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Race
I shall start with race, which is very often brought into the debate on civilisation, not only in Koneczny's days but also today. Race, however, has nothing to do with defining a civilisation. Race is a somatic characteristic; it is an aspect of the zoology of man. The physical differences between races may result in different abilities, well seen in the field of sport, possibly also in intellectual potential, though that is still a debatable issue, but it has nothing to do with the norms considered as proper for the life of a given community. As defined above, civilisation is the product of the human spirit.
An adopted child brought up in a family of a completely different race will normally grow up into a person endowed with the civilisation of the adoptive parents. Quite apart from this obvious observation, there are many examples of large communities of different race in the same civilisation or of people of the same race in different civilisations. White people, racially indistinguishable from each other, constitute a majority of the people belonging to Latin, Byzantine, Turanian and Jewish civilisations. In the Turanian civilisation, however, there are peoples of the white (Russians), Han (Chinese) and turkmenian (Turkey) race. Race does not define civilisation.
There is, however, a biological aspect to civilisation. Civilisation is a very strong marriage barrier. People normally look for a spouse in the same civilisation as their own. They expect to share civilisational norms with the spouse. As a result, the civilisational barrier becomes also a biological one. In biology, races, both animal and human, develop as a consequence of isolation. An isolated community will develop some biological characteristics due to accidental loss of some genes (a process referred to as "genetic drift") and possibly also due to adaptation to some specific environmental conditions. The latter cause requires life in a different climate or some other external determinant of the living conditions. In any case, an isolated community will develop some biological characteristics that will distinguish it from others, provided that the isolation is maintained. Of course, we know very well from animal breeding that isolation is the primary condition for the maintenance of specific races. In human societies, inter-civilisational marriage does occasionally occur but it is a rare phenomenon and the less it occurs the more biological differences will develop between civilisations. However, it is not the race that makes a civilisation. It is civilisation that can make a race.