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"Richard Dawkins atwitter"

Wouter 2013-08-12
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Hello,

Die volgende is seker al opgetel, maar Richard Dawkins het almal op hol met die volgende tweet:

'All the world's Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge. They did great things in the Middle Ages though'

Die tweet is nie meer nie, aangesien Dawkins dit na die oproer verwyder het, maar die debat woed nog steeds.

Hy weet duidelik nie wanneer om te stop nie.

Laat 'n mens wonder waarmee Hitch mee vorendag sou kom?

Baie dankie

Wouter

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Kommentaar

  • Pieter Redelinghuys

    Beste Wouter,

     

    Die reaksie op Richard Dawkins se opmerking/ waarneming sou tewagte wees, maar die feit dat hy dit verwyder het is onrusbarend om die minste te sê. Hier is 'n voorbeeld van selfsensuur van die ergste graad.

     

    Binnekort sal dit ook krimineel word om die waarheid te praat.

     

    Beste groete,

     

    Pieter Redelinghuys

    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Pieter

     
    Ek neem kennis van wat jy skryf en daarmee ook die oproer rondom Dawkins se opmerking aangesien Dawkins 'n baie duidelike punt probeer maak alhoewel dit vir my onduidelik is of dit teen godsdiens in die algemeen is of dan Islam in isolasie. 
     
    Wat ek graag sou weet wat is die statistiek rondom Nobel-pryswenners sou wees aangesien die godsdienstige oortuiging van die persoon nie van belang is nie. 
     
    Baie dankie
     
    Wouter
    Reply
  • Pieter Redelinghuys

    Beste Wouter,

    Dalk het Richard Dawkins dit veral teen Islam aangesien hierdie godsdiens die grootste gevaar inhou vir die sekulêre demokratiese Weste. 

    Onthou jy dalk die fatwa (doodsvonnis) wat die Ajatolla van Iran in 1989 uitgespreek het oor die skrywer Salman Rushdie oor die skrywe van  The Satanic Verses.  Die uitgewer van hierdie boek is dan vermoor.

    Beste groete,

    Pieter Redelinghuys

    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Pieter, 

     
    Ek lees vanaand die volgende as 'n opdatering vanaf Richard Dawkins na die oorspronklike tweet: 
     
    Twitter’s 140 character limit always presents a tough challenge, but I tried to rise to it. Nobel Prizes are a pretty widely quoted, if not ideal, barometer of excellence in science. I thought about comparing the numbers of Nobel Prizes won by Jews (more than 120) and Muslims (ten if you count Peace Prizes, half that if you don’t). This astonishing discrepancy is rendered the more dramatic when you consider the small size of the world’s Jewish population. However, I decided against tweeting that comparison because it might seem unduly provocative (many Muslim “community leaders” are quite outspoken in their hatred of Jews) and I sought a more neutral comparison as more suitable to the potentially inflammable medium of Twitter. It is a remarkable fact that one Cambridge college, Trinity, has 32 Nobel Prizes to its credit. That’s three times as many as the entire Muslim world even if you count Peace Prizes, six times as many if you don’t. 
     
    I dramatised the poverty of Muslim scientific achievement, and the contrast with their achievements in earlier centuries, in the following brief tweet: “All the world's Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge. They did great things in the Middle Ages, though.”
     
    And then the storm broke. About half the responses were supportive, and I am grateful for them but I’ll concentrate on the attacks because, obviously, they are the ones that need a response. Rather than quote particular tweets individually, I’ll condense families of attacks into generalised form:-
     
    You’re a racist (actually usually written as “Your a racist”)
     
    If you think Islam is a race, you are a racist yourself. The concept of race is controversial in biology, for complicated reasons. I could go into that, but I don’t need to here. It’s enough to say that if you can convert to something (or convert or apostatize out of it) it is not a race. If you are going to accuse me of racism, you’ll have to do a lot better than that. Islam is a religion and you can choose to leave it or join it.
     
    But aren’t Jews a race? 
     
    And you can convert to Judaism
     
    Yes you can convert to Judaism and no, the Jews are not a race. You can argue about whether Judaism is a religion or a cultural tradition, but whatever else it is it is not a race. That was one of many things Hitler got wrong. But if you want to bring up the Jews, I’m happy to drop Trinity, Cambridge and give you the truly astonishing Nobel Prize figures for Jews. You’ll find it won’t bolster your apologetics.
     
    Race is not a biological concept at all but a socially constructed one. In the sociological sense you can convert to a race because race is a social construction.There may be sociologists who choose to redefine words to their own purpose, in which case we have a simple semantic disagreement. I have a right to choose to interpret “race” (and hence “racism”) according to the dictionary definition: “A limited group of people descended from a common ancestor”.  
     
    Sociologists are entitled to redefine words in technical senses that they find useful, but they are not entitled to impose their new definitions on those of us who prefer common or dictionary usage. You can define naked mole rats as termites if you wish (they have similar social systems) but don’t blame the rest of us if we prefer to call them mammals because they are close genetic cousins to non-social mole rats and other rodents.
     
    OK, maybe you aren’t strictly a racist, but most Muslims have brown skins so you are in effect a racist
     
    Incidentally, the reverse is not true: huge numbers of brown skinned people are Hindus or Sikhs or Buddhists. But in any case, I’m a lot less interested in skin colour than you seem to be. I don’t think skin colour has the slightest bearing on ability to win Nobel Prizes, whereas it is highly probable that childhood education in a particular religion does. Educational systems that teach boys only memorisation of one particular book, and teach girls nothing at all, are not calculated to breed success in science.
     
    (Hiermee is ek volkome in akkoord)
     
    OK, you aren’t a racist at all, but you are a bigot, giving needless hurt and offence
     
    How can the assertion of an undeniable fact be bigotry?
     
