What I would like you to do is to find a topic from chapter 5 that you were interested in and search the internet for material on that topic. You might, for example, find people who are doing research on the topic, you might find web pages that discuss the topic, you might find youtube clips that demonstrate something related to the topic, etc. What you find and use is pretty much up to you at this point. But use at least 3 sources.
Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter, and why you are interested in it. Next, I would like you to take the information you found related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about it. At the end, please include working URLs for the three websites.
By now you all should be skilled at synthesizing the topical material you have obtained from the various web sites you visited. If you need a refresher please let me know.
Include a list of the terms and concepts you used in your post. (example - Terms: positive reinforcer, extinction, reinforcer, discriminative stimulus...)
Thanks,
--Dr. M
I decided to explore the topic of eugenics a bit more and what is all associated with this topic. Eugenics relates to the idea of evolution and psychology because its goes somewhat against the ideas of artificial selection. We humans can pick what genetics we want passed down through generation to generation. Eugenics is all the methods that are used for enhancing the quality of a species. Francis Galton was the person who developed the idea of eugenics. The term eugenics comes from the Greek word meaning “good birth,” which Galton believed humans can chose traits that we want passed down to create “good” babies. Eugenics became a huge social movement in the 20th century. Society, especially governments, influential people and institutions, practiced eugenics. They wanted to control what traits would be passed down to improve or impair racial qualities or traits that will be passed down to future generations. They really focused on physical or mental qualities. Eugenics was used to create what you could call “designer babies” that contained all the good traits that humans want in a particular race or society. In 1922 the American Eugenics Society was created to help to create and establish “designer babies.” The people associated with this society used eugenics to create what they thought were the best society with the best traits. Such a society promoted things like white supremacy and were racists in a sense. They advocated for the use of birth control among individuals that were seen as “dysgenic” and restricted immigration. They really focused on increasing the numbers of the people with good genetics rather than reproducing with individuals that have defects or bad genes. Such a society wanted to sterilize people with handicaps and it promoted euthanasia of people of babies that were not genetically based well.
There were three methods that Eugenic societies used to practice eugenics. One method was authoritarian eugenics, this was when the government mandated or ran a eugenics program. Another method is promotional eugenics, this practice occurred more among the general population of people and these people volunteered to practice eugenics rather than being mandated to. The final method is private eugenics, which is still practiced by individuals and they participated voluntarily. However, this method was not promoted to the general public. This method was more used among certain individuals and groups.
http://bioethics.georgetown.edu/publications/scopenotes/sn28.htm
http://www.all.org/abac/eugen02.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics
I decided to write about Charles Darwin's theory on comparative psychology. This is the study of other species behaviors, and it is used to compare the similarities between species to understand their relationships. Not only are psychologists and ethologists interested in studying the relationships between species, but also between them and us. Many animals such as dogs, rats, monkeys, and cats have been experimented on for research and how they function. Psychologists use animal cognition studies to test different species and their abilities to understand memory, problem solve, and use other cognitive skills.
They test animal memory by using the study of spatial memory which would be like putting a rat in a maze over and over again and timing it, or hiding food for a bird and having the bird remember where you put it.
Scientists and psychologists are still trying to determine whether animals have a conscious and have emotions, and in one article that I read for my psychology of personality class, apparently in a case study most species are extraverted and agreeable (not exactly the same as humans)but they found that only chimpanzees were capable of consciousness, like in humans! This interests me a lot because I know animals are smart, some birds can talk and dance but are they really capable of understanding on their own? One example of a bird is a bird named Alex, which is a parrot, and he could distinguish different object shapes from each other and distinguish between different colors. How come other parrots can't do this, and if they can, why don't we know about more cases? I do also wonder when animals talk to each other, can they really understand one another? It's weird to think that animals have their own language, but psychologists still do not know.
