Biologi vs social konstruktion

"-Gould was wrong when he claimed that Morton’s measurements of skull capacity by packing seeds were subconsciously influenced by his racial prejudice. In fact, Morton’s measurements show no statistically significant deviation in the direction of his hypotheses when compared to independent measurements that Lewis and his colleagues’ have now carried out using Morton’s own samples, which are located at the University of Pennsylvania’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in Philadelphia.

– Gould’s calculation of average skull size for Native American populations, and his statement that Morton wishfully underestimated this value because of his racial bias, were unduly influenced by Gould’s decision to exclude 34 skulls out of a sample of 144, on the basis that they came from populations with less than 4 skulls per population. When the omitted data are restored, the average calculated using Gould’s preferred method is actually slightly lower than the average calculated using Morton’s method.

– While Gould alleged Morton biased his results by breaking down some populations into subsamples while amalgamating others, a detailed review of Morton’s data shows that he did report the subsample values. Furthermore, Gould himself misdefined the Native American samples which served erroneously to inflate the mean he calculated.

While the paper stops short of accusing Gould of fraud, it does say “most of Gould’s criticisms are falsified or poorly supported” and one author on the paper, physical anthropologist Ralph Holloway of Columbia University in New York City, adds that he believes Gould’s alleged misstatements were intentional, that is, motivated by the case he was trying to build against Morton. “I don’t think it was an innocent mistake,” he says. Holloway notes that there is no known link between brain size and intelligence. That appears to make the data essentially irrelevant for Morton’s racist purposes."

Antropologisk och historisk forskning har visat att jägar- och samlarsamhällen varit relativt jämställda av den enkla anledningen att det inte fanns några direkta statushierarkier i dessa samhällen, något som är en förutsättning för att patriarkala samhällen skall utvecklas. Antropologisk forskning har dock visat att när familjerna i dessa grupper fattar beslut så samlas primärt männen och diskuterar innan de fattar beslut. Det är också alltid en man som utses som temporär ledare för varje projekt om det så är en räd mot en annan stam, storviltsjakt eller motsvarande.