鈥淵ou're always going to have people who look to science to justify racism and skepticism,鈥� said C. Brandon Ogbunu, a Yale assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology. 鈥淥ur job as scientists is to make (skeptics) have to be more and more magical about the way that they get there.鈥�
Ogbunu was one of three panelists at 鈥淩ace & Genetics,鈥� a discussion sponsored by the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America and the Office of the Provost March 24. The panel was .
Associate Professor of Biology, Director of the Center for Computational Molecular Biology and Associate Professor of Computer Science Sohini Ramachandran and Assistant Professor of Biostatistics Lorin Crawford also spoke at the event.
The panelists discussed common misconceptions about the relationship between race and genetics and the subsequent misuse of science to justify bigotry.聽
鈥淲hat worries me a lot as a population geneticist right now is where engagement online is coming from, with respect to the latest population, genetics and medical genetics studies,鈥� Ramachandran said. 鈥淭he bulk of online engagement with medical genetic studies and population genetics studies is coming from white supremacist groups.鈥�
Ramachandran cited an example of to 鈥渄emonstrate their whiteness and this special adaptation (lactose tolerance) that they have.鈥澛�
鈥淭he funding of genetic studies being concentrated in the West gives a lot of oxygen to these kinds of views,鈥� Ramachandran said. 鈥淭his fascination with certain aspects of medical and genetic literature and the way that it highlights our differences is really problematic.鈥�
Ogbunu added that though the field of genetics is extremely important and 鈥渆ncodes a staggering and important amount of information and instructions鈥� for society, its value as an explanatory science is often oversimplified and thus misused by certain groups.
鈥淲hen you take those truisms and you fail to identify the giant gap between the truths that genetics offers and the notion that we can use differences in DNA to explain the vast diversity ... of human experience,鈥� Ogbunu said, 鈥渢his is where the problem resides.鈥�
鈥淚t becomes toxic when DNA information can be used to explain history and rationalize historical trajectories of different individuals,鈥� Ogbunu added.
The panelists also considered the complexities within the field of genetic science that experts still need to tackle.
鈥淭hinking about language and how we define groups, in terms of statistical methodology right now, a lot of people are thinking about how to understand the differences and similarities across individuals,鈥� Crawford said. 鈥淎nd what I've realized in my viewpoint of working on these methods is that we don't really have standardized language to deal with this.鈥澛�
Crawford, who specializes in the use of computational methods to address problems in statistical genetics, also raised the issue of algorithmic bias in data collection and research.
鈥淭he big thing I really want to take away from here is the idea that complex data really (does) need complex methods,鈥� Crawford said. He explained the importance of 鈥渋nterdisciplinary research鈥� to 鈥渂uild and better inform methodology鈥� when studying genetics and personalized medicine, which can include .
Ramachandran explained that in order to avoid widespread misconceptions about genetics, schools must provide more accurate curricula.聽聽
鈥淭he way that we're taught genetics in primary school is completely false and oversimplifies the genetic architecture of traits,鈥� she said, citing an example of Punnett squares predicting eye color as 鈥渢otally problematic and not actually how pigmentation of any of our body, especially our eyes, is governed.鈥�
The oversimplification and misrepresentation of genetics at an early age can contribute to later misconceptions about race and other traits, Ogbuno said. The concept of genetics explaining race relations is 鈥渇raught with really, really problematic reasoning.鈥澛�
鈥淚t's all an attempt to get a shortcut about the way the world works,鈥� Ogbunu added. 鈥淥ur job is to get everyone to the point where if you want to be a sexist, you just have to be a sexist,鈥� he said. 鈥淚f you want to be a racist, be a racist. You cannot ask genetics for help.鈥�
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