    Do you deny the fact that Trinity College has produced more Nobel prize-winners than all the billions of Muslims? 
     
    Actually this raises the interesting question of whether, and under what circumstances, we should refrain from stating uncomfortable facts for fear of giving hurt and offence. I raised this question in a later tweet, out of genuine curiosity. The answers I got were all of the “white lie” form. You don’t go out of your way to tell people they are fat. You may even lie to cheer them up. Fair enough.Well, quoting an undeniable fact may not be bigotry in itself but you left an offensive, though unstated, implication dangling on the end of the fact
     
    You may be reading in an implication that I didn’t intend. Since (unlike many tweeters, apparently) I am firm about Islam being a religion and not a race, I certainly didn’t, and don’t, imply any innate inferiority of intellect in those people who happen to follow the Muslim religion. But I did intend to raise in people’s minds the question of whether the religion itself is inimical to scientific education. I don’t have the answer, but I think it is well worth asking the question. Has something gone wrong with education in the Islamic world, and is it a problem that Muslims themselves might wish to consider? 
     
    Just to throw in a separate piece of information, colleagues lecturing to aspiring doctors in British universities inform me that Muslim students boycott lectures on evolution. And I have myself interviewed, for television, pupils and teachers at one of Britain’s leading Islamic secondary schools – one with impeccable Ofsted ratings – where I was informed by a teacher that literally all the pupils reject evolution.
     
    Cambridge University, like other First World Institutions, has economic advantages denied to those countries where most Muslims live.
     
    No doubt there is something in that. But . . . oil wealth? Might it be more equitably deployed amongst the populace of those countries that happen to sit on the accidental geological boon of oil. Is this an example of something that Muslims might consider to improve the education of their children?
     
    Why pick on Muslims? You could arbitrarily pick on plenty of categories of people that have achieved far less than Trinity College, Cambridge
     
    Again, fair point. Somebody mentioned redheads (neither he nor I have figures on redheaded scientific achievement but we get the point). I myself tweeted that Trinity Cambridge has more Nobel Prizes than any single country in the world except the USA, Britain (tautologically), Germany and France. You could well think there was something gratuitous in my picking on Muslims, were it not for the ubiquity of the two positive boasts with which I began. Redheads (and the other hypothetical categories we might mention) don’t boast of their large populations and don’t boast of their prowess in science.
     
    Trinity College is a Christian foundation. Its full name is “the College of the Most Holy and Undivided Trinity”.
     
    Er, yes, that could be kind of the point. Christendom has moved on since 1546 when the college was founded. If Islam has not moved on during the same period, perhaps Muslims might consider asking why, and whether something could be done about it. That was sort of why I added the final sentence of my original tweet: “They did great things in the Middle Ages, though.
     
    ”Muslim scholars gave you algebra and alchemy
     
    Thank you, I’ll take algebra. But alchemy? Are you sure you want to own alchemy? In any case, once again, a substantial half of my point was that Muslim scholars did indeed grace a golden age, so it is all the more poignant to ask what went wrong and what should be done about it.
     
    How many Nobel Prizes has Richard Dawkins won?
     
    This is getting silly, it really has the scent of desperation but it was tweeted remarkably often. I am one person, Muslims are 1.6 billion.
     
    How many Nobel Prizes have been won by atheists?
     
    Now that’s a really interesting question, one that I would sincerely love to see answered. I suspect that the truculence with which the question was posed might turn out to be misplaced – and that’s an understatement. Polls of the US National Academy of Sciences and of the Royal Society of London give almost identical results and suggest that an overwhelming majority of elite scientists (and a lesser majority of scientists as a whole) have no religious faith, although many might nominally be recorded as, say, baptised Christians or Bar-Mitzvahed Jews. I would love to see a well-conducted study of the beliefs of Nobel prizewinning scientists. My guess is that a large majority would self-describe as atheist or agnostic. And a further substantial number would say something like “I might characterise my awe at the universe as ‘spiritual’ but, like Einstein, I have no belief in a personal god and follow no religion.” I’d be very surprised if a single prize-winner were to say “I believe Jesus was born of a virgin and rose from the dead” or “I believe Mohammed rode through the sky on a winged horse”. But those are all conjectures and I would love to see the research done.Henry Kissinger won a Nobel Prize. That just shows how worthless they are.That was a Peace prize, and the Peace prize does have a rather more controversial reputation. Mother Teresa won it, after all, and said in her acceptance speech that abortion was the “greatest destroyer of peace in the world”. I’d be happy to subtract the Peace prizes. Trinity would lose only one of its 32 and Muslims would lose fully half their tally. Because of the second of the two boasts that I mentioned at the outset, I was in any case primarily interested in scientific achievement. If we count only science prizes, discounting Economics, Literature and Peace, Trinity’s count drops to 27 and the Muslim count drops to two (and even that includes the great theoretical physicist Abdus Salam, who left Pakistan in 1974 in protest at his particular version of Islam being declared “non-Islamic” by its parliament). Bizarrely, some counts of Muslim scientific Nobelists are boosted by inclusion of that quintessential Englishman Sir Peter Medawar (born in Brazil, his father was Lebanese, a Maronite Christian).
     
    (Die laaste vraag fassineer my ook - net soos dit dalk dan ook bevestig dat die koppeling van religie aan wetenskap soos gedoen deur Dawkins is problematies - Die vraag bly van al die pryswenners die afgelope eeu - wat is die individuele pryswenner se godsdiens. Die wetenskap, vakgebied word nie bedryf uit die oogpunt van godsdiens nie - maar wel volgens die beginsel van die vakgebied)
    Reply
  • Angus

    Beste Wouter, 

    Dankie vir daai skerp oë van jou. Praat Dawkins nie die waarheid nie? Sedert die Middeleeue het daar nog niks opspraakwekkends uit Moslemwêreld gekom nie. Dit moet 'n mens mos verwag van lande waar vryheid van van spraak met die dood gestraf word. 
     
