This is the first time you've seen the claim, expressed as follows?
(1) "race" does not divide humanity according to any biologically justifiable criteria,
(2) "race" is used to provide a scientific halo effect to justify current social organization
(2) is obviously true - and is morally positive so long as the first assertion is false. (1) is controversial - but I've seen it expressed many times on LW and other places.
Offensiveness relies in the implicit premise that use of the halo effect when the underlying science is faulty is itself irrational / socially hurtful. That's isomorphic to asserting that the "Noble Lie" is immoral - which I thought was the consensus here.
I don't think I've seen "race" applied to animals-- "breed" or "subspecies" is what I'm used to?
I agree - I've never heard "race" used to categorize animals.
I think "landrace" applies to animals, though.
The first draft of the 2012 Less Wrong Census/Survey is complete (see 2011 here). I will link it below if you promise not to try to take the survey because it's not done yet and this is just an example!
2012 Less Wrong Census/Survey Draft
I want three things from you.
First, please critique this draft. Tell me if any questions are unclear, misleading, offensive, confusing, or stupid. Tell me if the survey is so unbearably long that you would never possibly take it. Tell me if anything needs to be rephrased.
Second, I am willing to include any question you want in the Super Extra Bonus Questions section, as long as it is not offensive, super-long-and-involved, or really dumb. Please post any questions you want there. Please be specific - not "Ask something about abortion" but give the exact question you want me to ask as well as all answer choices.
Try not to add more than five or so questions per person, unless you're sure yours are really interesting. Please also don't add any questions that aren't very easily sort-able by a computer program like SPSS unless you can commit to sorting the answers yourself.
Third, please suggest a decent, quick, and at least somewhat accurate Internet IQ test I can stick in a new section, Unreasonably Long Bonus Questions.
I will probably post the survey to Main and officially open it for responses sometime early next week.