That would explain, then, why tens of millions of German Christians agreed to murder people of one-quarter Jewish ancestry, even when these "Jews" had been wounded fighting for the in-group in the 1914-18 war, followed scrupulously the moral habits (except as they related to Jews) of the German Christians etc.

Does it ever bother religionists that they always end up making special pleadings?

Read "Non-Zero: The Logic of Human Destiny."

One result of the Enlightenment, Biology, and the Information Revolution, has been the increasing difficulty of defining others as being of the "out" group.

OJ, as you so frequently say, there are many belief systems, not all of them theistic. The orthodox churches no longer have a monopoly on promulgating belief systems, and so are not the critical institutions through which "we-ness" is absorbed. Liberal democracy and individual capitalism are, as you pointed out, the political and economic versions of Protestantism. These are the faiths that impart we-ness to Americans today.

Robert:

Yes, I'd think that anyone who conforms to the ideals of our Founding is part of the American "in-group" and and if you expand to liberal protestant capitalist democracy that's not limited to Americans. But nations and people that don't conform are fair game.

Jeff:

There are two billion Christians, so the in-group is pretty damn big these days.

Harry:

You've stumbled into the truth--Jews had conformed in Nazi Germany and Inquisition Spain, but were persecuted for race. The problem is science, not beliefs.

Could not have been science, since there was none in 15th century Spain. Must have been something else.

Must have been religion.

Besides, I could give lots of other examples where it could not possibly have been science. Iconoclasm, for example.

William Arens, "The Man-eating Myth," has a pretty good appreciation of in/out group psychology.

The guy is not a very good biblical scholar.

We are comanded to love our neighbors at Lev 19:18 but the teaching continues at 33:

"When an alien lives with you in your land, do not mistreat him. The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt. I am the LORD your God."

Further Dt 5:17 does not say "do not kill" it says Don't Murder. Dt 20:10-18 are laws of war. Killing during war is not now and was not then murder.

Harry:

"That would explain, then, why tens of millions of German Christians agreed to murder people of one-quarter Jewish ancestry,"

Don't you wish!

Peter, OJ:

Please explain the fate of the conversos.

You can change your religion, not your race. The biologists will always hate you for the latter, no matter what you believe.

Jeff:

What Orrin said. You will find lots of examples in pre-enlightenment(and post) history of men saying: "Come worship our gods and we will be as one, or else death to you and your gods." But it took 19th century scientific rationalism to say: "Biology condemns you whatever you do, so you must die."

Peter:

You and OJ need to get your stories straight. The conversos were Catholic, but racially distinct.

So pre-19th Century Spain killed people for their race, not their religion. No amount of conformance to Catholic doctrine could save the conversos.

Jeff:

Correct--genocides are driven by biological theory.

Jeff:

The whole point of your beloved Inquisition was to determine whether the conversos were genuine or not. If they were found to be, they got off. What in the world has that got to do with race?

Jeff, for crying out loud, they didn't even know how to define race, which is a scientific concept. Nationalism was still far in the future. How the heck could they have killed on the basis of race if they didn't have the means to determine it? Aren't you surprised they didn't kill all the blacks and Moors? Read your Shakespeare.

Re the Conversos in Inquisition-era Spain:

Race, Religion -- just different ways of defining the "out-group". Spanish Hidalgos hated Jews, so when they went Converso (denying the religion definition), the Hidalgos switched to Race.

And the Spanish Inquisition was Political more than it was Religious. The kings of Spain managed to get the Inquisition in their kingdom split off from Rome and put under control of the Crown; though using Church personnel (primarily Franciscans and Dominicans), the Spanish Inquisition was in all but name the King of Spain's personal secret police and political commissars.

Ken:

"Race, Religion -- just different ways of defining the "out-group".

Yes indeed, but Christians have largely faced up to what they did in religion's name and the faith is no longer a threat to Jews or any other faith. They don't try to blame science or materialism for the Inquisition or claim religion can't be a dangerous force. It's the other guys who go to desperate lengths to insist they are pure and innocent and that religion was behind everything, even the sins of the anti-religious.

Your political take on the Inquisition is quite accurate and should be readily believable by anyone who understands the relative powers of church and state in 15th century Spain.

Peter:

Jeff's right here. The Inquisition wasn't religious, but racial.

http://www.brothersjudd.com/blog/archives/008268.html

It certainly was not scientific, whatever it was.

