Xref: utzoo sci.misc:2850 sci.psychology:1166 comp.ai:2743 comp.ai.neural-nets:351 Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!unisoft!hoptoad!tim From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) Newsgroups: sci.misc,sci.psychology,comp.ai,comp.ai.neural-nets Subject: Re: Learned Behavior vs. Hard-Wired Behavior Message-ID: <5974@hoptoad.uucp> Date: 30 Nov 88 05:04:34 GMT References: <3978@charon.unm.edu> <1753@sun.soe.clarkson.edu> <5959@hoptoad.uucp> <17868@glacier.STANFORD.EDU> <1824@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU> Reply-To: tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco Lines: 23 In article <1824@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU> geb@cadre.dsl.pittsburgh.edu (Gordon E. Banks) writes: >A good guide to what is innate >in humans is to look for behavior that exists in all cultures, >even as remote as that of Australian aborigines. Laughing, smiling, >speech, fighting and sexual behaviors, all are found in all >genetic stocks. A good guide, yes; an absolute guide, no. At some point there was only one social grouping of humans, and all others derived from it. Some quite non-innate behaviors from that grouping may well have survived to the present day in all existing social groups. For any particular universal behavior, there's no way to say beyond reasonable doubt that the behavior is innate rather than learned. If one takes a set of such universals, as Gordon has done, the chances are that almost all of them are innate, but it would not be surprising if superior research methods in the future showed one or more to be extremely widespread customs instead. Nature vs. nurture is simply not answerable beyond reasonable doubt with respect to most behaviors of non-infant humans. -- Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim "Those who restrain desire, so so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained; and the restrainer or reason usurps its place & governs the unwilling." - Blake, "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell"