The Power of Nature and Nurture Essay

Violence take multiple forms, many of which are covered in the nightly news. Murder, rape, familial abuse, bullying, workplace hostility, armed robbery—all of these are societal problems with far-reaching repercussions. There have long debates and discussions regarding whether nature or nurture influences individual violent behavior. People are concerned about what makes an individual to engage in violent behavior such murder or burglary among other types of crimes. They are also concerned about what makes people stop such behavior. However, there is no precise conception whether nature, nurture or both influence violence. Some people assume that, violent behavior results from individual’s life experiences or upbringing also known as nurture. Others feel that violent behavior is more complex and results from individual’s genetic character or nature. In other words, it is not clear whether violent behavior is inborn or occurs at some point in persons’ lives, but even it’s hard, emphasizing one and ignoring other influences is always an unwise way to go.

Studied and debated for generations, is the conflict of Nature versus Nurture in the development of the human population; nature being the genetics that makes up the new human being and nurture being any other influences in the environment, such as: pre-natal health, care givers, location of development, education systems, and more. Some regard all happenings in a life time to genetics. Everyone is pre-destined by the genes from their parents to do certain things. An example of this would be if the child’s parents are both in jail, then the child would be a criminal as well; or if both parents are saints than the child will be an innocent being. As Berger says, children are innately good or bad in the view of people who see nature as the

The concept of nature vs nurture is easily one of the oldest and most controversial arguments of modern times. Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker is notably known in the world of psychology and the social sciences for his book “The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature.” In his book, Pinker addresses this exact argument and reasons that human behavior is mostly and at its roots is formed by evolutionary psychological adaptations. In 2003, Steven Pinker gave a Ted Talk regarding his book and the idea that human behavior is predisposed, rather than formed by socialization, interactions between people and the exposure to culture. Pinker discusses the reasoning behind his stance on nature over nurture using five key discussion points, these points being, human universals, neurology and DNA, political reasoning, the arts and parenting. During his Ted Talk, Pinker begins by stating that there are human universals, concepts, behaviors and traits that are carried and found, with many similarities, throughout every human civilization, he then explains that a common example of this is with twins separated at birth, and can be proven through neurological studies. Another concept that Pinker address to further solidify his stance is the idea that the argument that humans are ‘blank slates’ and human behavior is developed through nurture rather than nature is the political reasoning behind the benefits of everyone being ‘blank slates’. Two critical points he made however

As of the making of the new science “psychology,” the ancient Greeks created psychology’s biggest question in history; “Are our human traits present at birth, or do they develop through experience?” That specific question developed the “nature-nurture issue.” The nature-nurture issue is what the behavior goes to heredity or experience. As the issue began, Greek philosopher, Plato, assumed that we inherit character, intelligence, and certain ideas are developed inborn, on the contrary, Greek philosopher, Aristotle debated that nothing comes in the mind through the senses of the external world. Later in the 1600’s, there were new rivals for the nature-nurture issue which were John Locke and Rene Descartes. Locke didn’t follow through Plato’s whole “inborn” hypothesis, however, Locke suggests that the mind starts off undeveloped and figures out on it own by experience. Descartes on the other hand, disagreed to Locke’s concept. Unlike John Locke’s disagreement to Plato, Descartes obviously favorites Plato’s hypothesis because due to Descartes remark, he declares that some ideas are inborn. As Descartes laid down Plato’s remark, two centuries later, a naturalist named Charles Darwin came to dissolve more of the issue.

The classic debated topic of Nature versus Nurture has been and will always be a quarrelsome subject in the scientific world. Meaning, the issue of the level to which environment and heredity sway behavior and development in a person. Nature can be defined as, behaviors due to heredity. This means the behaviors is based on the inherited makeup of an individual and is an influence of the growth and development of that individuals’ all through life. On the other hand nurture is causes of behaviors that are environmental. This Intel’s the influence is from the individual’s parents, siblings, family, friends and all other experiences that individual exposed to during life. However, these concept of ideas supports the inborn genetic framework,

Throughout my nineteen years of living I have gone through many events and have had many influences, both good and bad. Only a few of these events I would consider significant. I believe that both nature and nurture played a role in these significant events. Nurture had the biggest impact in my life and how I am today.

