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PINKER_BIOLOGY
April 6, 2017
Going over a Steven Pinker
essay, covering his claims of
what The Evidence tells us PINK_SLATE
about the nature of human
behavior. Presumably this is
a summary of the material in
his book "The Blank Slate".
Another one for the todo list:
look up the evidence and Guys like Pinker rely heavily on
evaluate. Or just look up the studies of seperated twins-- we've
refutations directly-- Pinker is got a lot of ideology riding on
prominent enough that he gets analysis of this rather slim slice
shot down pretty quickly. of the population.
TWIN_STUDIES
In general, with Pinker every move
is dressed up in scientism, but he
barely distinguishes between data
and theory, and runs off into
opinonated rants without any sense
of self-consciousness that there
may be no ground under his feet.
"The Blank Slate has also been
undermined by behavioral
genetics, which has found that
at least half the variation in Hm: "within a society"?
personality and intelligence Does he mean to imply the data
within a society comes from shows big variations between
differences in genes." different societies?
--p. 44, "Science at the Edge"
QUIGGIN_BIOLOGY
"The most dramatic example is that
identical twins separated at birth
have fantastic similarities in Um: "fanatastic" similarities?
their talents and tastes." Not just notable, or significant.
"The Blank Slate has also been
undermined by evolutionary
psychology and anthropology.
For example, despite the
undeniable variation among
cultures, we now know that Ok: "vast set". None of which
there is a vast set of he enumerates, or references--
universal traits common to the or hints how we might have learned
world's 6000 cultures." about... I suppose this is one
of those "read my book" things.
"... evolutionary psychology has
shown that the physical features
of beauty are cues to health and May I inject a note of
fertility. Our fatal weakness skepticism into this
for attractive partners can be breathless rain of praise
explained in terms of our for biological determinism?
evolutionary history, not our
personal calculations of well-being." Actually, I don't believe this
crap for a second. There's
too much variation in standards
of beauty across different times
and cultures.
"The Blank Slate has been
undermined by brain science. FLIP
The brain obviously has a
great deal of what
neuroscientists call
plasticity-- that's what
allows us to learn." Uh: really? The only thing?
No other neural mechanism?
And the reason this matters, is?
We know we can learn, we
don't need a neuroscientist
to tell us we can.
Advocates of environmental determinism
have never claimed individuals are
incapable of learning. If anything, it's
the other way around, the believers in a
fixed "human nature" want to argue there
are limits on what we can learn.
(This baffling lack of sense or
logic does not exactly inspire
"But the newest research is confidence in the rest of this.)
showing that many properties
of the brain are genetically
organized and don't depend So there's stuff we can't learn?
on information coming in Or stuff we're pre-programmed to
from the senses." be able to learn?
Even granting all this, if
that genetic organization
doesn't actually impact John Quiggin makes the point that:
important behavioral traits,
it's a moot point for this " ... while genes are undoubtedly
particular discussion. important, we can't change them
and, at present, can only make
the most indirect inferences
about how they work. Since on
Pinker's own estimate, the social
environment is just as important
as the genes, and is amenable to
policy action, we should
concentrate our efforts there."
From ‘Trading blows in
the evolutionary war" (2003)
QUIGGIN_BIOLOGY
"Feats ... that were formerly
thought to rely on mental stuff
alone ... can be explained in
physical terms."
--p. 46, "Science at the Edge"
But "can be explained" does not mean it's
proven, just that there's a plausible story.
"And neuroscience has most decisively
exorcised the Ghost in the Machine by showing
that our thoughts, feelings, urges, and
consciousness depend entirely on the
physiological activity of the brain."
That there's this physical computation and storage
device-- the brain -- doesn't obviate the notion
that it's primarly externally programmed.
In other words, one need not be a mystic
to believe the environment is important.
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