Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Oolon Colluphid · 01-17-2003, 05:42 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by seanie
Because in a banal sense all human behaviour is determined by genes.

Sorry, now you've lost me. How so?

DT

seanie · 01-17-2003, 05:51 AM

Because if I had the genes of a duck, I'd look like a duck and behave like a duck. In fact I'd be a duck.

But I actually have the genes of a human. So I look like a human and behave like a human. In fact I'm human.

So in a staggeringly banal sense my behaviour is determined by my genes.

Of course if my grandmother had balls she'd be my grandfather but that's another story...........

Oolon Colluphid · 01-17-2003, 06:01 AM

Ah, gotcha. Was reading too much into it. D'uh

DT

Oolon Colluphid · 01-17-2003, 06:21 AM

Pz (or Dr Rick, or anyone else opposed to EP etc), we seem to be reading the same stuff, yet thinking the authors are saying different things. Perhaps if you could post some quoted examples of Pinker�s genetic determinism (and again, what you mean by it), seanie and I might be able to reappraise our position. I�d offer to find some similar quotes (and will if you�d like) for my position, but since you said...

Quote:

That's why all the proponents bracket all of their pronouncements on the subject with disclaimers, as you've cited.

... I fear they would just be taken as just hedging around the matter, rather than genuine acceptance of �nurture� �s input.

Thanks, DT

pz · 01-17-2003, 07:38 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Darwin's Terrier
Really? Determinism? It�s a while since I read Language Instinct (his others are in my huge to-read pile ), but I certainly didn�t read it that way (hence asking you what you mean by it). Everybody who knows anything about developmental biology -- even me, for instance, and these guys are surely rather more expert than I -- knows that genes determine -- as in �make inevitable� -- rather little. But they do influence the phenotype, in conjunction with, in a complex entanglement with, the environment. Dawkins has stressed that over and over, and I read virtually no difference between his and Pinker�s position.

Exactly! Pinker is just warmed over Dawkins, who is just Hamilton exaggerated.

You are reading too much into the word "determinism". No one seriously believes in the kind of strict determinism you are thinking of, where my fondness for Lewontin over Pinker is dictated by some nucleotide sequence in my genome (although there are examples in the literature of some determinists appearing to actually consider such a degree of specificity...). Rather, biological determinists believe that

genetic differences can account for behavioral differences in populations past and present.
reductionism is key: they can consider the evolution of genes in isolation, in conjunction with the modularity of the brain, to treat behavior as a consequence of microevolutionary processes.
since they've reduced behavior to genes, they can restrict their interpretation of the evolution of behavior to the strictly genic level favored by Hamilton and Dawkins. Any other levels are minor and unimportant.
the only significant force that can drive evolution is selection. Drift happens, but it represents nothing but uninteresting background noise.

Quote:

It seems obvious to me that genes might affect behaviour -- a reasonable hypothesis -- and that therefore it would be sensible to look for ways in which they do -- ie test the hypothesis... and if none can be found, then we might reject the hypothesis.

It seems that opponents of things like EP, however, wish to deny genes have any influence at all on human cognitive and behavioural development -- ie the stuff that makes us �human�. (In this attempt to set us apart from the rest of nature, they seem to me to be little diffferent from creationists.)

It is a serious error to mischaracterize critics of evolutionary psychology so profoundly. There is no attempt to set humans apart as somehow different from other animals. If you've read any Gould at all, I don't see how you could come away with that odd idea: one of his major themes is that humans are not special, but are only one small twig on a not very successful branch of a specialized lineaged. If their responses to evolutionary psychologists dwell on human counter-examples, it is only because so much of the EP literature is focused on human concerns.

I would also add that the anti-EPists do not think that genes have no influence on behavior.

To complement my list above, here are the positions that I think an EP critic would favor:

genetic differences are a trivial factor in behavioral differences, in most cases. Cultural contributions to human behavior, for instance, are orders of magnitudes greater than any hypothetical predisposition from the genes.
macroevolutionary changes are qualitatively different from the microevolutionary patterns we understand relatively well. Organisms cannot be broken down into neat parts, each part defined by some small bank of genes; wholism rules the day.
the genic is only one level of a whole range of processes that are acted upon in evolution. We have to consider multiple levels of selection and change in order to accurately describe evolution.
similarly, selection is only one force driving change, and it probably isn't the strongest force. Drift is significant and interesting in its own right, and many of the features that evolutionary psychologists like to explain in terms of selective advantage probably did not arise by selection at all.

These are all real and significant differences between evolutionary psychologists and their opponents. They just don't correspond very well to the cartoonish misrepresentations we're seeing here, of us pluralists thinking genes don't do anything or that the source of our disaffection is resentment at seeing mankind dethroned.

seanie · 01-17-2003, 08:38 AM

So what do you think when Pinker says;

Quote:

I don't think any complex behavior can be explained directly in terms of the genes, which is why I emaphasized evolutionary psychology and cognitive neuroscience. Behavior is produced by the trillion-synapse human brain, which assesses situations, absorbs values from the people that we grow up with, assesses the long-term consequences of actions, tries to impress other people, and many other things. All of the phenomena that we call culture are real and utterly indispensable, but they have to be connected to the emotional and learning mechanisms that our brain makes available. I think any behavior has to be explained at many levels; our inborn emotions and learning mechanisms are one important level, perhaps the most important level, but not the only level.

