Robin, you and I are now talking strictly about cognition, right? So parents may indeed find their love responsive to various features of their children that they might, perhaps, not realize that they’re taking into account. It wouldn’t be surprising to find them lavishing more attention on children who seem to have better chances “in life”, or feeling less grief for the death of a child already sick. But anyone suggesting an explicit, cognitive, represented ulterior motive for quote reproductive value unquote—conscious or subconscious—would seem argued-against by this experiment; if this experiment doesn’t argue it, what does?
Robin, you and I are now talking strictly about cognition, right? So parents may indeed find their love responsive to various features of their children that they might, perhaps, not realize that they’re taking into account. It wouldn’t be surprising to find them lavishing more attention on children who seem to have better chances “in life”, or feeling less grief for the death of a child already sick. But anyone suggesting an explicit, cognitive, represented ulterior motive for quote reproductive value unquote—conscious or subconscious—would seem argued-against by this experiment; if this experiment doesn’t argue it, what does?