Behavioural Genetics

seeing as this discussion had gotten pretty off topic in the last thread, and assuming that was locked because of patriarchy rather than science, I'll start this back up again in here:

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the only thing i need to show is some sort of reasonable doubt about the findings of twin/adoption studies, which i did.

you linked to an article about adoption studies, not twin studies, most of the methodological issues in that related only to the former, the degree of influence of the others was fairly small (as they accepted themselves), and wouldn't necessarily be enough to negatively influence the rate of heritability being investigated (given a suitable sample size at least). and even if it was a big deal (statistically speaking), it's only a possible big deal, you haven't proven anything, reasonable doubt is fine, but that's not what you were portraying it as.

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the more you post the more obvious it becomes that you have really deep misconception about how scientific research works and troubles with even basic logical reasoning.

this is hilariously ironic.

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the fact that identical twins develop different personalities (meaning all of their variance in personality is a result of the effect of the environment)

no it doesn't. the environment can regulate the expression of genes (both in terms of prenatal and neonatal development, and just day to day life as well), so if you had two separated identical twins A & B both with the copies of the same genes X and Y, but gene Y is only activated in the presence of some environmentally mediated factor which only twin B experiences, then you would have a heritable genetic behavioural factor that you would need to account for. this is not an unimportant issue either, even a trait as simple as height can have dozens or more gene correlates, when dealing with more complex behavioural stuff the level of complexity could be an order of magnitude higher (and not just with protein coding genes, but genetic and hormonal regulatory systems and epigenetics and who knows what else). it's the height of ignorance to discount all this shit.

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there's also research that shows that parents will attach much more strongly to biological children than to adopted ones, which will also result in more similarity between biological sibling compared to adopted ones. this is also traditionally ignored in adoption despite the claims that the environment is controlled.

there have actually been cases of swapped-at-birth identical twins, numbers are pretty low unfortunately, but they do seem to back up the conclusions of the other research.

This will be locked in approx 8 posts time

big ol booty bitch missus from texas

science is for everybody, lets leave the misandry/misogyny out of this thread.

Make that: Learning about science is for everybody. Doing science is for scientists.

Talking about scientists. Didn't we have some Sapolski videos for this subject?

I love Sapolski.

I should sneak into one of his classes.

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you linked to an article about adoption studies, not twin studies, most of the methodological issues in that related only to the former, the degree of influence of the others was fairly small (as they accepted themselves), and wouldn't necessarily be enough to negatively influence the rate of heritability being investigated (given a suitable sample size at least). and even if it was a big deal (statistically speaking), it's only a possible big deal, you haven't proven anything, reasonable doubt is fine, but that's not what you were portraying it as.

that's exactly what i'm portraying it as, when there are such strong alternative explanations available you can't go claiming that the study proves genetic effect without addressing the criticism head on.

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no it doesn't. the environment can regulate the expression of genes (both in terms of prenatal and neonatal development, and just day to day life as well), so if you had two separated identical twins A & B both with the copies of the same genes X and Y, but gene Y is only activated in the presence of some environmentally mediated factor which only twin B experiences, then you would have a heritable genetic behavioural factor that you would need to account for. this is not an unimportant issue either, even a trait as simple as height can have dozens or more gene correlates, when dealing with more complex behavioural stuff the level of complexity could be an order of magnitude higher (and not just with protein coding genes, but genetic and hormonal regulatory systems and epigenetics and who knows what else). it's the height of ignorance to discount all this shit.

 

 

well you're pretty much showing environmental effect, only through genes, but essentially it's the environment that causes the difference in this case as well. and in that case disentangling the alleged existence of some behavioral genes that express themselves, from direct environmental effect on behavior is pretty much impossible, unless you have a way to induce that expression under different environment. moreover, if there's some gene expression of this kind can the two twins be still considered biologically identical for our matter?

Honestly I'm just astounded that a person could actually believe that behavior is in no way affected by genetics.

