Talk:Caucasian race

Wikipidia Redirect error

For some reason, Americans of European descent redirects here. This would be inaccurate. One is a racial category that is losing favor in anthropology, and the other is a ethno-regional category. The two are not tied at the hip. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Salsassin (talk • contribs) 09:29, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Neutrality Dispute

This article is flawed in two areas, and biased admins continue to take away my scientifically accurate edits.

You are not going to convince me that a solid block of the anthropology community does not believe that there are 3-4 main races. Genetic studies suggest this too. http://www.biodiversityforum.com/showpost.php5?p=522568&postcount=1

In addition it can be proven that the statement about Indians is false. They were labeled Caucasian, but a distinction was made between Caucasian and white. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Austin2359 (talk • contribs) 08:09, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

"The Supreme Court conceded that anthropologists had classified Indians as Caucasians, and thus the same race as whites, as defined in Ozawa. However、it concluded that "the average man knows perfectly well that there are unmistakable and profound differences," and denied citizenship."

http://www.ling.fju.edu.tw/typology/Caucasian.htm http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5076/

So you were wrong, I was right. Now you can be quiet and stop removing my correct edits, to push your unscientific point of view.

"Caucasian" is a racial term but "white" is more restrictive and less scientific term. Quit removing my edits. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Austin2359 (talk • contribs)

The above was added by the same editor as the IP editor earlier blocked for 3RR violation. This was an attempt at block evasion, so there has been another block. As for the links, the first is to a forum, and we don't use forums as sources. The second is, bizarrely, to a copy of a version of the WIkipedia article, so useless as a source. The third link can be used as a source in the article based on the information here [1]. dougweller (talk) 08:39, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

As for the concept of race being now rejrectd by most anthropologists: "A similar survey in 1999 found that the concept of race was rejected by 69% of physical anthropologists and 80% of cultural anthropologists" (Lieberman, 2001 [2]). This does not even begin to address the opinions of biologists. So yes, racial typology is now rather widely rejected.--Ramdrake (talk) 20:10, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

The following item from today's news could be added to enhance the discussion. Here the term caucasian is used in a strictly medical/research sense:

The Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (CCFF) supports research into cystic fibrosis, which only affects people of the caucasian racial group. However, the term caucasian includes people from South Asia, North Africa, the Persian Gulf and Israel, according to Cathleen Morrison, CEO of the CCFF. "[Although] these are Caucasian populations," Morrison, CEO of the CCFF told CTV [ctv.ca]. "[they] do not have white skin". Bushcutter (talk) 06:55, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

The whole point of NPOV, and of WIkipedia, is, that one position on an issue is not determined to be "correct" by editors and presented solely, but that all views are presented. Clearly the term Caucasian is still in widespread use. And clearly a lot of people don't like that. Both those points are to be presented in a style which does not allow us to guess which opinion the editor holds.

BindingArbitration (talk) 14:38, 30 November 2008 (UTC)BA

Are you ("BindingArbitration") able to discuss this without pretending to be someone important? The quote from the CCFF is quite properly explained from CCFF's particular medical point of view and doesn't need to be altered to conform to your opinion of what it should say. Nobody is disagreeing with your statement that "the term Caucasian is still in widespread use", and nobody appears to be unhappy with the message. Or is it possible that you're saying something different? Please enlighten us. Bushcutter (talk) 22:18, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Almost exclusively in the US?

I'm not sure this is true. The term is familiar as part of their language by speakers of British English. It is also used in professional communication by the British Police as in 'A six foot tall, brown haired caucasian male'.

The British police make a point of avoiding controversial and confusing words such as 'Caucasian' - they have a classification of race by 'Immigration Code' - IC1, IC2, IC3 etc —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.80.255 (talk) 01:12, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Regardless of police usage, I'd agree with the first statement - I'm from the UK, with family in Australia, and in both places common usage of the term 'Caucasian' means 'ethnically white', i.e. either anglo-saxon, scandanavian, or european background. It's not seen as controversial at all, and if anything is regarded as a more 'polite' way of saying 'white'. I'm aware that there are several subtle ethnic/racial/anthropological issues involved here, but in practical common use, none of them crop up.

I agree. in my part of Europe, which is closer to actual Caucasia, we are aware of the differences between european whites and Caucasians, that are actually more asian looking. I don't understand, why would Americans call white people Caucasian, even though white people don't look like Caucasians, don't have common heritage or don't come from Caucasia. can somebody please explain this to me? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.73.49.80 (talk) 10:13, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Blame Blumenbach. He had a fancy for the (true) Caucasian looks and wanted to position himself as part of the super-race. --Bstard12 (talk) 22:34, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circassian_beauties#Racial_theories :) --Bstard12 (talk) 00:42, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

(( Begin of text moved from Talk:Caucasian ))

Moved comment below from 129.100.152.211 from article to here:

Very interesting. As far as I know three groups, the Manchurian, the Yeniseyan and the Ainu, carried three blood groups Haplotype C, Haplotype A, Haplotype D to the Americas. That's how the American Indians got them. Another group, the Northern Chinese, went over later on with Haplotype E which is found commonly among the Pueblo and Navajo Indians. At the mean time, two central Asian groups carried Haplotypes D and C to Europe which is found commonly among modern day Caucasian populations. While Haplotype B which is totally absent among the Amerindians, spread among Caucasian groups and Mongoloids later on from Africa via the Middle East. And the Mongoloids, like their cousins the Caucasians developed male pattern baldness and resistence to epidemic deseases, which are almost absent among their cousins the American Indians. This is the basis on which our society is legally divided into Mongoloid(Asian), Caucasian-Mediterranean, Indo-Dravedian, African-Mulato and Amerind-Meztiso social groups. And these groups continue to celebrate Multiculturalism by cultivating their own images, feeling proud on TV networks and popular entertainment, helping people of different ethnicities to understand their own respective cultures, supporing members of their own respective groups in highschool cafeterias, in order to make this society more diverse.

-Frecklefoot

I am Scottish, Czech, and Albanian. Why do I note my ethnicity? Because I am 100%caucasin. My father is from Albania. The Albanians are;a.) Nomads who live in Eastern Europe. These nomads originally came from the Caucus Mountains. b.) They are the poorest country due to there resistance of frivilous self glorification. c.) Their language is recorded as being the oldest language in Europe. d.)Before thier pilgrimage to East Europe from the Caucus Mountains they fled from persecution from the Islamic Semites and Orientals. The point is caucasins both eastern European and English etc...are defined by common language,persuction for thier Christian beliefs and there long standing strength. I believe it good people love one another for their inner selves, which often comes around to who one is on the outside and through thier historical blood. Note:Oddly enough an Albanian commited a terrorist attack in July 1914 which still is not accpeted by the world. One other comment I would like to add, the Galatians in The Holy Bible are better known as the Gauls. These people live were? They live in Europe. The Celts? The Celts were founders of Galatia!The Celts domination runs from Bohemia to the U.k. To close,simply put,Christianity is richly rooted in white soil....pretty amazing huh! - signed by an anon IP

Sorry to tell you Stolfi? but due to political reasons albanians are slavs. And you Sir are a degenerate human accoridng to the words of Hans K Gunther, half breed mongrel. You do know that christians carried out a haulacaust against native Nordic/Prussian Pagan people. So much for xtianity rooted in slav[ic] soil.

Wake up and spell the cofee.

Gracias Von Bosmark the 52nd User —Preceding unsigned comment added by Prussianbismark (talk • contribs) 03:25, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Stolfi, the Galatians are a Celtic people alright, but their homeland was in Anatolia, a region of Asia Minor or present-day Central Turkey. If there is a chance the Celtic peoples migrated farther south to Galilee along the Eastern Mediteranean, how come any certified anthropologist says the Galatians were a subgroup of West Semites like the Israelites of biblical times? I find it very ironic one of the cofounding Germanic peoples of England, the Jutes of Jylland in Denmark (came along with the Angles and Saxons), the word sounds much alike the term "Judes" or Jews in the German language. Are the Jutes related to the Jewish peoples of Palestine? Not really, the peoples of Galilee may not been Celtic or Indo-European, unless the Anatolians are cousins of Celts as they are to the Greeks, Armenians, Kurds and Persians of the region. + 71.102.2.206 (talk) 08:36, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

(( End of text moved from Talk:Caucasian ))

I have moved the Latin name to the History section, assuming that it was Blumenthal who coined it. Could anyone confirm that? Thanks...Jorge Stolfi 17:45, 1 May 2004 (UTC)

Usage in Australia

the word caucasian originated from Caucasia, A small island off the coast of Oklahoma.

In Australia the word Caucasian is used to refer to those people that have Anglo-Saxon background, this happens in the media as well as in official documents. There is an important number of Australians who have Greek, Italian and other European background which are not regarded as Caucasians. The Australian government refers to them as the ethnic communities along with other racial minorities.--tequendamia 11:13, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

What non sense. You are an idiot . Causcasian refers to any white people. This makes it liable , though, to subjectivity, as some people that might be 'scientifically' referred to as Caucasion (eg Middle-eastern) would not be in 'lay' usage. Eg in the media when referring to crime- they usually describe the perpetrator as "a man of middle -eastern / medeiterranean origin".

-- The same happens to be true in Canada. The term Caucasian is one used in reference to white Anglo-Saxon people of European background, excluding Southern Europeans. I was surprised to read much of the information found in this article, especially given how it conflicts with most western social norms. Surely the content of this article is debatable, depending on whom you ask. However, in most of the modern west the term Caucasian refers specifically to white Anglo-Saxons, and possibly Slavs. I do understand that in Russia the term Caucasian is one used to refer to the people of the Caucus region.

