Does Race Exist? (A Response to a Scientific Article of the Same Name)

Human race is a predefined concept to identify a group of humans based on their physical features and geographical origin. Science proves that race exists to a extent, but it is not an accurate way to group a species. In order to classify humans, scientists use tiny genetic variations in a genome called polymorphisms. A specific polymorphism that scientists use is called an Alus, which is a short piece of DNA that is of similar sequence to another Alus. The Alus replicates occasionally. For example, if a specific Alus was inherited from parent to offspring, that Alus would continue to show up in the genes of later generations of that same group. So obviously, if two people have the same Alus, then they share a common ancestor. However, the Alus is not an accurate way of classifying a human into a specific group. One would need sixty Alus polymorphisms to assign an individual to his/her continent of origin with ninety percent accuracy. In order to be completely sure, one would need one hundred Alus polumorphisms. This type of genetic analysis can distinguish groups of people according to their geographic origin, but it can only be used in populations of maximum genetic variation.

            Race is primarily distinguished by skin color and other physical features that have changed according to the environment that certain groups live in (natural selection). Genetically speaking, groups with similar physical features can have very different genes and vice versa. For example, the San people in Africa have the skin of an African, the eyes of an Asian, and the cheek and chin bones of a Caucasian. Their physical features are similar to that of three other races. Therefore, similar physical features due to natural selection are not strong indicators of genetic variation.

            Race is theoretically non-existent in the world of science. A person’s physical features may reveal his/her geographical origin, but it does not define who they’re closely related to and who their genetic common ancestor was. While, socially, race exists to classify groups of people, it is not that simple in science. 

Day 18: Why am I so Stupid!?!?! (Test Review Day...and other things)

Hey all!

So today, we got our test back and I got a 93%! Yay!

And I looked back to see what I got wrong and *face palm*

I was so stupid! I read a question wrong, completely blanked on another question, and guessed on another! Gahh!!

So, to prove to you, and my teacher, that I am not entirely an idiot, here's all the stupidity that went into my failure of Standard SP 2/5 and what I learned from it.


On the Unit 2 test, I got 1 out of 4 questions (numbers 25-28) for this standard right (which is why I got a 3).

Number 25 on the test  talked about similar animals that look the same and live in similar habitats but aren't very closely related. This is called convergent evolution. I'd put adaptive radiation because of the "adaptive" part, but "radiation" made no sense now that I look back at it. I now know what convergent evolution is!

Number 26: Yay! I got it right!

Number 27: I actually knew the answer to this one but I read the question wrong! Instead of reading "which of the following [adaptations] would least likely be observed, I thought it said "most likely". This question talked about how algae-eating fish had a predator that relied on vision to hunt. In order for the algae to survive, they needed to adapt so that it was harder to see them. And that's where I messed up my answer. Come on! "least likely" definitely does not mean "most likely". The correct answer to that is that the female algae eaters may become larger, bearing broods composed of more, and larger, young. Because that is definitely not going to happen.

Number 28 asked what would happen to a population if it was separated by a river and split into two populations that cannot interbreed. Now, I'm pretty sure we did not learn the exact name for this, but it was definitely in one of our labs so, I guess it's my fault for not figuring it out. I went for the most outrageous answer "Lamarckian evolution" and I'm pretty sure that's not an actual thing. The correct answer was "speciation".

Yup...I'm smart.

After that, we started watching a documentary on a man's journey to find the roots to early man and why they might have left Africa. It's made with hilarious '90s effects that probably looked cool at the time. So far it's pretty interesting. We haven't finished it yet, so I'll have more stuff on it in the next post.

Until next time.

Day 17: Test Day!!

Okay, I'm not going to lie. That test had me at wit's end for most of the week. I was freaking out.  I think I might have collapsed from sheer exhaustion and anxiety maybe twice. This week was just way to hectic.

So the test itself wasn't too bad. I read three questions wrong so I know I got those wrong (stupid!). There's a standard that I need to bring up, which I will do as soon as I get my test back. And, I probably should start slowly studying about a week before the next test. But let's be honest, knowing me it's probably not going to happen.

