I'm not buying this. And the concept of race being "pretty close to meaningless" is a long way from meaningless. It goes without saying (but I'll say it anyway) that variations within races are much, much greater than variations between races. But that doesn't mean that races don't exist. As Harvard pyschologist Steven Pinker has said, races are nothing more than large extended families. We don't expect all families to have identical traits, so we shouldn't expect all races to, either.

To use a very simple example, sickle-cell anemia is common in African populations and, if I may be permiited to say it, "blacks". It is almost unheard of in whites.

Sickle-cell anemia has nothing to do with skin colour, yet if you are a doctor and you are presented with a patient complaining of diffuse pain, you are right to consider sickle-cell anemia if he is black and an idiot to consider it if he is white. So, the concept of race is used in the real world on a daily basis and has genuine practical value.

So, if the gene for sickle-cell anemia is an example of one genetic difference that seems to be particular to blacks, why can't there be others?