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| charles brough |
 Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 6:09 pm Post subject: human behavior |
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Is our behavior instinctive or conditioned---or both? How can it be both? How can it be genetic? Did it evolve in us?
Here is an example of instinctive behavior:
A team of men kicks a leather encased object and chases it across a field in competition with another such team. They are playing a "game." The object, the ball, is the game and they are the hunting team part of the human hunting-gathering group instinctive makeup which has been with us (or ancestors) for millions of years. This is known as the chase part of the hunting instinct. We condition it into a stylized "sport." It is like ritual warfare---i.e., stylized.
When a group of policement finally catch someone who has fled the scene of a crime and who is resisting arrest, the officers are hard pressed to resist the urge to keep pummeling the suspect, to kick and beat him senseless because when captured, the kill part of the instinct tends to kick in. So, policement have to be instructed ("conditioned") not to do that so they can resist the urge when making arrests.
charles
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| ellion |
| Posted: Sun Jul 03, 2005 1:33 am Post subject: |
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| can instinctive behaviour be conditioned? |
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| vslayer |
| Posted: Sun Jul 03, 2005 2:48 am Post subject: |
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can you train a dog not to attack the cat?
of course.
all behaviour can be conditioned, that is the basis of rehabilitation, do you think we wolud bother with it if we knew that the guy was going to rape again anyway, no, we would jsut put him in prison instead
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| ellion |
| Posted: Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:07 am Post subject: |
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| question answered, it is both and that is how. |
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| BrokenMirror |
| Posted: Mon Jul 04, 2005 6:59 am Post subject: |
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well, its both.
but genes seem to favour some sort of stimuli when conditionig takes place.
A guy called Seligman and some russian scientist called Rozin have designed the Prepardness theory of Learning to take care of this matter of fact.
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| whitewolf |
| Posted: Mon Jul 04, 2005 9:02 am Post subject: |
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| In behavior, genes generally mean predisposition, however strong or weak. For example, an individual may be predisposed towards schizophrenia; if he does drugs, he increases his chance of getting ill. However, in some, schizophrenia is inevitable. (My psych classes were long ago, correct me if I'm wrong.) |
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| ellion |
| Posted: Mon Jul 04, 2005 11:45 am Post subject: |
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"genes favour some sort of stimuli when conditioning takes place"
what do you mean by that? |
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| charles brough |
| Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 12:09 pm Post subject: instincts conditioned |
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good question . . .what does "genes favour some sort of stimuli when conditioning takes place" mean? The problem is he is using social science terms and, as usual, the terms are ill and confusingly defined. A better way to state it would be "our instincts are genetically coded into us by our long evolution. Like all mammals, how we satisfy these instincts or wants is determined by what we learn as we grow up."
Isn't that a lot clearer? Yet, students are conditioned to use terms in ways which confuse the subjects rather than cleaify it because the whole subject of human behavior having an instinct basis is offensive to our religious beliefs. Not only that, but it is also offensive to our secular beliefs in "free will." It is even offensive to our Harvard Marxists who have to believe in the infinite maleability of human nature in order to believe we can someday, somehow, be molded into building the ideal egalitarian communal society. So, no one wants to be accurate!
charles
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| ellion |
| Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 12:50 pm Post subject: |
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so the point you are making is that we are purposefully conditioned to think about our nature in a way which keeps us from understanding our true instinctual source of behaviour.
actually i was thinking about this just today. did you read maslows hierachy of needs? i'll attach a PDF of a theory of human motivation if i can. what i was seeing was the possibilty of these needs being manipulated to keep an elite social hierachy functioning at the top level of existence. not just economical status but complete fulfillment and satisfaction of all possible needs of human nature. i'm not sure my idea has any basis in reality but the possibilty definitely does.
also looking at it in the same light but from the bottom end of the hierarchy if those needs which have been exaggerated through clever manipulation of the group mind could be could be transcended or at leat minimised, then the higher levels of potential inherent in human nature can be actualised. which is what i recognise happening in my own life as i realise my true nature and dissociate myself from the influence of group mind and social conditioning.
anybody know how to attach a file?
