From the reading of Haidt's essay noted in the previous post, I see that he analogises to clarify and make his point quite often. I greatly approve of this. I consider finding analogies to be a very useful tool for clarity and teaching. Terman thought it was one of the clearest marks of the very intelligent, that they could create and use analogies from one subject into another. Look how many times Jesus says "The Kingdom of God is like..."
The analogy he used about genetics versus environment jumped out at me. He stated that genetics writes the first draft of our behavior, but environment can overwrite that. He notes that sometimes the overwriting is minor, as the culture finds the easy path to go along with the genetic directives, but sometimes can be extensive, requiring a lot of cultural effort to make something different happen. This seems about right to me. The previous nature/nurture arguments would grant only that one's biological inheritance provides a pile of stuff lying around on a table, which the environment assembles into a person. That genes write the first draft captures what really happens much more clearly.
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I am a broken record, but I cannot but recommend this course, for understanding both genetics and human behaviour.:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL848F2368C90DDC3D
Thank you. Looks interesting. I will probably skip straight to the one on schizophrenia, as that is the place where I can tell right off if he is FOS. Even if he passes that test he might be wrong, but is likely to at least be worth listening to.
My training was "it's nearly all environment," but I have been dragged kicking and screaming over the years to the belief "it's nearly all genetics."
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