http://psychology.about.com/od/comparativepsychology/f/comparative.htm
http://www.suite101.com/content/comparative-psychology-a137193
http://helpingpsychology.com/comparative-psychology-and-the-study-of-animal-behavior
What I wanted to know more about was Darwin and his studies of the evolution of Emotional Expressions. All of these studies began because Darwin believed that humans were once a form of animal and therefor have a lower more animal like way of expressing our emotions. I don’t know about how much it correlates with animals but if you think about way back before mirrors were even invented how did the expressions that we use today come about? What was so innate that the common expression of happiness was to smile? Or when sad to frown, or confused to furrow our brow? What would it be like today if mirrors and literature was not around to state what expressions are correct for a certain emotion. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2YdkQ1G5QI&feature=related This video shows how for newborns have a conscious response to do as it sees. The baby doesn’t even know it has a face but it is mimicking what the dad is doing and is only 10min old! Besides copying and exploring a lot of expressions are learned through adaption. This the basis of Darwins, serviceabl associated habits. For instance when this baby first opens his eyes the light being so bright that to shield them from the light he will squint or furrow his brow to decrease the light. These responses turn then into expressions. In the same instance as a baby the direct action of the nervous system theory for Darwin proves that these emotional responses are just a natural thing. When I baby is uncomfortable, hungry, etc. it cries or gets a sour sad face. The baby can not identify what it is doing, it is just an innate reaction to a response from the nervous system.
The problems that Darwin found included not being able to calculate expressions when there were extreme emotions, and studying yourself. This is why he mostly worked with children and animals. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPn6Nurv6Ns in this video at 6:25 they show a picture of a main who is actually in pain and the same one who is faking paint but still doing the expression. This shows that clearly the idea you have about a certain facial expression is not the same as a natural “in the moment” expression.
http://pagerankstudio.com/Blog/2010/11/emotion-and-expression/
http://face-and-emotion.com/dataface/emotion/theories.jsp
http://face-and-emotion.com/dataface/emotion/expression.jsp
Galton's main interest in psychological phenomena was mental ability, but he also was interested in mental imagery and association which is the topic of my post.
Mental imagery is defined as the ability to mentally imagine or project an object or event without actually being in the presence of the object or in the situation of the event. It could be recalling a past memory, imagining a future victory, or even just imagining a person. Galton studied this by asking participants to imagine their breakfast table in the morning. He was primarily concerned with the illumination or lighting, the definition or quality of the objects present, and the coloring of the image. His initial date seemed to make it look like scientific minds could not hold imagery well, but he messed up on data that present scientists corrected in showing that scientific minds can experience imagery just as well as others.
His method using mental imagery with association was to take a walk outside and notice all the objects in nature. Then using mnemonic techniques such as the method of Ioci, he took the same walk, only mentally, to see if he could remember all the things he saw and how they brought past memories back to him. A normal person can do the same thing using the same techniques. Imagine walking through a park during fall. Maybe you will hear whistles from junior football teams practicing that will remind you of when you were in football. The falling leaves off the trees may remind you of a past event you had with a friend. You can look at something in the real world and associate it with something from the past.
I found this very interesting mostly because it shows how powerful out mind, especially our subconscious can be. We can look at something and it may suddenly bring back a distant memory of the past. We can use our mind to create our own vibrant worlds. The subconscious is extremely powerful I think, and just like recalling the past through current objects and events, it can influence our future as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Galton
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_image
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci
I decide to cover the history of eugenics for my topic because I found it interesting and it’s related to the earliest studies of genetic relationships in psychology. The term was coined by Galton to promote an idea that we should take steps to improving our genetic material.
Around this time Social Darwinism was popular which utilized Darwin’s theory of natural selection—meaning the fittest (who would be the successful wealth people) should have been prospering and growing while the poor would die out eventually because they were less suited to survive. However, this was not occurring as the population of the poor was growing and the wealthy were growing smaller. To try and remedy this, scientists—specifically Galton came up with Eugenics to try to control the population. His goal was to create the perfect human race by getting rid of the undesirable population and multiplying the desirable people all through controlling reproduction. Eugenisists strived to rid our humanity by eliminating traits such as schizophrenia, alcoholism, rebelliousness, depression, criminality and other diseases. Obviously these researchers weren’t aware that many of these behaviors aren’t just or even at all related to genes, and that a lot of these ailments and behaviors were caused by our environment.
Eugenics became increasingly racist as large groups of people were administered IQ tests and blacks endd up scoring 15 points less than whites on average, giving eugenicists reason to believe that they were less intelligent and less fit for survival than whites were. However, they took these studies one step further and devided the whites upon superiority as well stating there were significant differences between “old-stock whites”, “anglo-saxons,” protestants and many others.
