Zoological
Subspecies
Of Man
By
E. RAYMOND HALL Ph.D.
Reprint No. 2 from the
article that originally appeared in
THE MANKIND QUARTERLY
VOL. I, NO. 2 -- OCTOBER 1960
Originally published by
THE INTERNATION ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT
OF ETHNOLOGY AND EUGENICS, INC.
P. O. Box 3495, Grand Central Station
New York, N.Y., 10017
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About the Author
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.. .DR. E. RAYMOND HALL
is Sum--merfield distinguished Professor in Zoology and Director of the Museum of Natural History at the University of Kansas.
. . .Professor Hall, who is one of the nation's leading authorities in the field of natural history, was born in Kansas in 1902. He attended the University of Kansas from' which he received his B.A. in 1924, and did his post-graduate work at the University of California for which he received his M.A. in 1925 and his Ph.D. in zoology in 1928.
. . .During 1924 and 1925 Dr. Hall worked part-time as a field biologist of the U.S. Bureau of Biological Surveys and in 1926 he served as acting head of the Bureau of Research of the California Department of Fish and Game. He was appointed Curator of Mammals at the University of California's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology in 1927, a position he held until 1944 when he went to the University of Kansas. From 1938 to 1940 he served as acting director of the museum.
. . .Dr. Hall was appointed Assistant Professor of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of California in 1930, and in 1937 was named Associate Professor.
. . .He joined the faculty of the University of Kansas in 1944 as Professor and Chairman of the Department of Zoology, and as Director of the university's Museum of Natural History. In 1959 he was appointed Summerfield Distinguished Professor.
. . .Professor Hall served as Director of the Kansas State Biological Survey in 1947, and as State Zoologist in 1959. He also
[page IV of booklet]
served as a member of the advisory board on National Parks, Historic Sites, Buildings and Monuments of the U.S. Department of the Interior from 1954 to 1960.
. . .Dr. Hall, who was a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1943, is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and served as a vice president and chairman of AAAS's zoological section in 1957. He was president of the American Society of M,ammalogists from 1944 to 1946.
. . .Professor Hall is also a Fellow of the California and the Washington (state) Academy of Science, and a member of the American Society of Zoologists, the American Wildlife Society, the American Society of Systematic Zoology, the American Ornithology Union, the Cooper Ornithology Club, the American Association of Museums, and the Biological Society of Washington.
. . .Dr. Hall has written extensively on natural history and his work has appeared in numerous journals. He is the author of more than 250 articles and monographs and nearly a dozen books. His books include:
| The Muscular Anatomy of Three Mustelid Mammals |
(1926) |
| Species of the Mammalian Subfamily Bassariscinae |
(1927) |
Mustelid Mammals From the Pleistocene of
. . North America |
(1936) |
| Revision of the Rodent Genus Microdipodops |
(1941) |
| Mammals of Nevada |
(1946) |
| Charles Dean Bunker |
(1951) |
| American Weasels |
(1951) |
| Handbook of Mammals of Kansas |
(1955) |
Mammals of Northern Alaska on the Arctic Slope
. .(co-author) |
(1956) |
| The Mammals of North America |
(1959) |
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ZOOLOGICAL SUBSPECIES
OF MAN
. . .The systematic zoologist, one who classifies animals as to kind, has something to offer. If he specializes on the class Mammalia, it is clear to him as it is to the non-zoologist that man differs in heritable structure from place to place over the world's land area. Now the zoologist knows also that other species of mammals differ from place to place. In any one of these species, if the differences in shape and size are such that all individuals in one considerable area can be distinguished from all those in another, the kinds are classified as subspecies. In man, the races and geographic variants are divisible into approximately five zoological subspecies. The word approximately is used because some zoologists would include subspecies americanus under asiaticus and so recognize only four subspecies, whereas other zoologists would subdivide asiaticus into two or more subspecies and thus would recognize more than five subspecies. The five subspecies here recognized are:
| (1) |
Homo sapiens sapiens, Caucasian; |
| (2) |
Homo sapiens americanus, American Indian; |
| (3) |
Homo sapiens asiaticus, Mongolian; |
| (4) |