Peter is wrong to say that the Inquisition discriminated among true conversions and false. In fact, as Kamen demonstrated, it rooted out Christians who could be proved (or at least suspected) to have Jewish ancestry even generations ago.

To ascribe this to "science" is absurd. The people who did the murders did not invoke science, they invoked religion.

Peter:

Oddly, race is not a scientific concept. Try as you might, you won't be able to find a biological definition of race.

It is kind of like art--in the eyes of the beholder, but impossible to define.

Jeff:

That's idiotic. You think a scientist can't tell a negro from a caucasian from an asian? I do love though how black or white spots on a moth are supposed to have some signifigance while race is a "construct".

Orrin:

http://es.rice.edu/ES/humsoc/Galileo/Student_Work/Trial96/loftis/overview.html

If Jeff is right, then I hope I am man enough to extend him an apology, but it bloody well ain't happening quite yet.

If it was about race, what were they inquiring into? What relationship does race have to heresy? Is it possible that we are using the word "race" in two different senses here? Within Judaism, there is an ongoing debate as to whether it is a race of faith, but I believe that, in that context, race is more synonomous with nation. If that is what you mean, fine, but that is not what is conveyed by the gruesome pictures of Nazi doctors and scientists measuring and calibrating skulls.

Peter:

No, it isn't idiotic. I'm telling you there is no biological means of determining one from the other--it is all in the eyes of the beholder.

If you strip the skin off a corpse, as far as I know, there is no way to reliably identify what racial group it came from.

What most people think of as race goes only skin deep.

Jeff:

They sure seem to think they can:

http://www.cr.nps.gov/aad/kennewick/fpm_dna.htm

Peter:

the operative sentence here is:

"A second variety of the Inquisition was the infamous Spanish Inquisition, authorized by Pope Sixtus IV in 1478. Pope Sixtus tried to establish harmony between the inquisitors and the ordinaries, but was unable to maintain control of the desires of Ki ng Ferdinand V and Queen Isablella."

It was a political matter and based on race, not a church matter based on heresy.

Orrin:

And on that basis I am supposed to say Jeff is right? Fey!

Peter:

Now, now--if Jeff can admit that a major episode of social unpleasantness traces its roots to biology and not to religion you can certainly acknowledge science was to blame too.

Orrin:

You are right. I should be more humble. Jeff, I apologize and agree. Science was indeed to blame. Go, Jeff, go.

"We must first define the nature of the variation to be studiedd. Doing so helps us to understand what we mean by race, to decide which groups we should examine and what racial differences may tell us.

"We must note that most people do not distinguish betweeen biological and cultural heredity. It is often difficult to recognize which is which. Sometimes the cause of racial difference is biological (DNA); sometimes it is behavioral, learned from someone else (these are cultural causes); and sometimes both factors are involved. Genetically determined traits are very stable over time, unlike socially determined or learned behavior, which can change very rapdily. . . . There are clear biological differences between populations in the visual characteristics that we use to classify the races. If these genetic differences were found to be genuinely important and could support the sense of superiority that one people can have over another, then racism is justified -- at least formally. I find this genetic or biological definition of racism more satisfactory than others."

-- L. Cavalli-Sforza, "Is there a scientific basis for racism?" in "Genes, Peoples and Languages."

Orrin is using the word race in at least three different, incompatible ways.

However that may be, it takes some chutzpah to say that the policy of the Holy Office was not religious.

I wasn't aware that biology had quite reached its current, exalted, state in the 15th century.

I attributing that major episode of social unpleasantness to something that didn't yet exist as a discipline seems a bit of stretch. Traced its roots to mere physical appearance, however, appears much more plausible.

BTW--DNA testing can determine the relationship to an existing population, which is what the article is talking about. Without such a reference population's external appearance, such testing will tell you nothing about race, because racial definitions are, purely and simply, skin deep.

Exalted?

I left that as a bone for you, OJ. :)

Jeff's got it. Science cannot say, given a DNA profile of an individual, what "race" he belongs to.

Given the DNA profiles (or even the blood types) of a large number of people, you can make a fair guess as to what part of the world those people come from.

I quoted Cavalli-Sforza because the word "race" is being used carelessly here, and getting nobody anywhere.

"a fair guess as to what part of the world those people come from"

You mean like Asia, Africa or Eiurope?

If the person came from an area that has not experienced a lot of migration, and if that area has been well characterized statistically, you can narrow it down to a lot less than a continent.

But it's only a probability.

It's just like the Gallup Poll.

Thus, race.