Talk:An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races

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Where can this book be reviewed?!

For what it's worth I have written a blog article about the book here: Arthur de Gobineau: Essai sur l'Inégalité des Races Humaines.

--FreezBee 17:47, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

There is an extensive discussion of the work by Ernst Cassirer in his last book, "The Myth of the State." I will try, time allowing, to improve the writing and sources here. I am equally wary of the rather obvious hand of the white nationalists and their apologists; not to mention inadvertent straw-men erected by the well-intentioned. Jjoyce1978 (talk) 09:15, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

neutral online copy?

Is there an online version from a neutral source? We typically try to give our readers links to online versions of out-of-copyright texts, but in this case I can only find it published on white-nationalist sites, and am a bit wary of linking to outright propagandist sites. I don't suppose anyone has come across it in a neutral third-party historical archive? --Delirium 06:38, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Re. Gobineau and the Bible

Just for the record: I have added that section, because it is a common claim that there was no racism before Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species in 1859. It's not that I in any way endorse Gobineau's idea. --FreezBee 17:56, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Who added this sentence "In general, Gobineau considers the Bible to be a reliable source of actual history, and he was not a supporter of the idea of polygenesis."? Because that is utterly in contradiction to the information conveyed just before. If he believed Non White People don't descend form Adam then that is by Definition Polygenesis.--JaredMithrandir (talk) 03:53, 2 August 2021 (UTC)

Extensive French

It seems unnecessary to use so much of the original French in this article, as it is the English version, and anyone who knows French and wants to look at the original could easily do so on the French Wikipedia. --N-k (talk) 12:38, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Sources

All the sources are from the liberal-left and by anti-racist warriors.86.133.115.166 (talk) 19:00, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Calling historical theories "pseudo-science"

Is it sensible to call a 1853 work of this sort pseudo-scientific? One may elaborate on its various flaws and the scientific theories that have superseded it, but that terminology appears out of place...

How about "proto-scientific"?! Biohistorian15 (talk) 18:16, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

In particular, moving such accusations to the section on biblical inspiration might be advisable. Biohistorian15 (talk) 18:19, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

With regard to terms like "pseudoscience", we follow scholarly usage. Here I see that the cited source gives a helpful definition:

Along with newly emerging standards of truth and validity came public authority, and with this public authority came the usurpation of that authority in the gray zone of ‘‘pseudoscience,’’ usually only distinguishable as such in retrospect. The term pseudoscience refers to any work that appeals to the authority of science despite being methodologically flawed or incompetently reasoned, even if carried out by credentialed scientists.

Since the author designates the entire field of scientific racism as pseudoscience, it's clear that when he describes Gobineau's Essay as a model for the leading racist writers of the next two generations he means to place Gobineau's work under that umbrella. Calling this work "proto-scientific" would give the reader the false impression that scholars see it as a step in the direction of actual scientific understanding. Generalrelative (talk) 19:29, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Ok. "Proto-scientific" sounds too aggrandizing in any case. I'll consider alternatives. Biohistorian15 (talk) 20:33, 16 June 2024 (UTC)