That man Dawkins

Another, more 'brutal' way of expressing the same thing that I've heard, petallus, is that believing something 'on faith', and following a moral guide (such as that homosexuality is a sin) simply because someone tells you to but without thinking it through, is intellectually lazy, some say even dishonest.

How apposite! Article called Volume of grey matter may predict level of altruism just popped up into my web zone! (via Twitter)

Thanks, Whenim. Bags that's interesting. It would also be interesting if there had been some connection shown between grey matter and faith (or not).

Perhaps, being scientists, they think faith is irrelevant to altruism. I expect that's already been proved.

Well Bags I was trying not to be brutal

Just read the grey matter thing. Bit reductionist. What if being altruistic affects the way the brain develops?

Anyway, surely even in science nothing is proved 100 percent. There's always a small probability of doubt I believe.

Perhaps we don't have quite as much free will as we like to think. I have long been of the opinion that brain chemistry is very much involved in personality traits. Some people have a 'happy' gene (I have!) and others are born miserable and stay miserable. There is, I believe, a gene for criminality, but it is usually only activated if the subject suffers very bad life experiences. I know some people have believed that there is a 'god' gene that makes people turn towards religion.
The implication of these theories is that people's behaviour could be changed by altering their brain in some way (lobotomies?) and there is ample evidence that prolonged use of many drugs can alter it irreversibly. There was a researcher on Melvyn Bragg's programme on Radio 4 this morning, talking about exactly this subject. It is fascinating.

@petallus "Anyway, surely even in science nothing is proved 100 percent. There's always a small probability of doubt I believe"

As I think I may have already posted somewhere... science doesn't ever 'prove' anything - it seeks to disprove, to falsify. Work is published in certain journals, and then other scientists duplicate that work. If the data they produce tallies with the original work, it stands, and eventually may become a theory - and if the theory can be expressed in a short pithy description, it may become a law! If the work doesn't tally then the hypothesis will be brought up to date with modifications - and the process starts again.

I think you might need to keep saying it, feetle. Fine by me, by the way.

I don't think there is that implication at all, G.

More info at the actual MedicalXpress article.

I knew that Feetlebaum but thanks all the same. I've done a fair bit of research in my time, both at a teaching/academic level but also something involving a huge number of statistical tests when I did my M.Sc. in Psychology. Always hoping for a significance level of 0.001 rather than 0.05. I seem to remember anything higher than 0.05 meant results were not significant.

So I do understand the process and how important it is to scrutinise the methodology of any piece of research which seems to suggest that something or other has been 'proved' which is why when Bags said 'I expect that's already been proved' I made my comment.

Greatnan I am interested in your comment about a criminality gene, as I've always thought there may not be such a thing. Criminality is socially constructed and defined and certain acts may be crimes under one legal system and not others. Propensity to violence and psychopathic traits may be present in law-abiding people who manage not to act on them. I have always believed that certain personality types may be generally criminal, and that this is down to their interaction with the environment, but I wonder whether you are thinking that personality is wholly genetically determined? It's a fascinating subject

There was a Horizon programme about this subject:

Are you good or evil?

It was very interesting.

No, I don't think criminality is genetically determined but I watched the programme in which the researcher said there was a gene for a propensity to aggression - in fact he was concerned to find that he himself had that gene. I am not a scientist, so I can only give a layman's view of what he said, but I think his conclusion was that the gene would only be likely to come into play if the person had very bad early experiences. I thought of Ian Brady. This kind of research into the mind is still in its infancy and I don't know if the findings can be replicated. Perhaps the researcher was completely mistaken.
I am not sure which part of my post you don't agree with Bags. Is it not the case that mood-altering drugs have been found to affect the brain permanently? And behaviour certainly changes under the influence of drugs.

That was the programme I referred to in my post, Greatnan.

Flickety makes some interesting and relevant comments on the Older People Drinking thread.

But of course, my post was actually in reply to when's.

So I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you were not deliberately ignoring me, Greatnan.

Thanks, Greatnan I was listening to part of a programme on radio 4 this morning, in which the researcher being interviewed (the government advisor who got sacked after saying horse riding is more dangerous than taking ecstacy) said that we don't even have the equivalent of an alphabet to enable us to develop a langauge to start discussing the complex processes that take place in the brain. We know so litte yet about how the chemicals circulating through our respective bloodstreams affect our personality and behaviour.

Oh, I see....

ana

Don't worry, johanna - I'll stick to the 'fluffy' threads in future!
(I know my place)

Yes come over to the fluffy threads Anagram it's warm and cosy over there

Oh,, dear, Anagram, if you keep looking for slights you will be very unhappy. I am rather slow at posting and if you look at the times of our posts you will see how close they are. I genuinely did not notice your post. I am far too interested in this fascinating subject to bother trying to annoy anybody.

I wasn't annoyed, Greatnan. I was hurt.