Merlin Chowkwanyun (there’s a name to conjure with!–sorry) at The New Republic (there’s an annoying, but free, registration thingy) goes to the ramparts to defend the no-such-thing-as-race (NoSTAR) dogma. Justin Shubow has engaged with him. At least one friend of NR/NRO–Sally Satel–gets caught in the crossfire. NoSTAR baffles me even more than Intelligent Design. It is an exceptionally brazen form of reality denial. If some small group of humans (or any other sexually-reproducing organism) settles in some region of the world and proceeds to interbreed almost entirely among themselves for a few hundred generations, then OF COURSE they will develop particular group characteristics. Some characteristics will be visible to the eye: stature, hair form, skin color, facial features. Some won’t: blood types, disease susceptibilities, PTC tasting. Since individual behavior and personality have physiological, biochemical, and genetic substrates, there are undoubtedly group-statistical differences there, too. We already know some of them. All this is as well established as the orbit of the moon. Whether any social policies ought to “notice” these group differences, and if so, which ones and how, is a fruitful and interesting topic of discussion (which, to be fair, comprises a part of the Chowkwanyun-Shubow exchanges). That the group differences exist is simply not controversial. If they did NOT exist–THAT would be controversial. It would contradict the most basic known facts about living organisms, not to mention our own lying eyes.