Do Humans Have Instincts??

[Racoon]

We suckle at our mothers nipple... didn't have to be taught that one.

Smile when nice people are around us.

 

I still think that is learned behavior. Pavlov's dogs :eek2:

Baby will get hungry. That's need for food, not instinct..

Break out the Nipple from Momma' - Baby quickly learns what to do and whats going on.

Smiling is a reaction/stimulation response/interpretation from pleasant situation(s). as opposed to a dark,cold,dangerous cave

?

Many Babies are Bottle-fed, which would have been Unnatural in more primitive times...And what about stopping the suckle. Its not instinct to stop. That is learned too, as well as the realization that to suckle is also to be "comforted" in a psychological/physical development phase

?

 

More questions than answers ??

[Racoon]

I'm wondering if what we may think of "Instincts", is really just ingrained learned behaviour, with inclinations thrown in? And confusing physiological needs with instinct.??

 

There are no Migratory patterns we follow without thinking.

No strange dance we all perform for mating.

 

playing the Devil's advocate,

Racoon

[Boerseun]

I guess we do.

 

It has been shown that people born blind and deaf will show the same facial expressions for the same stimuli as sighted and hearing people. This implies that the repertoire of facial expressions aren't learnt at all - they are built-in, hardwired. A smile is a smile wether you're in 16th centure London or 10th century Hawaii - peoples who never had contact before.

 

According to various sources, this peculiarity made communication between explorers and natives possible all through the exploration era. There are an incredible range of subtle facial expressions that exist apart from the smile and frown. Basically, the whole forehead is just one big billboard of hardwired data - ever noticed how much of the nuances of somebody's words are lost when their foreheads are bandaged, or the lights are off?

 

It has been said that the ability to speak have evolved out of the same part of the brain that handles gestures, and that gestures came first. This also seems to be inborn and hardwired (instinctive) - just observe the next guy or gal making a phonecall close to you! The person on the other side of the phone can't see the guy making the call, but here they are, gesturing away like mad people!

 

Ever caught yourself doing it? I feels so natural...

 

That's part and parcel of who we are - would that be instinctive? It's not learnt in any way...

[Racoon]

Throwing up your hand to protect your face. Pulling your foot back when you stub your toe.

 

Instincts. You can't even STOP yourself from doing them, because they happen before the signal gets all the way to the brain.

 

Or do you just call those auto-motor responses?

 

And suckling.

 

TFS

 

Learned responses and Negative feed-back loops.;)

If you don't put your hands up, you get smacked, and you quickly learn from Pain Response.

 

so yes TFS, auto-motor responses.

It hurts when I do "this"- then you stop doing "this"

 

I would attribute instinct more to Bio-chemical responses/reaction.

ie, the pheremone match response.

there are hardwired inclinations I believe.(language, sexual orientation, etc.)

but you can choose not to communicate or have sex

Psychology and Evolution are fascinating!:eek2: ;)

Good job guys!

 

Needing more Thumps and Lumps on my head,

Racoon

 

:evil:

[Racoon]

Just read the big B's post,

and as usual, it doesn't disappoint.

 

I don't really see how a baby googling and placatory smiling is Instinct.

perhaps its just comfortable muscle postures with developing motor neuron connections

Perhaps I am a knuckle-head,

:eek2:

 

Instinctually returning to the stream I was spawned from,

Racoon

[Jay-qu]

I dont know - I have heard many accounts of people that say they had instincts of things going wrong but they where able to prevent it in one way or another, I am not sure about this though

Statistically speaking numbers is on their side, bad things happen everyday, by chance some people may luck out of it - Also its not like you can hear a dead persons story of how they had an instinct, went with it and ended up dead because of it... It could happen :confused:

[Eclogite]

This link seems relevant:

http://spartan.ac.brocku.ca/~lward/Angell/Angell_1906/Angell_1906_p.html

 

we find the generally recognised instincts in man to be as follows: Fear, anger, shyness, curiosity, affection, sexual love, jealousy and envy, rivalry, sociability, sympathy, modesty ( ?), play, imitation, constructiveness, secretiveness, and acquisitiveness.

 

These are then considered in a little more depth.