Further, equating the term Caucasians with a scientific designation is a misnomer. It is a social construction and should not be confused with scientific jargon.

All this talk reinforces everything that is wrong with the use of this word - no-one really shares a common understanding of its meaning. Really it should only be used for people from the Caucasus. Everything else is a misnomer - this is the accepted academic view and the article should support that, perhaps with mention to the word's other misuses. This encyclopaedia needs to educate responsibly - not perpetuate ignorance, no matter how widespread the ignorance is 87.194.80.255 (talk) 01:17, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

The use of "caucasian" in Australia is variable. When used in the context of media presentations, its use roughly (and unintentionally) equates to Huxley's xanthocroi peoples. Obviously this is left to the subjective interpretation of the individual. But often it includes anyone of Anglo-Cetic, Scandinavian origins, as well as any 'Germanic' looking French, Italians and Slavs. Most definitely Southern Italians, Greeks, Turks, Middle Eastern peoples incl Egyptians, as well as the darker/ shorter stocked French and Spanish people are referred to as "of Mediterranean appearance". However, recently the media has actually avoided using any descriptions associated with presumed race, as it has been seen by some to ignite racial hatred toward certain communities, about which stereotypes have arisen as being "trouble-makers". Hxseek (talk) 03:46, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

It's not up to Wikipedia editors to decide whether some usage is "good" or "logical". If indeed Caucasian is equivalent to "Anglo" or "Northern European" in Australia and Canada, than that is simply -- neutrally -- reported as a local use of the term BindingArbitration (talk) 14:37, 30 November 2008 (UTC)BA

That's true Binding Arbitration, but we probably need a reference. For clarification this business about of "mediterranean appearance" is usually said as "of middle eastern or mediterranean appearance", basically it refers to muslim Lebanese and people who might look like them. An islamic council persuaded the police to use this terminology as a description for people believed to be arabs. Atleast it's true, Lebanese are both middle eastern and Mediterranean.

Basically these Lebanese have been involved in high profile crimes, including gang rapes targeting Australian girls (people who look Anglo-saxon). Sometimes the media described these Australians as Caucasians rather than Australians or Anglo-Celtic, so from here there might be a concept that Northern Europeans are perceived to be a different race to Mediterranean people. It's basically that the media took the definition of Caucasian to mean "European" and the police adopted a description that classifies mediterranean Europeans with Arabs, which may have blurred the definition in common usage. Goramon (talk) 23:37, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Just as a follow up I found this article about Islamic Councils (Lebanese) complaining about police using the term "of middle eastern appearance" http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/which-faces-fit-middle-east-tag/2006/07/14/1152637872158.html The point of the article is silly, it's just about Islamic councils wanting less public scrutiny of Muslim crime. If you describe a person who looks middle eastern as "of middle eastern appearance" and they actually turn out to be a dark Hungarian in Adidas track pants who looks "middle easern" the description is obviously apt. I would describe a light skinned Lebanese with red hair as a "caucasian with red hair and light complexion". Another simple issue complicated by thought police.

The picture shows two pale skinned men with arabic names (but actually implies they are of both Irish and Lebanese descent) that said one is red headed and obviously that is a recessive trait. The article also describes them as Caucasians meaning the author is of the opinion that Lebanese are part of the Caucasian race.Goramon (talk) 03:15, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

New Cavalli Sforza research

Cavalli Sforza now claims that originally the first caucasoids were made 2 parts of 3 from a population originating from China and 1 part of 3 of a population originating from Africa, this is based on genetics and anthropology and paleoanthropology.

Anybody have anymore information on this?

This is a misreading. He just says that Caucasoids (or maybe Europeans specifically) are intermediate on some indexes. --JWB (talk) 00:46, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

He does a comparison of Caucasians vs. Africans, East Asians, and an artificial interpolation 1/3 of the way between Africans and East Asians. Caucasians are found to be closer to the interpolation than to either Africans or East Asians as a whole, but still a substantial distance. Also, the comparison is of a bunch of genetic information, but not necessarily representative of any visible or significant racial differences, which are likely on a smaller set of genes.

The pattern of difference is not necessarily due to origins and may mostly represent gradual diffusion roughly in proportion to geographical distance. --JWB (talk) 20:01, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Altogether, the evidence suggests that Caucasoids evolved through the northern part of the Near East, in places like Turkey, the Lower Caucaus (ie. Armenia, Azerbaijan) states, and the Iranian Plateau. That includes 1) autosomal, 2) Y/mtDNA based 3) craniometric, 4) archeological, Linguistic, geological, and antropological, and historical evidence. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.1.114.97 (talk) 16:14, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Balance tag

In glancing at the article, I was astounded at the weight/attention given the ridiculous notion that Senagalese have "Caucasoid" features because of some sort of admixture and that some physical characteristics of some East Africans have nothing to do with them being Black Africans. If this absurd, fringe info is going to be presented, then the prevailing view certainly must be as well -- and with at least as much emphasis. Just another reason the "disputed" tag should remain. deeceevoice (talk) 00:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad that you at least put something on the talk page regarding why you added the tag, so thank you for that. But don't you think it would be better to just simply add a fact tag to that particular section or just even remove it all together if it's a fringe theory? There was already a tag at the top, so I don't know how adding a similar one helps the article. Too many times I see people adding a tag to an entire article when either a few sentences could simply be removed, a "fact" tag could be placed requesting a citation for it, or a balanced statement could be added. Kman543210 (talk) 00:57, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Huxley

Claiming that Huxley's "races" included Caucasians is OR. Huxley defined Melanochroi and Xanthochroi "races", which overlapped significantly. Alun (talk) 15:12, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Sources, types and authors

We should probably have a section on the different sub-types proposed by different authors, and probably have even more authors mentioned.

Here are some old online text about physical anthropology where these types are described:

http://dienekes.110mb.com/texts/biasutticaucasoid/

http://carnby.altervista.org/

For some reason this URL is blaclkisted, so I've split it up so it can be shown here:

http://www.amorsite. shorturl.com/ FunkMonk (talk) 15:29, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Racist Predictions?

"They are also known as to have complete dominance over the black (negroid) race. In America the blacks have always been and will always be subordinate to white people." in Origins of the term

Is it just me or is this not that appropriate for an unbiased article?

--212.251.109.36 (talk) 08:58, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

It was vandalism that was just put there. It has since been removed. Kman543210 (talk) 09:02, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Actually the same sentence was placed in the article in three different sections, I have further reverted the vandalism. Cheers. Alun (talk) 09:07, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Ugh

I'm going in with an axe here. I see above that Deeceevoice thinks this article is shit. For once, I absolutely agree. Utterly incoherent nonsense. Talk:Caucasian race/Dumping ground is where cut material is going. Moreschi (talk) 15:02, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

to be fair, some of the material could be considered as raw material for an encyclopedia article. I guess we need more articles with "dumping ground" areas where people with much time for googling around but no editing skills or command of the context can contribute. --dab (𒁳) 08:16, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Isn't that one function of this page? Doug Weller (talk) 08:40, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

not really, this is for actual discussions. The problem is that useful material posted here gets swampt and eventually archived. Come to think of it, a "dumping ground" page for raw references and quotes yet to be worked into the article (or, that is, cut out of the article), could be a useful addition as a standard asset of all "C+" (i.e. better than "Start") articles. --dab (𒁳) 09:18, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I've created Wikipedia:Dumping-ground page to present this idea. --dab (𒁳) 09:39, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Why has this article been trimmed down to nothing, and why are sourced images replaced by a random image of a girl? The stuff which has been removed is sourced, that physical anthropology is pretty damn shaky is a fact, and that many different, and sometimes useless, theories have emerged shouldn't be hidden. FunkMonk (talk) 18:46, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Mythology

While it is true that the instances of Greek myth quoted are set in the Caucasus, the article suggests that there is some connection with the "fascination for European" exerted by the Caucasus and Blumenbach's hypothesis. Unless we have some reference making this suggestion, this is pure WP:SYN. --dab (𒁳) 08:21, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Caucasoid Physical Traits

User:Moreschi removed the citations I provided regarding the physical characteristics of Caucsoids as having thin lips, straight facial profile, receeding zygomas, large brow ridges, high-bridged, narrow noses which greatly project, large amounts of body hair, tendency toward balding, a narrow face and large jaws. All of these traits are obivously true and uncontroversial. I suspect User:Moreschi blindly removed these cited facts when they resurrected the ancient, low-quality version of the article, making their removal an accident on their part.----^DarkTea© 20:15, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

• And you were blocked for re-adding the cited bits. Ridiculous. FunkMonk (talk) 20:59, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
• large amounts of body hair = mediterranean race
• tendency toward balding = alpine race
• large jaws = negroids
• thin lips = north mongoloid blood/alps/alpinizateds —Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.114.203.15 (talk) 14:51, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

The anonymous poster missed the Horn of Africa, as proved by GENETIC analysis, being considered Caucasian. So, the anonymous one forgot SCIENCE that made Ethiopians, Djiboutians and Eritreans being Caucasian, not to mention much of the Somalian people. Hence, the large jaws point is beyond incorrect, as the "large jaws" are QUITE present in Eritrea, Djibouti and Ethiopia, from direct, personal experience and well documented sources all over the planet.Wzrd1 (talk) 03:51, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Recent rewrite of the article

I just reverted 3 edits because they introduced drastic changes in the article. Please discuss. Thanks. Dr.K. (talk) 00:28, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

CURRENT MAINSTREAM ACADEMIC USE OF "CAUCASOID" IN THE NEW YORK TIMES

Please don't apply political ideologies or agendas to Wikipedia.

