species."

And when you start using words like that things get wonky in a hurry. I mean you have said we are "Homo Sapiens Sapiens," a subspecies related I guess to things like Homo Neanderthalis.

But you know, both presumably came from Homo Something else. And that came from Homo something even more else.

And if you keep going back you get a plain old hominid or something. So when does something get to be called a species? Is this exactly defined? I mean like temperature, you know with an exact physical meaning derived from physics and statistical mechanics?

Give me your definition of what a race is, and also give me your definition of what a species is.

And tell me where you got your definitions from.

Anonymous said...

"We don't deny that genetic clustering exists, but this is not the same thing as "race". I mean really, why can't a blood group be a "race"? Why not tall people?"

Height is a general trait. While some races are taller than others, there is tall and short in every race. Height is therefore a genetic trait--though in pygmies it is a very unique trait.

Racial traits are more specific. Whether tall or short, Japanese look Japanese, and Nigerians look Nigerian.
There are tall and short Japanese but there are no nappy haired black skinned Japanese. There are tall and short Nigerians but no yellow skinned ones with straight black hair.
And taken as a whole, there will be significant differences in muscle mass and tone, voice, temperament, and even intelligence.

Anonymous said...

Should race be called clust?

rob said...

Anonymous said...

...Looks like the British were not the last to actively breed dogs for
[stuff about a Russian dog I'll call the putinhund from now own]...

...Wonder what the chinese are cooking up??


Teeheehee

Discard said...

ATBOTL: The word "troublesome" is just smoke to confuse the Lefties and keep them from premature ejaculation. I read "Before the Dawn". Nicholas Wade knows the score and has managed to report it AND keep his job.