    Wat sou Hitch gesê het? Wat van "Religion poisons everything"? Ek kan sommer dink dat hy miskien ook sou uitwei oor Joodse dokters wat op een dag meer Moslems gesond maak en lewens red  as die al Immams met hulle gesanik deur die eeue heen. 
     
    Interessant wat Hitch sou gesê het. 
    Groete,
    Angus
    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Angus, 

     
    Dit is net so wat Hitchens betref, wat 'n 'force of nature' was hy nie, en word hy gemis ten spyte van die vraagteken wat ek wyle terug publiseer het, het Hitch definitief sy plek gehad, wie beter om 'n Falwell aan te vat, daar het jy definitief iemand nodig wat nie trapsuutjies is nie.
     
    Maar ook wil ek graag begin om 'n onderskeid tussen persoonlike en politieke godsdiens te tref en is die politieke godsdiens dalk die problematiese aspek in die samelewing maar ook so die persoon wat in 'n onhoudbare dogmatiese blindheid funksioneer? 
     
    Daarmee ook dan hoe word die gebrek aan prestasie uit die Moslemwêreld  verklaar, want dit is tog hoe die gevoel is, die stand van sake is. 
     
    Ek wonder of daar 'n goeie boek daaroor is?
     
    Baie dankie
     
    Wouter
    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Pieter, 

     
    Jy het seker die nou die opdatering vanaf Richard Dawkins gesien en is daar veel mee om in akkoord te wees nou dat die detail beskikbaar is. 'n Voorbeeld is Boko Haram wat sekerlik die ergste mislukking bevestig met 'n naam wat beteken, "Western education is sinful". 
     
    Maar nog steeds soek ek 'n groter bestekopname? 
     
    Baie dankie
     
    Wouter
    Reply
  • Pieter Redelinghuys

    Beste Wouter,

     

    Dankie vir die interessante skryfstuk deur Dawkins. Ek deel hoofsaaklik sy opinie oor die meeste van sy skrywe hoewel ek die deel oor "ras" moeilik verteer. Om te konstateer dat ras 'n sosiologiese kontruksie is, is darem verregaande. Daar is terslot van sake 4 rasse: die Wit of kaukasiese- ras van Europa, die Geelras van Asië, die Swartras van Afrika, en die Rooiras van die Amerindian- volke van die Amerikas.

     

    Help my asb. reg as ek verkeerd is, en Angus wat 'n evolusionis is kan dalk 'n woortjie toevoeg.

     

    Beste groete,

     

    Pieter Redelinghuys

    Reply
  • CorneliusHenn

    Beste Pieter,  

     

    Onse slim Wouter copy&paste eintlik net ander intellektuele arbeid, self het hy gewoonlik geen mening daaroor nie.  

     

    Maar, meen jy straks dat ras, deel van 'n mens se identiteit kan wees; soos byvoorbeeld in die geval van iemand se geslag - om 'n man (heer), of 'n vrou (dame) te mag wees?  

     

    Ek sien uit na jou antwoord, maar neem tog in ag dat jy die "demokrasiste" hier, dalk stuipe kan gee.  

     

    Blonde groete,  

     

    Cornelius Henn

     

     

    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Pieter, 

     
    Hierdie vraag oor ras is 'n goeie vraag en een waarop ek nie nou dadelik 'n antwoord het nie maar is bewus van die argument dat ras is 'n sosiale konsep en aangesien ek nie Wikipedia gebruik vir die bevestiging van feite nie, sal ek eers in my eie boeke moet gaan opkyk. 
     
    Hopelik kan Angus, Charl of Leon Fourie, indien hulle hier sou lees 'n mens vinnig op die spoor sit. 
     
    Laat ek dit onomwonde stel, van Henn soek ek nie hulp oor die kwessie van ras nie, aangesien ek deeglik bewus is wat die heer Henn van ras dink na dit vir so lank agter mooi woorde versteek is. 
     
    Baie dankie
     
    Wouter
    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Pieter, 

     
    Soos ek my antwoord aan jou geskryf het, het ek gesoek wat ek oor ras gehoor het na aanleiding van Steve Jones, genetikus, se 1991 Reith Lesing en kon onthou, maar kon nie my hand onmiddellik op dit plaas nie en slegs na die kommentaar gestuur was kon ek dit weer vind. 
     
    Henn, kraai sonder end dat ek put op ander se intellektuele werk, laat dit dan so wees, want ek is nie bereid om dit op te maak soos Henn hier doen sonder end, daar is 'n weklikheid buite die persoon en daarmee moet gehandel word. 
     
    Dit wat ek kon spoor uit Steve Jones se lesings gaan soos volg: 
     
    Today’s Britons trace their ancestry from many parts of the world; from populations with black skin or white, round eyes or narrow. These characters are certainly some clue as to where their families came from; but a very incomplete one. Fewer than 10 genes are responsible for the difference between the blackest and the whitest human skin. 

     
    Hierdie bevestig dan die roete wat ondersoek moet word. Daar was meer in die Reith Lesings van Steve Jones maar kan ek dit nie gespoor kry nie....
     
    Baie dankie
     
    Wouter
     
     
    Reply
  • Pieter Redelinghuys

    Beste blou oog -blonde-Cornelius,

     

    Ras is beslis 'n integrale deel van 'n mens se identiteit, en diegene wat dit probeer ontken,  dwaal al vêr langs die pad van "new- speak", van die Orwelliaanse soort.

     

    Beste groete,

     

    Pieter Redelinghuys

    Reply
  • CorneliusHenn

    Beste Pieter,

    Sulke sinvolle beskouinge is miskien veilig doer vêr en op wonderlike plekke soos onder die Noorderlig, maar hier kan dit jou duur te staan kom!