Wikipedia needs to describe everything in the world whether you agree with it or not.

Some scholars today completely reject the notion that humanity can be described in distinct groups of physical types — but many others continue to find this entirely appropriate.

Here is a current article in the New York Times — hardly a bastion of racist extremism — on the Tocharian mummies showing that "Caucasoid" is in fact in use today:

"The Dead Tell a Tale China Doesn’t Care to Listen To"

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/19/world/asia/19mummy.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=dead%20tell%20a%20tale&st=cse&oref=slogin

"It's very clear that these are of Europoid or Caucasoid origins," Han, now retired, said in an interview in his apartment in Beijing.

Wikipedia readers need to know that there are differing views today in academia on the subject of race, and the term "Caucasoid".

Preventing them from doing can only be regarded as vandalism.

I don't have an account that can edit a semi-protected page at the moment, but will be back to present an accurate NPOV discussion of the subject soon if the current political essay has not been corrected.

Thank you. 76.204.26.55 (talk) 03:32, 20 November 2008 (UTC)NPOV editor

Ironically, the NY Times article is all about political attempts to suppress accurate scientific reporting on ethnic identity.

76.204.26.55 (talk) 03:32, 20 November 2008 (UTC)NPOV editor

Of course, that is not the reporter using the word but a retired Chinese anthropologist, so if you want to argue that some old Chinese anthropologists use the word, I'll have to agree. dougweller (talk) 05:53, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't know where that dougweller comment comes from — "Caucasian" is more in use today in biomedicine than ever as so many studies are finding different ethnic groups respond differently to medications, etc. I'm going to rework the intro with some quotes to this effect. The point above that we can't let our opinions bias the information presented is really important.

BindingArbitration (talk) 14:43, 30 November 2008 (UTC)BA

Please read the section heading again and my comments -- which don't mention 'Caucasian' at all. dougweller (talk) 15:34, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

it is a simple fact that people can easily distinguish "Asian people" (in historical terminology, "Mongoloid") from "white people" (in historical terminology, "Caucasoid"). This is a fact regardless of any racial theories, as is evident already from merely practical puropses such as the description of a suspect in police reports. When the FBI is looking for a "Caucasian" suspect, they aren't subscribing to scientific racism, they are simply using a term understood by people, so they will know to look for a "white" person and exclude all "Asian" or "black" ones from suspicion. This is the article on the concept of a Caucasian race (my emphasis), and as such on scientific racism, not just on the major groups of human physical aspects. For the purposes of the Tarim mummies, the simple message is that they would be classified as "white", not "Asian" on grounds of their physical aspect, which is worth noting in the context of Bronze Age Central Asia. --dab (𒁳) 17:34, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

• oid = similar than..caucasoid = caucasian + oid..a caucasian apaerence antropometric/etc —Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.114.203.15 (talk) 14:54, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

My NPOV Reworking of Intro Reverted to Inaccurate Political Tract - Reversed and Being Referred to Administrators

The intro of the article as I found it on Nov 29, 2008 describes "Caucasian" as an obsolete term, no longer in use. This is simply contradictory to reality -- it's in vigorous use today. Tons of citations.

I know some people don't like that -- but it's what's actually out there in the world. I apologize for reality. I will go out tomorrow and start speaking to every biomedical researcher on earth, explain to them that "race" doesn't exist, and demand they stop using the word Caucasian in their study protocols. And when they do stop using it, I will then gladly re-re-write the intro to state that the word is obsolete.

But for the period prior to that time, I rewrote a very neutral intro, clearly pointing out the current academic opposition to the term, but giving quotes of "Caucasian" in current, utterly reputable, mainstream sources.

This was hacked apart and reversed by Gandalf61 and Moreschi the same day of my reworking.

This is nothing other than vandalism -- you simply cannot use Wikipedia as your personal political opinion blog. A neutral and comprehensive survey of the subject must be presented to readers. And that includes the fact that, among other contexts, "Caucasian" is being used as an ethnic category in every biomedical study being conducted today.

I'm of course reversing this.

And I'm starting the process of discussing with the Administrators getting a full lock on the article (after it's further cleaned up), and the vandal-bloggers banned from Wikipedia (on their current accounts at least, and IPs if fixed).

BindingArbitration (talk) 11:47, 1 December 2008 (UTC)BA

And now Wobble has undone my intro again, with no comment here in Talk, and the Edit Summary "(is this reliable? what academc journals have they published in?)".

The academic journals you will find at the end of the reference links accompanying each quote.

So I'm reverting.

BindingArbitration (talk) 12:47, 1 December 2008 (UTC)BA

Binding Arbitration, the reason I reverted you was because you included long quotations in the introduction. You should not have done this as per the Manual of Style. Furthermore the quotes that you had included previously had not been removed from the article but had only been moved to the relevant sections of the article. The introduction should be a summary of the article, and as such we should not include many long quotes. My comment about reliable sources related to my tagging of the DNA tribes citation as a dubious source. I appologise that this gave the wrong impression to you. Clearly you are right that the term is is use by reliable sources,and it's fair that you include this claim in the introduction. You could of course achieve this without including long inappropriate quotes in the intro. There no need to get so steamed up, we're all trying to achieve the same thing here, that is a reliable encyclopaedia. How do you feel about simply rewording the intro so that it doesn't claim that the term is entirely obsolete, and then including your quotes later in the article rather than in the intro? That seems like a reasonable compromise to me. BTW please feel free to contact any admins you like, you seem to think this is some sort of threat, but I don't think that anyone is going to be impressed with your edit warring. Alun (talk) 12:58, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

BTW, I can find no place in the intro that "describes "Caucasian" as an obsolete term, no longer in use." What it states is that the concept is rejected as obsolete, not that the term is no longer in use. That's not the same thing at all. Alun (talk) 13:03, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

(after edit conflict) BindingArbitration, please calm down. If you read the whole article you will find that your examples of contemporary usage of the term "Caucasian" in popular science and medical literature are still there - I just moved them out of the lead and into more appropriate sections of the article. And the lead paragraph does not say that the term itself is obsolete - it says that the method of racial classification that originally gave rise to the term is obsolete. Very different thing.

Collaborative editing can take some getting used to, but most editors here are simply trying to work with you to improve this article. Giving vent to your frustrations is understandable, but it is really not productive. You might find our guideline on Wikipedia etiquette helpful. Gandalf61 (talk) 13:02, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not seeing neutrality here -- in motivation or result.

The latest intro is back to "It was thus in use as denoting populations of Europe..." -- past tense.

The content on biomedical research now in the main section has been watered-down to sound less significant. Why would that happen?

"In the medical sciences, where response to pharmaceuticals and other treatment can vary dramatically based on ethnicity[3][4][5], there is great debate as to whether racial categorizations as broad as Caucasian are medically valid[6][7], but nonetheless such definitions have recently become a standard variable in clinical research protocols..."

Becomes:

"In the medical sciences, where response to pharmaceuticals and other treatment can vary dramatically based on ethnicity,[16][17] there is debate as to whether racial categorizations as broad as Caucasian are medically valid.[18][19] Nonetheless, such definitions have recently been used as a variable in clinical research protocols..."

And if some of you have such a great understanding of this subject to be trying to completely control the article, why didn't you already have a section on this vital issue of biomedical research before I arrived?

The acid test is that I should have no idea what any editor's opinions are on a subject from his/her writing. You have no idea that I'm a leftist utterly opposed to racial discrimination in society. It really obvious that you are.

I'm going to continue working on trying to get this article to present a truly neutral description of this word "Caucasian" both here and at the Administrative level.

BindingArbitration (talk) 14:30, 1 December 2008 (UTC)BA

Okay, as an exercise, let's unpack the changes that I made when I moved that paragraph on biomedical research:

• I changed your in-line external links to in-line references. This is standard Wikipedia practice - the references are automatically collated at the end of the article.
• I removed the www.bidil.com link because it linked to an advert page and I couldn't see how it supported the sentence that it was attached to. You had two other good refernces on that sentence anyway.
• I changed "great debate" to "debate". "Great" here is an example of what we call a peacock term - it adds no factual information to the sentence. The key point is that there is a debate - we have no yardstick for determining whether it was "great" or not.
• I split the run-on sentence at "but nonetheless", to start a new sentence for greater clarity.
• I changed "have recently become a standard variable" to "have recently been used as a variable" - but I can't remember exactly why. Not especially attached to my wording here, so you could change it back if you feel strongly.

I don't think that paragraph has been "watered down", and the only thing it reveals about me is that I can be a bit pedantic about run-on sentences and such like. In short - it's a collaborative editing thing - if you can't handle that, then you will find your time at Wikipedia to be very frustrating. Gandalf61 (talk) 14:57, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

BindingArbitration already has the attention of this Administrator. Please don't call other editors vandals just because they disagree with you or you don't like what you think is their political point of view (and please don't think you don't have one). Calm down and listen to what other people have to say. This article is not going to get a 'full lock', although I wouldn't be surprised if another Administrator did lock it for a while if you are going to edit war like this instead of working together with other editors to improve it. And please read WP:CITE - as you've been told above, no in-line external links in articles, if you are basing something on a reference in a book please reference the full book informatin and the page number - I'm not happy with Gushi culture's references at all and you've had the same problems here. dougweller (talk) 15:46, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Bidil of course is the first race-based pharmaceutical. Some people are very, very unhappy about this. The link is to the Web site of the pharmaceutical company which authoritatively describes the nature of the product.