In 1911, eugenicists came up with eighteen solutions to improving our race, which we call now methods of “eugenicide” some of these “solutions” were gas chambers, forced segregation, sterilization, and increased marriage restrictions. Interestingly, some of these theories and ideas were used as a model for the Nazi’s giving them “scientific justification” to use some of the same certain tactics and pushing the holocost to new extremes.
https://people.creighton.edu/~idc24708/Genes/Eugenics/History%20of%20Eugenics.htm
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/darwin/nameof/page04.html
http://www.emmerich1.com/EUGENICS.htm
In researching for this topic I picked the term “Eugenics” which I encountered in the last chapter. Eugenics is society taking an active step to improve their genetic material. When reading this in the book I thought it was a good idea. What I was thinking of was more in terms of furthering education, and society taking steps to further themselves as people, but not necessarily genetically.
After researching, I pretty much think eugenics is a horrible awful thing and am moderately to very horrified with what I found.
It first caught my eye when I found something about Nazi’s and Eugenics. I am very interested in WWII and think that everything from Hitler and his SS and the propaganda and the war is actually really intriguing, and I actually took a class my freshman year about the Holocaust. At first I didn’t believe what I was reading. During my entire first website I was thinking how bizarre this was an how it couldn’t possibly be true, then looking further on this topic I found out a lot of interesting, and kind of scary things.
Eugenics originated in America a long time before WWII began. There were about 27 states with policies that forced sterilization and segregation and marriage restriction laws before California joined around 1909. California is said to have become the epicenter of eugenics. One example of this is that the president of Stanford David Jordan talked about eugenics in an epistle in 1902. In 1904 the Carnegie Institution housed thousands of note cards to help scientists plan the removal of familes and bloodlines. The Rockefeller Foundation actually helped found the German Eugenics Program. America’s encouragement is said to be what got Hitler started on his notion of the “superior race.”
From 1907-1960 more than 100,000 innocent American’s were sterilized. Although the height was form the 1920’s to the 1930’s. People were deemed either hereditarily valuable or inferior. After World War II eugenics was mainly an interest of the KKK and neo-nazi’s and other old fashioned scientists. Although it was still in America until the 1960’s. It even went as far as William Shockley (again from Stanford) suggesting that they should offer cash incentives for sterilization, and Welfare recipients were often told that they had to be sterilized or they would loose their benefits.
American children were often tested in schools and shipped off to government funded (!) institutions where they were labled “feeble minded” even if they had no mental disability at all. Orphans were also shipped to these places, which were described as being most uncomfortably reminiscent of concentration camps. One man who wrote a book about it said he legitimately felt like he was a different species. Eugenics was finally stopped in the 1970’s.
I’m not sure if I ever realized this had happened before now. I wonder, if it weren’t for one man’s idea if we could’ve avoided a horrifying 70 years of the world’s history. Although I don’t believe that WWII wouldn’t have happened, because something was bound to with the state the Germany was in after WWI, but it really makes me wonder just how history would’ve changed if eugenics was either never introduced or dismissed outright as an ignorant man’s idea.
http://hnn.us/articles/1796.html
www.stnp.net/eugenics/eugenics_america.htm
www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/29/60
I chose the topic of Comparative Psychology. Comparative psychology is the branch of psychology that studies animal behavior. I find subject interesting because I love animals and I’ve always found comparative psychology to be very interesting. This fits into the chapter because it evolved from Darwin’s studies of animal behavior and evolution.
Comparative psychology is an important branch of psychology. By examining their behavior and studying the differences between species, it can lead to a broader understanding of human behavior. Often times humans like to think of themselves as superior to animals, although much of our behavior is very alike. Darwin found that five major experiences are alike across animals and humans: Causal or mechanistic processes, function or adaptiveness, evolutionary patterns and processes, individual development, and private and subjective experiences.
