evolution and humans: nature vs society
 

Since this same debate popped up in multiple other threads and there are always complaints that it's off topic, here's a thread to continue that discussion should it continue to pop up.

Me and elph were having a back and forth regarding nature vs society and I was challenging him to explain the distinction he was making and he said he can't explain something so obvious. Imo when you can't explain something obvious that's a good sign you don't actually understand it yourself but rather are taking it for granted

oh cheers for making a proper thread for it

There’s no competing with nature because everything is part of nature. Even Casper.

ok but you understand learned behavior isn't unique to humans right?

Learned behavior is just a subcategory of instinct. They’re not separate phenomena.

No he's right that there's a distinction between learned behavior and instinct, but once again that is not just humans. Honeybees have been observed to operate on learned behavior.

The nature vs nurture distinction generally refers to what is genetic vs environmental

But those environmental factors are often if not always perfectly natural. That's why we're talking past each other. We need to clarify our terms.

Everything is perfectly natural.

Plants have learned behavior.

Sure. If you live before the advent of neuroscience.

So there are people who still think there’s living organisms that have a part of them that isn’t formed through genetics and it reacts to the environment? Do they have any theory where this mysterious puppet master resides?

It's actually mainstream science lol. Your environment affects how your genetics manifest into your phenotype. It's been documented for a long time.

A simple example would be that you can take two seeds from the same plant and grow them with different amounts of light and different soil and they will come out differently. There's nothing mysterious about it. Your genes are just a blueprint for your phenotype but you still need actual material to build said phenotype and your environment can affect this.

On a more abstract level, information you're exposed to is contingent on your environment. How you respond to said information is affected by your genetics but also by learned information which is once again a function of your environment.