But I got an A on the test, so that means my overall grade should be an A- (hopefully). So now, after a long and early Saturday (PSATs suck!) I'm going to head to bed...after I finish more work.

Until next time.

Day 16: Mating (and the awkward atmosphere that came with it)

Warning number 2: This class contained uncomfortably awkward music and actions. If you do not wish the cringe at teenage awkwardness, well that sucks because adults are just as awkward, so get over it. 

Today's class consisted off two things that I do not do under any circumstances. Taste an unknown chemical, and "mingle".

But we'll get to that later. 

Before I nearly lost my life (or well, I could have), we reviewed what we had learned in class earlier and were introduced to new things. (I'm being vague because I don't want to give it away!)

Mind maps!!! 

So we have physics traits. No duh, everyone does. But there are two kinds of traits, dominant and recessive. These traits are determined by our genotype, which is a set of genes that an organism carries. Our genes can either be homozygous dominant, homozygous recessive, or heterozygous. These genes are determined by the population. The physical traits that show because of the genotype are called phenotypes. Phenotypes are also dominant or recessive. These traits have many different variations that prove natural selection, "survival of the fittest", and evolution. The variations in traits can be found in proteins, DNA, and genes, and are the biochemical evidence of natural selection. In order to find the frequency of the gene and the percent population, two people Godfrey H. Hardy and Wilhelm Weinberg created a formula to solve that, creatively named the Hardy-Weinberg Principle.

Hardy and Weinberg looked at the dominant and recessive alleles in genes and created an equation that had an uncanny resemblance to the Pythagorean Theorem. (Come on you guys. The Pythagorean Theorem is so three thousand years ago.)

By using this theorem, one can find the frequency of the gene and percent population of the gene in a population. ( I would give examples, but blogger won't let me up equations in...)

Now here's the awkward part. In order to test genetic frequency and percent populations, the class was given four flash cards each, two with a capital 'A' and two with a lower case 'a'. We were then told to exchange two card each to create an offspring, thus "mating" with one another. 

To make things worse, there was mood music playing. The music fell into the same category of songs like "Let's Get it On", "Careless Whisper", and "Business Time". 

I learned three things from that.

1. I'm an awkward dancer
2. "Mating" is not my thing.
3. Evolution occurs when there is change in the genotype of a population. 

To go further into depth on number three, as we continued "mating" and such, there were less and less people with the 'aa' or recessive gene and more and more people with either the 'AA' or 'Aa' dominant gene. The species were slowly adapting to the environment that surrounded them so that more can live. 

And that my friends, is evolution in a nutshell.

So I've got a test next class and I know I said last time that next time I'll start studying before the night before the test...but a nasty AP U.S. History test and a dreadful AP Lang essay got in the way of that. So, yay cramming!!

Until next time.

Day 15: What goes on in the dark forest when no one's watching?

WARNING! THIS POST CONTAINS EXPLICIT BEHAVIOR OF TWO DIFFERENT COLORED BEADS PRETENDING TO BE BENGAL TIGERS IN A DARK FOREST!! YOU MUST BE MATURE ENOUGH TO HANDLE THE CONTENTS OF THIS BLOG POST TO CONTINUE READING.

Just kidding....sort of. I don't know what happened because I was told not to look.

So today was our first day back from October Break (yay...) and of course, our Honors Biology class was as boring, slow, and uneventful as ever. (I'm being sarcastic, of course. Mr. Quick, please don't make our lives any more difficult. Class is great!)

We did a lab in class that tested evolution and gene frequencies, which we called "The Tiger Lab". We had 25 red beads, which represented the recessive allele for no fur in a Bengal Tiger. We had 25 green beads that represented the dominant allele for fur. And our deep dark Indian jungle was played by a brown paper bag.

It's like you can hear the mating calls. 

