How are two people in the same race?

What determines if two are the same race? Like are all white people the same race? Is an Israeli and a Palestinian the same? Or like Pakistani and Bengali?

Also how would this work if you're mixed, I am quite an unusual mix as my parents are also mixed race and some of my grandparents are mixed too. So who would I say is also my race? Am I the same race as all other mixed people, or would someone have to be the same mix as me to be my race? Like am I in an entirely separate race then? How does this categorising like really work?

A subspecies is a taxonomic rank below species – the only recognized rank in the zoological code,^[9] and one of three main ranks below species in the botanical code.^[8] When geographically separate populations of a species exhibit recognizable phenotypic differences, biologists may identify these as separate subspecies; a subspecies is a recognized local variant of a species.^[10] Botanists and mycologists have the choice of ranks lower than subspecies, such as variety (varietas) or form (forma), to recognize smaller differences between populations.^[8]

I don't think subspecies and races are equivalent, so if its a spectrum, are we all a different race to each other except from identical twins?

The point is really that the concept of "race" makes no biological sense in the human species. For some animals it does - for example, where populations which can interbreed get geographically isolated, develop habits or diets that are distinctive and then cease interbreeding. But despite the fact that we are spread all over the world, and for short periods of time some populations have become quite isolated, humans have never stopped interbreeding for any length of time. So we have never formed true biological "races".

I am aware that there's no biological concept of race, its a point I tend to argue to others but it still exists culturally.

There have been numerous attempts to divide the human species according to biological definitions of "race". None of them have won acceptance, because we are such an interconnected species, that breeds freely without significant reproductive isolation. The result is that there is a relatively low level of genetic difference between human groups and no sign of the kind of geographic or genetic isolation that one sees in other species where genetic divergence might be occurring. For example, there is less divergence between human population groups than there is between African ape populations, even though we are spread out across the whole planet compared with the much smaller range of African apes.

As a further complication, genetic variation in human is "nested" e.g. ifwe try to distinguish between Sub-Saharan African and European populations, we find that genetic diversity within Europe is a subset of that within Sub-Saharan Africa. All human populations are in fact subsets of the SSA set. So Europeans end up being "sub-races" within a SSA "race", which makes the whole concept extremely difficult to work with and certainly incompatible with the idea of mutually exclusive groups.

There is certainly some geographic variation. For some specific, narrowly defined purposes e.g. predicting the likely occurrence of specific genetic disorders, or for tracking the movement of some population groups in history, we can use the frequency of specific markers in a useful way. But these are not markers of "species", "subspecies" or "races" as understood in biology. It is more useful to consider "race" in humans as a continuous variable like height, and this is what accords with the lived experience of most people. In humans (and some other species) "race" is a cultural/ethnic category rather than a biological one.

Idiotic responses like this demonstrate why we really need to improve the standard of scientific teaching in schools.

Alright, tell me why human populations shouldn't/can't be divided into subspecies like literally every other animal on the planet?

Alright, tell me why human populations shouldn't/can't be divided into subspecies like literally every other animal on the planet?

Oh come on, you are employing a ridiculous level of mental gymnastics here. There are blindingly obvious phenotypical differences between human sub-populations based upon their traditional geographical locations.

Alright, tell me why human populations shouldn't/can't be divided into subspecies like literally every other animal on the planet?