QUESTION SEVEN
7. How would a sociologist (one, for instance, who leans heavily in favor of the NURTURE argument) critique Pinker's argument in the Blank Slate. You may need to do web research on this one.
steven pinker provides both valid and sound arguments to the case against nurture, with factual evidences that are just hard to refute, that are just so convincing that any sociologist would have trouble arguing back.
a sociologist in favor of the nurture argument would most definitely bring up the case about separated twins. they would insist on arguing that if behavioral genes are truly hereditary and are the sole player in shaping the twins behaviors, then when they are separated and exposed to two extremely different way of living, they should end up being exactly the same. a number of studies, however, shows that they are never exactly alike. there are quite astonishing similarities between them, but they are not as similar as those kept in the same environment. pinker of course, would argue that the genes heritability chances are not exactly 50-50. the number is around 50% but never exactly reaches 50. this is still much more even compared to siblings, whose heritability probability can sometimes even be 80-20. pinker's nature argument would claim that in the end, environment matters not. however, with the fact that cases where twins with different environment have perfect similarity are coexisting with cases where twins with different environment have a little bit of differences, one cannot completely disregard that environment DOES play role in shaping an individual.
a controversial study done by john watson reveals that one can condition a behavior on a child. (PBSonline) watson exposes a few-months-old child named albert to a white lab rat and albert was not afraid of the rat. he found out, however, that upon hearing loud noise, albert was scared and started to cry. a couple months later, albert was again given the rat, but now everytime albert tried to touch the rat, watson makes the loud noise that albert was afraid of. after done repeatedly, even seeing the rat makes albert cry. the effect does not stop there; everytime albert sees something white and furry, he cries. this study, although considered unethical, revealed that environment does play a role in shaping an individual.
another study reveals that "sense of humor is a learned trait," in a study conducted by the twin research unit at the st. thomas hospital in london (university of wisconsin-whitewater article). the 127 pair of female twins were asked to rate cognitive humor from 0 to 10 separately, and surprisingly, "the identical twins provided no more common responses to the joke than the fraternal twins." often times, the fraternal twins were even "closer in agreement" as to which cartoon is funny and which is not. a study on different types of jokes also seems to show that "humor appreciation varies with age and personality." which is quite an interesting observation, since robert ploming claims that most twin studies "almost always show genetic effects."
these are some facts that a sociologist might want to use in an argument against pinker's nature argument.
steven pinker provides both valid and sound arguments to the case against nurture, with factual evidences that are just hard to refute, that are just so convincing that any sociologist would have trouble arguing back.
a sociologist in favor of the nurture argument would most definitely bring up the case about separated twins. they would insist on arguing that if behavioral genes are truly hereditary and are the sole player in shaping the twins behaviors, then when they are separated and exposed to two extremely different way of living, they should end up being exactly the same. a number of studies, however, shows that they are never exactly alike. there are quite astonishing similarities between them, but they are not as similar as those kept in the same environment. pinker of course, would argue that the genes heritability chances are not exactly 50-50. the number is around 50% but never exactly reaches 50. this is still much more even compared to siblings, whose heritability probability can sometimes even be 80-20. pinker's nature argument would claim that in the end, environment matters not. however, with the fact that cases where twins with different environment have perfect similarity are coexisting with cases where twins with different environment have a little bit of differences, one cannot completely disregard that environment DOES play role in shaping an individual.
a controversial study done by john watson reveals that one can condition a behavior on a child. (PBSonline) watson exposes a few-months-old child named albert to a white lab rat and albert was not afraid of the rat. he found out, however, that upon hearing loud noise, albert was scared and started to cry. a couple months later, albert was again given the rat, but now everytime albert tried to touch the rat, watson makes the loud noise that albert was afraid of. after done repeatedly, even seeing the rat makes albert cry. the effect does not stop there; everytime albert sees something white and furry, he cries. this study, although considered unethical, revealed that environment does play a role in shaping an individual.
another study reveals that "sense of humor is a learned trait," in a study conducted by the twin research unit at the st. thomas hospital in london (university of wisconsin-whitewater article). the 127 pair of female twins were asked to rate cognitive humor from 0 to 10 separately, and surprisingly, "the identical twins provided no more common responses to the joke than the fraternal twins." often times, the fraternal twins were even "closer in agreement" as to which cartoon is funny and which is not. a study on different types of jokes also seems to show that "humor appreciation varies with age and personality." which is quite an interesting observation, since robert ploming claims that most twin studies "almost always show genetic effects."
these are some facts that a sociologist might want to use in an argument against pinker's nature argument.
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