Racial features maintain the health of cultures indirectly rather than maintaining the health of individuals directly.
Prof. Mumblebard claims: “Racial features adapt people to local climates but become biologically useless and socially detrimental once people settle in new, different environments.”
Robin and the Honey Badger respond: “But hidden in plain sight is the fact that human races native to Australasia, Asia, the Americas and Africa spanned these whole continents, showing that features such as skin colour and hair texture defy environmental variation. Adding to the puzzle of racial variation without environmental correlation is the fact that in Africa and Asia different races have coexisted despite millennia of opportunity to interbreed. The resolution is that racial discrimination is a means to conserve culture. Indeed, culture is so important for human survival – by means of technical traditions – that there’s strong natural selection for racial features that help conserve cultures by keeping racial groups intact even if those features, such as pale skins, aren’t optimal for a particular climate. Conservation of cultural diversity means conservation of a wide range of technical skillsets. This has enabled the human species to hedge its bets through evolutionary time and manage major environmental changes.”
Please join us here at the Bio-edge with your own comments. In the discussion below we encourage links to any evidence supporting either Prof. Mumblebard or Robin and the Honey Badger. Illustrations are welcome but please cite all sources or we may be forced under copyright to delete your comment.
What is the true adaptive value of human racial variation?