Gregory,Here is a take on what I think. By the way, I did read "Neuroscience Under Attack." Having personally witnessed the effects of addiction, drug, alcohol, gambling, I would argue that there is moral failure on the part of those who refuse to see the effects of their addiction. So likewise, to say "it's not their fault" about murderers, child abusers, rapists, thieves, who grew up in "at risk" environments, is to suggest that it's OK to blame the world/family/economy without understanding, intending and expecting that something like the "social contract" will be useful in educating the young, after receiving education from the community, to then do their part.
I have simplified this way too much, but let me blast on, please, with a more focused answer for Gregory. When Quantum people discuss the effects of intention and mind together (ex. "synapses that 'fire together, wire together'" they are making sense, especially when they are talking to each other. Yet, all my life, I mean since the 1950s, there have been words like gobbledy-gook and psycho-babble to dismiss as unintelligible "jargon" what ordinary, well-educated people can't talk to each other about. There are good reasons and true to discuss how the brain works, blends and categorizes info. and builds behaviour into "habits", which can be corrected and ailments even healed (some names: William Tiller, Bruce Lipton, Michio Kaku, Joe Dispenza)
Then there are the "intelligent design" people arguing that the "intelligence" doing the designing was "The Lord God Almighty" as revealed to, hmmm, let's see, who? when? anyway, some group around 4,000 B.C. and a certain group of people ... This makes up the "idiot" group arguing against science and evolution and global warming.
Pop-culture personalities and well qualified people both use psychological techniques which borrow terms from astro-physics and quantum science. Here are a couple of books which teeter near "intelligent design, someone like Louise B. Young writing *The Unfinished Universe* and Stephen Hawking *The Grand Design*. But here is a really gnarly one. *The Goldilocks Enigma* by Paul Davies (2008) actually gets pretty close to learning theory, with the Goldilocks principle, which has the fragrance of Zoped learning theory. Clipped from Wikipedia: "In cognitive science <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_science> and developmental psychology <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Developmental_psychology>, " the Goldilocks effect or principle refers to infants' preference to attend to events which are neither too simple or too complex according to their current representation of the world.^[3] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldilocks_principle#cite_note-3> This effect was observed in infants, who are less likely to look away from a visual sequence when the current event is moderately probable, as measured by an idealized learning model."
So, not to throw any baby out with any bath-water, we have to work with what can be talked about. A baby develops autonomy as a process from crawling to walking, "practicing sounds" to talking, putting on pajamas, riding a bicycle, moving with friends, choosing interests, etc., and becoming a mature, autonomous individual. The processes are embedded in culture/community environments, not isolated from them. By all means, model independence not dependence.
V. Wilkinson (2012/11/26 14:27), Greg Thompson wrote:
And very closely related, I heard author Paul Tough out here on RadioWest last week and was really troubled by it. He weds neuro-discourses with "character" education (but in a different guise). The radio show turned out to be not as painful as I had expected, but painful nonetheless. His big argument was an argument that I always find fascinating because it sounds good but also feels very, well, icky. The argument goes like this: people in bad circumstances (think "inner-city" America) have their brain chemistry affected by the terrible circumstances that they live in. As a result, we shouldn't blame them for their inability to exhibit intentional control over their actions (e.g., their tendency to "fly off the handle"). What do others think? His book is titled How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character, and it is currently #222 on Amazon's list of bestselling books. The audio for the program that I heard can be found at: http://radiowest.kuer.org/post/how-children-succeed Anyway, I'd love to hear other's thoughts, esp. with the problematic nature of this discourse. It feels icky, but I can't quite put my finger on why. Would appreciate others' criticisms and concerns. -greg On Sun, Nov 25, 2012 at 11:51 AM, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:This article from the NY Times was forwarded it to me. I thought it might be of interest to others on the list. mike Date: 2012/11/25 Subject: "The Tip of the Hippocampus"(!) __________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
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