Are we a victim of our biology?

This article does not address how the neural pathways are formed in the first place - which to me, seems to be a significant thing to determine if we are to assume the conclusion that we do not have a choice about what has been passed down to us - either genetically or through our parents.

Another article I found goes the other way - it's not our biology but society that is "in control" of how we behave.

I liked a number of points made by Lesley Rogers in this review of three recent books on the relation of gender difference and biology.  Rogers takes exception to the genetic causal arguments proposed by two of the books, and suggests that there are underlying cultural assumptions about gender going on in both.  There was also a very interesting detail suggesting that this gene-behavior causation story is much too simplistic.  Rogers cites experimental evidence that typical male and typical female behavior in rats can be affected not just by what chromosones are at work, but by how rat pups are treated by their mothers.  That is that if female rat pups are treated as males, they will develop male typical behavior, and vice versa.

And here's some of Roger's description of the two authors she's criticizing.  I suppose I shouldn't be, but I'm somewhat flabbergasted by the obvious cultural bias in these findings and that they still led to published works: 

"To Baron-Cohen, the female brain is ‘predominantly hard-wired for empathy’ and the male brain ‘hard-wired for understanding and building systems’ (p. 1). Bainbridge too believes in the existence of a gene on the X chromosome that gives girls extra social skills, and those girls who lack it become socially disruptive—watch out feminists! According to Baron-Cohen’s theory, women have an empathising brain (type E), shown in baby girls as a preference for looking at a model of a human face over a mobile and in later life as a preference for reading magazines on fashion, romance, intimacy, and beauty, and spending their time on coffee mornings, as well as caring for people and pets."

I mean, the first time I read that last sentence I thought Rogers was just being parodic!

Genes in control: conservatism in popular science

Here are links to some of Rogers own work:

Sexing the brain

Gene Worship

Read an extensive article in the NY Times magazine about research being done regarding male/female desire.  One of the researchers cited is Lisa Diamond--whose work I had mentioned on the Feminism thread.

The first researcher, Meredith Chivers, compared male and female reactions to videos showing sexual acts between a male couple, between a female couple, between a male-female couple, and between chimpanzees.  

"Desire" was measured by a subjective rating system and an objective measurement of blood flow to the genital region.  Summary of findings: males responded according to orientation.  If they reported as homosexual, they had a physiologic response to male couples.  If they reported as heterosexual they had a physiologic response to heterosexual couples and female couples.  Male self reporting matched objective measurements.  Females in contrast responded physiologically to all the videos.  Female self reporting did not match physiologic response.  Women answered subjectively according to orientation and so their subjective response did not match the objective when it was counter to orientation.

It's difficult to take the cultural influence out of the study.  A separate part of Chivers research which is also examined by the third researcher, Marta Meana, looks at how men and women respond to male/female bodies and finds both respond to the female body more than the male.  Both Chivers and Meana conclude that the reason for this is that the female body has no signifier for arousal (see that's an assumption...init).  They also conclude that women are more narcissistic.  I know in feminist film theory there is an alternative explanation for this: that culturally both men and women are trained to identify visually with the male point of view and to see the female body voyeuristically.  This would also explain why heterosexual men found both heterosexual couples and lesbian couples arousing in the earlier study.  So I'm not sure I agree with Chivers and Meana in regard to the female body being inherently more arousing or that women are more narcissistic.  The earlier part of the study though and the possibility that men generally consider gender more than women do I find an interesting difference.

I'll also note some things I dislike about the reporting--first, the reporter seems to have to give details about the attractiveness of the researchers. Um, why?  Women who are doing research into sexuality, have to be described according to sexual attractiveness?  If someone was doing cancer research, would the reporter find out whether they had had cancer?  And then the whole thing is put in the context of "What do Women Want" (*sigh*)--yes it's better that female researchers are examining this question rather than just, say, Freud...but actually the subject of the research is both genders, not just women.

What do Women Want

I found interesting parallels between this article and the one on reassessing the use of the civil rights model to address problems of racial inequities that appeared in the same section of the Globe today (and which I linked here).

