[PEN-L:465] Re: sociobiology

["AK Sinha" <aks1v@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jim Devine wrote:
> I had written:
> >> What the sociobiologists miss (among other things) are: how "human nature"
> >> is much more flexible than, say, cat nature; how human cultural, societal,
> >> and technological evolution (and revolutions) have replaced genetic
> >> evolution as the main way in which people's character changes; and the way
> >> in which this non-biological evolution changes the manifestation of "human
> >> nature" (i.e. determines the concrete appearance of abstract human nature).
> >>
> >> IMHO, some concept of human nature is needed. Not only do social structures
> >> create people's characters, but (as some old German pointed out) people
> >> make history, though hardly ever as they please. Without some kind of
> >> constancy (exogeneity) for both social structures and human character, this
> >> dialectical interaction becomes a mish-mosh. Some (very abstract)
> >> transhistorical conceptions are needed.
>
> Ajit writes:
> >"needed" for what? And what could be an "abstract human nature"?
>
> That should be clear from the context, especially since the sentence simply
> repeated what I already said in the missive (not all of which Ajit quotes).
>
> But here goes: I'd already defined what I meant by "human nature" and said
> that by the nature (!) of the definition -- which I will not repeat, thank
> you very much -- "h.n." must be very abstract. Needed for what? as I sai,
> to make sense of the dialectic of history.
__________
Ajit:

So the so-called "human nature" is not established on any ground
at all. It is simply invoked to make sense of "dialectic of history".
Now, what if somebody argues that there is no such thing as
"human nature", then that would make the "dialectic of history"
senseless. On the other hand, if somebody argues that "dialectic
of history" is not a good account of history, then the concept of
"human nature" would lose its operative significance. It seems to
me that this way of reasoning is not very conviencing. Moreover, I
still don't understand what an "abstract human nature" could mean.
Cheers, ajit sinha
>
> Even more, I'd agree with Chomsky that without some sort of concept of
> "h.n.", it's hard to talk about human liberation (not to mention
> alienation). Robin Hahnel and Mike Albert have a good discussion of this
> stuff in their QUIET REVOLUTION IN WELFARE ECONOMICS, which I heartily
> recommend (except that they didn't finish the book, leaving the conclusion
> for other books, those on Participatory Econonomics).
>
> in pen-l solidarity,
>
> Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx &
> http://clawww.lmu.edu/Departments/ECON/jdevine.html
>