"It seems to me that to organize on the basis of feeding people or righting social injustice and all that is very valuable. But to rally people around the idea of modernism, modernity, or something is simply silly. I mean, I don't know what kind of a cause that is, to be up to date. I think it ultimately leads to fashion and snobbery and I'm against it."
Jack Levine: January 3, 1915 – November 8, 2010
LEVEL BILLIONAIRES OUT OF EXISTENCE
Monday, January 27, 2014
More Fun With The Alternet Atheist Brain Rust
Note: In one of the stupidest, literally stupidest, things I've read recently a D. F. Swaab makes his grab for some of that neo-atheist attention and gold. I got into it on several different issues, here's one of them.
"In Hardwired Behavior the author argues that social morality begins in the brain, for without the brain there would be no concept of morality. Individual responsibility, therefore, must be reconsidered in the light of biological brain processes. The question of whether new scientific findings destroy the relevance of free will, placing it in the context of biological forces that may operate outside the conscious control of the actor, is one of intense debate. Hardwired Behavior takes this question and moves it into the open by clearly detailing neuroscience discoveries and explaining how the ancient precepts of "morality"
Um, seriously?
Love, let us say, begins in the brain (I'm not sure "begins" is proven, but if you want to limit the discussion to materialism, so be it). Why isn't love "hard-wired"? Why are some people incapable of love?
If behavior "begins" in the brain, why is behavior conditioned by culture? It it is "hard-wired," why does behavior vary by culture, individual, age, etc.? What definition of 'behavior' are we using, here?
Oh, and cheap shot, but still:
"One of the first posts that comes up is about a book on this subject published through Cambridge University Press. Even esteemed institutions of higher learning post information on the internet."
Isn't that simply a blatant "appeal to authority"? I thought the Enlightenment taught us never to do that again. I thought reason was supposed to be the only foundation for knowledge. If so, how reasonable is the idea that anything in the human behavior is "hard wired"? How reasonable, even, is the metaphor "hard-wired"? Yes, yes, I'm sure I'm being difficult, but this is how reason works: it asks difficult questions, and doesn't settle for silly metaphors as a substitute for thought. I remember learning in a psych class 40 years ago that there were no "instincts" in human behavior, and "instinct" is the very definition of "hard-wired" behavior (I don't think we had the metaphor back then).
So now neurology proves we have instincts after all? Poppycock. Define "Hard-wired" behavior for me, then give me an example of it. If it's not an instinct, I doubt it's hard wired. If it is, it ain't human behavior.
End of discussion (with your correspondent, not with you).
"In Hardwired Behavior the author argues that social morality begins in the brain, for without the brain there would be no concept of morality. Individual responsibility, therefore, must be reconsidered in the light of biological brain processes. The question of whether new scientific findings destroy the relevance of free will, placing it in the context of biological forces that may operate outside the conscious control of the actor, is one of intense debate. Hardwired Behavior takes this question and moves it into the open by clearly detailing neuroscience discoveries and explaining how the ancient precepts of "morality"
ReplyDeleteUm, seriously?
Love, let us say, begins in the brain (I'm not sure "begins" is proven, but if you want to limit the discussion to materialism, so be it). Why isn't love "hard-wired"? Why are some people incapable of love?
If behavior "begins" in the brain, why is behavior conditioned by culture? It it is "hard-wired," why does behavior vary by culture, individual, age, etc.? What definition of 'behavior' are we using, here?
Oh, and cheap shot, but still:
"One of the first posts that comes up is about a book on this subject published through Cambridge University Press. Even esteemed institutions of higher learning post information on the internet."
Isn't that simply a blatant "appeal to authority"? I thought the Enlightenment taught us never to do that again. I thought reason was supposed to be the only foundation for knowledge. If so, how reasonable is the idea that anything in the human behavior is "hard wired"? How reasonable, even, is the metaphor "hard-wired"? Yes, yes, I'm sure I'm being difficult, but this is how reason works: it asks difficult questions, and doesn't settle for silly metaphors as a substitute for thought. I remember learning in a psych class 40 years ago that there were no "instincts" in human behavior, and "instinct" is the very definition of "hard-wired" behavior (I don't think we had the metaphor back then).
So now neurology proves we have instincts after all? Poppycock. Define "Hard-wired" behavior for me, then give me an example of it. If it's not an instinct, I doubt it's hard wired. If it is, it ain't human behavior.
End of discussion (with your correspondent, not with you).
I also have to ask: what are "behavioral codes," and what do they have to do with "morality"?
ReplyDeleteI think your correspondent is confusing ethics and morality, which ain't necessarily the same thing.