In both cases it seems to me a framework developed for attempting to deal with some facet of human interaction which used a linear model of causality and limited the way in which the problem is seen in the following ways:  Racial inequity is seen as caused by racism.  Solve the problem by eliminating racism institutionally through the political process and condemn those who are racist.  Similarly, sexual disinterest or dissatisfaction is seen as caused by sexual dysfunction (also note, that there has to be an assumption of a "norm" of sexual desire here).  Address the problem medically and pharmaceutically.  Instead we need an approach in both cases that looks at these particulars of human interaction as only a facet of a greater whole.  As some in this article point out--looking at sexual problems as problems of relationship.  

Particularly worrying in this article is the way in which it seems women are soon to become the target of the same kind of marketing which has diagnosed the apparently widespread problem of erectile dysfunction in order to sell products like Viagra.  Because 20-40% of women surveyed (and as the article points out, the larger number is cited by those wanting to market new drugs) say they have little to no interest in sex, we must develop a drug to increase women's desire.

A better question is not what is going on physiologically here--but what is going on culturally?  What does sex mean in the culture?  Is it's meaning different generally for men and women and why?  Might that difference help explain women's disinterest?  For example, given the way in which women's bodies are routinely treated as consumer objects, does this make women generally more alienated from their own bodies?  Or in a similar vein, does this affect the way women are generally treated sexually which would make sex less appealing?  Note, an approach like this highlights the assumption made by the medical/pharmaceutical model which defines sex as a good in and of itself.  And that approach is a complete denial of the history of sexuality in my opinion.  Instead one has to look at questions like: is the focus on increasing male performance and female desire linked to the whole work/consumption cycle?*  How does the history of  sexual roles, romantic narratives, misconceptions about love/relationships, women trained to see their sexuality in terms of something to offer to others, etc. impact concepts of sexuality?  I could go on....

Isn't it interesting though how our political system with the focus on individual rights, dovetails with marketing/consumerism?  In both cases the problem (racism, sexual dysfunction) gets treated at an individual rather than systemic level.

The new romantics

*(OK I couldn't resist this connection):

Wednesday night is the night that we make love.

`Cause everything is just right conditions are perfect.

There`s nothing good on TV. Conditions are perfect.

You lean in close and say something sexy like,

"I might go to bed I`ve got work in the morning."...

Maybe I'm really that naive but the whole "biological/societal influence", I don't understand why these two have to oppose each other.

No doubt - good point.

Break times at work were set up when studies showed that taking breaks despite the work-time lost, resulted in more productive work in the work-time remaining. The description of the hat looks like the intent is to train the brain to stay alert and not make any errors.

It's no doubt a useful device (under dangerous situations) but if you have an office job, you don't need to wear a flippin' hat.

New information on the baseball cap. Being that it's not reliable I don't think it's ideal where "backfiring" would be critical for the situation. But interesting to hear it could help medically abroad.

But it won't be able to penetrate my tin foil hat.

Wow... I find that slightly disturbing.

I'm not surprised though.

Yeah, I did too. The only slightly undisturbing way I can look at it is if all other marketing schemes (ugh, like TV commercials) were depleted. But that's not gonna happen.

Some light fun... what this did remind me of was an episode of Futurama I saw once. Fry has a dream about briefs. He wakes up and his friends inform him that they broadcast commercials into people's dreams via gamma radiation. He rejects it as brainwashing and goes on to mention that the only ads that existed in the 20th century were only on TV and radio. ....and in magazines and movies and at ball games and on buses and milk cartons and tshirts and written in the sky. But not in dreams.

I liked that scene... the irony of it kills me!

Relating to the "Wired" article I linked. Following what was mentioned in the article... if "predicting" a decision before it's made is more successful with uncomplicated decisions, is a seven second lag between a decision and realizing you've made a decision really accurately exercising the question of free will? I mean, I can easily imagine people subconsciously or consciously knowing what their decision will be before they "decide".  I suppose it could be argued that if your subconscious exercises free will, then you exercise free will. But... I think you have to be consciously aware of that in order for it to be free will because your subconscious is "making" your decisions prior to your conscious self... thus, you don't really have free will.

