title: Philosophy of race meets population genetics.
abstract: In this paper, I respond to four common semantic and metaphysical objections that philosophers of race have launched at scholars who interpret recent human genetic clustering results in population genetics as evidence for biological racial realism. I call these objections 'the discreteness objection', 'the visibility objection', 'the very important objection', and 'the objectively real objection.' After motivating each objection, I show that each one stems from implausible philosophical assumptions about the relevant meaning of 'race' or the nature of biological racial realism. In order to be constructive, I end by offering some advice for how we can productively critique attempts to defend biological racial realism based on recent human genetic clustering results. I also offer a clarification of the relevant human-population genetic research.
authors.affiliation: University of Pennsylvania, Department of Philosophy, 249 S. 36th Street, Cohen Hall, Room 433, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States. Electronic address: qspencer@sas.upenn.edu.
authors.forename: Quayshawn
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Spencer
mesh_terms: D014644:Genetic Variation; D005828:Genetics, Population; D006801:Humans; D010684:Philosophy; D044469:Racial Groups / Q000235:genetics
keywords: Biological racial realism; Population genetics; Population structure; Race