Race as optical illusion

[timelets]

“In 1972, Lewontin published these results in a profoundly influential paper entitled “The Apportionment of Human Diversity.” He concluded that racial classifications had become entrenched in Western society thanks to optical illusions. People defined races based on features “to which human perceptions are most finely tuned (nose, lip and eye shapes, skin color, hair form and quantity).” But these features were influenced by only a small number of genes. It was wrong to assume that all the other genes people carried followed the same patterns.”

-- Carl Zimmer. “She Has Her Mother's Laugh.”

If we can identify relevant groups of salient features then we can create new social groups.