Ugh, I didn't want to get into that... anyway, I think the research itself is VERY interesting. I love reading stuff about neurobiology/science and all that. And I love reading stuff about random processes. But I have a hard time believing the two are connected. So why can't it just be as simple as "People can subconsciously think ahead" or something?

It does make sense to me that the kind of reaction they are examining in this experiment would not be the result of conscious decsion making.  If a predator suddenly attacks--you don't want to go through the pros and cons of whether to run or to fight (and whether to run to the left or the right) and make a carefully weighed decision; you'd be dead.

I think probably the other kind of decision making process they talk about (buying a house) takes place rather differently.  And of course much of what we do is not willed at all (our hearts beating, our blood pumping).  Maybe what is hard to imagine is that so much more of what we do that feels willed, isn't (like going to get a drink out of the frig).

Of course some of this depends on what we wind up defining as "will"--conscious decision making is what we generally think of as "free will"--but the part of the brain that's firing that controls the motor activity that's happening 7 seconds before the conscious decision could that also be will in the sense of an intention?  That is do intentions have to be conscious?  We speak of unconscious motives so I'm not sure that they do.

Hmmm well, I don't know. The role of the conscious will would be to control whether the act takes place. Whereas the unconscious role would include voluntary actions that "cloud" up the brain - intentions? But the conscious self selects which initiative. In the study, the scanner picked up on unconscious decisions people made, but these decisions were trivial (not like buying a house, or a car) along with no known consequences either way.

You could look at the bigger picture, free will (illusion itself?) is property of the whole mind. And the study is demonstrating what happens when you look into the lovely quantum realm of the brain and thus you discover that part of your mind initiates decisions before they're actually made.

Re: (my browser won't allow me to quote your 1st sentence) carefully weighed decisions - When you feel threatened, your brain automatically responds to this. In some ways, it is unconscious decision-making. I saw a video on the Discovery Channel once that gave a kind of "magical" insight at what our brain does in response to fear. The point in relation to the study is that our brain works harder when under pressure which essentially results in a smoke and mirrors effect. Our brain "sees" in snapshots in a series of about 30 frames a second. In an emergency, that rate increases letting the brain take in more information in less time, which makes it appear as though our brain slowed time down so we can observe and reflect.

Kat, I wasn't quite following what you said in the first paragraph.

"the unconscious role would include voluntary actions"--can you explain more about how what is voluntary could be unconscious? And then in what way are voluntary actions clouding the brain?

I'm wondering if a lot of the interpretation of this and the definition of free will changes if we try to look at it without mind/body duality. So if we use the experiment described in "Wired" as an example--there is some signal given "Push right/left button" and the brain is scanned. The part of the brain that initiates the action lights up 7 seconds before the part of the brain which consciously makes the decision to push the button. If we are interpreting that experiment to show there is no free will then the definition of free will is something like this--I (my mind) control the actions of my body. The body is just a kind of shell inhabited and controlled by the mind. But the experiment shows that in fact the body (the neurons that are firing to initiate physical action) is taking precedent over the mind (the brain area of conscious decision making).

If one discards that duality then the part of the brain that initiates action--the part that is firing 7 seconds earlier--that is still me. That is just as much "I" as the conscious decision maker part of the brain. So the fact that that part of the brain responds first is not evidence that "I" am not initiating (or willing?) the action. Maybe all that it is evidence of is that if I wanted not to respond to that stimulus ("Push the right/left button") there'd be a delay between the time of the stimulus--starting to react to the stimulus--becoming aware of the decision--changing the stimulus (deciding not to do it).

I'd like to get back to this but I'm having a difficult time following everything you're saying.

As far as "voluntary unconscious actions", that may be an inaccurate view but for clarity sake I was speaking to the part of the brain that fires off 7 seconds before the conscious decision itself is acted out. It's our unconscious but it's voluntary (if "willed", not via stimulation) in the sense that we become aware of intention to act, and is therefore the initiated 'voluntary' act that starts in the brain unconsciously. I don't know how well I can articulate but perhaps that can be ommited for the sake of confusement.

