Neither Nature or Nurture, or Universals

The individual should not be determined by Church or State, nor should the individual be determined by nature or nuruture....

Although we live in contexts which do limit us, and all individuals have distinct natural giftings, these cannot be determined in any specific outcome in free societies. There are various "outcomes" in which the individual may use their certain giftings.

Those that want to prescribe a universal value are determinists and will use power to undermine liberty. And these do so with impunity of conscience because their value is absolute, or ultimate. Aren't there various ways of understanding universals?

Children are impacted by their family or origin, but the "impact" does not have to be permanant. All humans have the capactity to enlarge their understandings, or to re-orient themselves to healthier ways of viewing the world or themselves.

Just as we are impacted by our familial envirounments, we are impacted by our physical environment. But, to say that humans are only submissive, compliant "outcomes" of such, is short of true. Humans are resposive to their environments, but aren't prescribed as to how or what they will respond to.

The human mind is a mystery in some sense. Though we respond to stimuli, do we always take the same actions? If the human brain were only a computor then it could be assumed that humans are little more than robots to various stimuli. Don't humans all have various ways of processing information and putting that information together? Isn't finishing a dissertation adding a "new dimension" of understanding and knowledge to the human race? How, then does new information come about, if humans all process their information in the same way?

On "Liberty and Tyranny"

I just recieved a copy of Mark R. Levine's "Liberty and Tyranny" and plan on reading it when we go to Colorodo.

On the back cover was this statement, "We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word my mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name-liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different names- liberty and tyranny." Abraham Lincoln, 1864.

I find that this quote fascinatingly pertinent for today, as it is a universal value of our Founding Fathers. We must not loose our fight and will to maintain our individual liberties.