"A great debate" is significant and significantly distinct from "some debate" -- and that this is a "great debate" is supported by the references which describe, "A major discussion has arisen recently...", "controversy", "biomedical scientists are divided in their opinions about race".

"Standard variable" is factual and alters the entire substance from being just one approach, to the nearly universal, mainstream approach.

But your attention to detail here is significant given the horrific condition in which I found the article -- objectivity-wise, organization-wise, prose-wise -- under your assumed dictatorship.

Some poetry about Europeans being mythologically-fascinated with the magical land of the Caucuses since ancient times sat there happy as you please. Anything suggesting a view other than the utter non-existence of any biological connection to human physical appearance is simply leapt upon. That's not good editorship. And not NPOV.

I'm going to stop trying to revert to my full rewrite, and make some more-modest edits to get the intro to describe what this word means today in the real world, to someone from Mars. I'm putting "great' and "standard" back in the medical section. Let's see how it gets skewed, a little more skewed, a little more skewed back...

BindingArbitration (talk) 15:46, 1 December 2008 (UTC)BA

Well done. Adopting a gradualist approach is definitely a step in the right direction. However, I am afraid I am not going to be able to give you any more help here, as my stock of patience has been just about used up by your incessant rudeness and incivility. Sorry, but you are now on your own. Good luck. Gandalf61 (talk) 15:59, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I apologize to Gandalf61 for my dogged pursuit of this issue, if I have mistaken him for one of the people trying to bring a political agenda to the article.

BindingArbitration (talk) 18:20, 1 December 2008 (UTC) BA

DNA tribes

I'm querying if DNA tribes can be considered a reliable source.[8] I don't dispute that "caucasian race" is not supported by genomic analysis, but the article states that 'Human genome studies have shown that there is no single and simple genetic definition equivalent to "Caucasian"', we need to provide a published study from a reliable source to make this claim. Are the claims of DNA tribes published in a reliable source (an academic journal for example)? I'm not convinced that a commercial company, which obviously has a vested interest in promoting their products, can be considered a reliable source. Two recent academic studies would dispute the claim of DNA tribes that Europe is composed of several "races". Rather genomic variation in Europe is characterised by isolation by distance and not into genetic clusters.Genes mirror geography within Europe and Correlation between Genetic and Geographic Structure in Europe Do we have a reliably published source besides DNA tribes? Alun (talk) 12:51, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

See the Talk thread just above this one. You're probably seeing a fragment of the NPOV intro I'm trying to get in against the efforts of some activists-cum-encyclopedists.

Regarding that link, I was just trying to use something showing genetic diversity to support the view against a genetic basis for major races, in my effort at presenting that side of the issue.

I think my phrasing is good though -- as it's concise and can comprise a range of views on the subject.

So to support the general premise in a thoroughly neutral way, without getting into unnecessary detail here (certainly not advocacy of one particular view I'm sure you will agree), I propose this very general reference:

The History and Geography of Human Genes By Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, Paolo Menozzi, Alberto Piazza

http://books.google.com/books?id=FrwNcwKaUKoC&printsec

I am just now reverting to my full NPOV intro from the latest reversion -- I will add the Cavalli-Sforza link there. When that gets vandalized again, you can add it to the vandalism, then I'll revert to my version, etc., etc., and both will hopefully end up with Cavalli-Sforza  : )

Thanks

BindingArbitration (talk) 13:57, 1 December 2008 (UTC)BA

Edit War 1 Dec 2008 - Ramdrake vs Binding Arbitration

Ramdrake has just reversed my latest reworking of the intro with an Edit Summary "Previous wording was better."

But the version he wants doesn't clarify the distinction between the technical use of Caucasian which can include very dark-skinned people in India, and "white".

And then it equates "white" to "European" -- which is very racist in the U.S. where most Middle Easterners are definitely "white" (and Caucasian).

And there's a logic problem in the final phrase 'usually with its more restricted sense of "white" ' -- vs the intro sentence which says Caucasian = white. And the only way to correct that without getting awkward would be to say 'usually with its more restricted sense of "European" ' (compounding the white=European racism).

So there has to be some reworking to clarify these issues.

RAMDRAKE WANTS:

“ The Caucasian race, sometimes the Caucasoid race, is a term of racial classification, coined around 1800 by Johann Friedrich Blumenbach for the "white" race of mankind, which he derived from the region of the Caucasus.[1]

It is used to denote the general physical type of the indigenous populations of Europe, North Africa, Southwest Asia and sometimes South Asia, or more narrowly only Europe.[2]

The concept of a Caucasian race is highly controversial today. It is rejected by many academics and political activists who view any system of categorizing humanity based on physical type as an obsolete 19th Century racism,[3] and human genome studies have shown that there is no single and simple genetic definition equivalent to "Caucasian".[4] However the term continues to be widely used in many scientific and general contexts, usually with its more restricted sense of "white".

”

BINDINGARBITRATION WANTS:

“ The term Caucasian (or Caucasoid) race is used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the indigenous populations of Europe, North Africa, Southwest Asia and South Asia. In more technical use, especially historically, it may encompass the whole population of this region without regard necessarily to skin tone. In common use it is usually restricted to Europeans and other lighter-skinned populations within this area and thus equivalent to the varying definitions of "white" race.[1]

The term was coined around 1800 by Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, and is named for the peoples of the Caucasus Mountains, whom he regarded as the archetype for the grouping.[2]

The concept of a Caucasian race is highly controversial today. It is rejected by many academics and political activists who view any system of categorizing humanity based on physical type as an obsolete 19th Century racism,[3] and human genome studies have shown that there is no single and simple genetic definition equivalent to "Caucasian".[4] However the term continues to be widely used in many scientific and general contexts, usually with its more restricted sense of "white".

”

You can see that I'm making it clear that Caucasian may not be equal to white, and that white may include non-Europeans.

So I'm going to revert to this and in my Edit Summary direct Ramdrake to this Talk section.

BindingArbitration (talk) 17:57, 1 December 2008 (UTC)BA

"The concept of a Caucasian race was developed around 1800, and today, most scholars reject the concept because human genome studies have shown that there is no genetic definition of Caucasian." Who the hell can quote such a nonsense on Wikipedia? And to use obsolete bluffs of some leftist like Lewontin as a source? Are we still in the 21th century?! Or do we return to the Dark Ages of ignorance? There are already several autosomal studies showing clear genetic clustering of Caucasoids, Mongoloids, Papuomelanesians, Native Americans and Africans. Centrum99 (talk) 02:08, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

KlastrBastosRodriguezBarvySmall.jpg

L. Bastos-Rodriguez ET AL.: The Genetic Structure of Human Populations Studied Through Short Insertion-Deletion Polymorphisms. Annals of Human Genetics, vol. 70 (Pt5), September 2006, pp. 658-665

"According to Leonard Lieberman, Rodney C. Kirk, and Alice Littlefield, the concept of race has been all but completely rejected by modern mainstream anthropology...IN THE UNITED STATES AND POLITICALLY CORRECT CIRCLES IN WESTERN EUROPE! Centrum99 (talk) 02:15, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Two things that are not the same

I searched for "Caucasoid race" and was redirected to this article. The two concepts "Caucasoid race" and "caucasian race" are however wildly different. The "Caucasian" race is literally people from the Caucasus. This would include Armenians, Georgians etc. These people would likely be described as "Armenoid". In the USA the term "Caucasian" has come to signify "White" people, and is most commonly used to refer to people of Northern European Germano-Celtic descent. Ironically some "Anglo" types would not consider Armenians or Chechens to be part of "their" "Caucasian" race!

"Caucasoid" however is a broad term that includes all Europeans, Middle Easterners, North Africans, Western Asians, and some South Asians and Central Asians. Would an North Indian or an Arab be classified as "Caucasian"? But both are undoubtedly Caucasoid. Dr Rgne (talk) 08:00, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Physical Anthropology

"In the United Kingdom and Europe, the term "Caucasian" is mostly used to describe people from the Caucasus, although it may still be used as a racial classification.[13]" Is it true that in the UK Stalin, for instance, would be described as a Caucasian and not as a Georgian? I ask because English Usage in the UK and USA. is not particularly accurate in many of its examples. Usually in the US we'd describe persons who lived in the Caucasus by country of origin or ethnic identity: Armenian or Kurd and seldom or never as Caucasian.Nitpyck (talk) 22:28, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Georgian would suggest Nationality, Caucasian ethnicity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kurtle (talk • contribs) 23:41, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

It is easy for some to confuse POLITICAL terms with SCIENTIFIC terms or just be confused in general. Hence, Nitpyck is far more correct in the encyclopedic sense, if not political vs scientific sense, as the term is the evidence based approach, science. Politics will catch up at varying times, nation and culture dependent.Wzrd1 (talk) 04:06, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

What page in De generis humani varietate nativa liber?

