Milk Chocolate Future? In some science fiction the major races remain what they are today. Isaac Asimov's Foundation Trilogy was filled with white people-because after all it was written right after World War II. Asimov fixed this in Forward The Foundation by creating the idea of Easterners, Westerners and Southerners (Asians, whites and blacks, of course we brown people were left out as usual!). It wasn't a major part of the book, but like the insertion of computers, Asimov added racial diversity to keep up with the times. On the other hand, there were those authors that imagined that the future would be filled with golden-skinned people that mixed the different phenotypes of modern-man into a coherent whole. Some, like Ursula K Le Guin populated the future with non-white racially amorphous protagonists. As someone who was non-white myself, I liked this sometimes as it was a good change of pace from the blonde Nordic overman you tended to find in space operas. Of course, in much of science fiction-as Dale Amon would say-race doesn't matter, there are other much more important differences. Genetic engineering and nanotechnology change human physiology so much as to make them a different species in much of the future histories that dominate the mind-space of young geeky males. But what is the short-term scenario likely to be? I think that depends on what country you're talking about. For instance, though larger than it once was, Europe's non-white minority is still smaller than that of the United States. From the CIA WORLD FACTBOOK: United Kingdom Ethnic groups: English 81.5%, Scottish 9.6%, Irish 2.4%, Welsh 1.9%, Ulster 1.8%, West Indian, Indian, Pakistani, and other 2.8% France Religions: Roman Catholic 90%, Protestant 2%, Jewish 1%, Muslim (North African workers) 3%, unaffiliated 4% (France doesn't seem to collect racial data, but Muslim is an indicator, though it leaves out Christian blacks) Germany Ethnic groups: German 91.5%, Turkish 2.4%, other 6.1% (made up largely of Serbo-Croatian, Italian, Russian, Greek, Polish, Spanish) As you can see, the number of visible minorities, though not neglible (and concentrated often in certain urban locales) does not even break 10%. In the United States on the other hand-there is a complicated mess of race and ethnicity-exacerbated by political jockeying. Check out the Census site for detailed information, but anywhere from 70-80% of Americans are white, while 20-30% are non-white. The ambiguity is created by the fact that Latinos are of any race, and often identify as white though most Americans might not recognize them as such. To add to this complication, a white looking Latino in California might identify as non-white, while a brown-skinned Latino in Texas might identify as white because of peculiar regional cultures. Needless to say, there are many non-whites in the United States. As Steve Sailer points out, when there is a critical mass of any race in a given area, they tend to marry each other rather than the surrounding population. Therefore, immigration is in fact discouraging intermarriage in California. I can personally attest that in my home state of Imbler, many of the "black" people I meet are actually racially mixed. This happens because there are so few black people in this state that segregation and assortive mating simply doesn't have a chance to happen. In Britain there is much more 'race mixing' going on. But I think this makes sense-there are simply more chances when the vast majority, not just the majority, of the population, is white. In fact, Britain has a long history of assimilating black folk, as I mentioned on the Samizdata comment boards, they've already assimilated one group of blacks, the men that came back with the British fleets in the 1700s and settled in London's East End and disappeared into the general population. Attitudes are changing, I would be a fool to deny that. But though there will be plenty of blending at the edges, especially from those with common backgrounds (religion, income and schooling), at least in the United States, race will continue to exist for a long time. Experiences in countries like Trinidad, Brazil or South Africa show that mediating mixed-raced castes do exist, but that does not mean that the "primary races" disappear. The fact that racism as an acceptable position is on the wane will accelerate the growth of mediating castes, but I suspect that the primary races will still be around for some time to come simply because they are a good proxy for a lot of cultural traits, and perhaps sexual selection. I believe that Godless is right that race won't disappear because of intermarriage but will be made obsolete by genetic engineering as the vast expanse of our phenotypic possibilites stretch out before our future. Yes-race may become irrelevant, but because of biology - not culture!