Darwin used his examinations of animal behavior to develop his theory of natural selection. Few people had thought about WHY animals acted the way they acted. Darwin believed that every behavior had a purpose that helped the species adapt and grow. By understanding that every animal behavior had a purpose, he became interested in how animals communicate. He generated the idea of antithesis, which stated that emotions had certain behaviors associated with them. Darwin also came up with the concept of serviceable associated habits. This principle explains why we make some of the emotional expressions we do. Darwin believed that at some point in our history these reactions were useful, and eventually just became habit in certain types of situations.
Through the studies of animals, Darwin discovered a lot about the human race. The unaffected behavior patterns of animals are much easier to study than the behavior patterns of humans, which can sometimes be deceitful. I think that although many people believe animals lack emotions and that observing their behaviors isn’t applicable to human life, comparative psychology has made many advances in psychology that wouldn’t have been discovered otherwise.
Terms: Comparative psychology, Darwin, natural selection, antithesis, and serviceable associated habits.
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/amp/64/2/102.html
http://www.psywww.com/intropsych/ch08_animals/summary_early_comparative_psychology.html
http://nro-dd.sagepub.com/lp/psycharticles-reg/darwin-s-legacy-to-comparative-psychology-and-ethology-X9VMZ7aKsg
I chose to focus on Darwin’s study of emotional expression. This fits into the chapter because it is mentioned while discussing the history of Charles Darwin. The story of emotional expression is fascinating to me because in the book it states that a smile means the same thing everywhere in the world, therefore it must be instinctual. Human behavior can be understood today by knowing its past. Darwin created the first cross-cultural study specifically for emotional expression. He did this by creating a questionnaire consisting of questions that asked people to describe what certain facial expressions meant to them. He had another method that studied the emotional expressions of animals which led him to certain theories about where emotional expressions originated.
He created three main principles from these studies. The first one was the principle of serviceable associated habits. This principle is the idea that reactions occur in order to relieve sensations and desires. These reactions can be minute, but through the force of habit and association, they occur more frequently. The second principle is known as antithesis. Particular states of mind lead to certain habitual behavior. When a directly opposite state of mind occurs, generally the direct opposite reaction will occur. The third principle is the direct action of the nervous system. These are expressions that follow strong emotions. Such as, crying when you’re sad, trembling when scared, etc.
I found this idea of emotional expression to be fascinating because I love to people watch and observe others. Knowing that many expressions are universal is a cool way to feel connected to the rest of the world.
http://face-and-emotion.com/dataface/emotion/theories.jsp
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010\01\08\story_8-1-2010_pg3_4
http://www.emotionalprocessing.org.uk/emotion%20concepts/Emotional%20expression.htm
My topic for this week’s blog is over catastrophism and uniformitarianism. These two things were mentioned in the book as theories of why species and geological aspects of the earth have changed or have differences throughout certain species. Catastrophism was developed to explain these changes but to keep constant with the belief in God; things such as volcanoes, tsunamis, and hurricanes are examples of catastrophism. Uniformitarianism is another concept that falls in line with incorporating God into the explanation of things but focuses more on a development of change over time, rather than happening all at once. Lyell’s thoughts about uniformitarianism were the basis of which Darwin got some of his ideas for his theories of evolution later on in life.
Further examples of catastrophism are some of our historic natural geographic landmarks, like the Rocky Mountains or certain islands that have not been around long. There is also a collection of approx 300 floods throughout history that are believed to have contributed to the development of the world; it is commonly referred to as the Noachian Flood which can be seen throughout Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and North America. As far as uniformitarianism goes Lyell believed that change was constant and never changing speed to be faster or slower, like it was believed to be in catastrophism.
The importance of these two theories was that it gave Darwin his curiosity to go and explore the ideas behind them. In turn Darwin came up with a basically new theory all together that is still controversial, yet widely accepted among the science community.
http://www.catastrophism.net/
http://science.jrank.org/pages/1267/Catastrophism.html
http://www.uniformitarianism.net/
http://geography.about.com/od/physicalgeography/a/uniformitarian.htm
Catasrophism, uniformitarianism, darwin, evolution, lyell
It was difficult to find more various research on these two topics so instead I decided try and compare the two in my search and I came up with a few more findings.