The Latin book is here: http://books.google.ca/books?id=zzkC1Z1LqWkC&ots=aKED-miFK6&dq=De%20generis%20humani%20varietate%20nativa&pg=PP1&output=text

What page has the quotation where he talks about Caucasian people being attractive?--Sonjaaa (talk) 18:02, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

What IS attractive? To WHOM? If one is Caucasian, one typically is attracted to one's peers, hence, typically, race. If one is from and always has lived in India, Indians are attractive. If one is of the Sikljskdfjhksh tribe, hidden deep in a classified region of the planet that has no outside influence, they'll be attracted to one of the Sikljskdfjhksh tribe. Hence, the author placed a SUBJECTIVE opinion into what SHOULD have been a SCIENTIFIC paper, which would have NO opinion, only facts, theories, conjecture and EVIDENCE. As I do not currently read Latin (it's on my to do list), from the dead language, hence the dated nature and noted cultural lack of true science, based upon contemporary views of what science is, the reference is obviously POV on the part of the author.Wzrd1 (talk) 04:11, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

A couple problems with this article

"The term Caucasian (or Caucasoid) race has been used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the indigenous populations of Europe, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, West Asia, Central Asia and South Asia.[1] Historically, the term has been used to describe the entire population of these regions, without regard necessarily to skin tone. In common use, the term is sometimes restricted to Europeans and other lighter-skinned populations within these areas"

This is confusing, within what areas? If this sentence is referring to Non-European Caucasians (Mid East, North Africa, Central Asia, Etc.) it should say so.

"Several journals (e.g. Nature Genetics, Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, and the British Medical Journal) have issued guidelines stating that researchers should carefully define their populations and avoid broad-based social constructions, due to the fact that these categories are more likely to be measuring differences in socioeconomic class and access to medical treatment that disproportionately affect minority groups, rather than "racial" differences.[18] Nevertheless, there are journals (e.g. the Journal of Garstroentorology and Hepatology and Kidney International) that continue to use poorly defined "racial" categories such as Caucasian"

"Poorly defined "racial" categories such as Caucasian" is a biased statement. Whether or not it is "poorly defined" is a matter of debate. Most people know that Caucasian means the people of eur., Mid East, Central Asia, N. Africa, Etc. If it is referring to whether Caucasian is a valid construct, this is also a matter of debate.

The phrase "poorly defined" should be removed and the quotes should be removed from "racial", this implies sarcasm.

71.244.245.163 (talk) 01:31, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

this is true. The concept isn't "poorly defined", this is talking down to the efforts of 19th century scholarship. The proper way to phrase it is that it was defined very elaborately, but in ways that have since turned out not to be tenable scientifically and which are thus obsolete. This is like calling Alchemy a poorly defined science, while it is in fact a highly elaborate one, which just happens to be obsolete. --dab (𒁳) 16:19, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Some journals seem to endorse the concept of race. There is actually debate about whether they are valid, so I don't think that the article should take a position on the usefulness or accuracy of the concept beyond quoting positions.Goramon (talk) 22:31, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Deletion of sourced material

I believe that any problems with sources cited should be discussed here before removing material attributed to those sources. What specifically is wrong with the sources that the material they are cited for must be removed from the article? -- Donald Albury 00:15, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

This is in chronological order as they appear in the article.

1.A definition being "falsely" restricted to white skin Europeans. It's not "false", http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Caucasian "b. Of or relating to a racial group having white skin, especially one of European origin; white.". It's a different definition of a word, not a "false" definition of the word.

2. I read that article by Lewontin, and i couldn't find a quote supporting what "most scholars" think, so I deleted it for not supporting the statement. If you can find the quote in the article then tell me as I asked in the edit summary.

3. About "Caucasians" usually referring to people from the Caucus in the UK, I am skeptical since in Australia Caucasian refers to a racial group and usually words are used in the same way in Australia and the UK(if it is different to the American usage). The website wasn't a reliable source, as for the book listed I'd like a quote otherwise the null hypothesis is the word is used in the same way.

Update - I searched the cambridge dictionary online and the primary definition was "belonging to the races of people who have skin :that is of a pale colour:

The chief suspect for the robbery is a Caucasian male."

Also searched Oxford " • adjective 1 relating to a broad division of humankind covering peoples from Europe, western Asia, and parts of India and North Africa. 2 white-skinned; of European origin. 3 relating to the region of the Caucasus in SE Europe. "

So you can see that these definitions support that "white skinned European" isn't a false definition, and that usage of Caucasian is not different in the UK.

4. Using "racial" in inverted commas expresses a sarcastic or judgmental tone about the decisions made to use that taxonomy. I don't think it's in supporting a NPOV, but I did delete too many words and your edit did improve the sentence. I think it would be more neutral to say "Nevertheless, there are journals (e.g. the Journal of Garstroentorology and Hepatology and Kidney International) that continue to use categories such as Caucasian."Goramon (talk) 05:55, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

I've replaced the statement cited to Lewontin. It doesn't need citing, as an equivalent statement is cited later, but in any case you should either have found another citation, or added a 'fact' tag. I've replaced the inverted commas also. Dougweller (talk) 09:23, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Dougweller do you agree with me about my points 1 and 2 (that the UK definition statement was false in light of the Cambridge and Oxford evidence) and that a dictionary definition should not be considered false?

In any case, I deleted your edits because of WP:BURDEN and WP:NPOV. I disagree that such a statement is exactly referenced in the article and am also unsure if the cited source agrees with that statement exactly. You asked me to read the "inverted commas" article like it was a wikipedia policy, which it isn't. I would describe the usage of comas in that situation as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scare_quotes , and since scare quotes imply irony and that the word is a misnomer then I believe using them is not in keeping with a NPOV.Goramon (talk) 11:10, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

No, dictionary definitions should not be considered false, but they can be considered wrong or inappropriately used. You have raised no NPOV issues, just a general comment, which is not sufficient. You are also refusing to either add a 'verify' tag or a fact tag and instead have chosen to delete the statement "The concept of a Caucasian race was developed around 1800. Today most scholars reject the concept because human genome studies have not demonstrated a precise genetic definition of Caucasian". Exactly what problems do you have with the two sentences? You are at 3RR, I'll place the appropriate warning on your page. Dougweller (talk) 13:45, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

The NPOV issue i bought up was using scare quotes around some journals use of racial catergories which as I mentioned imply the word is a misnomer which is obviously not a neutral point of view. It has been mentioned that other journals do not consider these labels accurate/appropriate which is fine, but if other journals use them then it should be reported neutrally i.e. without scare quotes.

As for the two sentences, my problem is quite simply that it is not appropriately sourced so I removed it as per WP:Burden "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation.[nb 1] The source cited must unambiguously support the information as it is presented in the article.[nb 2] The source should be cited clearly and precisely to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question. Editors should cite sources fully, providing as much publication information as possible, including page numbers when citing books." so as you can see if you want to reinsert that statement the burden of proof is on you to find that the source supports it and find the quote.

Also I don't think Lewinton is correct in his 1972 hypothesis (basically he argues that races do not exist because there aren't individual genes that uniquely identify races, while this is the case races can be classified genetically by groups of genes just as we can easily physically classify races into broad catergories with an error rate approaching zero). The fact that Lewinton is wrong doesn't matter though, verifiability and not truth is the issue and competing points of view can also be expressed in the article in a neutral way.Goramon (talk) 14:17, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

You are selectively quoting. WP:Burden also says "Any material lacking a reliable source may be removed, but how quickly this should happen depends on the material in question and the overall state of the article. Editors might object if you remove material without giving them enough time to provide references, especially in an underdeveloped article. It has always been good practice to make reasonable efforts to find sources oneself that support such material, and cite them.". I have pointed out twice now that you had other choices than to remove the text. What you seem to be saying is that you have no problem with what the two sentences actually say, just that you don't think the sources back them up. Have you read WP:Point? Dougweller (talk) 15:08, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

On the contrary, I did make a reasonable effort to find the supporting quote myself and failed to do so. I also offered that perhaps I missed it and invited other editors to find it. I also rate the quote as contentious (since medical journals continue it's usage) and factually incorrect (since Lewontin's hypothesis while using true premises draws a false conclusion and has been refuted in papers such as "Lewontin's fallacy"). WP:BURDEN is actually extremely simple, as I've pointed out earlier. I did make a good faith effort to support the source, you however did not when you re-inserted the quote contrary to letter and spirit of the WP:BURDEN policy.Goramon (talk) 21:44, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

A bit of piling on here, but I agree with Dougweller. I will delete unsourced material, but only if it was very recently added and strikes me as unlikely or out of place, or I know that it is contradicted by available sources. If a statement cites a source that you think does not support the statement, you can place a {{verify}} tag on it, or raise the question on the talk page. If you want to challenge an unsourced statement that has existed in an article for a while, you can place a {{fact}} tag on it and/or raise the issue on the talk page. Once a change you have made has been reverted by another editor, it is bad form (see Wikipedia:Edit war) to reinstate the change without discussing the change on the talk page. -- Donald Albury 19:58, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

You don't agree with Dougweller, because you said I was deleting sourced material in your initial objections. Now what I would like to know is which properly sourced material I deleted? Since your initial objections have been shown to be false you have now shifted to an argument about "poor form". This leads me to the conclusion that you have a bias, whether you know it or not, when editing this page. In this case I am not merely deleting unsourced material but also balancing a highly biased POV pushing article. Further WP:BURDEN is quite clear that the burden of proof is on the editors reinserting it unsourced edits. Goramon (talk) 21:44, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

I've now done what I should have done earlier, reinstated the sentences which in fact have not been challenged, with the fact tag suggested. Some sources - [9] which says "The term Caucasian categorizes populations on the ill-defined basis of a common origin in the distant past in the Caucasus region of Central Europe. Most populations originating in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, for example, are Caucasian. Except as an erroneous euphemism for referring to persons of European descent, the word has little value in race, ethnicity, and health research. Freedman's8 plea that this tenm be rejected by science should be accepted." (Freedman BJ. Caucasian. BMJ. 1994;288: 696-698.), and maybe this book [10]. I'm looking for some other stuff. Dougweller (talk) 21:08, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

