Political leaning. Nature or Nurture?

The central question is a prime example of what is wrong with the base thinking in our current society. Political leaning, whether one follows the law always, sometimes, or hardly ever, whether one helps, ignores, or preys on others; ALL of it is CHOICE. It is the exercise of free will. Certainly both nature and nurture have some influence. But no person is irreducibly bound by the influences of nature or nurture when it comes to socio-political-economic choices.

Each person is the ultimate authority over themselves and their choices. The fact that we forget choice, and focus on the ridiculous psychobabble "nature or nurture" dichotomy is a BIG reason we face many of the troubles we face today.
 
Good Luck said:
The central question is a prime example of what is wrong with the base thinking in our current society. Political leaning, whether one follows the law always, sometimes, or hardly ever, whether one helps, ignores, or preys on others; ALL of it is CHOICE. It is the exercise of free will. Certainly both nature and nurture have some influence. But no person is irreducibly bound by the influences of nature or nurture when it comes to socio-political-economic choices.
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No one said it was Good Luck. You are presenting a false dichotomy.

Good Luck said:
Each person is the ultimate authority over themselves and their choices. The fact that we forget choice, and focus on the ridiculous psychobabble "nature or nurture" dichotomy is a BIG reason we face many of the troubles we face today.
Click to expand...

There has never been anything said that is less true. It's like when a person says an addict has complete and total free will because some addicts have broken free. Compulsion can be said, in some sense, to violate your free will. It is at least extremely influential. If 1 in 100 people "freely" break free of something, you could say that people have 1 in 100th free will on that issue. To take the exception as the rule would be foolishness. The failure to recognize that compulsion is a damper on free will is a BIG reason we face many of the troubles we face today.

Although, if you had no compulsion, you probably wouldn't do anything. A state free from compulsion would be, ironically, equal in that respect to slavery.
 
Free will is sometimes hard to exercise, as in the case of an addict, as you mention. That does not mean it doesn't exist.
 
Interesting question. Obviously both as external can reinforce internal. Nature must have a lot to do with it as first knowledge comes from family and family is genes. In some families I know everyone is conservative republican, oddly I know few families that are all liberal democrat - actually i can't think of one.

But I look too at my father who is a cynic and I am far from him even though some of my brothers are closer to his perspective. But I think experiences, education, and temperament are key factors. My mother's stories of the depression, our experience as a poor family, early work experiences, military experience, tutoring the poor and uneducated, and most of all a great deal of reading reinforced a liberal approach to life. I could no more call myself conservative then I could call myself a martian.
 
midcan5 said:
Interesting question. Obviously both as external can reinforce internal. Nature must have a lot to do with it as first knowledge comes from family and family is genes. In some families I know everyone is conservative republican, oddly I know few families that are all liberal democrat - actually i can't think of one.

But I look too at my father who is a cynic and I am far from him even though some of my brothers are closer to his perspective. But I think experiences, education, and temperament are key factors. My mother's stories of the depression, our experience as a poor family, early work experiences, military experience, tutoring the poor and uneducated, and most of all a great deal of reading reinforced a liberal approach to life. I could no more call myself conservative then I could call myself a martian.
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Families are genetically related, but the political affiliations they pass on are purely ideological, thus, it's nurture.
 
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