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I think there is a substantial fear that any result based on genetics can lead to a result of "therefore these genes are better", at least when taken at the most surface level (the level a typical headline and widely circulated article might take). Nobody wants to be associated with such an article and so anyone involved is extremely zealous in filtering out topics that might lead in that direction.

There is still a shadow of eugenics over any field studying human genetics, anthropology perhaps more than others. Personally I think its because the concepts of race and genetic ability were rejected primarily on moral grounds, rather than a scientific ones.

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Archaeologists already use ancient DNA, and so much of folk archaeology has been proven false, and they are fine with that. Anthropologists seem to be outright hostile to empirical methods, which is crazy because they are an empirical science, and an important one. Fear should not lead science, in fact it is the fear of genetics and empirical science that destroys anthropology.

My guess it that archeology does not attempt to link DNA to behavior, and so gets a pass. Ultimately what directs anthropology is fickle, there is no real push for correctness or profitability; its all prestige and arbitrary funding directors.

Archaeology is a subfield of anthropology in the US.

The guy who won the Nobel for ancient DNA (Svante Pääbo) literally runs the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, so I'd say ancient DNA is very much part of anthropology.

If Anthropologists are hostile to empirical methods, anthropology is not a science.

I think that mindset is deeply mistaken, even though it may be understandable. If you don't research it you will leave a void that the actual racists can fill with their pseudo-scientific babble, and if you don't do any actual research or have any arguments to counter them because it's all taboo then all you have are ... the racist's arguments, strengthened by a "they're covering it up!"

Everyone can tell the different between bona-fide research for scientific and historical purposes and eugenics. The dangers are strongly overstated: eugenics was used to justify existing racism, it didn't cause it.

If some genes really are so much better than others, why not use CRISPR to give more people the best mix of genes? Actually, beyond obvious cases like single-mutation diseases, attempts at finding out which genes are associated with what have not been very successful.

Has CRISPR been successful on mammals yet? Once its widespread enough for someone without ethical constraints to have a try it seems like an inevitability.

I've seen papers where CRISPR was used to modify mouse embryos so the mice grow up to express certain proteins in certain organs (the proteins were useful for modeling disease). The differences between this and human modification are probably that nobody minds losing a bunch of mouse embryos, and that a lot of human traits are polygenetic and thus not a simple matter of adding a single protein. That said, it's only a matter of time until someone unscrupulous demonstrates human gene modification in some poorly regulated polity.

Why even go that far? Why hasn't nature spread them on its own?

Honestly this whole topic reeks of social hierarchies (which are entirely malleable) being applied to other aspects of life. After all, when you are convinced of a social hierarchy, you are going to try to find or manufacture evidence and if it can be explained by genes you have the ultimate excuse for racism.

"concepts of race and genetic ability were rejected primarily on moral grounds, rather than a scientific ones."

Ironically, this rejection comes, because they were once introduced on "moral" or rather cultural grounds, disguised as science. Socialdarwinism and co. The Nazis for example did lots of "research" on race, but their concept of research was to proof the obvious truth, that white people and especially the aryans are superior. And then working out all the practical details of heritage and ancestors - for example to decide who is competent for a given job and who goes on the train to the death camps.

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