Ronn Blankenship <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>>Fixing this might involve time travel - I think the current widespread
>>conception of a "soul", independent of knowledge and experience - is an
>>element that lead to this,
>
>
>I'm not sure what you mean by this statement. Could you clarify it?
Sure:
If we're basically a glorified neural network, then it follows that
absolutely everything we are or do is a product of our past experience*, and
all of our actions are a result of our current situation being interpreted
by our wiring.
But look at this phrase: "He can't be held responsible for comitting this
crime, because he was abused as a child."** Whether you agree or disagree,
odds are that the phrase doesn't seem incomprehensible. IMHO, it presupposes
a distinction between the ideal person (or "soul") which has an additional
layer (trained behavior as a result of past experience). To me, the notion
of "person" and "person's past experience" being distinct items is
nonsensical.
Without singling out any religion or philosophical school as a source for
this, I think that this notion is entirely incorrect, but also nearly
universal in our culture at such a level that we don't think about it.
I think this, combined with attitudes from recent eras (Victorian stoicism,
the liberal Post-WW2 era, etc), results in us viewing children as fully
fledged people who merely haven't memorized an encyclopedia yet. I would
describe children as creatures of vast potential that must be carefully
crafted into functional adults.
In past eras, children were often raised towards a goal - e.g. taking over
their parent's role. Thus, the parents would guide the child with training
throughout life with a fairly simple direction. On the path to becoming an
adult blacksmith you do X and don't do Y; if you do X you're rewarded, if
you do Y you're punished. Do this for 24/7 for 18 years and you have a fully
functional adult, coincidentally with job training. This doesn't have to be
conscious - a puppy learns the same thing from its packmates, and so
presumably a Homo erectus child would follow its parents and learn the ropes
the same way.
Nowish, with a formal school system and two working parents, we aren't
dictating what children can and cannot do enough to train them into behaving
correctly - that is, it isn't enough to show them a list of rules; they have
to be baked into the brain on the order of Asimov's Laws are into his
robots. Susan espouses the view that children should have a stay at home
parent until they're pre-teens***. That's extremely unpopular in our culture
since we want to allow two adults to do whatever they want - but I think the
result is that the kids don't learn how to behave, and can only pay lip
service to the rules.
This comes back to the "soul" thing. I think our liberal (and by that I mean
a "let anybody do whatever they want") culture is extended to include
children and makes us think of them as miniature adults. Give them 18 years
to memorize an encyclopedia, food and shelter, and they're magically an
adult. If there's a "soul"**** that is independent of experience and defines
who a person is then this should work just fine. If not, and the person is a
result of their experiences, then this isn't going to work and you'll end up
with a lot of screwed up kids and pseudo-adults.
Joshua
* Including instincts, which are basically pre-wired neural configurations
we get from our genes through the evolutionary experience of our species.
** And, for the record, I am philosophically opposed to any sort of pure
"revenge" punishment in response to crimes; rather, I favour reparations
where possible and prevention of repetition.
*** Susan is a nanny, thus filling in the role of a stay-at-home parent for
a family. She just switched families, but has some interesting observations
about the contrast between her child-centric behavior around the 2-year-old
she was nannying and the adult-centric behavior the parents exhibited when
they came home. Now that we have net access at home she can resubscribe to
the list, and regale us with annecdotes. :)
**** I'm not attempting to pin this definition of "soul" with any religion
in particular, or even in general, just my observation of what our culture
seems to assume exists.
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