And;

Quote:

I think that evolution and genetics and neuroscience are essential parts of an explanation of human behavior, but that doesn't mean that people are sealed in a barrel, oblivious to the standards of behavior set by other people, and unable to make decisions based on them. Quite the contrary -- one of the things our brains are designed to do is learn the contingencies of the social world we find ourselves in. Obviously there is variation among cultures, which is made possible by the fact that people innovate and people learn other people's innovations. Also, the optimal way to behave in a given situation depends on how other people behave and react to one's own behavior, and those contingencies vary from place to place and have to be learned. There are large differences, orders of magnitude, in rates of violent encounters across different countries, although the psychology of the violent encounters is strikingly similar. The rates differ because of differences in the cultures and social values, those values aren't like a gas that seeps out of the earth and that people merely breathe in. They emerge from a bunch of minds interacting in a group, exchanging ideas, assessing one another, making decisions. So culture itself, even though it's part of any explanation of behavior, itself has to be tied to the psychological and ultimately neurological mechanisms that allow cultures to arise to begin with

Jan Haugland · 01-17-2003, 09:54 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by seanie
An isolated community of humans has never been found lacking complex communication skills.

Have you tried visiting a bar at closing time?

Ahem.

I would also suggest that language changes more rapidly when:

1) there is no written version that tends to conserve language, at least if literacy is widespread

2) groups are small. Small communities allow for faster changes and more complex grammar.

In European languages weak verbs are typically modern words, while strong verbs are old. The older a word is, the more complex and irregaluar grammar (e.g. go - went - gone; and the word for "to be" is highly irregalur in most languages as far as I know).

Small language groups can preserve arcane grammar, while the common languages of larger communities called for more regularity.

- Jan

...who rants and raves every day at Secular Blasphemy

Nialler · 01-27-2003, 07:35 AM

.... just ask the Acadamie Francais or "les Immortals", who are charged with maintaining the purity of the French tongue. They are fighting a losing battle! In my own country - Ireland - there are similar difficulties in managing the introduction of new concepts and ideas and maintaining older forms of words. And that's in a language that's relatively moribund.

But here's an example of a word that looks quite different in two languages but is actually the same.

The word "wasp" in French is "G�pe". In many cases, the French verison of an English word starts with a "g" instead of the "w". Also the �" (that should be a circumflex) is often used to represent a vowel-s combination.

My point: the two words don't look remotely similar until you know the rules that obtain. Both words are from the same latin root, yet in a relatively short time have diverged to an enormous extent.

RufusAtticus · 01-27-2003, 08:02 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Nialler
My point: the two words don't look remotely similar until you know the rules that obtain. Both words are from the same latin root, yet in a relatively short time have diverged to an enormous extent.

They're from the same Indo-European root, not the same Latin root.

English wasp, Middle English waspe, from Old English w�ps, w�sp; akin to Old High German wafsa (wasp), Latin vespa (wasp)

Nialler · 01-27-2003, 08:30 AM

... and very sloppy of me.

Of course, you're right.

01-27-2003, 07:35 AM	#68
Nialler Banned Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Paris Posts: 8,473	Language evolves rapidly.. .... just ask the Acadamie Francais or "les Immortals", who are charged with maintaining the purity of the French tongue. They are fighting a losing battle! In my own country - Ireland - there are similar difficulties in managing the introduction of new concepts and ideas and maintaining older forms of words. And that's in a language that's relatively moribund. But here's an example of a word that looks quite different in two languages but is actually the same. The word "wasp" in French is "G�pe". In many cases, the French verison of an English word starts with a "g" instead of the "w". Also the �" (that should be a circumflex) is often used to represent a vowel-s combination. My point: the two words don't look remotely similar until you know the rules that obtain. Both words are from the same latin root, yet in a relatively short time have diverged to an enormous extent.

01-27-2003, 08:30 AM	#70
Nialler Banned Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Paris Posts: 8,473	My bad... ... and very sloppy of me. Of course, you're right.

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01-17-2003, 05:51 AM	#62
seanie Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Edinburgh. Scotland Posts: 2,532	Because if I had the genes of a duck, I'd look like a duck and behave like a duck. In fact I'd be a duck. But I actually have the genes of a human. So I look like a human and behave like a human. In fact I'm human. So in a staggeringly banal sense my behaviour is determined by my genes. Of course if my grandmother had balls she'd be my grandfather but that's another story...........

01-17-2003, 06:01 AM	#63
Oolon Colluphid Contributor Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: Alibi: ego ipse hinc extermino Posts: 12,591	Ah, gotcha. Was reading too much into it. D'uh DT

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