What is Natural Human Behavior?

[aguy2]

So what about people in Africa' date=' the ones who put large plates in their lips...is that natural human behaviour...they all do it...

it's the norm for that culture.

[/quote']

 

Again, "Is the above a question?" If it is my answer is:

Yes. 'Culture' is a human norm, and it is normal for there to be physical displays that are unique to a given culture.

 

aguy2

[aguy2]

The first modern cultures, beyond migratory and hunting/gathering, are about 6000-7000 years old, while fossil evidence have human remains from at least one million years.

 

The tools found in association with the fossil evidence are called 'cultural artifacts'. Culture predates city building (civilization).

 

Nonetheless, I like the concept of there being 'cultural cages' that tend to induce stress in their occupants.

 

aguy2

[aguy2]

You have lost me. Whose question?

 

Sorry, Reverse's question (?) way back in post 11.

 

aguy2

[Ophiolite]

Thanks. It was difficult to follow: it didn't seem to be sunspot's original, or modified queries.

Developing your idea of cultural cages a little makes me even more uncomfortable with the use of the word natural in any scientific context.

A cultural cage, as opposed to a free range culture, implies that there will be a repertoire of behaviours associated with each cage. If we examine only behaviour in a single cage then that repertoire will appear normal, for that cage. Set against the free range culture the behaviour would be abnormal.

I propose (and suspect that this is exactly what ethologists and anthropologists do) that we never use natural or unnatural, but only normal and abnormal, where such are defined and justified by statistically valid sampling and analysis.

[reverse]

Great!...sounds like you have developed a theory of relativity....

[reverse]

If you had taken a good look at your question and substituted something like 'biological life' for 'mankind' we could have been discussing substantive issues instead of wasting time and effort while you tried to defend a simple mistake in syntax.

 

aguy2

 

Dude!...I'm just making sure we are all using the same frames of reference.

Not even trying to be combative...though it is a natural human tendency .

 

 

Uhhhhhh...

 

I better expand on that in case you get hold of the wrong end of the stick again.

 

The first question in this thread … yes…the very first one ….

Has in it, quite a few overlapping assumptions.

 

The words “natural” and “instinct” etc etc.

 

Now…the word “Natural” has been used differently though out time.

Some use it to mean all things of the material world.

Some use it to mean in accordance with Gods master plan.

Some use it to mean in accordance with the local social norm.

Some use it to mean pertaining to the biological Darwinist scheme of life on earth.

Do you see the problem?

We need to agree what way we are going to use the word before we can say anything else.

[aguy2]

reverse,

Professionals like Ophiolite never use the terms 'natural' and 'unnatural', because of the same problems we are experiencing. Professionals use 'normal', 'abnormal' in lieu. Why don't we act like pros and rephrase the question to those terms? If we don't ask good questions we can't expect good answers.

 

aguy2

[aguy2]

reverse,

Professionals like Ophiolite never use the terms 'natural' and 'unnatural', because of the same problems we are experiencing. Professionals use 'normal', 'abnormal' in lieu. Why don't we act like pros and rephrase the question to those terms? If we don't ask good questions we can't expect good answers.

 

aguy2

[reverse]

ok.

 

well it's up to SUNSPOT to rephrase the question in your terms then.

[aguy2]

What is 'Normal' Human Behavior?

 

I would like to begin a post to get everyone's opinion as to what constitutes 'normal' human instinct and behavior. Humans are different than animals in that we can act both inside and outside the range of observed animal instinct and behavior. Some of this extended behavior may be 'normally' human, while other aspects of this extended hehavior might 'represent abnormal' human behavior.

 

Ambiguities are to questions as is cursing is in church. Lets just say I cleaned the question (?) up a little.

 

Do you think we should stick another question mark in there someplace?

 

aguy2

[lrokwild]

Normal is relative term, therefore there is no such thing as "normal" human behavior, and it can more correctly be called "behavior of the masses"

[aguy2]

What is the behavior of the masses?

 

I would like to begin a post to get everyone's opinion as to what constitutes human instinct and the 'behavior of the masses'. Humans are different than animals in that we can act both inside and outside the range of observed animal instinct and behavior. Some of this extended behavior may be 'behavior of the masses', while other aspects of this extended behavior might be 'behavior of the massless'.

 

If you want to make up your own definition of the term 'normal' and call it the 'behavior of the masses', the above would be a restatement of the question at hand. Do you want to try and answer this question?

 

aguy2

[lrokwild]

haha, i could try give me a bit to think about it and see what i can come up with.

