[lbo-talk] hetersex instinct

[wrobert at uci.edu]

Human beings obviously have instincts.  You hit the right part of the
knee, the leg goes up. However, there are a few steps missing from the
argument if we want to argue for what you are arguing for. What I would
not accept is that there are instincts that somehow structurally determine
human existence.  (ie when you try to make this a socially meaningful
claim, it loses validity very quickly.) As a last note, there are a lot of
things that we do 'instinctively' and are part of our 'second nature' that
could be classified as ideology (within Althusser's use of the word) 
robert wood


> Robert, In your opinion , do humans have _any_ instincts ? Or are we an
> instinctless animal species ?
>
> Charles
>
>>>> <wrobert at uci.edu> 06/12/2008 3:50 PM >>>
> Charles, I think some work needs to be done to link this with a claim
> about instincts towards a 'heterosexual instinct' among humans.  This
> is
> also true about the Feuerbach/Marx material, which seems to be missing
> a
> few steps.  Robert Wood
>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instinct
>>
>> Instinct is the inherent disposition of a living organism toward a
>> particular behavior. Instincts are unlearned, inherited fixed action
>> patterns of responses or reactions to certain kinds of stimuli.
> Innate
>> emotions, which can be expressed in more flexible ways and learned
>> patterns of responses, not instincts, form a basis for majority of
>> responses to external stimuli in evolutionary higher species, while
> in
>> case of highest evolved species both of them are overridden by
> actions
>> based on cognitive processes with more or less intelligence and
>> creativity or even trans-intellectual intuition.
>>
>> Examples of instinctual fixed action patterns can be observed in the
>> behavior of animals, which perform various activities (sometimes
>> complex) that are not based upon prior experience and do not depend
> on
>> emotion or learning, such as reproduction, and feeding among
> insects.
>> Other examples include animal fighting, animal courtship behavior,
>> internal escape functions, and building of nests.
>>
>> Instinctual actions - in contrast to actions based on learning which
> is
>> served by memory and which provides individually stored successful
>> reactions built upon experience - have no learning curve, they are
>> hard-wired and ready to use without learning, but do depend on
>> maturational processes to appear.
>>
>> Biological predispositions are innate biologically vectored
> behaviors
>> that can be easily learned. For example in one hour a baby colt can
>> learn to stand, walk, and run with the herd of horses. Learning is
>> required to fine tune the neurological wiring reflex like behavior.
> True
>> reflexes can be distinguished from instincts by their seat in the
>> nervous system; reflexes are controlled by spinal or other
> peripheral
>> ganglion, but instincts are the province of the brain.
>>
>>
>>
>>
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