1980.04.23 (910: DEVF2) If there were no idiots among you, you would soon find that geniuses were absent also. Those human abilities that you consider to be characteristic of your species are, again, dependent upon the existence of infinite numbers of variations that appear in the aggregate, to give you often obviously opposing states. What you think of then as the average intelligence is a condition that exists because of the activity of constant variables, minute variations that give you at one end of the scale the idiot and at the other the genius. Both are necessary to maintain that larger norm of mental activity. I am using the word norm here for your convenience, though I disagree with the ways in which the term has been used, when it has been set up as a RULE of measurement, psychologically speaking. The genetic system is not closed, therefore. The genes do not simply hold information without any reference to the bodys living system. It does not exist then (the genetic structure) like some highly complicated MECHANISM already programmed, started and functioning blindly, so that once it is set into operation there is no chance for modification. Particularly in your own species there is a great give-and-take between human genetic systems, the environment, and cultural events. And, by cultural events, I mean events having to do with our peculiarly unique field of activity that includes the worlds of politics, economics, and so forth. Genetic events are not irrefutable in a deterministic fashion. They represent strong inclinations toward certain bodily or mental activity, certain biological preferences. They lead toward the activation of certain events over others, so that the probabilities are loaded in certain directions. Genetic events ARE then events, though at a different level of activity than you are used to thinking of. ... with thanks to Kasey
Posted on: Sat, 27 Dec 2014 13:50:18 +0000