Catastrophism was the original thought to still incorporate God into the development and changes of the world. Uniformitarianism basically dismissed catastrophism stating that change occurs gradually and that a massive flood 'listed in the Bible as the story of Noah's Arc' could not have been possible. It was stated that "the present was key to the past." Showing simliar slow changing aspects of the world. This means that a much older world is needed than what is stated in the bible for these changes to occur, thus leaving God out of the picture. Evolution sprouted off of Uniformitarianism and that is where some of Darwin's ideas sprouted from. Uniformitarianism is still in practice today but connected with biological macroevolution. Also, over the last 50 years a lot more evidence for catastrophism and intellegent design has been brought forth.
http://www.allaboutcreation.org/catastrophism-versus-uniformitarianism-faq.htm
http://amazingdiscoveries.org/C-deception-Earth_history_catastrophism_uniformitarianism
The topic I decided to cover in more depth was Charles Darwin’s work in South America. Darwin took the opportunity to take a trip to South America on the ship Beagle. The trip took around five years and the ship travelled from one coastal region to another and this allowed Darwin to collect much of his research. Darwin spent five weeks on the Galapagos Islands and this is where Darwin collected his information that would lead to the theory of evolution. Darwin noticed variations from one island to another in characteristics of birds but he failed to notice that all the birds were of the same species.
Darwin then moved to London after the trip where his research would come together. Thomas Malthus gave Darwin the idea that only those suited to survive will do so. Darwin also reflected on pigeon farming of the day and how pigeon breeders could change certain characteristics of the birds by the process of selective breeding. Also, John Gould at the time was going over Darwin’s research and found that the birds that Darwin was studying were the same species.
This new information made Darwin look back over his notes and make a revelation. He realized that the birds he studied were in fact of the same species. With this new information he published the book, Origin of Species. The book took over twenty years for him to write because of illness and the fact that he knew it would bring negative feedback because the idea of evolution was not of church approval.
Darwin’s theory of natural selection was very in depth and included his research from the Galapagos Islands. He believed that the original finches (birds) arrived at the mainland island as a single species. These birds would then go on to settle on different islands and the variations in their beaks was due to their primary food source and how the birds adapted. He said that an island full of seeds would produce birds with tough, blunt beaks to be able to crack the seeds. This brings up Thomas Malthus’ influence on Darwin. With this information, he was able to say that the birds adapted to their environment to be able to survive.
Terms- Charles Darwin, evolution, Thomas Malthus, John Gould, Origin of Species, natural selection
http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Biographies/Science/Darwin.htm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/darwin_charles.shtml
http://www.google.com/#q=charles+darwin&hl=en&prmd=ivnsbo&tbs=tl:1&tbo=u&ei=wqVVTenpCoz2gAf77YTLDA&sa=X&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnum=20&sqi=2&ved=0CJQBEOcCMBM&bav=on.1,or.&fp=74bc1d71389729ad
I was interested in comparative psychology and wanted to look up more information on it. Comparative psychology looks at the way humans and animals are linked to each other and how similar or different they are in cognitive and social areas. I found one thing being studied is animal memory, especially spatial memory, which has to do with the fact that squirrels can remember where they put their nuts and re-dig them up. Tool use and problem solving have also been used. A tool can be described as anything used that is not a part of the body. Chimpanzees are known to use different tools the most and are thought to be the most intelligent. Some animals are also capable of problem solving like dogs and ravens. There have been studies done on dogs to see if they can solve a problem once they see a human or another animal solve it first. This would be related to social learning. There is also a question of whether or not animals have their own language, and the difference between communication and actual language. It has been shown that dogs have a unique way of being able to communicate with humans, unlike other animals. One way this is shown is that dogs often respond to a human pointing to help them find something. Something that is still often in debate is if animals are capable of feeling emotions. From what I have seen I think that dogs can feel pain, such as if they are separated from a companion they have been with for a really long time. But this has not been proven and is an example of anthropomorphism, which means putting human characteristics on non-human beings. I also found more research being done on seeing if animals can use electronics to study their social and cognitive capabilities. A problem with this is that some animals take long to learn how to use the electronics.