Homo sapiens afer, Negro; |
| (5) |
Homo sapiens tasmanianus, Australian Black |
. . .Something that most non-zoologists seem not to know is that the subspecies of man are distinguished one from the other by the same sort of differences—characters, in zoological parlance as are subspecies of almost any other kind of mammal, say, subspecies of the mole, marmoset, or moose. For example, in the skull of a Point Barrow Eskimo, one of the races of the subspecies Homo sapiens asiaticus, the size and shape of the bony opening for the nose is significantly different from that in a Zulu Negro, one of the races of the subspecies Homo sapiens afer. In the Eskimo the opening is narrow (less than half as wide as high), whereas in the Negro it is wide—more than half as wide as high. Under a microscope the hair of the head of the Zulu is seen to
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have a characteristic shape in cross section, and inspection by means of only the naked eye reveals that the hair of the Zulu is kinky and his skin black, whereas the Eskimo's hair is straight and his skin yellow or dark reddish. Even cursory comparison will serve to multiply this list of differences. Similarly, in the moose, the subspecies Alces alces alces of Europe has the premaxillary bone extended back beneath the nasal bone and the color of its hair is grayish, whereas the subspecies Alces alces gigas from Alaska differs in that the premaxillary bone does not extend back so far as the nasal bone and the hair is blackish (see figure 1 showing geographic ranges of the subspecies of moose).
. . .It is necessary thus to stress that subspecies of man, like subspecies of other mammals, are distinguished by trenchant morphological characters of a heritable sort, because many advocates of an international brotherhood of man give the impression that kinds of men cannot be so distinguished. This mistaken impression prevails probably because in an area geographically intermediate between those inhabited by two different subspecies, crossbreeding produces people with intermediate structural characteristics. This blending, or more precisely intergradation, makes it impossible certainly to classify as to subspecies every individual person. For example, in crossing Asia on the Trans-Siberian Railway, the passenger rides through a belt of transition in which the native peoples are intergrades between Orientals (subspecies asiaticus) and Caucasians (subspecies sapiens). As a result the anthropologist usually says something to this effect: Because of intergradation it is impossible satisfactorily to distinguish one race of man from another. Note that the anthropologist said one race—not one subspecies which is composed of several or many races—but, nevertheless, from this statement other persons (usually unfamiliar, to be sure, either with physical anthropology or zoological classification) conclude that it is impossible to distinguish by tangible structural characteristics all Eskimos from all Zulus as we have been at pains to show can be done. Incidentally, and most significantly, it is this intergradation which permits and requires the division of men into subspecies, because, for the systematic mammalogist intergradation is the criterion for subspecies and lack of intergradation is the criterion for species. Therefore, if there were no geographic intergradation (crossbreeding) in the areas where the geographic ranges of two kinds meet, they would be full species instead of subspecies.
. . .The differences in customs, habits, and especially in artifacts which tend to set man apart from other mammals, have unquestionably complicated the geographic distribution of subspecies. For example, the construction and use of boats have
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given to the subspecies of man on the Pacific Islands a distribution different from that of almost any other terrestrial mammal. Still, the difference in artifacts and habits in different areas may have aided geographic differentiation and one effect probably offsets to some extent the other.
. . .Not only do subspecies of man differ in shape of parts of the skeleton, color of skin, and shape of hair, as do subspecies of other kinds of mammals, but they differ in psychological characteristics. A Chinese who find himself in a crowd of perspiring white men, or a Caucasian who finds himself in a similar situation among Negroes, by distinctive odor alone can identify his companions as of a subspecies different from the one to which he belongs. G. M. Stratton and P. M. Henry (Amer. Jour. Psychology, vol. 56, p. 169, 1943) record significant differences in electrical resistance of the skin of Caucasians and Orientals when there was involuntary impulse to avoid pain.
