Posted on 05/11/2005 9:03:13 PM PDT by beavus
Here is the current issue. I'm having difficulty locating the article without an author or title. All articles appear to be online for viewing.
Seems you spend far too much time thinking about homosexuals.
The Eugenics movement called attention to parentage in determining our behaviors.
It was really just for the elite to rationalize their eliteness and the poor's poorness. Good breeding and all.
Can't stick your head in the sand because you don't like it; though. People are very uncomfortable with the idea that any of their personality is genetic, but it's clear that it plays a role.
A lot of pain was caused for a lot of families over the years by people insisting their kids were Schizophrenic because they weren't raised right or were traumatized or something; turned out Schizophrenia was a medical condition that was largely genetic.
Twin studies are notoriously flawed.
Anything like this which argues that a nuanced behavior like religion is "genetic" is suspect.
Your questions are FAR to simplified to be reasonable when it comes to human genetics. It is like the gene studies which argue alcholism is inherited without considering the issue more of pain/pleasure reception not a Jack Daniels/Johnny Walker/beer issue.
This study might as well say that monozygotic twins tend to dress the same and fraternal twins do not have that tendency.
as I said, garbage in garbage out.
You've noticed that too?
I don't quite get where people have the fountains of energy to obsess about the subject.
Actually though I cant vouch for this particular study.
I believe a great deal has alot to do with nature more than nuture.
I think for the most part it is commons sense... and simply takes observation.
In my own experience... my son had a condition(ADD) that is found to cluster in genetic lines... though no genetic link has been found.
After he died... a few years ago .. I discovered I had a grandson --his son.. ...who grew up estranged from the family and in an entirely different environment.. I have since met and got to know my grandson. He not only has ADD etc...but he has several other behaviorial similarities that are obviously genetic
Where to you get that nonsense? You can't just ignore the data on the basis of flaws in methodology. ALL studies have flaws. You have to be thoughtful enough to evaluate those flaws lest you simply disregard all observations.
Now, with your specific criticism, you have to explain (1) why monozygotic and not dizygotic twins are placed in similar environments, or (2) why if both placed in similar environments, a difference in religiousness developed.
stealth genetic/born-that-way study
Eugenics is a false science because it makes demonstrably false assumptions about human reproduction, not because it says genetics influences behavior.
Yes, it is a queer obsession.
Yes. The similaries can be so striking that even anecdotal evidence can be very persuasive for the argument that genes affect complex behaviors.
Emotional connections among large groups of people certainly would seem to be relevant to the forming of communities. And community formation would seem to impart a survival advantage.
eu·gen·ics Audio pronunciation of "Eugenics" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (y-jnks)
n. (used with a sing. verb)
The study of hereditary improvement of the human race by controlled selective breeding.
--- I think it all goes back to Eugenics. Those right wing church going crazies have it in their blood so to speak.
Eugenics is a *false science*, as I said, because of its false assumptions about inheritence. It is morally reprehensible for more important reasons.
At any rate, "eugenics" does not equal "genes affect behavior".
Well it is dharn spooky .... sometimes I think I am talking to my son... the mannerism..turn of phrase etc are so much alike....
I noticed that my grandson even has some of the same gestures that are perculiar to myself.
There is also the way the mind processes information... my son was considered a genuis... my grandson has the same ability ...when I first met him he was 8 years old... he could not read but was acing math... now a year later he is doing math several grade levels above his peers...
This leads me to believe that the way ones brain developes in certain ways or not is predisposed genetically. This may determine to some degree ones ability to 'believe' or not.
My jury is still out on that one. :o)
BTW-- from the little I understand about genetics and from my own observations I do not believe that homosexuality is genetic... I think it probably has more to do with gestation and nothing to do with nurture ...I certainly do not believe it is a choice... for the perponderence of those identifying as homosexual.
Just my 2 cents.
Full disclosure: I'm a fundamentalist Christian. I'm also someone who did her graduate work in neuroscience at a medical school and did the whole med school range of courses.
It's easy to envision that a tendency to stubbornness, aggression, sensuality, compliance, optimism, depression, or emotional lability could be inherited as well as having an acquired/learned component. (Surely none of us will deny, for instance, that some babies are just born with an easy-going, laid-back disposition, while others are born ready to fight the world; some kids are born emotional and passionate about things while others hardly care, some are noisy while others are naturally quiet and contemplative, etc.) Some of the traits listed above make it more difficult to submit onesself to faith, while others make it easier to do so, and they might well have a genetic underlayment.
As the Scripture says, faith is a grace, a gift. Maybe for some people the Holy Spirit does give this gift more lavishly, and that coincides with being given an inborn temperament that makes submission to religion easier.
Which is not to say that people don't make a lot of choices about their behavior and faith, of course.
I always wonder why people obsess about people who are concerned about the "gay" agenda. I mean, what drives this obsession about other peoples' legitimate concern?
Hmmm....
Moral Absolutes Ping.
According to eugenicists, human beings are nothing but pre-programmed machines, with absolutely no free choice or free will. Kind of like the inverse of (what little I know about) Calvinism.
If you're "religious" (does that mean believing in God? What's their criteria?) it's just because you - the machine - has been programmed to have that idea/belief. You're an atheist? You were born like that, nothing can be done about it.
This is so full of **** that I don't want to even begin, it's too late. What they're really saying is that no one has any actual consciousness, ego - the awareness of "I am", "I exist" is just an illusion. Many of these thinkers actually say that - no one exists, it's just an illusion.
Well, WHO is "having" the illusion? A machine can't have an illusion. If people are just soulless machines, it takes the wrong out of manipulating, killing, using for spare parts, etc etc. And, of course, defective ones should be put out of commission.
Let me know if you want on/off this pinglist.
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