    Onse slim Wouter, het heel onlangs selfs 'n copy&paste geplaas waarin "aseksualiteit", of te wel; iets soos "geslagloosheid", of om 'n identiteit te het sonder om manlik of vroulik daaraan te koppel, gepropageer word - wat nog iets soos ras as 'n identiteit vir hierdie demokrasiste te verduidelik?

    Wouter misbruik net die "nuanse" kamstig te wees in sy copy&paste; so al kante van die draad, het hy glo nooit enige standpunt nie.

    Ek deel hierdie onderhoud waarin Mohammed Ali, 'n demokrasis soos Wouter, behoorlik ore aansit en die waardigheid aan elkeen se ras beskryf:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9iN-JM755c

    Blonde groete!

    Cornelius Henn

     

    Reply
  • Charl le Roux

    Hallo Pieter, Wouter,

     

    Dawkins verwys na die taksonomiese begrip van ras, wat na `n kunsmatig geteelde variëteit onder gedomestikeerde diere verwys, soos perdras of hondras.  Daar bestaan geen taksonomiese definisie van ras onder mense nie.  Ras vertaal ook as na "breed", wat geen taksonomiese betekenis het nie.

    Reply
  • CorneliusHenn

     

    Charl le Roux, jy tik: "Daar bestaan geen taksonomiese definisie van ras onder mense nie". ... werklik? ...  geen departement of vertakking aan enige wetenskap wat met die klassifikasie van swart, wit, bruin of Indiër te doen het nie? ... geen sistematiese en stelselmatige verdrywing van Afrikaners gegrond op hul velkleur onder terme soos regstellende aksie en "swart" bemagtiging, met die skuld aan rassisme as wapen nie? .. die woord rassisme net van toepassing waar 'n opregte hoender 'n baster aap uit die hok verja? ... vergewe asseblief tog die affliksie wat die uitlig van jou dwaling op jou as persoon mag meebring Charl; maar op watter planeet woon jy sodat ons al die demokrasiste soontoe kan lanseer? ... Opregte groete, Cornelius Henn

     

     

    Reply
  • Angus

    Beste Pieter en Wouter, 

    Julle kan my maar braai, maar ek stem saam met Dawkins. Die woord "ras" het geen betekenis in Biologie nie. Ek kan sommer hoor Pieter sê: "Is jy dan blind? Kan jy nie sien die geel ooste verskil van die wit weste nie? Gooi nog tussen in duister Afrika en en rooi Amerikas? Sjoe! al wat ek kan sê is 'n mens se brein kan alles ook nie reg interpreteer wat jou oë sien nie. Ek kan mos sommer sien dat die son soggens in die ooste opkom, en saans in die weste verdwyn, daarom draai die son mos om die aarde. Wat Galileoons wil wysmaak,  "verteer" ook  maar moeilik.  😀 

    Ek weet van mense met vanne soos MacDonald, McFarlane, Page, wat egte Boere is, my buurman oorkant die straat is 'n rooinek Van der Merwe.  Tussen die Dorslandtrekkers was daar swart Van der Merwes, en sou 'n mens kon sê tot watter ras iemand behoort as sy van Williams is? Engels? Afrikaans? Neger dalk? of miskien bruin Kapenaar? Huisvriende van ons is egte Duitsers uit Duitsland. Hulle kinders was Duitsers voor hulle skool toe is. Toe het het die twee seuns Afrikaners geword, en daarna, toe hulle getroud is, weer Engelse. 

    As 'n mens die rol van immigrasie wegneem, en net konsentreer op ou bewoners van 'n streek, kan die volgende virtuele eksperiment dalk gedoen word. Begin by Engeland en neem foto's van mense en hulle bure. Beweeg oor na Europa en al verder ooswaarts. Elke mens lyk, wat "soort" betref, maar soos sy buurman. Hou so aan deur China tot by Japan. Niemand  verskil veel  van sy buurman nie, en tog verskil  Engelsman en Japannees duidelik van mekaar.

    Groete,
    Angus 


    Reply
  • CorneliusHenn

    Terug tot slim Wouter se hoofd "Richard Dawkins atwitter" ...  

    Kan enige redelike mens sin maak uit die volgende "tweets" deur die genoemde "twit"?    

    I'm not "intolerant" of your belief in a virgin birth. Please be tolerant of my right to tolerate your belief but call it stupid.    

     

    I'm not "intolerant" of your belief in a winged horse. Please be tolerant of my right to tolerate your belief but call it stupid.    

    En so karring die "twit" @RichardDawkins se "tweets" die hele dag aan ...  

    Richard Dawkins se aktivisme het gewoon ten doel "to tolerate your belief but call it stupid".  

    Dis erg hoe Richard Dawkins se eie "stupidgeit" op sy aanhangers afvryf, gereken dat hulle selfs  agter hom aan "belief"  - dat "die woord 'ras' het geen betekenis in Biologie nie"!  

    Hahaha...  

    En hoe tolerant moet ek nie wees om sulke dwalinge te verdra, sonder om dit "stupid" te wil noem nie.  

    Vergewe asseblief tog die affliksie wat die uitlig van hierdie dwalinge, op enigeen se persoon mag meebring.  

    Opregte groete,  

    Cornelius Henn

    Reply
  • Pieter Redelinghuys

    Beste Angus,

    Dankie vir jou bydrae waarvoor ek jou nie wil braai nie, maar die grysselle van my brein is nou hoogs ontsteld oor jou skrywe. Hier volg 'n definisie van ras uit die Chambers Encyclopedic English Dictionary, aangesien ek nie my Oxford kan vind nie:

    Race noun 1 a major division of mankind having a particular set of physical characteristics, such as size, hair type, or skin colour. 2 a tribe, nation or other group of people thought of as distinct from others.3 human beings as a group: the human race. 4 a group of animals or plants within a species, which have  characteristics which make them distinct from other members of that species.