Terms: comparative psychology, spatial memory, tool, social learning, anthropomorhphism
For Chapter 5 I decided to look into Darwin’s concept of natural selection for my topical blog. Natural selection is the process in which traits become more or less common in a population based on the effect it has on the survival of the population. A species is always within a constant state of flux, as is the environment where the species lives. Natural selection plays upon variation and adaptation. Natural selection is one of the most basic parts of evolution. Evolution is the change over time in a species or population, these happens from generation to generation and happens through processes like mutation – changes as a genetic level, genetic drift – change in the frequency of a gene allele in a population due to random sampling, natural selection, etc. The most basic definition can be described as follows: There is a variation in traits within a population, such as some bugs are red and some are brown. Because the red bugs do not blend in as well they are more likely to be eaten by predators, like birds, thus causing the genes for the red bugs to not continue as prominently as the genes of the brown bugs. This then allows the brown bugs to be more common than the brightly colored red bugs. In the end, all the individuals in the population will be brown.
Terms: Darwin, natural selection, population, environment, variation, adaptation, evolution, mutation, genetic drift, genes, individual
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_selection
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_25
http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/biology/evolution/genetics/naturalselection.html
Eugenics is basically breeding organisms with desirable traits to improve the genetic composition of the organism. Eugenics means in Greek “good in stock, hereditarily endowed with noble qualities.” Eugenics promotes selective breeding in humans. Hitler took Eugenics to the extreme when he tried to exterminate everyone without his idea of desirable traits. During WWII Hitler was determined for the “Master Race.” He killed people who did not fit this description or had Jewish faith. He basically applied Darwin’s theory of artificial selection to the human race. This is obviously unethical and inhumane on many levels.
Today’s society also has their spin on using eugenics that for some is more of a moral grey area. Apparently people are working on engineering genes in order to be able to genetically alter embryo’s to have the parent’s desired characteristics. Apparently, Jacques Cohen did it kind of under the radar in 1997. It was originally meant for mothers that were having trouble conceiving. Cohen put mDNA into the children in the womb. It doesn’t sound that bad until you hear that that means that these 17 children he did it to, have three parents… mom, dad, and the mDNA donor. Some of the kids were born with pervasive developmental disorders from mild speech delay to autism. They didn’t get the combination quite right. Apparently today though, parents (who have the cash) can choose if their child is a boy or a girl, and they can also screen for genetic diseases. It’s mildly un-ethical in my book but amazing that we can do it. Hey they did it to a monkey in 2003ish. They inserted gloey DNA from a jelly fish and it didn’t do anything. They tried it on mice and it worked. Crazy. A little scary.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics
http://www.purefood.org/Patent/genebabies.cfm
http://www.bioethicsanddisability.org/eugenics.html
http://www.actionbioscience.org/biotech/agar.html
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0203.brownlee.html
Eugenics, Darwin, Hitler, artificial selection, Jacques Cohen
After reading Darwin’s theory of evolution I really did not know how to take it. I always have found Charles Darwin to be very interesting, especially in his field of evolution. However, being raised as Christian how do I look at his theory? I recognize his theory as a good study, but I hate to question my religion. The argument about the species problem about how did the earth come to be populated by such diversity, why did so many species seem to disappear where their existence is only evident through fossils, and also the one that everyone questions how did all these species fit on the ark? Also if you look at Lamark’s chain of being it tells us that all the species on earth could be arranged on a linear scale with reference to complexity. Also I found it to be very interesting when Lamark approached his idea on the inheritance of acquired characteristics. When I look at this I simply think of hand-me-downs because in contrast that’s exactly what it is. Over the course of its time an animal or species will adopt traits from the next generation. A good example of this would be old family recipes. A family member may have establish that extra special ingredients to enrich the flavor that much more. And has time goes on they pass this recipe down from one family member to the other.