What you should have done is not re-insert unsourced content as per WP:BURDEN and not reinserted scare quotes as per WP:NPOV. So simple. I would also argue that you were wrong to reinsert the quote, if i may call it that, without the source since I may have missed it. But it's good to see that you are finding other sources and making an effort to properly cite positions. You are wrong that these sentences have not been challenged, or that this is even particularly relevant since "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable", obviously a statement such as that could be challenged. Goramon (talk) 21:44, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

You wrote "As for the two sentences, my problem is quite simply that it is not appropriately sourced". There are two of us saying that you handled this incorrectly. I didn't reinsert a quote as there was no quote. And you hit 4RR last night. You edit rarely but each time you edit you seem to be edit warring. The text you removed last night is clearly sourceable and you should know that if you know the subject. I'll give you a clue, Meiners and Blumenbach (writing separately). This is not controversial and removing it does not balance the article in any way. Dougweller (talk) 05:36, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

The reason I removed it is that it wasn't properly sourced, that's the only valid reason to remove it. I went on to explain that the quote was in fact incorrect and the position that Lewontin has taken on this issue is 36 years old and subsequently refuted by a more nuanced approach. However, I think an admin should know that the standard for inclusion is verifiability and not truth so you should know that this is irrelevant. Instead you try and imply my position is logically incoherent due to my focus on verifiability and not refuting the statement. I focusing on the issue at hand because I have arrived at the impression that you don't understand basic wiki policy so stuck to the relevant point. Further I have made many other changes that were initially reinserted with poor or false arguments that have subsequently been conceded. I have improved this article markedly in contrast to POV pushers who are making the process of simple changes based on simple policies, such as verifiability and NPOV, difficult.

I made a good faith edit to find a supporting quote to the statement, (and saying "I didn't reinsert a quote as there was no quote." is conceding it should be removed as per "^ When there is dispute about whether the article text is fully supported by the given source, direct quotes from the source and any other details requested should be provided as a courtesy to substantiate the reference."). As I have said from the outset this is simple. Thanks for your hints about where to look for a supporting quote but "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material." meaning that if you don't find "a reliable, published source using an inline citation." the statement will be removed as per policy.Goramon (talk) 06:48, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I will make things simple. What quote are you referring to? Did I miss some quotation marks? And please stop the handwaving about pov pushers unless you are going to start being specific about who and what. I haven't seen many changes made by you, by the way. And your opinion of my knowledge of Wikipedia policies and guidelines appears, shall we say to be polite, ironic considering your history of edit warring. Maybe you should consider the possibility that you don't have a broad enough understanding yet - after all, you haven't done much editing, have you? Dougweller (talk) 07:04, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I made the 4 changes I justified above, the "quote" i'm referring to is the unsourced edit about most scholars and precise genetic definitions of race (the only change that I have made to the article that you have not yet conceded). My opinion of your knowledge is not "ironic", it is literal. You have literally demonstrated a poor understanding of basic wikipedia polices by inserting unsourced edits and ignoring the burden of proof, then attempting to say that my only argument is that the statement is unsourced, like any more would be necessary? You try to justify inserting unsourced statements with an appeal to a majority (that I have already prevailed over with 75% of my changes), and then with an appeal to antiquity of an editor. It doesn't matter if you have made 1,000,000 edits, what you are doing is contrary to policy. What I'm saying in a nutshell is all of your arguments so far are irrelevant.

An example of your POV pushing is putting scare quotes around the word race, e.g. "race", and re-inserting unsourced statements critical of the idea of race. You are pushing the POV that race doesn't exist, if you were using sources in a balanced way then it would be fine but you are not. What is relevant is that you have a statement that is able to be challenged, and you have reinserted it without a reference from a reliable source and the burden of proof is on you. Goramon (talk) 07:32, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Goramon, the point is not that "race does not exist" (it obviously does), but that scientific racism is obsolete as a scholarly frame of reference. Your attempt to present literature of scientific racism as sources to be taken at face value isn't admissible. The term "Caucasian" is indeed in current use in the meaning "white", as is duly pointed out at the disambiguation page at Caucasian. This article, however, is not about the term "Caucasian", it is about the notion of a Caucasian race in the obsolete scholarlly schools of thought discussed at scientific racism. --dab (𒁳) 13:40, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't recall conceding anything, I do agree (if that's the word, as he never said it was redundant) that one sentence, the last one he removed, was redundant. It's not worth my time arguing with him about quotation marks, collaborative editing, etc. Dougweller (talk) 14:40, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

the point is that this article has the recurring problem of people trying to establish that "Caucasian" is in continued use, when the article is very plainly about the Caucasian race of pre-WWII scientific racism. Sure, an American can say "I'm Caucasian" and mean "I'm white". Does that mean that the speaker subscribes to Coonian racism? No. Which is why the current meaning "white people" is a matter for WP:DISAMBIG, to be addressed at Caucasian. Now current usage is of course derived from historical usage, and brief mention of current usage is admissible just as long as it isn't actively conflated with historical racist usage. --dab (𒁳) 16:40, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Hi dab, the argument above was simply about sources, NPOV and wikipedia burden. I had just taken out some unsourced or POV pushing material. The only reason we spoke about the existence of race is that Dougweller insisted that I challenge an unsourced sentence I was deleting, rather than simply delete it because it was unsourced. It is simple wikipedia policy and I'll continue to remove unsourced and POV pushing text.

dab, I agree that race obviously exists but I also agree that some academics are critical of race as a physical reality some call it a social construct with no physical/genetic basis. Most people would think that position is obviously incorrect, but I'm sure a citation saying something along those lines will be found (but the edit must agree exactly with the source). However, I'm also a bit skeptical about your example. It's not just an American who would describe themselves as Caucasian, any white in the English speaking world would (if you look at the top of this discussion that was one of my first points). I don't know why calling yourself Caucasian, even by a pre-ww2 definition would mean you are racist, it would actually mean you subscribe to racial classifications though. According to the Oxford dictionary the pre-ww2 definition is the primary one, and a definition of white European is the secondary definition.Goramon (talk) 21:59, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Goramon, since other editors have objected to your edits, you need to stop edit warring in the article, and participate in discussion here on the talk page until a consensus has been reached. Wikipedia is a collaborative effort, and any challenged edits must be resolved by the editors involved reaching a consensus. It is very poor manners to continue to institute your preferred changes over the objections of other editors. Now I know it takes more than one editor to edit-war, but you are the one pushing for changes, and, for now, I do not think you have a consensus for those changes. -- Donald Albury 22:48, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:BURDEN.Goramon (talk) 23:26, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:Consensus and WP:Wikilawyering apply here. I will rewrite the sentence with a cite shortly. Dougweller (talk) 05:42, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:Wikilawyering to demand sources? I've come to the opinion that WP:Wikilawyering is what people say when they know they are wrong, so at least you know now. Go ahead and get your citation, that's all I was asking for.Goramon (talk) 06:04, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, you are ignoring the need for consensus -- you should have added a fact tag, at least after your edit was reversed. As for Leowontin, I've been puzzling about the sentence and the redundant one you removed as there did appear to be something strange there. Your last edits have made the penny drop. As I suspected, this was an artefact of an edit, in this case where there were two references and two statements, and an edit meant to clarify that particular section unfortunately led to some confusion. I'll restore that. Dougweller (talk) 07:37, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Paragraph is much better, I now think it's factually correct. I switched your sources around because I think they were in the wrong order, correct me if I'm wrong. The book isn't properly cited yet, have you read it? I might put a fact tag on it but leave the source, it will look strange. The last sentence of the paragraph may also need a source. Anyway, good work. Goramon (talk) 08:04, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Dab's changes

Dab I'd like to discuss with you the changes you made to this article. The previous debate is a simple one about sources. Your change is different and I would like to discuss them separately. I disagree with what you have done since according to the Oxford dictionary Caucasian " • adjective 1 relating to a broad division of humankind covering peoples from Europe, western Asia, and parts of India and North Africa.". Your edit infers that this primary definition is Scientific Racism and that term only survives in the US as Oxford "2 white-skinned; of European origin." . The Oxford dictionary definitions show that the term is used in the UK (and I would argue throughout the English speaking world) as a racial category similar to what you described as scientific racism. I also think it's really unfair (ie not NPOV) to describe such a term in current neutral use as scientific racism.Goramon (talk) 23:52, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I assume this is because you are here to push tenets of scientific racism? Sorry if this is blunt, but you are hardly the first editor to attempt that.

OED is a dictionary. It doesn't aim at an encyclopedic discussion of th word meanings it lists. If you check the references it gives for the meaning "relating to a broad division of humankind", you will note that they date to between 1804 to 1939, plus one attestation of 1967 which clearly refers to the 1960s US civil rights debate, and has 'Caucasians' in scare quotes: "1967 Economist 9 Sept. 892/3 The top business jobs in Hawaii tend to be reserved for ‘Caucasians’". This meaning A. is the racist meaning which this article is supposed to discuss, preferably the scientific racism predating 1945. Non-scientific racism is to be treated in different terms, for which please consider consulting the white supremacism article.

Meaning Bb. "a member of the ‘white race’, opp. one of other ethnic descent" is the meaning of "Caucasian" (not "Caucasian race") current today. I said this is mostly American English, but I do not dispute the term may also pop up in British English. Our article on this is at white people, not here.

After we have clarified that this article addresses OED meaning A, can you please stop harping on the dictionary definition and begin presenting actual encyclopedic or scholarly literature? We cannot base this article on a dictionary entry, if giving a dictionary definition is what you are aiming at, you should perhaps try editing wikt:Caucasian.