    Waar op aarde pas die "social construct " van Dawkins in hierdie definisie?

    Beste groete,

    Pieter Redelinghuys

    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Angus en Charl et al, 

     
    Dit is die antwoord wat ek verwag het, aangesien die lesing van Steve Jones dit in detail ook vir my bevestig het en 'n vinnige bevestiging van 'n reeks programme aangbied deur PBS dit ook bevestig. Kleur is nie ras nie en het die hammering van persone op kleur alreeds bevestig hoe 'n vernietigende konsep kleur wat as onderskeid gebruik wil word in die samelewing het. 
     
    Daarom is ek tevrede met die antwoord, so min soos 10 gene tussen die wit en swart en die kleure in die middel. Dit is inderdaad veldiepte. 
     
    Daarmee herhaal ek ook, alhoewel ek 'n 'fan' van Richard Dawkins is, koop ek nie hierdie argument van hom nie, daar is nie Moslem-fisika, Christen-fisika nie, maar slegs fisika, die persoon se godsdienstige oortuiging, kleur, het geen impak op die terme van die vakgebied nie en was die vergelyking 'n nonsens een. 
     
    Wat sonder twyfel wel ondersoek kan word is wat is onderliggend tot hierdie debat. 
     
    In simplistiese terme, Islam en moderniteit en wat daaruit afgelei kan word. 
     
    Dit is egter nie 'n debat vir twitter nie en moes Richard Dawkins beter geweet het. 
     
    Baie dankie
     
    Wouter
    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello, 

     
    Soos voorspel is Henn toe die een wat die meeste lawaai maak oor ras, maar ignoreer ek dit verder indien daar gepoog wil word om 'n kalm gesprek oor ras te voer. Dit is ongelukkig so dat ek put op verwysings en doen weer so in die volgende opdatering en word die reeks van PBS gebruik en kan die besonderhede hier gevind word. 
     
     
    Daar is 10 kern idees wat van die reeks geneem kan word en word aangebied soos volg: 
     
    (Dit sluit perfek aan by die kommentare van Charl en Angus) 
     
    Daarmee ook bevestig hierdie dat 'n woordeboek is net die begin en nie die einde van hoe daar sin gemaak moet word van die werklikheid. 
     
    TEN THINGS EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT RACE
     
    Our eyes tell us that people look different. No one has trouble distinguishing a Czech from a Chinese, but what do those differences mean? Are they biological? Has race always been with us? How does race affect people today?There's less - and more - to race than meets the eye:
     
    1. Race is a modern idea. Ancient societies, like the Greeks, did not divide people according to physical distinctions, but according to religion, status, class, even language. The English language didn't even have the word 'race' until it turns up in a 1508 poem by William Dunbar referring to a line of kings.
     
    2. Race has no genetic basis. Not one characteristic, trait or even gene distinguishes all the members of one so-called race from all the members of another so-called race.
     
    3. Human subspecies don't exist. Unlike many animals, modern humans simply haven't been around long enough or isolated enough to evolve into separate subspecies or races. Despite surface appearances, we are one of the most genetically similar of all species.
     
    4. Skin color really is only skin deep. Most traits are inherited independently from one another. The genes influencing skin color have nothing to do with the genes influencing hair form, eye shape, blood type, musical talent, athletic ability or forms of intelligence. Knowing someone's skin color doesn't necessarily tell you anything else about him or her.
     
    5. Most variation is within, not between, "races." Of the small amount of total human variation, 85% exists within any local population, be they Italians, Kurds, Koreans or Cherokees. About 94% can be found within any continent. That means two random Koreans may be as genetically different as a Korean and an Italian.
     
    6. Slavery predates race. Throughout much of human history, societies have enslaved others, often as a result of conquest or war, even debt, but not because of physical characteristics or a belief in natural inferiority. Due to a unique set of historical circumstances, ours was the first slave system where all the slaves shared similar physical characteristics.
     
    7. Race and freedom evolved together. The U.S. was founded on the radical new principle that "All men are created equal." But our early economy was based largely on slavery. How could this anomaly be rationalized? The new idea of race helped explain why some people could be denied the rights and freedoms that others took for granted.
     
    8. Race justified social inequalities as natural. As the race idea evolved, white superiority became "common sense" in America. It justified not only slavery but also the extermination of Indians, exclusion of Asian immigrants, and the taking of Mexican lands by a nation that professed a belief in democracy. Racial practices were institutionalized within American government, laws, and society.
     
    9. Race isn't biological, but racism is still real. Race is a powerful social idea that gives people different access to opportunities and resources. Our government and social institutions have created advantages that disproportionately channel wealth, power, and resources to white people. This affects everyone, whether we are aware of it or not.
     
    10. Colorblindness will not end racism. Pretending race doesn't exist is not the same as creating equality. Race is more than stereotypes and individual prejudice. To combat racism, we need to identify and remedy social policies and institutional practices that advantage some groups at the expense of others.
    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello, 

     
    'n Britse tydskrif, The New Statesman het 'n artikel wat die kwessies na vore gebring deur Richard Dawkins se tweet in die detail ondersoek waarvoor ek 'n antwoord gesoek het. Om te begin mee, die vraag, 'Why do so many Nobel laureates look like Richard Dawkins?'
     
    Hier dan uiteindelik die kruks van die hele kwessie met die beskuldigings van rassime wat in die lug hang en die gedurige kwessie van godsdiens as 'n remskoen op vooruitgang. 
     