Urges to avoid pain

Urges to eat and drink, and thereby avoid pain

Urges to have sex

Urges to defecate

Urges to feel happiness

Some of these are reflex reactions, flinching when you see someone about to punch you, pulling away when you feel pain on your arm. But some of them are high level goal based desires

And in a more abstract social note, there are biological urges to feel accepted by a social group. This is innate and biological despite its methods of expression being sculpted by the society one is a part of. And it's probably the number one influence apart from base necessities like food water and sex.

This is not even controversial, it's not even up for debate - most of our physical actions are not even conscious anyway but rather orchestrated consciously and actually carried out subconsciously. These urges and genetically necessitated behaviors are what sculpt our society and culture, primarily

If you meditate and really focus you can play a mental experiment whereby you descend into a feedback loop of realization of your own inability to fully control your body, try it right now.

it's actually a good thing that you bring it up, because your and caze's conceptions of human behavior is pretty damn primitive and stupid and we should have actually dealt with that first before going further.

i can give an array of contradictory (to those you assume as natural and obvious, i guess) behaviors when confronted with the urges you mention:

1. people who are into bdsm do not avoid pain.

2. as mentioned before there are people who exploit and invite hunger for spiritual purposes, cleansings of sorts.

3. same as above, chastity has spiritual significance in many contexts.

4. girls do not engage in pooping.

5. happiness is an utterly nebulous concept, i can't really see how it can be considered an urge.

there's not a single human action that's not completely decided by thought process, it's all just a navigation through network of meanings.

the rest of your post is just some made up silliness. is there really that hard to think of people who derive meaning and pleasure from being loners? hermit lifestyle? what the fuck is subconscious, are we really going to go all 19th century pop science here?

i wouldn't barge into a topic that is related to a field of science i'm not familiar with, so why the heck do you feel so confident spouting nonsense that's been long challenged by sociology and anthropology?

watch the ride, prikface

  On 11/11/2015 at 1:08 AM, eugene said:

it's actually a good thing that you bring it up, because your and caze's conceptions of human behavior is pretty damn primitive and stupid and we should have actually dealt with that first before going further.

 

i can give an array of contradictory (to those you assume as natural and obvious, i guess) behaviors when confronted with the urges you mention:

1. people who are into bdsm do not avoid pain.

2. as mentioned before there are people who exploit and invite hunger for spiritual purposes, cleansings of sorts.

3. same as above, chastity has spiritual significance in many contexts.

4. girls do not engage in pooping.

5. happiness is an utterly nebulous concept, i can't really see how it can be considered an urge.

 

there's not a single human action that's not completely decided by thought process, it's all just a navigation through network of meanings.

 

the rest of your post is just some made up silliness. is there really that hard to think of people who derive meaning and pleasure from being loners? hermit lifestyle? what the fuck is subconscious, are we really going to go all 19th century pop science here?

 

i wouldn't barge into a topic that is related to a field of science i'm not familiar with, so why the heck do you feel so confident spouting nonsense that's been long challenged by sociology and anthropology?

Yeah no shit there are outliers and exceptions to the general rules, how does this in any way prove that behavior is not at all influenced by biology? It doesn't.

Do feral children not eat things? Not defecate when they feel the need? Not drink water when they're thirsty if it's available?

No, they do. Stop pretending humans aren't animals

Explain the fight or flight response in terms of your "biology doesn't affect behavior" nonsense please. Oh yeah, you can't, and won't respond to my request anyway.

Lemme just sit here and listen to this unravel with my popcorn.

.

  On 11/11/2015 at 3:44 AM, Mesh Gear Fox said:

i love when a bunch of white people start getting really interested in genetics. that's never gone wrong before.

"You're a male, you can't discuss feminism"

"You're white, you can't discuss genetics"

How in any way is a retarded mindset like this beneficial for determining the truth?

Times MGF has said privilege in the last 12 months: 18,093.

This is a FACT. I have polls and statistics to back this up.