There is a reason simple Caucasian does not redirect here, ok? Precisely because "Caucasian" as used in the context of the misplaced "in the medical sciences" section does not refer to OED meaning A, but to meaning Bb, pertaining to our white people (or White American in US-centric contexts) article. --dab (𒁳) 09:20, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

You want to know if I'm here to push scientific racism? I'm not here to push anything, I just want edits sourced and NPOV. Also I'd say that asking my opinions on the topic isn't really relevant (though I'm happy to answer) because all edits must be sourced and NPOV, it's also an appeal to bias in argument to address someones biases rather than the strength of their argument. If you ask if I consider myself a racist or scientific racist I would say no, but I think you might consider me that.

THE FOLLOWING IS COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT TO THE ISSUE AT HAND

I believe that race is a physical, and not social, reality. I believe that races differ on average in many abilities, though there is overlap between races. I don't think the races are of different moral value, or that all members comply to stereotypes. I find it very interesting. Why do West Africans dominate sprinting? The usual answer is more fast twitch fibres, but I find that very unsatisfactory. If black dominance was due to a single cause then a genetic mutation could occur in a Chinese athlete who would have near 100% fast twitch muscles and be competitive. (Just like the worlds tallest person comes from a mix of races (tallest american is black, tallest man in the world is Ukranian, second tallest is Mongolian)). The best answer I've heard is that West Africans on average have several advantages including more fast twitch muscles, have a better structure for running (long legs and achilies tendon, narrow pelvis, large glutes and quads), better coordination (walk earlier as children, dance better, better running style) and a lower level of bodyfat in males. When you consider that the West African dominance comes from several areas, you can see why the dominance is so complete. Where as if it came from a single area there would be exceptions and champions from other races (like Yao Ming is an exception for Asians being too short for basketball). There are fast whites and asians, but not really competitive in world level sprinting, as I'm sure you know.

BACK TO THE POINT

Now anything I add will be sourced and stated neutrally, so my beliefs aren't particularly important as yours won't be if you do the same. IMHO this is how wikipedia should work through controversial issues.

To answer your objection to the OED being used, I agree that the dictionary definition isn't a satisfactory source or format to solely base this article on. However, the fact that the primary definition in the UK dictionary refers to the older anthropological definition means that the position that the term barely survives only in America to mean "white people" isn't accurate. The OED is a source, amongst many others that is part of a balanced article, you are right that it's not a dictionary definition we are trying to provide but I think it's relevant none the less. Also I think the secondary definition of " Bb. "a member of the ‘white race’, opp. one of other ethnic descent" is very clearly a racial label. Goramon (talk) 12:06, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

I do not object to the OED being used. If I am not mistaken, I have originally introduced citation of it. I sympathize with your open account of what you believe, and I do not necessarily object to anything you state, except for what I consider terminological confusions. Thus, "race" is the interpretation of selected physical traits within the social sphere. Of course the differences between "races" are physical reality, but their selection, and the delineation of a discrete number of races is, of course, ultimately arbitrary in "physical" terms and only a "reality" because of its social applications. Your account betrays this confusion. Thus you say that "race" is real, and then immediately jump to discussing "black" as an example of race, ignoring the highly non-trivial intermediate step of enumerating "races". You yourself go on to muse on certain West African traits. So which is the "race"? "Blacks" or "West Africans"? The answer is, of course, that most African Americans have West African ancestry, which means that the idea of "black" in the USA is strongly influenced by West African phenotypes, but it is just as obvious that this is a US-centric historical peculiarity that has no relevance to the wider notion of a "black race", it is just "black" from the perspective of US pop culture (and, might add, US "Afrocentrism").

Races are still enumerated today, of course, outside of scientific racism and for purely practical reasons, as in the US census, viz. five, plus the categories "none of the above" and "more than one of the above".

This article, however, discusses the delineation of a specific racial category in historical scientific racism. It is irrelevant that the "white race" of the US census can synonymously be called "Caucasian" in common parlance. If the terms were really equivalent, we would need to merge this article into white people because it would violate WP:CFORK.

The only justification for this article as separate from the white people one is its discussion a category of a "Caucasian race" separate from the notion of a "white race". This separate category is historical. You will nowhere find a census where people can pick between the two categories of "white" vs. "Caucasian" as separate options.

I hope this makes sufficiently clear that I am objecting to your edits not because they are in some way not "factual" or "neutral" but for the much more basic reason that they are based on a misunderstanding of this article's scope. How you manage to maintain this misunderstanding in spite of all explicit disambiguation notes and the clean separation of the meanings even in the source you yourself insist on using, and how you can continue to imply this article is about "the term" Caucasian when it is quite plainly about the historical notion of a Caucasian race remains your secret. --dab (𒁳) 14:31, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Right, I was using "black" as a synonym for "West African". The apparent confusion was due to political correctness (but I don't think you were actually confused). Calling a West African a "negroid" or "congoid" is often considered racist and I didn't want to generate controversy. But I was discussing congoids as opposed to Capoids or East Africans. Also, I'm not here trying to classify races, it would be interesting but I couldn't make up my own arbitrary (as you said) system for classifications and put them in wiki.

You bring up some good points, caucasian is used as a synonym for white people (but not just in the USA). It's used under a folk system of anthropology that classifies Europeans as a separate race. Sure you could argue that is arbitrary, though it does have some justification, but you just can't insert that in the encyclopedia without a reference. You also can't decide that this won't be included because you think it's untrue, our standard is verifiability and not truth.

I would argue that both definitions of caucasian, the primary and the secondary are relevant to this article. The "White People" article necessary discusses physical race but then is more of an article about European demographics and history. This article is more narrowly focused on the physical definitions of Caucasian race, and use of the term (in any racial sense). So I'm saying I think you are trying to define this articles scope based on truth rather than verifiability, and not accepting the degree of overlap that is to be expected.

Finally, I think that defining the term as exclusively part of "scientific racism" is not accurate, and not NPOV.Goramon (talk) 15:29, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

but how can it be "not NPOV" to pick an article topic? Is it, in your opinion, "not NPOV" to keep an article at Energy which is purely dedicated to a concept in physics, in spite of the existence of many other meanings of the term listed at Energy (disambiguation)?

You say Calling a West African a "negroid" or "congoid" is often considered racist -- well, perhaps it is beginning to dawn on you that the topic we are discussing here is racism? After having been told only aboug five times over? In scientific racism, West Africans are "Negroid". In the current US census, they are "black". Two concepts, two articles. On exactly the same grounds, an Englisnman in scientific racism is Caucasoid, while in the current US census, he is "white". Two concepts, two articles. Calling an Englishman "Caucasoid" is exactly as racist as calling a Fula man "Negroid", indeed the two terms stem from the same historical school of thought, discussed at scientific racism. --dab (𒁳) 16:36, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

The problem here that this article is about Caucasian Race and there are two different, but related, definitions in wide usage. A person with a particular skull type (and the largest racial group) or a light skinned European. They are both racial definitions and it's not up for you to pick which is right. Just follow WP:ASF. If a medical journal wants to define Caucasian as a member of the majority population of Europe, that's fine, we'll just cite what they have done.

Further on to the racism topic, I don't think calling somebody a "negroid" is racist, but many people find the term offensive. So in dealing with that issue, a citation would be find saying the word is considered offensive and that would be that (I wouldn't argue that I disagree with the position so it should be taken out). "Caucasian" is not considered offensive by most people, for whatever reason. The fact that they are from the same system of racial classifications doesn't matter, just find citations about how they are considered and include them neutrally. You don't have a citation to say all use of "caucasian" is scientific racism and it's not NPOV. I don't need you to argue facts with me, or prove your point logically. Just present verifiable material in a balanced way.Goramon (talk) 23:11, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

once again, "Caucasian" in current usage may be a racial category, but there is the signficant point that it will not be referred to as "the Caucasian race". Your medical journals speak of "Caucasian probands", not "members of the Caucasian race". This is just an application of OED meaning Bb. "Caucasian" not "Caucasian race" and as such outside the scope of a discussion of OED meaning A.

You are beginning to repeat yourself rather heavily. "Negroid" is a technical term taken from scientific racism. It is a racist term beginning to end. You cannot use the term "Negroid" in any way other than racist because it is part of racist terminology. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with that, mind you. "Racism" doesn't necessarily mean "racial discrimination", it just means "classification of people based on notions of race".

You don't have a citation to say all use of "caucasian" is scientific racism -- seriously, are you editing drunk or something? I do not have a "citation" for this ludicrous claim because I wouldn't dream of making it. Once again, "Caucasian" (Bb) is simply a synonym of "white" and doesn't imply any acceptance of scientific racism. "Caucasian" (A) is a technical term in scientific racism. This article is supposed to discuss the technical term. Can you please take a minute to re-read and take in this very simple statement so I won't have to repeat it yet again? --dab (𒁳) 08:57, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

I understand that you are saying that "Caucasian Race" is the primary definition in OED " • adjective 1 relating to a broad division of humankind covering peoples from Europe, western Asia, and parts of India and North Africa.". And you consider this to be scientific racism as your definition of racism is "classification of people based on notions of race". You don't consider the second definition of Caucasian as racist because it is a "synonym" of "white people".