    Die inleidende bespreking gaan nie uitgelig word in hierdie kommentaar en word daar direk na die kruks van die artikel gegaan en die vraag wat dit soos volg formuleer: 
     
    Die tweet sinspeel op 'n werklike probleem. 
     
    Maar wat is werklik aan die gang?
     
    Die verduideliking is soos volg. 
     
    Wanneer die lys van Nobelpryswenners in oorweging gebring word is die mees opvallende aspek die oorheersende teenwoordigheid van Westerse lande op hierdie lys. Hierdie lande wat soos verwag kan word het die VSA as oorheersend op die lys en is die lande se statistieke dan soos volg. 
     
    Van 863 individuele wenners oor die afgelope 110 jaar ongeveer, (1909 as die begin) is 338 Amerikaners of dan wenners wat gebaseer was in die VSA. 
     
    Brittanje is tweede op die lys met 119 wenners en Duitsland derde op die lys met 101 wenners en Frankryk vierde met 65 wenners. 
     
    Die ironie hier is, is dat Cambridge as 'n geheel het meer wenners as Duitsland. 
     
    Tog is dit nie die tweet komende van Dawkins nie, hoekom nou Duitsland ontstel. 
     
    Buiten hierdie vier lande kom die meeste van die res uit ander Westerse lande. 
     
    Ook soos verwag kan word is hierdie gewig van Westerse lande selfs groter indien die pryswenners vir vrede en letterkunde uitgelaat word. Net soos die lande wat grootliks Westers is vertel die stand van universiteite dieselfde storie en is Amerikaanse instellings soos Harvard bo aan die die lys met 147 wenners en so ook Oxbridge, die kombinasie van Cambridge en Oxford. 
     
    Die rede hiervoor is nie een of ander 'n internasionale sameswering nie en is dit belaglik om dit te sien as 'n soort van mislukking aan die kant van die Islam, maar aanvaar ek ook dat hierdie oop is vir debat, alhoewel dit 'n komplekse debat is en die aard van Islam en die moderne samelewing dan in die gesprek bring. Hier kan verwys word na die Blackwell Companion to Contemporary Thought wat ek toe desnoods ten duurste aangekoop het. Maar dit is aparte gespek. 
     
    Om te fokus op die huidige aspekte is dat die idee wat bevestig word is dat die moderne wetenskap (akademiese, navorsings-intensiewe wetenskap) is en bly 'n oorweldigende Westerse verskynsel. 

    Om te vra: "Waar is al die Moslems?" soos Dawkins doen, is dan om die punt te mis. 

    Jy kan net sowel vra: Waar is al die Chinese, want China het net 8 Nobelprys wenners en is die ironie weereens daar is ongeveer dieselfde aantal Chinese mense as wat daar Moslems is. Tog het Dawkins nie getweet, waar is die Chinese nie?

    Japan, het 20 wenners, is ook uit die Ooste, maar dan het Japan die Westerse model van universiteit-gebaseerde wetenskaplike navorsing in die laat 19de eeu begin volg maar het eers in 1949 'n eerste Nobel gewen. 

    Die antwoord op al hierdie vrae volgens my en waarmee ek in akkoord is, is die volgende gedeelte: 

    There are many reasons why modernity developed in Western Europe and its American offshoot and why the West continued to be economically and politically dominant for so long. Political, geological and geographic factors all played their part, as to a lesser extent did philosophy and theology. But the long list of Western Nobel laureates has a more proximate cause: the weight of economic and intellectual capital that has accumulated in a small number of leading institutions, among which Cambridge University is among the most significant. Religion has very little to do with this. There is no doubt that there will be more Muslim Nobel prize winners in the future, not least because if you walk around Cambridge today it's not difficult to find Muslims doing science. 

    Globalisering sal daarvoor sorg? 

    Daar word afgesluit met die gedagte dat die VSA word beskou as die bakermat van die wetenskap maar tog is dit die land met die meeste kreasioniste. 

    Dalk kan Dawkins volgende daaroor tweet. 

    Baie dankie

    Wouter
    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello, 

     
    Racism: A Very Short Introduction (Ali Rattansi) Kindle Location. 233-870 (Highlights & Major themes) 
     
    The Nazis were in no doubt that Jews were a distinct race and posed a threat to the Aryan race to which authentic Germans supposedly belonged. The idea that Jews were a distinct race was given currency by Nazi racial science. But before that, there was little consensus that Jews were a distinct race.The idea of racism is obviously closely tied to the concept of race, but it should be clear by now that the more one delves into the history of both notions, the more puzzling they turn out to be.
     
    The idea of ‘race’ contains both biological and cultural elements, for example skin colour, religion, and behaviour, just as the biological and cultural appear to combine in variable proportions in any definition of a racial group, depending upon the group and the historical period in question. 
     
    Racial status, as in the ‘whitening’ of Jews, Irish, and others, is subject to political negotiation and transformation.
     
    The idea of race has been in retreat in the second half of the 20th century in the aftermath of the defeat of Nazism and discoveries in the science of genetics.
     
    The current discrimination on grounds of culture rather than race is mostly a rhetorical ploy to get round the taboo around racism that has gradually been established in the Western liberal democracies. 
     
    There is now a new ‘cultural racism’ that has increasingly supplanted an older biological racism. ‘Islamophobia’ has been identified as one of the most recent forms of this new racism. Fewer and fewer people in Western societies will nowadays openly describe themselves as racist.. 
     
    To make sense of the social construction of race the history of the idea of race needs to be considered. In doing so, we must pay close attention to the ways in which the notion of race, and its associations with skin colour, facial features, and other aspects of physiognomy, has been intertwined, amongst other things, with issues of class, masculinity and femininity, sexuality, religion, mental illness, and the idea of the nation. And, crucially, with the development of science.
     