[CraigD]

I dont know - I have heard many accounts of people that say they had instincts of things going wrong but they where able to prevent it in one way or another…

In this thread, I think it’s important to distinguish between the several different things to which the word “instinct” commonly refers.

 

Racoon defined it for this thread as

instinct: (n.) - an Inborn tendency to to act or respond in a particular way

Jay-qu is using it with a different meaning – its most common meaning, I think – roughly synonymous with “hunch” or “intuition”.

 

While these 2 definitions may overlap – we and other animals likely have inborn, “hardwired” aptitudes for forming and following hunches – in the context of this thread, they’re entirely different ideas.

[InfiniteNow]

Agreed. I will pivot back to my first post in that the problem seems to be more with your definition of "instinct" Racoon, rather than whether or not we have them. You seem to want to limit it to so many things, and you are causing your own headache. Tell your friend he's wrong, that if he's arguing that humans are somehow seperate and distinct from all other life on this planet that he's a moron, and go play some hoops. See if he has an instinct to win or not... :eek2:

[Jay-qu]

Jay-qu is using it with a different meaning – its most common meaning, I think – roughly synonymous with “hunch” or “intuition”.

 

Yeah that was the first thing that came to mind when i read 'gut-feeling' that racoon refered to in the first post..

 

but sure we have other solid instincts like if you put 2 people in a room (girl and guy) and they never knew about sex - I reakon that they would instinctivly 'do it' anyway.

[ingannilo]

If we're going to look at this realistically we must acknowledge that all things are one, instinct no more separated from emotion than my tea kettle from a rainstorm that may happen later this spring.

 

All individuals, including infants lacking any learned behavior do not lack emotions, evoked by the same stimuli as developed individuals. Example. Here is a scared human that obviously has no preconceived notion of what to do with facial muscles when scared:

 

 

And here is a human that does know how to act scared, doing so:

 

 

That's enough to convince me that there's at least some hardwiring upstairs.

 

The article that Eclogite linked to states that instinct and emotions are not the same, but closeley related (not unlike my tea kettle).

There are reasons for all of our instinctive reactions, and while the article only mentions a few, I think it's safe to presume that the others are simply still illuding us.

the blood vessels in anger, the secretion of tears in grief, the laughter in response to wit and humour, have been held to assist in relieving the abnormal circulatory conditions in the brain

 

whew. :thumbs_up (So sorry Eclogite)

[Eclogite]

I'm going to extensively reference a lengthy read I turned up

Thank you so much for your fulsome acknowledgement of my presentation of this link in post #28. It is always so satisfying to know that ones efforts have not only been helpful, but are recognised as such.

[ingannilo]

Thank you so much for your fulsome acknowledgement of my presentation of this link in post #28. It is always so satisfying to know that ones efforts have not only been helpful, but are recognised as such.

 

 

ACK!

 

There I go getting excited and not thinking again.

I'm a fool.

 

I'll edit down the post to just include my thoughts on the matter, then.

[InfiniteNow]

So Rac... have you conveyed any of this information to your friend? Is he still sticking to his guns?

[Racoon]

So Rac... have you conveyed any of this information to your friend? Is he still sticking to his guns?

 

Still sticking to his guns...(and homeboy literally has a closet full!)

 

I've diagnosed him what you might call a "Mis-Matcher"

You have to tell him the opposite, or totally agree with him for it to register, and affect his opinion. Which I am skillfully learning to do ;)

 

:rolleyes: :)

[leo555]

Humans and instincts ..indeed we do have instincts...but we cannot realize those instincts as instincts as they happen to be occur obly when something occurs triggerring it off.

 

Lets consider this...

humans are different from animals in the sense that our most important organ is the brain...

A lion for example on the other hand uses its brute strength...hence instinct is different for different for differnent organisms depending on their essential tools.

OUR INSTINCTS occur up there in the cerebral cortex.

When asked a question our intstinct would be to think ...reason...apply logic or use memory.

some are just more developed at this instinct than others.

[learnin to learn]

Yeah, all humans have instincts but do we all share the same natural instincts? I was born and raised in the country, would I have the same instincts as some1 born and raised in the city? or vise versa?