Tweet
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gn...=Google+Reader
Its a long but interesting entry, click the link and read the whole things.
I echo Razib's sentiments.
Its a long but interesting entry, click the link and read the whole things.
Dienekes points to two interesting phenomena which when juxtaposed together show how the pace of technological change can outrun ideological arguments and hand wringing. Those of you who have been reading me since the early 2000s know where I stand on issues such as the “Kennewick Man” controversy. I think there’s an objective reality which should be studied. The latter is a normative judgement. There’s no rule embedded in the universe that truth needs to be set free, it’s a preference. So when it comes to Creationism of organized institutional religions, or shamanic ethnic Creationism, I don’t put much weight in its value or importance. But the shadow of Kennewick Man still looms over contemporary controversies as we crest the peak swell of human genomics in terms of the rate of increase of insight. Apparently members of the America Indian Program at Cornell are objecting to The Genographic Project. The project is headed by Spencer Wells, who has an appointment at Cornell now. An English professor associated with the American Indian Program apparently sent the student newspaper an almost parody-like email of impenetrable obfuscating academic-speak:
In a statement issued by AIP, the program’s director, Prof. Eric Cheyfitz, English, criticized National Geographic’s language about diversity and said that the project “deconstruct[s] communal identities by individualizing members” of marginalized communities, such as indigenous peoples.
“In marked contrast to the goals of the Cornell Ancestry Event, which seeks to define ‘diversity’ biologically in terms of universal genetic codes … Indigenous peoples customarily define themselves not biologically, but socio-culturally and politically in terms of varying ideas of nationhood,” the statement says.
“[The project] is ahistorical in that it substitutes a biological profile of one’s identity for one’s historical (social and political) connections to a particular community. This clearly has an impact, among others, on historically underrepresented groups in the U.S. — African Americans, Asian Americans, Latino/as, and Native Americans — in that a biological profile can be dissociative in relation to one’s history,” Cheyfitz said in an e-mail.
... ...
It goes to show how insulated this particular academic and activist community is that they’d think this sort of opaque holding forth in a caricature of fashionable nonsense does their cause any good. There are real concerns they’re mooting here, and concrete issues with how science and powerful institutions have dealt particular populations. You can state the concerns in plain English in a way that makes it so that you are taken seriously, and you don’t give people an excuse to giggle because they think you’re being cleverly obfuscating. If you really believe in your cause you should try to speak as clearly as possible, and not cloak yourself in the dialect of your tribe. Terms such as “dissociative in relation to one’s history” probably have a plain meaning, if you are an Ethnic studies major, but they are just mystifying to the general public. It’s as if I held forth seriously about how we need to be careful, because the “genotype data is unphased.” That’s not going to mean anything to anyone.
...
Remember there are different kinds of genomic variation (e.g., microsatellites, SNPs, CNVs). Because of the political battles apparently there hasn’t been much sequencing of Native Americans. So the researchers simply looked at Mexican American mestizos, who have substantial indigenous ancestry. At some point in the near future anyone will be able to download the genomes of Mestizos and so gain a window into the genetic variation of Amerindian populations, whether those populations consent or not. If enough white Australians get sequenced, presumably someone could reconstruct the Aborigine genome from the fragments in white Australians. And so on. The technology has outrun the time for talk. If Spencer Wells is stymied by politics, private individuals could get genotyped and pool their information. This horse has left the barn.
So back to my preferences and values. We live in an age when human genomics is exploding, when the knowledge can pour out in front of you if you put in the labor hours. They take away the university funding. They can terrify scientists, or even assault them. But much of the data is now out in the public domain. There’s software to analyze the data, and visualize it. All that’s required is a will. Battles based on whether truth is One or truth is divided and subject to ideological preference will continue. But rest assured, the conclusion of this war is foregone. The incantations of the priests and the lamentations of their followers have no more power over us. I am smiling. Let them scream. They should if they suspect what truthful terrors may well up from the deep.
In a statement issued by AIP, the program’s director, Prof. Eric Cheyfitz, English, criticized National Geographic’s language about diversity and said that the project “deconstruct[s] communal identities by individualizing members” of marginalized communities, such as indigenous peoples.
“In marked contrast to the goals of the Cornell Ancestry Event, which seeks to define ‘diversity’ biologically in terms of universal genetic codes … Indigenous peoples customarily define themselves not biologically, but socio-culturally and politically in terms of varying ideas of nationhood,” the statement says.
“[The project] is ahistorical in that it substitutes a biological profile of one’s identity for one’s historical (social and political) connections to a particular community. This clearly has an impact, among others, on historically underrepresented groups in the U.S. — African Americans, Asian Americans, Latino/as, and Native Americans — in that a biological profile can be dissociative in relation to one’s history,” Cheyfitz said in an e-mail.
... ...
It goes to show how insulated this particular academic and activist community is that they’d think this sort of opaque holding forth in a caricature of fashionable nonsense does their cause any good. There are real concerns they’re mooting here, and concrete issues with how science and powerful institutions have dealt particular populations. You can state the concerns in plain English in a way that makes it so that you are taken seriously, and you don’t give people an excuse to giggle because they think you’re being cleverly obfuscating. If you really believe in your cause you should try to speak as clearly as possible, and not cloak yourself in the dialect of your tribe. Terms such as “dissociative in relation to one’s history” probably have a plain meaning, if you are an Ethnic studies major, but they are just mystifying to the general public. It’s as if I held forth seriously about how we need to be careful, because the “genotype data is unphased.” That’s not going to mean anything to anyone.
...
Remember there are different kinds of genomic variation (e.g., microsatellites, SNPs, CNVs). Because of the political battles apparently there hasn’t been much sequencing of Native Americans. So the researchers simply looked at Mexican American mestizos, who have substantial indigenous ancestry. At some point in the near future anyone will be able to download the genomes of Mestizos and so gain a window into the genetic variation of Amerindian populations, whether those populations consent or not. If enough white Australians get sequenced, presumably someone could reconstruct the Aborigine genome from the fragments in white Australians. And so on. The technology has outrun the time for talk. If Spencer Wells is stymied by politics, private individuals could get genotyped and pool their information. This horse has left the barn.
So back to my preferences and values. We live in an age when human genomics is exploding, when the knowledge can pour out in front of you if you put in the labor hours. They take away the university funding. They can terrify scientists, or even assault them. But much of the data is now out in the public domain. There’s software to analyze the data, and visualize it. All that’s required is a will. Battles based on whether truth is One or truth is divided and subject to ideological preference will continue. But rest assured, the conclusion of this war is foregone. The incantations of the priests and the lamentations of their followers have no more power over us. I am smiling. Let them scream. They should if they suspect what truthful terrors may well up from the deep.
Comment