    The idea that human biological characteristics such as skin colour, shape of nose, type of hair, and size of skull were associated with ingrained cultural and behavioural traits was well established. It was widely held that level of ability to use reason, capacity for ‘civilization’ and the arts, and tendencies towards sexual lasciviousness, for example, could all be read off from a study of the outward appearance of human beings. 
     
    There was also considerable speculation about the relation between humans, the ‘lower races’, and apes. 
     
    Assertions that inferior races were either born of sexual relations between humans and apes, or interbred with apes, or were closer to apes than other humans were commonplace.
     
    The Middle Ages were characterized by a symbolism that associated otherness with blackness, wildness, and the monstrous. In Christianity, there had developed associations between darkness and evil. Noah’s curse that Canaan, his grandson from Ham, would be fated to a life of servitude was one such instance. Ham derives from the Hebrew Ch’m, associated with being black and burnt. The story was subsequently used to underpin theories of the origin of Africans and to justify their enslavement. 
     
    It is now generally acknowledged that the term ‘race’ entered English early in the 16th century. This was also the time when the term was acquiring currency in other European languages, for example ‘rassa’ and ‘race’ in French, ‘razza’ in Italian, ‘raca’ in Portuguese, and ‘raza’ in Spanish. 
     
    By the middle of the 16th century, one common meaning was beginning to gain ground. Race began to refer to family, lineage, and breed. In this there was some continuity with the later Middle Ages, for the term had come to signify continuity over generations in aristocratic and royal families. It was in the 18th-century period of great intellectual fervour and social change, generally referred to as the Enlightenment, that the idea of race began to be incorporated into more systematic meditations on the nature of the world. Europe made a decisive transition to a distinctly modern age, beyond Columbus’s Christianity, with the Enlightenment.
     
    The most influential of the classificatory systems of the 18th century was produced by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus. In the volumes of his Systema Naturae, published from 1735 onwards, Linnaeus extended his classification of plants and animals to include humans into the animal variety. Homo sapiens was united by the ability to mate with all other kinds of humanity, and Linnaeus proposed a four-fold classification of humans: 
     
    americanus (red, choleric, and erect), 
     
    europaeus (white and muscular), 
     
    asiaticus (yellow, melancholic, and inflexible), 
     
    and afer (black, phlegmatic, indulgent).
     
    H. Europaei:
     
    Of fair complexion, sanguine temperament, and brawny form … Of gentle manners, acute in judgement, of quick invention, and governed by fixed laws … 
     
    H. Afri:
     
    Of black complexion, phlegmatic temperament, and relaxed fibre … Of crafty, indolent, and careless disposition, and are governed in their actions by caprice. 
     
    The classification has clear evaluative judgements built into it.

    The dominant image of the black was that of brutishness and bestiality. And the sexual anxieties and repressed desires of the age were projected onto the black male, as in Shakespeare’s Othello. 

    The myth of the African’s large penis was born during this period.In the 19th century there emerged a whole range of theories that explained all human variation on the basis of innate racial characteristics.

    Firstly, that humankind could be divided into a limited number of distinct and permanent races, and that race was the key concept for an understanding of human variation. 

    Secondly, that there were distinct physical markers that characterized the different races, especially skin colour, facial features, texture of hair, and, with the growing influence of phrenology, size and shape of skull. 

    Thirdly, that each race was innately associated with distinct social, cultural, and moral traits. 

    Fourthly, that the races could be graded in a coherent hierarchy of talent and beauty, with whites at the top and blacks at the bottom.

    Moreover, women and the lower races were regarded as being impulsive, emotional, and unable to engage in the abstract reasoning that was the preserve of the white male.

    Historically, it did not take long for ideas of nation, race, ‘people’, citizenship, and popular sovereignty to coalesce.It was increasingly held that distinctively French, German, and Italian national characteristics had been nurtured by long, shared histories. Thus, non-nationals could be defined as potential invaders or traitors. The outsider became a potential carrier of pollution who could infect the body politic and damage the nation’s health. Conceptions of ‘motherland’ and ‘fatherland’ explicitly encouraged associations of biological kinship between citizens of the nation-state. 

    It required no great leap of the imagination to link these themes with miscegenation and racial degeneration through interbreeding between different, incompatible races.Ideas of race derived nourishment as much from concerns internal to Europe as from the growing encounters with non-Europeans in the period of early modernity and that that the schemes of classification of human variety that mushroomed in the 18th and 19th centuries were as anxious about drawing boundaries between white European races or ‘nations’ – Gauls, Saxons, Slavs, and others – as between whites and blacks and that the schemes of classification of human variety that mushroomed in the 18th and 19th centuries were as anxious about drawing boundaries between white European races or ‘nations’ – Gauls, Saxons, Slavs, and others – as between whites and blacks and Orientals. 

    The late Victorian era saw a significant cultural realignment. From a period in which gender, race, nation, and class had been closely intertwined emerged a phase in which race assumed a greater importance.The result was a more rigid line between whites, deserving of the vote, and the blacks and other natives who – depending on the point of view – were either not ready for enfranchisement or were inherently inferior, could never govern themselves, and were only fit to serve white interests in the British Empire.

    As trade within the empire grew by leaps and bounds, so advertising, in particular, disseminated even more widely images of blacks as uncivilized, inferior, but smiling, happy, and grateful in their subservience. The empire was charged with ‘the white man’s burden’ of bringing Christianity and civilized habits, especially hygiene, to God’s ‘coloured’ peoples.

    The very success of the European, but especially British, imperial project gave widespread legitimacy to the obviousness of white racial superiority reinforced the belief in race as the key human division. 

    Bogenoemde dan die agtergrond tot die 'social construction of race'.....en bevat dit meer detail as wat 'n woordeboek kan bied en dui dit ook aan hoekom 'n woordeboek nie kan instaan vir 'n argument nie. 

