[ale] [OT] Omniscient, Omnipotent, Omnipresent or Not.

[Chris Ricker]

On Tue, 26 Aug 2003, da Black Baron wrote:

> I assumed as much to be the case, I just wanted to make the point that there 
> were random factors in the makup of a human being at the most basic level.

Whether they're random is certainly debatable (and is debated -- that's one
reason some of the philosophy of science guys are now interested in biology
instead of physics)

> > And that's assuming you buy into biological determinism (ie, that your
> > genes are what make you "you"). There's lots of good evidence that isn't
> > 100% the case.
> 
> I was speaking of physical characteristics.  I'm by no means a biological 
> determinist in terms of what a personality or person *is*...   

Even for physical characteristics, genes don't strictly determine them. Take
height.  In higher mammals such as ourselves, quantitative genetics shows
that it's determined by a combination of ~100 genes, plus your environment
(where environment contributes about as much as the genes). That still
doesn't say it's random, though. In fact, it says exactly the opposite....

> > > and the odds of the hormones in your mother causing you to have that
> > > extra chromasome)!
> >
> > Say what?!?! I have no idea what you're talking about, other than that it's
> > not true ;-)
> 
> "Mongoloid, he was a mongoloid,
> One chromasome too many..." ;-)
> 
> No.  That isn't really what I meant, I just couldn't resist an oppourtunity to 
> quote Devo.  :-p
> 
> I meant to have the x-y chromasome *pair* rather than the x-x pair.  Sorry.  

Maternal hormones have nothing to do with it, at least for all we know now.  
If they did, someone would have long since marketed a pill so that expectant
moms could pick the gender of their babies ;-). It's determined by which
sperm wins the great race to the egg (which can be controlled by flow 
sorting sperm to pick the desired X or Y, then doing artificial 
insemination, but not by manipulating maternal hormone levels)....

At any rate, I'll shut up now.

later,
chris
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