From: revpk@cellar.org (Brian 'Rev P-K' Siano)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: _The Mismeasure of Man_
Date: 13 Apr 92 06:11:58 GMT
Organization: The Cellar BBS and public access system

gerry@cmu.edu (Gerry Roston) writes:
> My question is this though: does Dr. Gould believe/suggest/imply that
> all people have the same mental potential at birth?  [I know that the
> pre-natal environment can affect this potential, but let's ignore that
> for now.]  It seems to me that, at birth, certain individuals are
> endowed with greater potentials in certain areas of endeavor than
> others.  No one would call me names if I were to claim that Bo Jackson,
> at birth, had greater potential for becoming a great athlete than I.
 
        I dunno, Bo knows a LOT of stuff.

        Seriously though, I'm not even sure if I'd agree that Jackson 
had a better, intrinsic atheltic potential; I recall reading somewhere that 
obesity was linked to overfeeding when an infant, so if his mom was generous 
with the Similac, Bo might know Cheetos real well. There are environmental 
factors as well-- supportive environments for athletic ability are important 
as well.
        It's always seemed to me that environmental factors cannot be 
completely ruled out when trying to decide whether an individual or group of 
individuals has an 'intrinsic ability' that sets them apart at birth, apart 
from obvious variances from the norm-- malformed limbs, Down's syndrome, etc. 
So the degree to which abilities are intrinsic is a lot tougher to pin down 
than actual physical attributes.

> But many people might call me names if I were to say that at birth I
> was endowed with greater potential for mental achievement than he.
> Therefore, it seems that there IS some native, inheredited potential
> that is independent of environment.  And, since, as I claim that this
> inheredited potential must exist, is it possible to identify and
> measure it in some manner?
 
        Well, just defining what the ability _is_ that we
're looking for can be a real bitch. Let's say we have an individual who is a 
terrific running back, who has skill and grace in dodging oncoming tackles, 
and can run like a maniac. Now, do we term this an innate ability for 
_football_, _athletics_, or just physical agility that might also be applied 
towards ballet? Or, if thje same individual became a ballet dancer, wouldn't 
we be tempted to see this ability in terms closer to dance than football?

        Similarly, let's say we have an individual who has an astounding 
mathematical ability-- not an idiot savant, but who can assess a real-world 
situation in terms of well-formed mathematical models. That person might grow 
up to be a John Von Neumann, so we'd say he's got a natural math ability... 
or he might get into money laundering for Manuel Noriega, and we'd term his 
ability in criminal language. In short, the 'talents' that we look for are 
subject to interpretation colored by our personal outlooks, and defining them 
objectively is going to be very tough.

        Getting back to the athletics issue, another possibility occurs to 
me. A lot of people I know who jog report that they feel pretty high when 
they're running; but when I do it, I really don't enjoy it a lot. Perhaps 
some people are born _enjoying physical exertion_ of various forms, which 
reinforces (to borrow a Skinnerian term) the development of athletic skills. 
In this case, what's given at birth isn't clearly clarified, but it gives 
rise to something _else_ that is.

> 
> isolated, so why then can the races interbreed today?  It would be
> interesting to determine if the rate if miscarraiges for inter-racial
> couples is higher or lower than for intra-racial couples.
        I'd be surprised if such a study wasn't done already; if such was the 
case, it seems like a good idea to rule out the possibility that the 
miscarriages weren't due to stress derived from living as a intra-racial 
couple in a society that don't like it a lot. (Actually, at a local coffee 
house last week, I spent an evening playing with a three-year-old who's a 
product of such a union; she spent the evening stapling my right arm to the 
wall so I wouldn't be able to tickle her.)

Brian "Rev. P-K" Siano                                  revpk@cellar.org
Warning! Beware of weird, horrible cult which: Uses promises of money, a job,
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e.g., The Service, military, Armed Forces, ROTC, JROTC, recruiters,
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