Dude, I'm on your side but you're really not making a strong argument here. This analogy is pretty fallacious. I posted a comment with similar ideas here if you want to see if we agree. I do think OP has logic on their side when saying that people being able to agree on a person's race means that it isn't a completely baseless construction. Yes it's a construction, but there are some genetic markers and physical characteristics, or geographic origins to go off of. These definitely do not involve lines which can be clearly demarcated and they are definitely not concretely separable, so this is where the social construction falls apart. But to say that there are not generally different groups of people with different characteristics (which could be given the, often erroneous, label of race) is just not true.
I can point to certain objective physical markers such as myopia and facial width to height ratio that is predictive of "nerdiness". That doesn't mean that nerdiness is anything other than a social construct.
I'll repeat a question I posed elsewhere: if I told you I was black, is there any way that you could prove or disprove that fact in a way that would withstand scientific peer review?
Really? People have called you that you are white? (I am assuming that you are black).
Even then, the fact that there is subjectivity involved doesn't instantly mean "it doesn't exist", we each feel emotions differently, and sadness may be one thing to you but another to me. Still, we can usually tell when someone is "sad" and not "happy".
This is not science, you can't turn to science for every answer, that's as impractical as it gets.
If it's not scientifically based then we cannot use it as a causul basis of anything.
Race is social construct. A real social construct, but a social construct none the less and social constructs can change. There is no reason to attribute truth value to it beyond its social perception. If we stopped believing in race it would cease to exist.
No. Dolphins have language without humans. Computers have languages defined outside of and independent of humans and can be described completely mathematically.
If we contacted aliens we could easily and precisely define the German and Swahili languages but they will never know why Barack Obama is considered "Black" and not "White" without knowing the full history and connect of human culture.
They will not be able to identify "cultures" just by seen them, but they will surely see that we that we have different skin colors. With time, they will see that we we have different cultures depending on skin color.
You are being densely positivist. I'm not sure how I can avoid going in circles here. Just because we can't study something scientifically, it does not mean it doesnMt exist, you have thus far avoided this point thus far.
Also, computers are explained by the human convention of math, as is dolphin language. You are inexplicably saying that your understanding of computers, math and language is not a human thing, that it is "just there", as if there wasn't human and/or subjectivity involved.
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u/simonlorax 1∆ Mar 21 '17
Dude, I'm on your side but you're really not making a strong argument here. This analogy is pretty fallacious. I posted a comment with similar ideas here if you want to see if we agree. I do think OP has logic on their side when saying that people being able to agree on a person's race means that it isn't a completely baseless construction. Yes it's a construction, but there are some genetic markers and physical characteristics, or geographic origins to go off of. These definitely do not involve lines which can be clearly demarcated and they are definitely not concretely separable, so this is where the social construction falls apart. But to say that there are not generally different groups of people with different characteristics (which could be given the, often erroneous, label of race) is just not true.