Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!watserv1!alternat
From: alternat@watserv1.waterloo.edu (Ann Hodgins)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Are Humans Naturally Monogamous?
Message-ID: <1990Nov23.172523.15769@watserv1.waterloo.edu>
Date: 23 Nov 90 17:25:23 GMT
References: <1990Oct24.175532.9407@pmafire.UUCP> <15490@netcom.UUCP> <1990Oct26.000754.24765@odin.corp.sgi.com> <4836@lure.latrobe.edu.au> <1990Nov22.191009.20772@watserv1.waterloo.edu> <1990Nov23.015509.14871@massey.ac.nz> <14977@cs.utexas.edu>
Organization: University of Waterloo
Lines: 48

In article <14977@cs.utexas.edu> turpin@cs.utexas.edu (Russell Turpin) writes:
>-----
>In article <1990Nov23
>.015509.14871@massey.ac.nz> A.S.Chamove@massey.ac.nz (A.S. Chamove) writes:
>> If instinctive behaviour is only vestigial in humans then why 
>> do we still breathe when we are asleep ...
>
>Breathing is not an instinct, but rather, a reflex.  Behavior
>that is but one instance of a broad range that is possible to
>human nature, but whose instances are supported or suppressed by
>human culture, falls on the other side of what is instinctive. 
>
>A pregnant cat's search for an out of the way place to bear
>kittens is an instinct.  It is not reflexive: if all of the out
>of the way places available to her are unusable, she will give
>birth in the open.  The cat's behavior is not cultural: she does
>not have to learn it from other cats.  There are few human
>behaviors that fall between these parameters.  A child's bonding
>to the adults who care for the child may be one such. 
>
>Russell

I disagree with this definition of 'instinctive' because I find it too
exclusive.  I think that most people realize that all our behaviours
from early in childhood are a mixture of hereditary
predispositions and tendencies on the one hand and on the
other learned behavior. 
To me it is fair enough to call a behaviour 'instinctive' is if we have
evidence of an inherited pre-disposition towards the behaviour, ie.if we
tend towards it and find it easier or more rewarding to do than not do 
the instinctive behaviour.  After all, even animal behaviour that
we think of as instinctive has a learned component supporting it.
Cats, for instance, usually cannot hunt unless taught by their
mothers although all cats have a tendency to chase objects of a certain
shape and movement, but have to be taught the proper kill method.

Chimp maternal behaviour instinct collapses if the
baby chimp is not properly mothered. If separated from its mother in its
infancy a female chimp grows unable to mother. 
Chimps, and probably other animals as well not yet studied,
need to learn mothering by the experience of being mothered otherwise their
indisputable predisposition to mother is not supported and does
not develop properly.

In other words, the fact that instinct and learning go hand in hand in
humans does not set us apart from other animals.
 
ann hodgins