  On 11/11/2015 at 3:31 AM, Zeffolia said:

 

  On 11/11/2015 at 1:08 AM, eugene said:

it's actually a good thing that you bring it up, because your and caze's conceptions of human behavior is pretty damn primitive and stupid and we should have actually dealt with that first before going further.

 

i can give an array of contradictory (to those you assume as natural and obvious, i guess) behaviors when confronted with the urges you mention:

1. people who are into bdsm do not avoid pain.

2. as mentioned before there are people who exploit and invite hunger for spiritual purposes, cleansings of sorts.

3. same as above, chastity has spiritual significance in many contexts.

4. girls do not engage in pooping.

5. happiness is an utterly nebulous concept, i can't really see how it can be considered an urge.

 

there's not a single human action that's not completely decided by thought process, it's all just a navigation through network of meanings.

 

the rest of your post is just some made up silliness. is there really that hard to think of people who derive meaning and pleasure from being loners? hermit lifestyle? what the fuck is subconscious, are we really going to go all 19th century pop science here?

 

i wouldn't barge into a topic that is related to a field of science i'm not familiar with, so why the heck do you feel so confident spouting nonsense that's been long challenged by sociology and anthropology?

 

Yeah no shit there are outliers and exceptions to the general rules, how does this in any way prove that behavior is not at all influenced by biology? It doesn't.

 

Do feral children not eat things? Not defecate when they feel the need? Not drink water when they're thirsty if it's available?

 

No, they do. Stop pretending humans aren't animals

 

 

Explain the fight or flight response in terms of your "biology doesn't affect behavior" nonsense please. Oh yeah, you can't, and won't respond to my request anyway.

 

those are not exceptions but completely real possibilities of human behavior, just as plausible as their opposites. the only reason that they're not more common is the current particular cultural/societal state of things. asceticism was a major thing in religious communities of many religions in the past, for example, still is to some degree.

so what about feral children? what does that explain? that they don't have more peculiar narratives of the sorts i mentioned related to body maintenance? well ok, it's possible. many human cultures draw from animal world.

i've been doing the explaining for those past two threads, and i think we're made some breakthrough with caze, from "you're talking nonsense" now he's looking at critique of a popular type of studies that allege to have found some biological effect of behavior or at least personality more seriously i think.

O, the irony of someone with "gene" in his name arguing how little genes have to do in explaining human behavior.

Please continue though.

  On 11/11/2015 at 10:25 AM, eugene said:

 

 

those are not exceptions but completely real possibilities of human behavior, just as plausible as their opposites. the only reason that they're not more common is the current particular cultural/societal state of things. asceticism was a major thing in religious communities of many religions in the past, for example, still is to some degree.

 

so what about feral children? what does that explain? that they don't have more peculiar narratives of the sorts i mentioned related to body maintenance? well ok, it's possible. many human cultures draw from animal world.

 

i've been doing the explaining for those past two threads, and i think we're made some breakthrough with caze, from "you're talking nonsense" now he's looking at critique of a popular type of studies that allege to have found some biological effect of behavior or at least personality more seriously i think.

 

Please be a troll. Nobody can be this dumb.

Hunger doesn't influence behavior? At all?

it's a biological fact that you have to deal with in some way (though even that is not always true), but the array of various behavior and meanings attached to it is pretty infinite to claim that it produces a some kind of constant or predictable behavior.

it's really like claiming that rain influences human behavior, it forces some kind of interaction when humans confront it, but the manner in which this interaction will proceed is dependent on the meaning people attach to it.

Hi eugene, are you a jaded and generally pissed off AI?

There is a cortex in the brain that shows activity when human body parts are shown to the participant, and specific areas of it show activity for each body part. The areas for feet and genitals are pretty close to eachother and for some people, they are that much closer. BAM! Foot fetish.

Short man syndrome?

Good genes syndrome? Women fall for me like leaves from a tree before winter.

* swags out of thread *

WATMM class is in session