Response to Siearra's Post "Patrio-Country?"

Siearra poses an interesting topic in her blog post "Patrio-country?".  She explores the definition of patriotism given extenuating circumstances of one individual identifying with a foreign nation more than their birth nation. If the individual relocated to their new desired country and formed affection towards that nation would they still be considered patriotic.  I found this very interesting, deconstructing the broader concepts and the intersection of personal instances that can cause debate.
I began to think:  What if their dedication and support to another country occurred when they were citizens of their birth nation? Would this still constitute patriotism towards Russia or would it be considered a betrayal against the United States?  What if a person was adopted and their affection for their birth nation was stronger than their adopted location? How would the premise adjust to this situation. 

Jensen's Argument about Patriotism

Jensen make extremely poignant and effective arguments in his article "Saying Goodbye to Patriotism".  I was struck a number of times within the first few pages with just how successful he is with correlating his ideas of patriotism being morally devoid and examples from history and present policies.  Jensen writes "I want to put forward the radical proposition that we should care what the facts are. We should start with the assumption that everything about the United States, like everything about any country, needs to be examined and assessed.  That is what it means to be a moral person".     Is this not the fundamental procedure to achieve critical thinking? By making this relation between assessment and examination with critical thinking and comparing the lack of both in regards to patriotism is enough to convince me (my opinion is easily persuaded, especially in this case where patriotism has never been a component in my personal life).
  Jensen further proposes that instead of the conventional method of patriotism in which one assumes their nation is above all others, that person should support their nation for their strengths (not in relation to other countries, just on the basis of how the particular concepts of their nation affect them) and admit their shortcomings.  By participating in this altered sense patriotism would not posses such a stigma of one nation superior from another due to personal opinion. Instead, it would be a recognition and appreciation of the strengths of a nation, while admitting there could be improvements. 
After reading Jensen's article and considering his examples of the shortcomings within America, would you ever consider moving to another country?  Once there would you consider being patriotic for your previously foreign, now domestic, land?

Exploring Extremes of Nationalism

While the concept of patriotism has interesting components, I find myself desiring to explore nationalism further.  Probably due to the intrigue created by chaos and disagreements that I often mind myself attracted to.  Anyhow, we talked in class today about nationalism being based on ideals in subculture in addition to countries.  What are the boundaries of nationalism and who determines them? When an nationalist organization is created, does the opinion of the "leader" determine the primary parameters of the specified group or do the majority opinion decide?  If a group is created in support of women's' rights, for example, is the enterprise exclusive to accepted members?  Would men be allowed if they supported the cause?  These questions falsify the stability of nationalistic ideals, in my opinion.  How can one respect or understand the basis for groups that are unregulated in selecting their aspects?  On a different note, how does this support for subcultures impact the totality of our universal culture? Is there a truly universal culture, or do we ascribe culture based on general assumptions about characteristics of the masses. If a person is not at all patriotic or nationalist do you consider them contributing members of their respective country or cause?

Coincidence, I think not. Or, so.

This post was not anticipated, a mere result of a coincidence I experienced today.  We discussed in class the specifics of nature and nurture with an example of how intellectual capacity is affected by nature and nurture.  If an intelligent person is born to average intelligence person, is it the result of nature or nurture that they embrace and succeed in their abilities? We also discussed if a person suffers an injury how would that correlate to this debate.  Today I found myself reading an issue of Popular Science magazine when I came upon the featured article titled "The Genius Within".  The article explored Savant Syndrome and cited three examples of average people who had suffered head injuries and acquired extraordinary talents they had previously no interest or skill in.  Where does this concept exist in the nature vs. nurture debate?  What would Pinker do with this example?

Continuing My Nature/Nurture Thoughts

Our opinion of nature vs. nurture depends on how we examine specific examples.  If we see only the practical applications we can formulate different theories than if we trace concepts to their origin.  Take, for example, Pinker's explanation of identical twins.  He states that different personality traits are determined by prenatal factors such as blood flow or toxicity.  This had validity in my personal opinions, however I want to cite an example to offer where an argument could be made.  Knowing that often times twins (identical in this case) are born with different weights which can impact their development and needs- does this make all nurturing instances moot?  If twin A is born 7lbs and twin B is born 5 lbs, is it safe to say there is an increased likelihood twin B will require more extensive nurturing and regardless of success with that nurturing problems will still exist due to natural origins? This is a very difficult debate to argue, as we have concrete evidence that natural instances determine characteristics unique to each individual but we also have become accustomed to being told that parenting and nurturing are very important in human development. While I don't like to classify myself exclusively ascribing to nature, nurture, or holistic interactionism- I will say that facets of each exist in science, culture, and family.

Specifying Concepts with Examples (Nature vs. Nurture)

I want to use this blog post as an opportunity to categorize what I consider to be nature or nurture.  Pinker, in his article, cites examples such as PKU (phenylketonuria, a genetic disorder in newborns) as the source for the nature vs. nurture debate.    I want to explore the social and biological constructs that might make a case for either concept. Would birth order impact either debate? Could you make a case based on comparing or contrasting personality attributes dependent on the order in which one was incorporated into a family structure? Knowing that a fertilized egg contains 46 chromosomes and each embryo differs from each other, are there any relationships biologically or familial that explain different personality traits? If a child is adopted how would the arguments change? What is your opinion about this topic?

General Reactions To Nature vs. Nurture Debate

Having no prior experience with any of the philosophical concepts provides me with an unbiased perspective on pivotal debates within the discipline.  I have recognized a pattern emerging regarding widely debated fundamental origins and human actions (and while I hate to establish structure to ideals within philosophy; a discipline that enables for multiple concept debates) there is an undeniable resounding theme to resolve or unresolve differing opinions.  A compromise of sorts, in which a middle ground that encompasses facets of each extreme concept exists to balance human nature and actions.  The nature vs. nurture debate held true to this format.  I found the primary acceptance for this debate is "a little of each" exists in forming human psychology and stability. The extreme nurture debate of every person being a blank slate is marginally rejected as problematic.  The accepted components of nurture give rise to the idea of holistic interactionism.  Basing human interactions with specified people, in specified geographical locations, and owing psychological capacity to environmental factors formulates the main components from this concept.  The nature debate cites genes (and I found they loosely defined genes in the article, leaving grey area so uneducated readers have the ability to construe their own false meanings) as the solitary deciding factor in all psychological matters.  Nurture's respect to parenting attributes is replaced by heredity and genetic transfer of predisposed characteristics.   I thoroughly enjoyed reading about this debate, and find myself with the majority: What determines an individual's personality traits is a balance of nature and nurture, care and heredity, love and genes,  symbiotic with each other. I want to end with a quote I found particularly powerful for the argument that there exists a balance of nature vs. nurture.

"Two recent studies have identified single genes that are respectively associated with violence and depression, but have also shown that their effects are manifested only with particular histories of stressful experience"