From what I’ve gathered, Darwin was also a Christian. The thing I question though is how were people letting him perform these studies on evolution? People get really offended when you even bring the subject up in today’s society, how was it in the seventh and eighteenth centuries? I read that catastrophism is the issue with the prevailing theory of geological change. So when it says tried to maintain the supremacy of God and the Bible while accounting for what scientists were discovering about nature did it really work? With uniformitarianism it seemed like people blamed God for volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, erosion, and other global effects of weather.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution
http://www.allaboutcreation.org/catastrophism-versus-uniformitarianism-faq.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inheritance_of_acquired_characteristics
After reviewing other posts I decided to go out of the box a little and research the principle of serviceable associated habits. I thought it was interesting how our facial movements and expressions could evolve. Darwin first claimed how our facial movement were useful and serviceable. Darwin went on to discuss how our facial expressions have evolved to convey emotions. He gave an example of how our expression for smelling a fowl odor that was offensive turned into an expression when we are approached by someone that we find offensive. This example is an example of how emotions have evolved and how we use emotions to tell others how we feel without actually saying it. It was described as almost a way of survival. Darwin also added the direct action of the nervous system when you might tremble and feel other strong emotions it is basically the direct action of the nervous system, essentially how your body should react in the moment. Maybe you were approached by someone larger than you and you stand up taller to make yourself seem larger than that person, this links back to being well, related to how an animal would react.
After doing some research I have read a lot about how facial expressions are involuntary, but we can also use facial expressions as a voluntary movement like making a funny face on purpose versus seeing someone that makes you happy and some expressions are out of habit. I think what Darwin and everyone who has researched this is that facial expressions and emotions can be voluntary and involuntary.
http://www.darwin-literature.com/The_Expression_Of_The_Emotions_In_Man_And_Animals/1.html
http://pagerankstudio.com/Blog/2010/11/evolution-of-emotions/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_emotion
I realize a lot of people already covered this, but I was interested in it so I wanted to research it more. I chose to research Comparative Psychology. The definition according to our book is the systematic study of similarities and differences among all animal species. Basically, it means the study of mental processes that exist between humans and other species. Darwin believed that there are factors that set humans apart from animals such as higher mental processes, morals, and beliefs in spirituality.
One thing that comparative psychology studies is animals memories. Spatial Memory in animals are animals like squirrels, jays, and mice. This is because they bury things and have to remember where to dig them up later.
Primates fall into because they can problem solve and use tools.
Darwin was the first person to try and study Emotional Expressions (which relates to comparative psych). Darwin believed that emotional expressions were a result of evolution and that many expressions were probably consistent around the world.
Terms: comparative psychology, Spatial memory, emotional expressions, Darwin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_psychology
http://psychology.about.com/od/comparativepsychology/f/comparative.htm
http://www.suite101.com/content/comparative-psychology-a137193
After reading this chapter i decided i would look further into eugenics. I find the concept of eugenics to be very interesting, and also kind of a weird topic.
In this chapter eugenics was proposed by Francis Galton. Galton believed that through eugenics we would be able to create a highly gifted race of men. In Galton's mind this would be as easy as taking measurements of a person's body, senses, and reaction time. Also it seemed he believed that the poor should not be allowed to procreate, this was because he believed they wouldn't be poor if they were smart.
One of the most well known Eugenics programs occurred during world war 2, during which the Nazis would exterminate races and groups of people who they believed to be inferior, including the Jewish People, Gypsies, the mentally handicapped, the physically handicapped, and even some completely healthy people who just grew up in eastern Europe. Along with the mass exterminations, selective breeding was encouraged among Himmler's "SS" troops. To be in the SS you had to prove you had pure Aryan descent. Then, once you were in the SS you were only able to have someone else who has proved their Aryan descent as your mate.
Another well known instance of eugenics occurred in ancient Greece by the Spartans. When a child was born in ancient Sparta, the child would first have to swim in wine, and if the child could survive that, the child would be inspected, and if determined to be inadequate, would be thrown off a cliff. This was done to ensure that the Spartans would maintain a strong warrior culture.
Something that is much less known about is the programs of eugenics that were undertaken here in the United States. There were laws in many states that forbid the marriage of people of different races because people of other races were considered to be inferior. Even more shocking than this is the laws that allowed sterilization of people who were considered to be inferior. The majority of people who were considered to be inferior were prostitutes, the feebleminded, the blind, the deaf, and many other people.
Eugenics is basically a form of artificial evolution, or artificial selection, attempting to take the people most fit to survive, and then make them the norm. While there have been many disturbing attempts to practice eugenics, there are still people who push for it to be an official policy.
Terms: Eugenics, Artificial Evolution, Galton, Sterilization, artificial selection.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sparta#Birth_and_death
http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/list3.pl