Your argument rests on the premise that "white people" do not constitute a race in any verifiable system of classification. However, the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_people article is "A series of articles on Race" and is part of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_terminology_for_race and the Cambridge dictionary defines Caucasian as "belonging to the races of people who have skin :that is of a pale colour". Clearly, the classification of white people is a racial classification, and your premise is false.Goramon (talk) 11:55, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

My allegedly 'strange' edit

There was nothing strange about my edit, I was reverting to an earlier version while at the same time keeping the paragraph with the word 'controversial'. I asked that this be taken here for discussion, as it is clear that at least two editors disagree with what you are doing. It appears from what you have written above that you are confused as to what this article is about, or object to what it is about and wish to change that. Dougweller (talk) 15:44, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

The article is about the "caucasian race", and there's two definitions of that. dab's changes are WP:OR because he/she is trying to decide which one is "correct". The controversial paragraph is buried in the current version and an Original research paragraph is in it's place. You use ad hom rather than addressing my points, I've explained how dab's changes are WP:OR, and not WP:NPOV. The scope of this article will be decided by the sources that refer to a "Caucasian Race", your comment about scope never being verifiable is false.Goramon (talk) 22:54, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

South Asia?

I cannot edit this page, but the very first line states that South Asians are considered Caucasian. Can someone explain? Also, according to this article , West Asians (I assume you mean Middle Easterners) are Caucasian. This needs to be fixed. (Or at least, the first part.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by StuufC (talk • contribs) 23:34, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

In this context, South Asian means some Indians, Pakistani and people from mearby Asian countries. But otherwise, that is exact. What seems to be the problem? The Caucasian type doesn't limit itself to Europe.--Ramdrake (talk) 23:42, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Very True 24.239.153.58 (talk) 09:28, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

• in the past south asians was caucasians, because in the middle ages, very slaves of the eastern coast of africa imported for the indic coast.. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.114.203.15 (talk) 14:41, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Picture

You think maybe you could put a picture of what a caucasion person looks like. Maybe have like a bunch of different pictures if there is a big difference in people. 69.226.111.151 (talk) 03:46, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Genetics Proves Caucasian race

At http://www.andaman.org/Background/Background.htm#genetic there is a genetic chart of people that clearly shows a caucasian race. I have seen similar or the same charts in numerous other places. They all seem to be based on something from The history and geography of human genes, so could someone verify if its in the book so we can put the title of this post in the article? 110.32.137.11 (talk) 09:55, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

you cannot "prove race". All you can do is document the genetic relationship between various populations. It is then a matter of definition which groupings you take to be "races". It is not the fashion to define any such groupings today, but if you are going to do so regardless, you need to be aware that the grouping choose will include arbitrary choices no matter what. --dab (𒁳) 17:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

I know that, but I don't see its relivence. Tall and short are also arbitary. 110.32.147.162 (talk) 10:11, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

Check out http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/Populations.png. Looks like there's a caucasian race there. I will add the genetic evidence to the article if no one objects. 110.32.131.13 (talk) 07:55, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Can someone please Explain

Under the Subraces section I was looking at what I read to what I saw in the book of these Genealogists and something only Wiki can come up with was Iranids? What is this, its not a Race or a major tribe and it can never be classified as a single group. Politically yes as a nation state but when look at their history and their skulls and roots and even looks Iranians, cannot be classified as "One Race or Iranids. If So then imagine a new Racial Classification "Americanids". Comeon guys in Reality even if we just take skin color into consideration in USA we won't reach 80%, because Blacks, and Latins can consume 40%. I have look at many Books and there is no such word as Iranids.

""Conceived as one of the "great races", alongside Mongoloid and Negroid, the Caucasoid race was taken to consist of a number of "subraces". The Caucasoid peoples were usually divided in three subraces on linguistic grounds, termed the Aryan race (native speakers of the Indo-European languages), the Semitic race (native speakers of the Semitic languages) and the Hamitic race (native speakers of the Berber-Cushitic-Egyptian languages).

The postulated subraces vary depending on the author. Another way of classifying the subraces was by the shape of the skull: The Nordic, Mediterranean, Alpine, Dinaric, East Baltic, Arabid, Turanid, Iranid and Armenoid subraces."" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.245.68.159 (talk) 05:50, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

You "have look at many Books and there is no such word as Iranids"? Have you looked at the books referenced in the Iranids article? --dab (𒁳) 10:41, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Poblem is probably that you should search for "Iranid", not "Iranids". Mainly used in German texts I believe. That's the problem wit most of these "subraces", many times no English literature doesn't includes them. FunkMonk (talk) 10:43, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from Deexannihilate, 17 May 2010

{{editsemiprotected}}

The classification has been used in scientific racism, a concept that asserts the superiority of one race over another.

Racism has not been used to classify any of the other Great Races originally named by Meyers Konversationslexikan of 1885-90. The sentence is counterproductive to the information put forth in the article. Instead of allowing the reader to learn about Mongoloids, Caucasoids, Negroids, etc. it introduces racism of the White Supremacy and inhibits further learning of old concepts.

Deexannihilate (talk) 04:56, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

Yep - we believe in verifiability, and this statement fails. Removed. Thanks,  Chzz  ►  08:58, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

 Done

This may just have been vandalism, or perhaps a misunderstanding of the term[11]. It seems that this is a spillover of a trolling attack on the scientific racism article. --dab (𒁳) 10:40, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Renfrew (1989)

removed from article:

In a 1989 article in Scientific American by Colin Renfrew, he classifies the Dravidian race along with the Semitic race and the Aryan race as the three major subdivisions that emerged from the Proto-Caucasian race, which he states separated into the aforementioned three groups about 9,000 BCE after migrating from North Africa—-the Semitics (i.e., Proto-Semitics) establishing themselves in and radiating from Jericho, the Aryans (i.e., Proto-Aryans) establishing themselves in and radiating from Catal Huyuk, and the Dravidians (i.e., Proto-Dravidians) establishing themselves in and radiating from what is now southern Iran.[Renfrew, Colin. (1989). The Origins of Indo-European Languages. /Scientific American/, 261(4), 82-90.]

Renfrew's 1989 Sci Am article today appears cited in rather interesting contexts[12][13] and I have no doubt he is severely misquoted. My suspicion is that this paragraph reaches us via such an intermediary rather than from the source directly.

Renfrew uses "Aryan" for "Indo-European", but I do not think he uses "Aryan race" as claimed here. Feel free to prove me wrong by quoting the actual passage. --dab (𒁳) 11:40, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Scientific racism?

Currently, the lead section says "In scientific racism, the term Caucasian race (or Caucasoid, sometimes also Europid, or Europoid[1]) has been used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the indigenous human populations of...". This seems to me to be a not particularly NPOV take on the term. While the term has been used by scientific racists, it is not its only use by any means, unless one uses an extremely loose definition of "scientific racism". While the uses of the term in scientific racism (however defined) should be discussed, the right place for that is not the very first sentence of the article. Unless someone can give very good reasons for keeping the current version of the lead, I will change it.--Victor Chmara (talk) 22:30, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

"Caucasian" vs "Caucasoid"

I have stated this before, but I enetered "Caucasoid race" into the "Search" function and was redirected to this article. The two concepts(while having similar sounding names) are two entirely different concepts! Dr Rgne (talk) 10:30, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Not really, but the modern American usage of "Caucasian" has diverged quite a bit from the original meaning of Caucasian race/Caucasoid. I believe this is addressed in the article. FunkMonk (talk) 14:10, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

• europoid and cromagnoid are most scientifics..(sorry for my bad english)! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.114.203.15 (talk) 14:32, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Illustration

Look at the picture. Note "in blue". Look at the picture again. Try to find blue. Notice the size of the picture. Can you get ANYTHING out of this? Please upload a better illustration. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.115.211.98 (talk) 20:25, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

I DO have to admit that I don't see Horn of Africa shown on the graphic at all. Or is the provider of the image trying to say that Eritreans, Ethiopians, Djiboutians and Somalians look like one in the image. I'll say right now, from direct, personal experience and TONS of media evidence to support it, it's missing one group. Can someone provide a CURRENT image?Wzrd1 (talk) 04:32, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Caucasian race etymology

In the section of origin of the concept there is Blumenbach's quote: "Caucasian variety - I have taken the name of this variety from Mount Caucasus, both because its neighborhood, and especially its southern slope, produces the most beautiful race of men, (I mean the Georgian) and because all physiological reasons converge to this, that in that region, if anywhere, it seems we ought with the greatest probability to place the autochthones (birth place) of mankind."

The quote lacks "I mean the Georgian" part which I put in the brackets above. I don't know for what reason but it seems to be deliberetely removed from the page, because I remember it used to be there before. I tried to edit it but it got undone twice and my user account - blocked.

As for the sources, there is not online english version of Blumenbach's De generis humani varietate nativa (3rd ed. 1795) to check the original source but it has always and everywhere been quoted with the "I mean the Georgian" part except until recently here on wikipedia, some other examples: http://www.blumenbach.info/_/de_generis_analysis.html http://www.ling.fju.edu.tw/typology/Caucasian.htm

So please someone edit the quote unless you have other arguments. Regards — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.169.99.94 (talk) 22:32, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

origin unclear

I think it needs to be made more clear that the origin of the concept is as part of a now widely discounted views on race. Also, most people use it to mean white and European, and don't ascribe to the racist ideology from which the term is derived. 71.194.44.209 (talk) 23:13, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

File:Europaeid types.jpg Nominated for Deletion

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skin tone

wtf does this sentence "Historically, the term has been used to describe many peoples from these regions, without regard necessarily to skin tone" mean?? can somebody rewrite it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.7.123.12 (talk) 22:58, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

who is "isaac benjamin, and what is his expertise?

Soon to be deleted without a good answer. Some random idiots opinion doesn't mean jack.68.115.53.79 (talk) 19:17, 5 August 2012 (UTC)