TEACHSOC: Re: Biological determinism, nature/nurture assignment

[Del Thomas Ph. D.]

Judith, I would present biological determinism with Phrenology and Social Darwinism as examples of popular yet bad science.  And then show how some of us have moved on.  I think that it is important to recognize that many sociologists as well as other scientists (many with great credentials) have become faith based rather than science based. That is what Durkheim called mechanical rather than organic.  There is great upside in the mechinical in the short term although it leads to entropic ruin.  The mechanical is based on adopting and sameness rather than adapting and diversity and relies on brut force to force things to "work".  That is why it takes 20 to 30% of the worlds resources to run our  nation 5% of the worlds population.  Next the  universe including the things we study are in flux thus what  the classical tradition / mechanical must  do is ignore uncertainty this is linked to durkheim's claim  that the  mechanical is primitive. Fuzzy sets as in fuzzy logic was invented to deal with the organic and the uncertain and not crisp.   This also gives you a chance to discuss Darwin adapt rather than adopt.  In the real things can be + and - male and female at the same time.  Unfortunatly many of our texts (whcih themselves have not been tested) present a crisp set of facts to be adopted so you may have to use readings.  There is the pepsi vs coke study using fMRI data that shows that thinking is governed not determined by the definition of the situation. Sorry to ramble but it is late and our daughter is on a bus somewhere because of train failure between Ney York and PA. Del Judith Doyle wrote: I was thinking about arguments which assert that human behavour is biological in origin; that our biology determines our behaviours leaving little room for agency, culture, nurture etc. Particularly, I was thinking about the trend to attribute social behaviours to genetics. Some experts, for example, assert that problem gambling is to do with our genes. --- "Del Thomas Ph. D." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: What do you mean by biological determinism? The recent data particularly fMRI and PEP show that there is more adapting than determined. After all if you controll for time Darwin is about learning. Del Judith Doyle wrote: Hi All, For my intro class, I have an assignment due at the beginning of the third week in term. It draws on the second chapter of the textbook looking at biology and culture. I want to get them to think about biological determinism, 'human nature' that sort of stuff and maybe have them do some research that teaches them so information literacy skills. I know that much but am having trouble, pardon the phrase, actualizing it. Maybe because I would prefer to be outside on a sunny August day!? Does anyone have an assignment (whether in class or not) that covers some of this? Thanks muchly! Judith *********************************** Dr. Judith Doyle Sociology Mount Allison University Sackville, NB, Canada __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com