Nature versus Nurture is the issue of the degree to which environment and heredity influence behavior and development. In this issue nature can be defined as, behaviors due to heredity. Which means behaviors are based on the genetic makeup of an individual and is an influence of the individuals' growth and development throughout life. On the other hand nurture are causes of behaviors that are environmental. Which means the influence is from, parents, siblings, family, friends and all other experiences to which the individual is exposed to.

“Cut from the same cloth”, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree”, “A chip off the old block”; most of us have heard these types of idioms at one point or another, ways of likening us to our parents. Sometimes they are right, while other times it couldn’t be farther from the truth; leaving us to wonder, “what is it that makes us who we are?” Are we simply the product of our environments, a collective sum of our interactions and experiences? Or, do our genetics pre-determine who we are, complex variations in our DNA that dictate our individual personalities? Some scientists argue on behalf of the nurture theory, that our personalities are continually changing and growing, influenced by the world and people around us. Others believe that we are pre-wired by genetics alone, that while external factors may magnify or diminish some aspects of that wiring, everything we are is already programmed into us from the moment of conception. So, who is right?

1) Use the example of feral children to construct an argument in the nature versus nurture debate.

Through history, the idea of nature vs. nurture has been a hotly debated issue. Nature, or genetics is often believed to be the most important aspect of a persons’ upbringing, as nature is something intrinsic to any one person. However, many debate that nurture, or the care and encouragement of any human life, trumps nature. The earliest evidence and rebuttals of these theories have been honed and developed over time by specific psychologists and educational theorists – all who hoped to prove their own ideas as fact at one time in history.

From Dr. Money’s perspective, raising Bruce as a girl would allow him to live a “normal” life, if he were to live his life without a penis, he would be seen as an outsider and rejected from society. He also suggested to put Bruce on estrogen, but also surgically give him a cosmetic vagina. Dr. Money explained to Ron and Janet that Bruce/Brenda, would psychologically mature as a woman, and be attracted to men, as well as be able to have sexual intecourse, without a problem. According to Bruce’s parents, there was no reason “that it shouldn’t work” (50). However, they could have thought it out thoroughly, what if Brenda didn’t feel comfortable in her own skin? Would she feel as though something is wrong with her? This is where the topic of

In society, not one person is alike. By saying this, many people believe that they strongly take after their parents. Meaning they think Nature is a big part in their life and why they are who they are. The genes in each cell in us humans determine the different traits that we have, more dominantly on the physical connections like eye color, hair color, ear size, height, and other traits. However, it is still not known whether the more abstract attributes like personality, intelligence, sexual orientation, likes and dislikes are gene-coded in our DNA. The nurture theory has experiments showing a child’s behavior with the environment as to adult behavior. In the Nature Vs Nurture debate, everyone has their own thoughts and ideas on each

Nature vs. nurture has been discussed by philosophers in the past and by scientists more recently. Philosophers such as Plato argued that all knowledge was inherited from your parents and when you were told something you didn’t learn it you were just reminded of it. Aristotle however argued that all humans were born with a blank slate and built on it with influence from there environment. In the 1700’s the empiricists and the internalists took over the argument. They fought through letters explaining there point of views and denouncing the others. This leads to Pavlov coming up with the idea of behaviorism in the early 1900‘s. Behaviorism became the new wave of Psychology and influenced a lean towards the nurture side. It was not

Nature versus nurture is a commonly debated topic in the scientific world. For example were all child molesters abused as children themselves or are their genes or other factors to blame for their bad decisions? Genes seem to determine much about children, such as eye color and height, but do they also determine behavior and overall health, or is the environment the children were raised in to blame? For example, when a child is misbehaving, is it the parents responsibility to take the blame for their offspring's behavior due to how they have chosen to raise their son or daughter, or is the child's genetic makeup to blame for their faults? Can a child's environment override the genes a child is born with?

Scientists and psychologists everywhere study twins. The argument most commonly studied is nature versus nurture. The focus of this essay, however, is whether or not to separate twins in schools. Some believe the separation is demeaning and traumatic to the twins. The side about to be proved however that is this separation is a necessary step in the individualization of twins. Often, separation sparks the path to individualization.