[reverse]

After looking at this a bit how about we change,

 

I would like to begin a post to get everyone's opinion as to what constitutes natural human instinct and behavior. Humans are different than animals in that we can act both inside and outside the range of observed animal instinct and behavior. Some of this extended behavior may be natural human, while other aspects of this extended hehavior might be unnatural human behavior.

 

 

into this....

 

 

Humans are different from animals' date=' in that we can act both inside and outside the range of observed animal behavior.

 

Some of our behavior may be like the animals,

while other behavior might not be.

 

What behavior separates us from the animals[/quote']

 

on target. or way off?

 

 

one of mans early attempts to answer this question can be found in the book of Genesis.

[sunspot]

Let me give an example of unnatural behavior being the normal. Picture Nazi germany before and during WWll. It was the cutural norm for most of the german people to perscecute the Jews, Catholics, Gypsies, etc.. Just because culture makes a behavior acceptable does not automatically make it natural by any stretch of the imagination.

 

I think the fence that everyone is balancing on is; defining natural behavior might create a problem with respect to socially acceptable behavior that might be unnatural but is nevertheless fun to do. This is loosely analogous to natural morality getting in the way of immorality.

[aguy2]

on target. or way off?

one of mans early attempts to answer this question can be found in the book of Genesis.

 

(1) Other than the fact that you still neglected to denote the question with an appropriate mark, I think we finally have a question that might go some place.

(2) Where in Genesis?

 

aguy2

[lrokwild]

the bible is nothing more than a fictional story, we are all a type of scientists here, lets not get into the bible....people who believe in something that has no physical proof what so ever need to go hang out with a lower level of life.....sorry.....lol..... but how about we stick to the original question.....

 

What is Normal/Natural Human Behavior?

 

There is a simple answer....

 

.....there is no right or wrong answer!

 

The concept of Human Behavior is pretty straightforward... anything that an organism (human) does involving action and response to stimulation.

 

The concept of normal (like I mentioned before) is not so straightforward - simply put it’s constituting a norm. So "Normal" behavior is only "Normal" if it is accepted as "normal" among the masses!

 

The concept of Natural is pretty straightforward....anything living or anything normal.

 

Should the Question be rephrased to?

 

What is Acceptable Human Behavior?

or

What is Instinctive Human Behavior?

[reverse]

I feel like we have an obligation to speak directly to Sunspots original question...not create our own sub topics.

 

But from his last post ...he seems to have evolved the core concept a bit more.

[reverse]

Let me give an example of unnatural behavior being the normal. Picture Nazi germany before and during WWll. It was the cutural norm for most of the german people to perscecute the Jews' date=' Catholics, Gypsies, etc.. Just because culture makes a behavior acceptable does not automatically make it natural by any stretch of the imagination.

 

I think the fence that everyone is balancing on is; defining natural behavior might create a problem with respect to socially acceptable behavior that might be unnatural but is nevertheless fun to do. This is loosely analogous to natural morality getting in the way of immorality.[/quote']

 

 

OK so..

 

persecution of those who are socially variant = unnatural.

.

 

Now form this I get that "unnatural" is meaning immoral or evil.

 

So... we are into the field of ethics.

[lrokwild]

Uhh...ethics.... couldn’t you consider ethics to be a real suppressor of scientific evolution...

 

and I think this thread is done....unless someone what’s to rephrase the original question and let us all take a stab at it

[reverse]

Agree.

 

oh and to answer Aguy's question about Genesis....

it's the apple...

they bit the apple.. and they were changed.

 

PS see the "epic of Gilgamesh" for earlier versions.

[lrokwild]

http://www.scienceforums.net/forums/showthread.php?p=242472#post242472

[aguy2]

Agree.

 

By "Agree." did you agree that we should reduce the question to a more managable, "What behavior separates us from the animals?"

 

oh and to answer Aguy's question about Genesis....

it's the apple...

they bit the apple.. and they were changed.

 

Sorry reverse, but I checked with my Strong's and there is no mention of of an apple in Genesis. If you are going to cite a 'primary document', it might be a good idea to actually read the document before citing it. In doing your work for you I did find something that might to seen to pertain to the question at hand, which of course you remember as being, "What behavior separates us from the animals?"

 

Namely Gen.2:19

 

aguy2

[aguy2]

What is Normal/Natural Human Behavior?

 

There is a simple answer....

 

.....there is no right or wrong answer!

 

and as a consequence of the unanswerability of the question, "What is Normal/Natural Human Behavior?", reverse and I agreed to reduce the question to the more managable, "What behavior separates us from the animals?"

 

Do you agree?

 

aguy2

[lrokwild]

Yes, let me think about this for a bit......