In our lab, we were to put all the beads in the bag, shake it up, and pick out two beads at a time. If the bead colors were either green, green or green, red, then the tiger had the dominant allele. If the bead colors were red, red, then the tiger had the recessive allele and died.

The red beads slowly disappeared from the gene pool. In the end, the tigers all had the dominant fur allele.

And was our introduction to gene frequencies. More to come in the next post.

Until next time.

Day 13/14: I Can't See It!/The Parents are Here

So today's blog post is going to be a combination of day 13 and day 14 because day 14 was Parent's Day and we only had half an hour of class.

Day 13: I Can't See It!!

Here we have an artistic shot taken by my me with my iPhone. 

So Day 13, we discussed evolution and the different branches of a species and how the evolutionary process may have occurred. We looked at different sea shells that once belonged to sea snails. And some of these shells were tiny. So we had our handy cheap plastic magnifying glasses.

After we took a look at the majority of the shells, I drew a diagram with the different branches of shells.

In evolutionary terms, we have the common "ancestor" the shell, that relates all these types of shells to each other.

Then that group is split into cone shaped shells and flat shaped shells, which are then split into groups based on size: big, medium, or small.

We could have kept going, splitting the shells into colors, or patterns, but thankfully we didn't.

In blue is the thought map that my teacher wrote up on the board explaining the different variations of species. See, variations are caused by DNA mutations, which cause different species to evolve. These variations can be different, shapes, patterns, colors, and/or sizes. The DNA mutations that cause this are either positive, negative, or neutral mutations and they are there so the species can adapt the their surroundings in order to survive. The survivors, then reproduce to pass on their genetically superior genes to their offspring. Those offspring will then pass on their genes and so forth until there is a species with that same variation.

Now, onto the lab!

We were to look at how a species has adapted to different environments. And what better way to do that than to use a species that you can't really see?

Brine shrimp are these tiny shrimp things that honestly just look like dots. I swear, you need to have some freaky super human eyes if you actually want to see them. So here are pictures I found off the Internet of brine shrimp up close because 1) a picture of grey dots wouldn't be interesting and 2) I forgot to take pictures...

  fully grown brine shrimp

those boring grey eggs (up close!)

We had five different salt solutions in which we were to put at least 20 brine shrimp eggs in to see the different environments the shrimp can live in: 0% salt solution, 0.5%, 1.0%, 1.5%, and 2.0%. The interesting thing about brine shrimp is that they have this unique adaptation that keeps them in a dormant state until their surroundings are ideal for life. Of course, the eggs would have to be in a dry, oxygen-free environment and they can stay in this dormant state for many years.

So our test was to see how many brine shrimp can hatch in a specific environment. We put in about 20 eggs (although some of them were over calculated and we ended up putting in forty...oops) into 30mg of different salt solutions. And then we waited.

We had results!!

As predicted, we found that the greater salt solution had more hatchlings. (That's not a real word. I made it up. Deal with it.)

Day 14: The Parents are Here

So at our school, we have this thing called Parent's Day where our parents get to come back to high school and see what it is we do in class. And for most of the day, it's pretty awkward. And our Bio teacher saw the awkwardness and seized an opportunity to make it even worse.

But we'll get back to that in a bit.

As for the brine shrimp, our hypothesis stayed true. The solutions with more salt, had more hatchlings.

Data!!!

So after we scooped up the living brine fish and put them in a beaker full of other living brine fish, we gave the dead ones a traditional viking funeral and watched the water drain them down the sink. (sniffle)

Now, here's the awkward part...

For homework the night before, we were told to read up on three aspects of human evolution: averageness, masculinity, and symmetry. All three of these were ways humans instinctively judge some one's attractiveness. 

You guessed it. We had to judge someone's physical attractiveness with our parents. 

It wasn't too bad, that is until we had to explain the scientific reasoning behind why we thought one person was more attractive than the other. And talking to your dad about attractiveness was not on my To Do List that day, or any other day.

But I survived!! And now I have a short break before school begins. 5 day weekend!!!!

Until next time.