. . .For these reasons the zoologist recognizes the falsity of statements to the effect that the kinds of men cannot be satisfactorily distinguished morphologically or physiologically. He knows that subspecies can be satisfactorily distinguished and, as an improved basis for amicable relations between them, urges frank recognition of the differences, the better to make allowances for them.
. . .Many persons who have expressed themselves on racial and international problems at the peace table in the past were unaware of the magnitude of these differences, therefore minimized their importance, and so far as known the zoologist's view has never been taken into account in drawing up peace terms. Recognition of the differences between subspecies of man, or for that matter recognition of inherent differences between categories of almost anything, permits the application more readily of provisions that promote harmony. Harmony among men makes for peace and thus we see one reason for the zoologists' contention that application of their findings may contribute to a longer and enduring peace.
. . .But the zoological view may be helpful in yet other respects. Consider, if you will, the results of competition between closely allied subspecies of wild mammals when one penetrates into or is introduced into the range of another. Whether they be mice, moles, or monkeys, one and only one subspecies survives in a given area, because after a few thousand years, ordinarily in a much shorter time, crossbreeding may result in amalgamation, a sort of extinction by dilution. But the more common results are either that they fight and one kills the other, or that as a result of less direct combat, the individuals of one subspecies more often usurp the best food. places best suited for rearing young,
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and shelters affording maximum protection from enemies. Therefore the one subspecies thrives, whereas the other subspecies because of lower birth rate and decreased longevity that result from inferior food, inferior nurseries and insufficient shelter, decreases and disappears. The introduced black rat (Rattus rattus rattus) has disappeared from some large areas in North America where competition was furnished by another introduced subspecies, Rattus rattus alexandrinis. So it goes in almost every instance where kinds of mammals so closely related as subspecies of the same species are suddenly thrown into competition over a large area. Indeed, study of the thousands of subspecies of native wild mammals has led to the formulation of the biological law concerning them that: Two subspecies of the same species do not occur in the same geographic area. Of the half dozen or fewer exceptions reported to date, reinvestigation has shown that the two kinds instead were in every instance full species, or two subspecies that lived each in a habitat apart from the other. Thus the rule remains almost or quite without exception and it should give pause to anyone about to advocate the long continued residence together of subspecies of man.
. . .Another zoological generalization that man ought to take into account is that when two kinds of closely related animals are thrown into competition, the one native to the larger land mass ordinarily prevails. The reported increase of the introduced Old World reindeer (Rangifer tarandus tarandus) in Alaska at the expense of the native caribou (Rangifer tarandus arcticus) is a case in point.¹ The red-backed mouse (Clethrionomys dawsoni)² which seems to be relatively a newcomer to the Alaskan area of North America from Asia, appears to be succeeding at the expense of the native American red-backed mouse (Clethrionomys gapperi). In past geological ages there have been several interchanges of fauna between North America and Asia. These were at times when a higher land level, or a lower sea level, between Asia and North America provided a land bridge between those two continents. Our increasingly complete record of fossil mammals shows that the balance in those past ages, as well as in the present, definitely favored the large land mass, Asia (see fig. 2). That is to say, of the mammals that North America gave to Asia in later geologic time only the camels and horses survived there; but of the mammals that Asia gave to North America, elk, moose, reindeer, bison, and other species prevailed and remain in North America today.
¹ By 1960 it seems that Rangifer tarandus tarandus is not holding its own in North America.
² Clethrionomys rutilus dawsoni of 1960 nomenclature.
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[page 6]
. . .What, then, are the chances of survival of the Caucasians in North America if they permit the infiltration of the Oriental subspecies of man from the larger land mass of Asia? The Caucasians' chances would appear poor indeed. But the Caucasians are not Americans—there isn't a family among them that can claim residence of more than 400 years on this continent; the Caucasians, too, are from the larger land mass, the Asiatic land mass, albeit from its western edge whereas the Orientals are from its eastern edge. What the Caucasian subspecies did to the subspecies native here, the American Indian, whose ancestors at a much earlier time came from Asia, the Caucasians may after all avoid for themselves because their recent Asiatic origin gives them in North America almost a 50-50 chance with the Orientals.