Interpretation of free will - I think we're thinking along the same lines in that one thing is for sure it seems is that what this study does suggest is a different fundamental way we might look at free will, or how we define it. But I don't think the exclusion of free will based solely on the study is plausible simply because free will isn't about the initiation of the act but how our conscious controls it. The study however is claiming that our body preceds over our mind. I understand how such a conclusion can come forth... but ultimately our consciousness is what makes the choices in the form of following through or suppressing from certain acts originating from the unconscious, so even though it was initiated unconsciously, our conscious-will is able to control it before our muscles respond to act. (More consideration is the estimated time our spinal/motor functions responds preceding the unconscious initiation and prior to the conscious act.) In that respect, and in terms of the study, free will is not actually questionable as far as its existence. But rather, perhaps how we determine the nature of it.

So why can't it just be as simple as "People can subconsciously think ahead" or something?  

You've hit the nail dead on the head with that one.

These scientists have collected evidence - of *something* ... they just can't prove what this something is.  They are only subjectively guessing at what the connections may be.  Until they know for sure - they don't really know what they are measuring.

I'd like to think of it as physical evidence of synchronicity myself.

...it seems to me these studies, especially into the "quantum realm", often results in some outlandish proposals. I mean, that IS fun to do. But... we're also not publishing an article and presenting it to the public.

Physical evidence of synchronicity...

Melikes.

But why? How? (synchronicity deals with acasual events... how do you determine this "quantum decision-making" being casual or acasual?)

Well - first I think I need to address the assumption that my statement about synchronicity was made only in relation to the "quantum decision-making" topic on the same plane that these scientists are approaching this topic - with the focus on only the individual and their choice - oh to press a key, let's say. 

Let's give a little wiki background just to be clear anyone reading is on the same page:
Synchronicity is the experience of two or more events which occur in a meaningful manner, but which are causally un-related. In order to be 'synchronistic', the events must be related to one another temporally, and the chance that they would occur together by random chance must be very small.

I am speaking on the level that this measurement is picking up on something outside of the individual and this event to choose to press a key.  That there are outside "forces" for lack of a better word, that can imprint to this distinct physical level on any given individual prior to the event happening.  Forces that distinctly appear to be (and perhaps are) causally un-related.  Let's keep it at that level now, for the sake of discussion.

Harbingers brings a good analogy of synchronicity to mind - regarding a blanket and a baseball.  Put the baseball in the middle of the blanket and it creates a physical indentation.  The baseball is an immanent event and the blanket represents space-time and how other causally unrelated events in space-time may be impacted to an extent that were a person paying attention to this "indentation" they may be able to predict the event before it happens.
For this experiment - The baseball would be equivalent to the final choice - the immanent event of pressing the key.
The "measurable indentation" can be seen in measuring the event of the brainwaves ... on this level seemingly showing the evidence of this immanent event prior to the event happening.  The amount of time in advance this measurement can be read is "startling" to these researchers because the timing of the change indicates to them that the brainwaves are not likely to be related to the key press, but they are happening at the same time.

If you can determine that the brain waves are not causally related to the pressing of the key - that would explain things, but obviously there is a connection made there... perhaps medical, I'm not sure - but let's say that the brainwaves are causally related to pressing the key.   That would pose a problem of explaining how the brainwave measurement could start so early.

You can explain the timing of the 2 events with all manner of theories - that imprison us in an ultimate way perhaps to determinism "we can't fight our biology"... or to calling people that are perceptive to these changes "psychics, mystics, or magical" which relegates them as "special" and outside the capabilities of humans in general.  The problem with this is that we're looking at the details up and making guesses at best with what little we know.  Synchronicity on the other hand, attempts to look at the bigger picture downward to then explain the details of the phenomenon in a distinct context, keeping what we already know to be true about the bigger picture.  This way of approaching things helps to eliminate underlying inconsistencies presented by human misperception and any other number of things.  I find it a particularly elegant way to approach the topic.

