Lewontin did not commit Lewontin's fallacy, his critics do: Why racial taxonomy is not useful for the scientific study of human variation

Abstract

In 1972, R.C. Lewontin concluded that it follows from the fact that the large majority of human genetic variation (≈ 85%) is among individuals within local populations that racial taxonomy is unjustified. Three decades later, Edwards demonstrated that while the accuracy with which individuals may be assigned to groups is poor for a single locus, consideration of multi‐locus data allows for highly accurate assignments. Edwards concluded that Lewontin's dismissal of racial taxonomy was unwarranted. Edwards misidentified the aim of Lewontin's critique, which was directed at the utility of racial classification and not at assigning individuals to groups using genetic data. Moreover, Edwards conflated distinct kinds of correlation when sketching out his argument. If we follow Edwards’ argument to its natural terminus, it becomes clear that it is consideration of all of the correlation structure among local groups in human genetic data that renders racial taxonomy scientifically useless. Lewontin considers the correlation structure relevant to his analysis of racial taxonomy and does not make his eponymous misstep. Rather, critics of Lewontin who use racial taxonomies in their work are the primary offenders when it comes to committing Lewontin's fallacy.

Arthur Jensen, evolutionary biology, and racism.

“…Jensen often cited Baker in his subsequent publications (e.g., Jensen, 1978aJensen, , 1994Jensen, , 1998. , geneticist Richard Lewontin (1972 proved that genetic variation within commonly defined races exceeded the genetic variation between those races meaning Jensen's habit of listing phenotypical differences was irrelevant on a genetic level (on Lewontin see Roseman, 2021). Jensen, however simply presented Baker's phenotypical differences and waved away the objection:…”

“…(p. 260)Jensen often cited Baker in his subsequent publications (e.g., Jensen, 1978a, 1994, 1998, p. 517). By 1972, geneticist Richard Lewontin (1972) proved that genetic variation within commonly defined races exceeded the genetic variation between those races meaning Jensen’s habit of listing phenotypical differences was irrelevant on a genetic level (on Lewontin see Roseman, 2021). Jensen, however simply presented Baker’s phenotypical differences and waved away the objection: Despite the overall much greater degree of genetic commonality than of genetic difference among human races, there are obvious genetic differences in many characteristics, which are most apparent at the phenotypic level of polygenic organized systems or traits, as contrasted with the relatively small differences seen in any collection of single genes sampled at random from a large number of loci.…”

The apportionment of citations: a scientometric analysis of Lewontin 1972

“…Such statements lionize Edwards' critique as the authoritative interpretation of Lewontin's results and paint Lewontin as a solitary proponent of this claim, despite more contemporary research that has largely vindicated Lewontin's interpretation and demonstrated that Lewontin did not, in fact, commit 'Lewontin's fallacy' (e.g. [6,66,[97][98][99][100][101][102]). Moreover, we find that the Twitter users who vehemently oppose the conclusions of Lewontin 1972 often have significant overlap with extreme far-right political communities, underscoring how rejection of Lewontin's interpretation has become a tenet of white nationalist ideology.…”

Celebrating 50 years since Lewontin's apportionment of human diversity

“…1Lewontin's paper [1] is discussed in detail in an essay by Roseman [31] and in chapters by Edwards [32], Gannett [33], Hochman [34], Kaplan [35] and Winther [36] in an edited volume [37]. Like Novembre [2] and Shen & Feldman [6], Winther [36] gives a detailed account of the construction of Lewontin's paper.…”

“…Gannett [33] situates Lewontin's paper and the critique by Edwards [38] in a discussion of human variation, classification, and race over the long term; Kaplan [35] considers these papers in relation to current discussions of race and racism. Roseman [31] gives a detailed analysis of Edwards's critique, and, like Novembre [2] and Shen & Feldman [6], argues that Edwards's term ‘Lewontin's fallacy’ is unwarranted. Like Carlson & Harris [7], Roseman discusses abuses of the existence of this term to misleadingly appear to invalidate Lewontin's result, when, as discussed by Novembre [2], Shen & Feldman [6], and also Rosenberg [39] and Hochman [34,40], it does not; Carlson & Harris [7] memorably discuss this abuse as use of a ‘rhetorical cudgel in an attempt to dismiss an opposing argument as logically invalid'.…”