    Verskoning daarvoor Pieter, maar Henn het 'n erger manie vir die woordeboek as 'n manier om argumente te vervang.....

    Baie dankie

    Wouter
    Reply
  • Angus

    Beste Pieter,

    Ek aanvaar jou woordeboek se uitspraak: dit is hoe die woord "ras" in 'n taal gebruik word. HAT sê: Groep mense, diere, plante verbind deur gemeenskaplike afkoms, en gekenmerk deur min of meer vaste erflike eienskappe, deur ooreenkoms wat  belange, gewoontes en uiterlike betref. (My beklemtoning.)
     
    Ek sien daarin 'n klassifikasie gebaseer op sosiale, nie op biologiese grondslag nie. Ras is in die Biologie nie so goed gedefinieer nie; spesie wel. 
     
    Eintlik het ons hier 'n skepping-evolusie debat weer van vooraf, net op 'n ander vlak, met jou nou aan die kant van die Kreasionis, maar dis 'n lang storie. Ek is op pad Lesotho toe en sal kyk of ek  meer sin kan maak op my laptop terwyl ons ry. Gelukkig bestuur ek nie. 🙂
     
    Groete,
    Angus 
    Reply
  • Pieter Redelinghuys

    Beste Angus,

     

    Dankie vir jou terugvoer wat altyd waardeer word.

     

    Ek is beslis nie aan die kant van die Kreasioniste nie, en verlang nog 'n oortuigende uitleg oor die konsep van "ras". Ek is oop vir oortuiging en revisie van my beperkte kennis.

     

    Beste groete,

     

    Pieter Redelinghuys

    Reply
  • Charl le Roux

    Verskeie aspekte rondom Dawkins se nou welbekende twiet word bevraagteken, veral of dit onsensitief was en aanstoot kon gee.  Daar word ook gevra hoekom die Moslems hier uitgesonder word.

    Om een twiet in isolasie te evalueer is misleidend.  Dawkins het al herhaaldelik fel teen Christendom te velde getrek en word soms daarvan beskuldig dat hy sy sterkste kritiek juis teen Christene rig terwyl Moslems lig daarvan afkom.  Die beknopte formaat van twiet as kommunikasiemiddel bied nie die geleentheid vir omvattende standpunte nie.  Om hierdie redes beskou ek nie die feit dat hy in een spesifieke twiet Moslems uitsonder as geldige kritiek nie.

    Die onderliggende vraag is of die Moslemgeloof in die algemeen en Moslemteokrasieë in die besonder `n remskoen is wat tot `n lae standaard van opvoeding en gevolglik tot swak vakkundige prestasie lei.  Hier dink ons byvoorbeeld aan lande waar vrouens nie opvoeding mag ontvang nie.  Daar is die aspek van sensuur, waar sekere akademiese materiaal verban word omdat dit nie ooreenstem met godsdienstige konsepte nie.  Vryheid van opinie bestaan nie.  Alles moet konformeer met Islamitiese denke.  Dit behoort tog duidelik te wees dat sulke teokrasieë nie `n teelaarde vir akademiese vooruitgang kan wees nie.

    Dat daar `n paar Moslems op Cambridge is, is irrelevant.  `n Geweldige groot gedeelte van Moslems word die geleentheid van `n hoë standaard van opvoeding ontsê as gevolg van godsdienstige onderdrukking, veral in die teokrasieë.   Is dit dan onsensitief om die gebrek aan prestasie in die Moslemwêreld te bevraagteken?  Dan kon ons mos net sowel sê dit sou onsensitief wees om Bantoe-onderwys te bevraagteken.

    Dit is goed dat Dawkins hierdie saak aan die groot klok hang.  

    Reply
  • Wouter

    Hello Charl, 

     
    Kennis geneem van jou argumente en is daar weereens gedeeltes waarmee ek in akkoord is en het ek ook aangedui dat die studie van 'n enkele teks nie 'n fondasie vir die moderne mens is nie. 
     
    Hierdie begin daarom volgens my mening 'n vraagstuk oor Islam en moderniteit word en die wisselwerking tussen die twee strominge en die negatiewe gevolge van Islam se bestaansblik. 
     
    Hierdie is dus 'n enorme  gebied om te ondersoek maar is dit sonder twyfel die moeite werd. 
     
    Die enkele tweet, gegewe die aard van tweets kan nie reg aan die kwessies laat geskied nie en daarom moet daar na die tweet dieper ondersoek ingestel word en het die tweet dalk in daardie aspek geslaag, dit laat mense dink....(Ek weet dit het my gestimuleer om oor die onderwerp te dink - maar het ek nie duidelike antwoorde nie)
     
    Baie dankie
     
    Wouter
    Reply
  • George Redelinghuys

    Beste Wouter,

     

    Baie dankie vir die moeite wat jy gedoen het om al die drade van die gesprek bymekaar te trek, maar  Henn se oorspronklike vraag het as volg gelui: of "ras" deel van 'n mens se IDENTITEIT kan wees......en my antwoord daarop was , "ja". Ek vermeen dat hy homself tereg identifiseer met die witras weens sy wit velkleur en blou oë, en verder identifiseer hy homself dus met sy voorouers van Noorse afkoms, met Noord-Europiërs, nie met Suid-Europiërs, of Afrikane nie. Hierdie uiterlike fisiese eienskappe het hy geërf  in sy gene, 'n kwessie waaroor hy geen seggenskap gehad het nie, en is nie die produk van "a social construct" nie.

     

    Aan die ander kant verstaan ek, na die lees van jou insiggewende artikel,  die geskiedenis en ontwikkeling in die Westerse denkwêreld van "ras" en "rassisme", maar hierdie konsepte het niks te doen met Henn se oorspronklike vraag nie.

     

    Best groete,

     

    Pieter Redelinghuys 

    Reply

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