Er Yabby, yes? I don't know why you have to repeat what I say in a way that makes it appear you disagree. "Tabula rasa" does not exist, but you can certainly train children to believe things and act in certain ways independently of genetics.

"What does not change is that genes influence our every decision,
so the will is not so free at all, but is highly influenced, even
if we are not aware of it."

Not every decision Yabby. But being influenced by factors does not mean that it isn't 'free'. If decisions were uninfluenced or independent of external factors, they would be totally deterministic, if they were totally uninfluenced by internal factors, then they would be completely unconscious and mechanistic. There is a requirement for both to have an element of choice involved.

50/50 is often quoted because some decisions are heavily influenced by genetics and some not at all. 50/50 is the easy way of saying "actually they are both important for many things, but we cannot actually quantify the factors for each, so we'll make it up."

Bugsy of course you are right but the fact is that the first cell is the fundamental blueprint on which all the other things depend. If the first cell determines that my brain will have a tendency to produce a certain level of neurochemicals that make me more likely to submit to the difficulties of life, ie to be a weak and anxious person, then it simply is more difficult and in some cases impossible, for me to behave in the way that you value.

Of course I can change and that is what I should be doing, if I want a better world, but strong willed people need to understand that weak willed people are not made stronger by being denigrated as dole bludgers, lazy and useless. That is actually counter-productive for producing people with freewill.

Check out the 'sterotype effect' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotype

The more efficient way of changing behaviour is to enourage we weak willed lazy people to be stronger, provide us with support and a clear way that we can change ourselves - our patterns of thinking - to be more like you. If I grew up in a family that didn't have any skills in changing their behaviour, didn't understand that we do have free will, how will I learn those skills? How would I even know that change was possible?

There seems to be a strong belief by conservatives that people are inherently bad and cannot change and this belief is the basis of the welfare problem. The left knows that people can be better and tries to find ways to improve their lives, the right believes that it has always been thus and always will be.

But we could build a society in which we value everyone's strenghts and recognise the fact that weak-willed people do have other valuable qualities that can compliment the strong and ambitious.

Bugsy the 50/50 idea is fine but the new thinking says that it is 100% genetics and 100% environment.

I'd think that the influence luck has on what we become goes in the environmental category, because it is the luck of the draw when a child in a bad environment does have the opportunity to see what a good environment is like but it is also the luck of the draw if they have a brain type that is able to use this information to change themselves.

And some brain types can change more easily than others. There are limits to how much the 'default' brain chemistry can be changed and probably costs - eg depression, increased levels of anxiety - to the individual person, if the change required is too far from the default brain type.

Hasbeen "Of course we would never have been so stupid as to put girls & boys on a ship together for long periods at sea, back in those more enlightened days."

Stupid in your asssessment but I'm not willing to deny women - they are not girls! - the opportunities to do what they want, because men believe they cannot change their brain chemistry and behaviour.

Men can change their attitude and accept that they do not have a right to be agressive sexual beings. They can develop free will and control their thoughts and behaviours. The world will be a better place when men accept that women have a right to choose without having to take into account the male belief in their inherent right to dominate women sexually.

Men need to realise that they can choose to control their stone age impulses.

Mollydukes,

"Bugsy the 50/50 idea is fine but the new thinking says that it is 100% genetics and 100% environment."

Amongst the innumerate, perhaps.

Molly, We have watched the left at work for many years now, with all the encouragement.

Well it sure has worked, you have encouraged many more to become bludgers, & those who were just a little lazy to become complete parasites.

Every night we hear from another lefty who wants "more" for whoever their favoured cause is made up of. I have never yet heard a lefty, or academic, [same thing I suppose] say that we should take back some, that we have given too much.

You have missed the best encouragement of all. No work, no food. Always worked in a more natural situation than our modern cities. Never saw a single bludger in the pacific islands. Perhaps they had all starved to death.

Same problem with your thoughts on sex.

The most recent noise was about a girl, [& they are girls] who was quite happy to sleep around, just got upset at being a video star. So it was not male sexual behaviour that was the problem, just fame.

Anyone who thinks the problem is a male one is very naive. The problem is what the feminists do with any resulting unhappiness that inevitably arises in love sex & war, to further their cause. Do you really think their squealing over the last episode was done with any benefit of the girl in mind? If so, you do have to walk up a hill some time, & take a look down on the real world.

Every boy who ever went to Duntroon, & most school boy cadets who went to a cadet camp got their balls polished with boot polish. It may not be fun for some, but it was part of becoming a man. I wonder what they do with the boot polish to the girls, & what the feminists think of it.

Every private knew that every general had had his balls boot polished, & it was kind of unifying. If you can't handle it, go else where.