Eva Durant wrote:
>
> I don't think that the level of
> aggressivity is an ethnic trait
> or even genetic.
> Any such statement on "human nature"
> is very suspect.
Have you ever noticed the bully & the runt in a litter of puppies? Have you
noticed some species of dogs as more predictably aggressive than other
breeds? And please don't tell us as you always do that humans are
'different'; sure we're different, but we're still mammalian.
> I am not aware of any present mongols
> being more aggressive than other peoples.
Another example of nature/nurture adaptive fitness is high altitude
athletes who's genetic heritage, childhood development, and training
increase their capacities/skills.
> And I am not being PC, just never heard about
> such scientific evidence.
Not hearing of something doesn't falsify it.
> Most research comparing such ethnic or
> race differences are scientifically
> contraversial to say the least.
Evidence? Historical literature is full of genealogical lines with their
dominant traits/characteristics. Do you think the attributions made in
literature are unrelated to real experience? Pure tabula rasa fantasy?
I'm short, pensive, studied philosophy in univ., made enough $ trading in
finance to retire young to organic gardening, and am 1/2 eastern euro jew,
1/4 german jew, 1/4 german christian. Kurtz (kurz) means short in german.
Jews were historically good traders, and studied talmud (philosophy). In
_Heart of Darkness_ (J.Conrad), Kurtz is a gloomy, philosophical
businessman/trader. He is referred to in Eliot's poem "The Wasteland", and
reappears as Colonel Kurtz in "Apocalypse Now". All coincidence?
> The level of allowed/legit aggressivity
> is a social construct
> (level of control expected i.e.
> aggressivity tolerated), with individual
> variation being a mixture of nurture
> environment and the given chemical balance
> of the nervous system.
OK. You acknowledge a "mixture" of nurture/nature. So why throw out the
"nature" by speculating that nurture can overrule it? A first & second
order cybernetic feedback system is IMO the clearest way to approach the
issues we've been slinging around these last weeks.
excerpted from abstract below:
"Third, this is caused by autopoiesis (Greek for self-production), the
recognition of the fact that all living organisms are self-steering within
certain limits, and that their behaviour therefore can be steered from the
outside only to a very moderate extent."
better format on:
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/Einmag_Abstr/FGeyer.html
The Challenge of Sociocybernetics.
By F. Geyer
Felix Geyer
SISWO
Plantage Muidergracht 4
1018 TV Amsterdam
Nederland
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Full Paper
Abstract:
This paper summarizes some of the important concepts and developments in
cybernetics and general systems theory, especially during the last two
decades. Its purpose is to show show how they indeed can be a challenge to
sociological thinking. Cybernetics is used here as an umbrella term for a
great variety of related disciplines: general systems theory, information
theory, system dynamics, dynamic systems theory, including catastrophe
theory, chaos theory, etc.
A distinction is made between first-order and second-order cybernetics.
First-order cybernetics originated in the 1940's, exemplified an
engineering approach, and was interested in system stability, and thus in
feedback processes in automata and other machines which further equilibrium
conditions and make them amenable to steering efforts. Second-order
cybernetics originated in the 1970s, was based on biological discoveries,
especially in neuroscience, and was interested more in the interaction
between observer and observed than in the observed per se. It has led to a
re-evaluation
of many of the tenets of mainstream philosophy of science, which was
implicitly based on a rather mechanistic and Newtonian clockwork image of
the universe, stressed linear causality, and had a preference for order
rather than disorder.
Many of the concepts and procedures of first-order cybernetics admittedly
seem useful for sociology: system boundaries; the distinction between
systems, subsystems and suprasystems; the stress on circular causality;
feedback and feedforward processes; auto- and cross-catalysis, etc.
However, second-order cybernetics is more likely to influence sociological
thinking in the future.
This is due, first of all, to its insistence that the interactions between
the observer and his subject matter should be included in the system to be
studied, which leads to increased attention for phenomena like
self-reference. Second, its basis in biology furthers its predilection for
change rather than stability, for morphogenesis rather than homeostasis,
and this may lead to an increasing stress on self-organization, and to a
realistic awareness that sociological phenomena often cannot be forecast,
but at best understood. Third, this is caused by autopoiesis (Greek for
self-production), the
recognition of the fact that all living organisms are self-steering within
certain limits, and that their behaviour therefore can be steered from the
outside only to a very moderate extent. Fourth, this leads to the
continuous emergence of new levels of organized complexity within society,
at which new behaviour can be demonstrated and new interactions with the
environment become possible.
Finally, attention is devoted to the emerging "science of complexity" -
including neural networks, artificial intelligence, artificial life, etc. -
while the methodological drawbacks of especially second-order cybernetics
are discussed.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steve
"To teach how to live without certainty, and yet without being
paralyzed by hesitation, is perhaps the chief thing that philosophy,
in our age, can still do for those who study it."
Bertrand Russell, A History of Western Philosophy.
