The perfect lens, or in praise of mammals

[shkrobius]

...nuclear architecture of rod photoreceptor cells differs fundamentally in nocturnal and diurnal mammals. The rods of diurnal retinas possess the conventional architecture found in nearly all eukaryotic cells, with most heterochromatin situated at the nuclear periphery and euchromatin residing toward the nuclear interior. The rods of nocturnal

Comments

[shkrobius]

OK, so I talked to my friends. They are husband and wife, both Chinese scholars. They assured me that there was no "ethnic cleansing" of any kind. There were episodic atrocities (like the massacre of the Jesuits in the 19th century, but it had no racial bias). There is no trace of such "cleansing" in Chinese historical records, literature, or archeological data. Furthermore, there are examples of assimilation of Persians and other non-Mongoloid traders into the Chinese population proper. Ed told me that I am overemphasizing the records of Chinese aversion to the European visitors, he says that most of such accounts are favorable. The barbaric customs are denigrated, but not the people themsleves, though they are routinely compared to animals. He says that the general feeling was repulsion at their barbarity mixed with clearly discernible awe. He says he still evidenced just such a reaction in his first visits on inland China in the early 1970s, when he was frequently the first European ever seen by the villagers

[i_eron]

Thank you for talking to them, it is interesting, although I have the chutzpah to still disagree.

chyyr has found a reference to just the sort of ethnic cleansing I have suspected in an old work by a XIX century sinologist Bichurin. I am sure more could be found along the same lines

[shkrobius]

Look, Ed is one of the top US sinologists and paleographers
http://ealc.uchicago.edu/faculty/shaughnessy.shtml
I am in no position to second guess him. If he tells that there is no documentary evidence, it means there is no documentary evidence. Furthermore, he is the leading specialist precisely in the Zhou and pre-Zhou period. I accept his judgment and consider the issue closed.

[i_eron]

I do not doubt Prof. Shaughnessy authority. Next to him I know nothing about China, yet this is not a general knowledge contest. I am now armed not only with a lucky general guess, but with a specific reference about these 350 AD events: "Shi Min saw that, in particular, the Xiongnu and the Jie would never support him, so he issued an order that if a Han killed a non-Han and presented the head, he would be rewarded. Some 200,000 died in the massacre -- including some Han who had higher nose structure or thicker beard, both considered signs of non-Hanness."

Apparently, this genocide is a widely known part of the official history of China, based on an "ancient Chinese historical annals". The internet is full of it (1, 2, 3). Some even call Shi Min "Hitler of East Asia". Is this unanimous anonymous wrong? Were the "annals" some later fabrication? I could not find any mention of that

[shkrobius]

Ed wrote on the entire cultural history of China. As I know nothing of this period of Chinese history, I will relay it to Ed. However, I want to remind you that even if this is the case, there were several major invasions afterwards. To explain the facts you need to postulate that such atrocities were committed every time.

[i_eron]

But that was my point. During the Civil war, the Chinese population has dropped dramatically, so that the total number of Chinese was only a few times higher, than the number of their nomad neighbors. So, the influence of the nomad invasions was considerable. And incidentally, the population drop itself has invited mass invasions. Since the Chinese population has recovered and the nomad population has stagnated (and most Europeoid tribes moved west), further influence became negligible. Now there are 140 times as many Han Chinese as all Mongols, Buryats and Tuvans put together. But the Han-nomad population ratio was very different then.

[shkrobius]

Let me hear what he says, then I'll get back to you.

Part 1

[shkrobius]

So I asked again:

Q: You told me that there were no major hostilities against Han Chinese with Europeoid features; rather, there were isolated atrocities targeting missionaries, etc. late in Chinese history. Wikipedia, however, informs that there was such a massacre around 350 AD:

...As the non-Han continued to flee Yecheng, Shi Min saw that, in particular, the Xiongnu and the Jie would never support him, so he issued an order that if a Han killed a non-Han and presented the head, he would be rewarded. Some 200,000 died in the massacre-including some Han who had higher nose structure or thicker beard, both considered signs of non-Hanness. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ran_Min... )

Part 2

[shkrobius]

I concede that Ed's position seems to be mainly informed by his personal opinion rather than researched scholarship, but this opinion reflects his knowledge of the country and his subject and should not be readily discounted. What he says is reasonable: maintaining hostilities against foreigners when these foreigners are ruling the country is implausible. Every such period provides an opportunity for demic diffusion. You undeed need thorough weeding all the time to explain what you purport to explain. Furthermore, your logic is incorrect; this is the fallacy of blending inheritance (genetic traits being diluted by large numbers). By such logic you would never get redheads anywhere. What Ed tells is not unlike the other critique you got. Nearly the only constant features are Asian hair and Mongoloid eyes. These are probably the most genetically dominant traits, and that is all to it. I give you an example. There are no red head Chinese. That's because MCR1 gene mutation is recessive when it defines hair color. And yet the same

Re: Part 2

[i_eron]

I do not propose an absolute effect. In the genetic study you have recently recommended, a good correlation was shown between looks and traditional status on the one hand and genes on the other in India. So, imagine a (God forbid) mass genocide event in the Indian past. Surely, the currently observed racial diversity there would have been lower than it is now