denizaksulu wrote:phoenix wrote: . . it's funny how one thing leads to another. Whenever I search with the word "Intolerance" and "Turkish" . . I get stuff about the Armenian Genocide etc.
If I search with "Turkey" I get stuff about the bird, and if I search alongside "alcohol" and "Turkey" I get stuff about going"Cold Turkey".
Anyway . . . just thought I'd post this interesting article about Pharmacogenetics which is the study of how one's ethnic group should be taken into consideration when prescribing drugs as there are differences.
Pharmacogenetics
Samuel D. Uretsky PharmD
Pharmacogenetics is the study of how the actions of and reactions to drugs vary with the patient's genes.
....In humans, genes influence race, hair and eye color, gender, height, weight, aspects of behavior, and even the likelihood of developing certain diseases....
Pharmacogenetics is the study of how people respond to drug therapy. Although this science is still new, there have been many useful discoveries. It has long been known that genes influence the risk of developing certain diseases, or that genes could determine traits such as hair and eye color. Genes can also alter the risk of developing different diseases. It has long been known that people of African descent were more likely to have sickle cell anemia than people of other races. People of Armenian, Arab, and Turkish heritage are more prone to familiar Mediterranean fever than people of other nationalities. ....
Because people of the same race carry similar genes, studies based on race were the earliest types of pharmacogenetic studies. One study evaluated the levels of alcohol dehydrogenase in people of different nationalities. This is an enzyme involved in the metabolism of alcohol. When people with high levels of this enzyme, or people in whom the enzyme acts more rapidly than in other people, drink alcohol, they are subject to facial flushing and slowing of the heartbeat. The activity of this enzyme is determined by genetics, and different levels can be seen in different races because these people belong to the same gene pools. Among Asiatic people, 85% have high levels of this enzyme, compared to 20% of Swiss people, and only 5-10% of British people
Ahem, err. The article produced above uses the word 'race' erronously. It does not fit into your definition.
Phoenix mou, could you please explain?
If you are right, the article is to be rubbished. If the article is to be believed, you are wrong. That cant be right for sure.
Bestest regards
Kindest regards
Heritage . . . the bit outlined refers to "
heritage" . . . which is where families come in
Deniz, the article was written with laymen in mind . . . hence the simplistic descriptions of what genes control.
The accepted breakdown of Humans is as all belonging to ONE species called
Homo sapiens.
Within that classification we have degrees of similarities that are shared between Groups or Families of people.
They are Families because you can do dendrograms or trees of relatedness (lineages) with techniques currently available.
All go back to "Eve" (the most recent common ancestor) or the one mother who lived about 150,000 years ago.
The Groups or Families are her great-grandchildren (x number of generations).
For medical reasons we can compare their genetic similarities to determine conditions, susceptibilities, intolerances etc.
Any "firm" labelling such as "race" is not scientific but political. Unless each individual member has had his/her DNA sequenced and aligned, then you cannot group them into a "race". But the interesting thing is, families tend to stay close together and when you compare individuals within that family you can find patterns of similarity. This is where pharmacogenetics is useful.
You can have races of bacteria because they are much simpler and you can assign their DNA to this or that race. But to date we do not have the resources to do that with enough Humans.
