Sunday, October 23, 2005

The other half of the variance

When people introspect about who they are and how they came to be, they often think back to significant events in their childhood, adolescence and various other formative years. These events are usually of a social or emotional nature and people seemingly cannot help but wonder "What if my parents treated me differently?" or "What if she said yes?" or "What if I had different friends?" or "What if I lived somewhere else?"

People usually fail to ask about the differential gene expression of CMRF35 antigen precursor or Zif268 or hepatocyte nuclear factor 4 alpha.

Neglecting biology will lead to insufficient conclusions.

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

...can there ever be a sufficient conclusion?...isn't this just another example of the nature v. nurture debate, to which there is no conclusive answer, but only favouritism for one or the other? Then again, there's always a fencesitter's acknowledgement that it's probably some unknown combination of the two...hmmm...or, perhaps the answer is: (c) none of the above (it's really the influence of some unknown omnipotent relative of Jesus!) - or maybe not.

3:15 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Darren's post wasn't about "nature vs. nurture". As implied by the title, it has been borne out in many realms that each plays an approximate equal role in human development. Therefore, although the precise ontogenetic dynamics are uncertain, it is very likely that a complete picture of human development must include analysis of both nature and nurture. As such, Darren's post was an attempt to highlight the insufficiencies of the folk-psychological perspective which often focuses on nature to the exclusion of nurture.

5:26 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

correction to that last sentence: "As such, Darren's post was an attempt to highlight the insufficiencies of the folk-psychological perspective which often focuses on nurture to the exclusion of nature."

5:30 PM  

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