. . .But, is this competition necessary? To invite it by permitting the immigration of Orientals, and to foster it by granting citizenship on the North American mainland to Orientals seems foolish and violates every biological law, of recent and past geological ages, that relates to the harmonious existence of two or more subspecies of the same species. To imagine one subspecies of man living together on equal terms for long with another subspecies is out wishful thinking and leads only to disaster and oblivion for one or the other. More to the point at the moment, such a course and its inescapable consequence insure in the process of solution either bloodshed and violence or a more insidious competition in which racial prejudice, and fancied superiority, set over against alleged inferiority, come to the surface with all of the associated evils that poison men's minds, sicken their bodies and torture their souls.
. . .The biologist knows that subspecific characters make Negroes extreme in hairlessness of body, Caucasians extreme in lack of pigment, American Indians extreme in thinness of upper incisor teeth, and Australian blacks extreme in overhanging brows, but when the biologist totals all the extremes for anyone subspecies he neither proves nor implies superiority or inferiority for any subspecies. He does emphatically proclaim significant differences. To him, the biologist, the prospect of a world brotherhood in which all men everywhere are subspecifically the same also is unalluring because it robs the world of variety and hence of much that is of interest. For the zoologist—and probably most men hold the same view—an improved world order should insure the opportunity to each subspecies to perpetuate itself, if it so chooses. Many think that a more progressive species, as well as a more varied and interesting one, will be the result if each subspecies preserves itself,. if necessary by deportation of "invaders" which have a higher birth rate and are of another subspecies. Obviously, therefore, in some countries or in certain selected political areas, it would be
[page 7]
necessary to grant citizenship rights to one subspecies only.³ Advocates of this policy would encourage the interchange of scholars, teachers, scientists, skilled craftsmen, commercial representatives, and others to the maximum but citizenship for one of these selected areas would depend on zoological subspecies.
. .³.In effect the United States of America did this in the 1800s by establishing Reservations for the American Indian. Private ownership of real property on a reservation was restricted to the Indian subspecies (H. s. americanus), giving the Indians control of occupancy. They could leave and compete with subspecies outside the reservation. Many who did so failed in that competition and returned at will to the reservation. But on nearly all reservations an increasing percentage of each succeeding generation prospered outside the reservation. As a result of that economic and cultural prosperity of individual Indians outside, and as a result of their amalgamation (in the sense of interbreeding with other subspecies), many reservations were abandoned as such after only three to five generations. In and around the reservations in the eastern and central states, which areas were the first to be usurped from the Indians by Caucasians (and Negroes, then mostly in slavery), the inevitable amalgamation has progressed so smoothly, sociologically, that today almost every American who is of Indian ancestry even in minor degree makes no attempt to conceal that ancestry and, indeed, instead points to it with pride. This attitude is rapidly spreading westward and 50 years hence probably will be general all the way to the Pacific Coast of the United States of America.
. . .On a few reservations the Indians up to now have chosen to perpetuate the subspecies. The Navajo Indian in Arizona can be cited. At the boundaries of the Navajo Indian Reservation pride, without arrogance, in subspecific ancestry, on each side of the boundary, is developing mutual respect. Consequently, for a considerable time yet, "citizenship" in the vicinity of Kayenta, Arizona, probably will depend on subspecies (americanus in this instance).
. . .Regardless of whether amalgamation was rapid or slow at a given reservation, the setting aside of it prevented much insidious competition, individual injustice, human suffering, and in many instances violence and bloodshed, while the Indians were learning enough of the culture of the Caucasian invaders to enable the Indians successfully to compete outside the reservation. Therefore the results realized from setting aside reservations for North American Indians has provided a strong argument to persons who favor granting citizenship rights to only one subspecies in certain political areas for as long as may be necessary. —E.R.H., June 1960.
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at
the Battle of Cowpens, S. Carolina, 1781