The Question of Inheritance: Nature and Nurture

[keirsey]

Normally, I wouldn't include in my normal blog, things about which have more to do with my own "stuff" on complexity than my own "stuff" highly related and based on my father's ideas on human interaction, which falls under the rubric: Temperament.

However, I just finished reading the book "The 10,000 Year Explosion." (Recommended by a person on this forum jsx1000ny) And I felt compelled to comment on it, since it does address some of the issues regarding how humans have been changing, and what is "inborn" and what is "environment" and some of THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THEM.

I think it is a great book, and it really finishes the pounding in of the last nails of the coffin of the false dichotomy of the Nature versus Nurture debate.

The book The 10,000 Year Explosion: How Civilization Accelerated Human Evolution, by Gregory Cochran and Henry Harpending, shatter the Anthropologists long held belief that humans have not be evolving physically (hence genetically) since civilization (or cultural evolution) "took over."

There's been no biological change in humans in 40,000 or 50,000 years. Everything we call culture and civilization we've built with the same body and the same brain -- Stephen Jay Gould

Wrong, Wrong, Wrong. Cochran and Harpending give you the reasons and the specific cases to convince any reasonable human being that our previous theories (educated guesses) were wrong to some degree.

For those interested in more details on Evolution here is my review of Gould's book on The Structure of Evolutionary Theory.

[Lord Vetinari]

I wonder how long before this book is used in support of some kind of racial supremacy theory.

[ENFP123]

I wonder how long before this book is used in support of some kind of racial supremacy theory.

have you ever thought that KTT can be used for tempermental supremacy?

[lisafairhurst]

I wonder how long before this book is used in support of some kind of racial supremacy theory.

have you ever thought that KTT can be used for tempermental supremacy?

How? It's all good. Every temperament, every type is needed. None are inherently any better than any other.

I realize, of course, that wacked people can twist things amazingly, just as they've done with various religions, but the fundamental idea behind the KTT is that it's all good.

[ENFP123]

There's a fundamental idea to the theory? The theory can be used as a tool, the way it was intended to be used or it itself can be manipulated for someone's ends to be reached. Nietzsche's theories were used to promote Nazism.

[jwetmore]

Economists generally agree that voluntary exchange and trade are all good and benefit everyone on the whole. Comparative advantage is a powerful force for increasing our living standards when exchange can occur. But that does not mean that everyone is a winner all the time through trade. So despite the benefits of trade and globalization, most people fear it. Media and schools seem to generally treat it as a negative, and politicians use the fear of trade to get elected. (Perhaps everyone remembers the rehtoric against NAFTA in the recent elections.)

So yes, it is easy to imagine people mis-using KTT to create a movement for temperament supremacy and temperament cleansing.

My general observation is that very few people understand complex systems, especially self organizing complex systems, but they are quick to understand individual advantage and band together to seek an advantage - even to the detriment of the group.

[Architron]

My general observation is that very few people understand complex systems, especially self organizing complex systems, but they are quick to understand individual advantage and band together to seek an advantage - even to the detriment of the group.

Human "nature"?

[keirsey]

My general observation is that very few people understand complex systems, especially self organizing complex systems, but they are quick to understand individual advantage and band together to seek an advantage - even to the detriment of the group.

Human "nature"?

Yep. And more generally life's nature, and more abstractly, the nature of the universe.

[ENFP123]

My general observation is that very few people understand complex systems, especially self organizing complex systems, but they are quick to understand individual advantage and band together to seek an advantage - even to the detriment of the group.

Human "nature"?

Yep. And more generally life's nature, and more abstractly, the nature of the universe.

Haha yah architron and I love discussing you complexity theory, it just fits into everything. We are really using in respect to philosophy and showing how various philosophical inferences can be made understanding the order of things (pardon the pun)

[lutra]

My general observation is that very few people understand complex systems, especially self organizing complex systems, but they are quick to understand individual advantage and band together to seek an advantage - even to the detriment of the group.

I think this is changing with the youngest generations coming into the workforce now. Kids today grow up with facebook, texting and complex social networks communicating thru many kinds of channels. They're comfortable with complexity and multitasking - I think it's possible this could lead to an evolution in humans since those people most comfortable in this kind of environment will succeed and raise their own kids to be good at those skills too. Maybe this will mean that some parts of the brain will evolve to be more prominent than they were before.

The next question that comes to mind then is: for those areas of the world that do not have the technology being used in developed nations, will there be a split in human evolution? Will those societies still based in agriculture evolve in a different direction than those based in technology?

I'm not saying one type of culture is better than the other, lest anyone read that into what I'm asking. I don't mean to imply any such thing. I only wonder what will happen, if anything. The overwhelming availability of new kinds of technology, and the fact that new generations are more comfortable in this environment than their forebears, will have *some* effect on evolution, at least in some parts of the world. Therefore, conversely, what will be going on in other parts of the world? Maybe this is addressed in the book Dr Keirsey reviewed, but I haven't read it.