Monday, August 13, 2007

Are Children Naturally Bad?

I heard a person say that children come into the world rude, insolent, discourteous, greedy, selfish, self centered, thieves, liars, vandals, demanding, and prone to disobedience and anarchy.

This is true, but it's not the whole truth.

Human children are born with what natural selection deemed best suited for both their personal survival and the survival of their species. After birth, their behavior is conditioned by their environment. Thus their phenotypical behavior is a product of both their genetics and their environmental experiences.

Left on their own (as as been seen with feral children), they will do what is necessary to ensure their survival. This will certainly involve breaking some of the "10 commandments". However, such children would also instinctively demonstrate a certain amount of altruistic and caring behavior -- similar to that of other apes.

Natural behavior is not evil -- it's what evolution (or the Creator if you wish) provided. The natural behavior of a child is no more "evil" than that of a puppy. What's evil is selfishly harming others after knowing it's wrong. A person's behavior will depend a lot upon their conditioning. Left to their own learning (as many are), children tend to be less altruistic and conforming and more self-centered and anarchic because that is their natural state. So, where do we place the blame when a person behaves "badly"?

Children are victims of their genetics and conditioning. Nature provides the first. Nurture provides the second. Neither is chosen by the children when they pop out of the womb. We should try and remember this and limit ourselves to judging behavior, not people.

Granddad

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