Suppressing bad instincts. Seems to make sense to me and describe a real thing that’s often a big deal in culture and civilization. All it needs to be coherent is that people can have both values and instincts, that the values aren’t necessarily that which is gained by acting on instincts, and that people have some capability to reflect on both and not always follow their instincts.
For the software analogy, imagine an optimization algorithm that has built-in heuristics, runtime generated heuristics, optimization goals, and an ability to recognize that a built-in heuristic will work poorly to reach the optimization goal in some domain and a different runtime generated heuristic will work better.
The usual. The decisions that you make result from a weighted sum of many forces (reasons, motivations, etc.). Some of these forces/motivations are biologically hardwired—almost all humans have them and they are mostly invariant among different cultures. The fact that they exist does not mean that they always play the decisive role.
You appear to be implying that all (or nearly all) motivations that are hardwired are universal and vice versa, neither of which seems obvious to me.
Hm. I would think that somewhere between many and most of the universal terminal motivations are hardwired. I am not sure why would they be universal otherwise (similar environment can produce similar responses but I don’t see why would it produce similar motivations).
And in reverse, all motivations hardwired into Homo sapiens should be universal since the humanity is a single species.
Hm. I would think that somewhere between many and most of the universal terminal motivations are hardwired. I am not sure why would they be universal otherwise (similar environment can produce similar responses but I don’t see why would it produce similar motivations).
Well, about a century ago religion was pretty much universal, and now a sizeable fraction of the population (especially in northern Eurasia) is atheist, even if genetics presumably haven’t changed that much. How do we know there aren’t more things like that?
And in reverse, all motivations hardwired into Homo sapiens should be universal since the humanity is a single species.
I’m aware of the theoretical arguments to expect that same species → same hardwired motivations, but I think they have shortcomings (see the comment thread to that article) and the empirical evidence seems to be against (see this or this).
Well, about a century ago religion was pretty much universal
Was it? Methinks you forgot about places like China, if you go by usual definitions of “religion”. Besides, it has been argued that the pull towards spiritual/mysterious/numinous/godhead/etc. is hardwired in some way.
I think they have shortcomings
This is a “to which degree” argument. Your link says “Different human populations are likely for biological reasons to have slightly different minds” and I will certainly agree. The issue is what “slightly” means and how significant it is.
This is a “to which degree” argument. Your link says “Different human populations are likely for biological reasons to have slightly different minds” and I will certainly agree. The issue is what “slightly” means and how significant it is.
Well, that’s a different claim from “all motivations hardwired into Homo sapiens should be universal” (emphasis added) in the great-gradparent.
If you want to split hairs :-) all motivations hardwired into Homo Sapiens should be universal. Motivations hardwired only into certain subsets of the species will not be universal.
Who is “we”? and are you comparing individuals to an amorphous military-political movement?
Everyone has these genes. It’s just that some people can successfully override their biological programming :-/
Killing children is one of the stronger moral taboos, but a lot of kids are deliberately killed all over the world.
By the way, the US drone strikes in Pakistan are estimated to have killed 170-200 children.
“Every computer has this code. It’s just that some computers can successfully override their programming.”
What does this statement mean?
Suppressing bad instincts. Seems to make sense to me and describe a real thing that’s often a big deal in culture and civilization. All it needs to be coherent is that people can have both values and instincts, that the values aren’t necessarily that which is gained by acting on instincts, and that people have some capability to reflect on both and not always follow their instincts.
For the software analogy, imagine an optimization algorithm that has built-in heuristics, runtime generated heuristics, optimization goals, and an ability to recognize that a built-in heuristic will work poorly to reach the optimization goal in some domain and a different runtime generated heuristic will work better.
The usual. The decisions that you make result from a weighted sum of many forces (reasons, motivations, etc.). Some of these forces/motivations are biologically hardwired—almost all humans have them and they are mostly invariant among different cultures. The fact that they exist does not mean that they always play the decisive role.
You appear to be implying that all (or nearly all) motivations that are hardwired are universal and vice versa, neither of which seems obvious to me.
Hm. I would think that somewhere between many and most of the universal terminal motivations are hardwired. I am not sure why would they be universal otherwise (similar environment can produce similar responses but I don’t see why would it produce similar motivations).
And in reverse, all motivations hardwired into Homo sapiens should be universal since the humanity is a single species.
Well, about a century ago religion was pretty much universal, and now a sizeable fraction of the population (especially in northern Eurasia) is atheist, even if genetics presumably haven’t changed that much. How do we know there aren’t more things like that?
I’m aware of the theoretical arguments to expect that same species → same hardwired motivations, but I think they have shortcomings (see the comment thread to that article) and the empirical evidence seems to be against (see this or this).
Was it? Methinks you forgot about places like China, if you go by usual definitions of “religion”. Besides, it has been argued that the pull towards spiritual/mysterious/numinous/godhead/etc. is hardwired in some way.
This is a “to which degree” argument. Your link says “Different human populations are likely for biological reasons to have slightly different minds” and I will certainly agree. The issue is what “slightly” means and how significant it is.
Well, that’s a different claim from “all motivations hardwired into Homo sapiens should be universal” (emphasis added) in the great-gradparent.
If you want to split hairs :-) all motivations hardwired into Homo Sapiens should be universal. Motivations hardwired only into certain subsets of the species will not be universal.
If you mean motivations hardwired into all Homo Sapiens sure, but that’s tautological! :-)