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| BrokenMirror |
| Posted: Fri Jul 08, 2005 7:20 am Post subject: |
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Hi,
I will try to explain myself 
In the beginning there is an unconditioned reaction UR (e.g. fear) to an unconditioned stimulus US (e.g.snake).
then there is a coupling of an neutral stimulus (CS), which is presented together with the US. After some trials, the former neutral stimulus alone is able to cause the UR.
But there are some critical factors, you have to look for, when the coupling takes place.
1) There are different kind of stimuli ->auditory, vusual, olfactory etc.
2) there are critical time intervalls between the presentaion of the stimuli.
¨The CNS is predisposed, to favour some time intervalls. These time intervalls are dependent on the kind of stimuli.
E.g.
a)when you use visual stimuli as US and CS, then then the time intervall should not exceed 500 ms, to form a coupling
EDIT: this is the best time intervall; others are possible, but it will take a long time to learn and less time to forget
b) Rozin and Kalat (1971?) have performed an experiment, where rats were given food, which caused nausea. Assume that the nausea is the UR. Now the smell of the stimulus is the CS. The conditiong is only successfull, when a smell is presented at least several min before the onset of the Nausea.
c) Today, phobias are usually explained and treated by use of conditiong paradigms. But you will seldom meet a phobia towards butterflies 
When chimpanzees grow up isolated, they do not show a fear reactions to snakes. But afterward it is very easy to establish a conditined fear reation to snakes, whereas it is very difficult to establish a conditined fear reaction towards butterflies. so there seems to be a disposition to show fear towards snakes. This is what Seligman called the "Preperdness theory of Fear Learning)
there are other experiments too. You will find several examples, when you do a literature search (pubmed/APA)
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| BrokenMirror |
| Posted: Fri Jul 08, 2005 7:31 am Post subject: |
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| ellion wrote: |
actually i was thinking about this just today. did you read maslows hierachy of needs? i'll attach a PDF of a theory of human motivation if i can. what i was seeing was the possibilty of these needs being manipulated to keep an elite social hierachy functioning at the top level of existence. not just economical status but complete fulfillment and satisfaction of all possible needs of human nature. i'm not sure my idea has any basis in reality but the possibilty definitely does.
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I konw Maslow. But in my opinion its just a pseudoscientific thought. I think so, because the needs that on the top levels of his hierachy are cultural dependent. We are not able to think of the needs of different cultures. The exception is the top of his hierachy. But when you have a look at it, the content of the term self-actualisation may change daily.
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| BrokenMirror |
| Posted: Fri Jul 08, 2005 7:32 am Post subject: Re: instincts conditioned |
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| charles brough wrote: |
A better way to state it would be "our instincts are genetically coded into us by our long evolution. Like all mammals, how we satisfy these instincts or wants is determined by what we learn as we grow up."
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THAT IS EXACTLY; WHAT I DID NOT WANT TO SAY
There is an inborn disposition, to learn specific behaviour.
Of course there are still many degrees of freedom
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| ellion |
| Posted: Fri Jul 08, 2005 12:58 pm Post subject: |
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| BrokenMirror wrote: |
I konw Maslow. But in my opinion its just a pseudoscientific thought. I think so, because the needs that on the top levels of his hierachy are cultural dependent. We are not able to think of the needs of different cultures. The exception is the top of his hierachy. But when you have a look at it, the content of the term self-actualisation may change daily. |
he does take a lot of culture into consideration when formulating his theory. 'the farther reaches of human nature' goes a little further into his theory and its conception and the ramifications of the application of his work in the future in education in science in business and society.
i wonder why you speak of inherent genetic predisposition then say something like his theory has a lack of cultural consideration.
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| BrokenMirror |
| Posted: Wed Jul 13, 2005 7:33 am Post subject: |
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| ellion wrote: |
i wonder why you speak of inherent genetic predisposition then say something like his theory has a lack of cultural consideration. |
why?
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| wallaby |
| Posted: Thu Jul 14, 2005 1:33 am Post subject: |
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obviously millions of years of human evolution have brought up the survival of the fittest, kill or be killed kind of thing.
all humans obviously still have these traits but we are conditioned not to use them because we simply don't need them. insted they have been replaced by social instincts in order to survive in a different kind of environment. |
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