Argumentative EssayEssay Preview: Argumentative EssayReport this essayA wave of recent studies would have us believe that our destinies are shaped at birth. But is there more politics than science in this research?Why do you act the way you do? Some folks blame their genes–for example, “He inherited his artistry from his mother and his alcoholism from his father.” Indeed, in the last two decades, quite a few scientists have tried to prove that your soul is written on your DNA. But recently theyve suffered big scientific setbacks–setbacks with major political implications, especially for those eternally warring factions: men and women.
Thanks to enthusiastic and uncritical media coverage of genetic theories of personality, everyone has heard of scientific “discoveries” that girls are innately less skilled at math than boys, that womens brains are built differently from mens and that womens brains occasionally go on the blink due to hormonal changes. In reality, theres serious doubt about the validity of each of these “discoveries.” But the “discoveries” tend to make the front page, while subsequent disproofs tend to be buried deep inside the paper. So have (with some exceptions) recent refutations of efforts to link genes to a myriad of human behaviors–from femininity to manic depression, from IQ to alcoholism, from crime to dyslexia.
I hope I’ve answered your questions right away, and I know that you still have some time to decide. You may then reply to this article with an informed and cogent, though still unclear, rebuttal. As you will see below, you may also come up with new, even more valid arguments (I hope there’ll be more).
This article by Mark Driscoll covers the topic presented in detail above, in much more context than the current article as the following:
http://www.rebirthblog.org/2008/07/28/muscular-dyslexical-dysmetic-disparities-in-moods-and-sex-with-gen_161924_5
You will notice that it’s at least 2,500 words. This may not be necessary as the article doesn’t include any significant quotes.
Here’s your question from a fellow reader:
“My question is in the second paragraph of the article, where the link to a paper by the University of Wisconsin’s Bazelons’ School of Neuroscience gives the complete picture of gender differences in the brain. It gives a strong showing of a sex difference of 8%, but a sex difference of 7%:
“And here are these results of recent studies on different gender differences in brain development as well – I will link to both of those, but this section of the paper contains a little interesting stuff because it looks at many of these different brain dimensions, not just in terms of genetics. So I’m interested in trying to figure out exactly how this relationship develops. What I can tell you is that what you were trying to do in the second paragraph is not to show that these differences change with age, but to say: ‘It’s not even clear.’ The key is to show you where the gender effects are from, by comparing them with a few of the genes that determine the brain’s sex.”
There’s some confusion: what this does is show that differences in the brain’s hormones and neurotransmitter systems are present in females, but there’s no significant evidence that those differences are actual things that you can cause (I’m going to refer to this for the first time!). It’s also unclear if the “sexism vs. biology” connection applies to people and so forth. And of course, for some people these differences are not real. How many times have you heard people talk about this stuff in the past? How many times have you talked about it in the past because somebody said they did this to prove they were somehow more or less human? And it’s just all an illusion.
It’s also pretty confusing to actually do some of the experiments. How many of the women in my group had experienced some gender dysmatic behavior (and if you know anything about
Its the latest twist in the “nature-nurture” debate: i.e., are you a product of your genes or your environment? As every Psych