I attempted to leave some fantastical add-on (specifically to the baseball analogy - very good, btw) but my computer shut down in the midst of replying.

But, just suffice to say that for now... yes, very elegant approach indeed.

I agree that the topic should be just that simple.

Just the fact that you can learn indicates that these scientifically measured things can be changed.  Just because a brainwave pattern indicates a certain propensity, does not mean that it is an accurate predictor of behavior.  Choice gets in the way.

You can choose to learn and grow - or choose to follow an inclination without thinking about it.  A person who follows the inclination without thinking about it will be easier to predict.

Heh.  Reminds me of a term I heard recently - was it here?

Sheeple  LOL

I doubt I would want to return to the place I first saw "sheeple" used in a sentence. It's usually not intended to be nice

Something I forgot about was consciousness experiments by J.P. Moreland and others. Their experimentation lead them to surmise that all the things we can measure as far as brain activity are the results of a thought, not the cause or even the method. In other words, what you consider you is not anywhere in your head. You are "outside" working the controls, like a puppeteer of sorts. To revisit our keyboard analogy, watching someone's brainwave patterns is like being underneath a keyboard and seeing the keys come downward and strike the contacts which closes an electrical circuit that etc. etc. etc. From that angle, you cannot see or determine much of anything about what is driving the keys.

Aw - darn it!  Sheep are cute!  Too bad I can't commandeer the word and make it nice.  It'd be fun to hang out with my "sheeps" - you know what I'm sayin?  hahahaha

Your keyboard analogy is awesome.

Hahahaha! I think you just did make the word nice. "My sheeps" LOL

That's hilarious.

LOL

I certainly don't expect MSN media to be an "insightful" read per se, however I do have a concern that this is the news that most "normal people" read and actually take seriously.

Your skepticism of such things, in my experience, is an exception to the rule.  (The people on this site are generally an exception to that rule from what I can see.)   The type of people that are not skeptical would also be the kind of people who would also think that the second article you link is boring because they don't want to take the effort to understand it.  Like it's "too sciencey" and they're going to leave that sort of "brainy thinking" up to the scientists who get paid to know all that "boring stuff"... which is why they accept sometimes ridiculous things as fact without questioning how this "fact" was established.

...wink

Yep, I think you've hit the nail on the head for sure... I agree.

...wink

Yeah... clearly I had a topic in mind, eh? 

A group of scientists has identified an abnormal structure in the brain of psychopaths called the "uncinate fasciculus" (UF), a white matter region that connects the amygdala and the orbitofrontal cortex.

I read this article that raised the question of whether brain scans can be used in court cases. This article is a spin-off of this research essay, it looks like.

"When discussions turn to psychopaths and sociopaths, talk of criminal proceedings cannot be far behind. While the study was small and has not been repeated, the mind immediately wanders to a court room where MRI evidence is given to support the conviction of someone on trial for mass murder. The controversy of the topic is likely to be heated. Could a jury be convinced with biological proof that a person’s brain is marked with the brand of a psychopath?

That day, however, is probably far in the future. Dr Michael Craig, co-author of the study, stated, “If replicated by larger studies the significance of these findings cannot be underestimated. The suggestion of a clear structural deficit in the brains of psychopaths has profound implications for clinicians, research scientists and the criminal justice system.”

Whew.

My instinct says no all across the board. But my mind is telling me it might be OK under certain situations like criminal cases. But then my mind tells me that it doesn't matter anyway because, as the article says, it's kind of a double-edged sword. You get this genetics test and it determines you have a hereditary violent gene. The sentence can lessen because the jurors sympathizes or the sentence strengthens because the jurors believe that he/she is a threat to society because they have that violent gene.

But creating laws based on predicting a violent act before it's actually made would be unconstitutional in my opinion.

Senate passes genetic discrimination ban
The law forbids using DNA tests to decide jobs, health coverage

Pres. Bush signs Genetic Nondiscrimination Information Act into law

Kind of predictable but I still wonder where the loophole is... there's never not a loophole.