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Myths

  • #22
whoa you guys are fast! :p (or maybe i just type too much lol)
How bats work
for info on bats. interesting ...article or whatever it is.
PS. LOL trea
I didn't mean that to spark another debate. Believe it or not the example is still valid.
 
  • #23
So who thinks witches and vampires are myths?
 
  • #24
witches are no myths... (lol... ok fine the fictional ones about crazy old women flying on brooms are but there is a religion where they're called witches)
and vampiers aren't either... (again... the living dead are but the central american species that lap blood aren't. There are only three species of vampire bats in the whole world and they only live in Mexico and central america)... and if you consider any organism that sucks blood a vampire, there are also those finches in the galapagos, mosquitoes, fleas, lice, bed bugs, leeches, etc.
 
  • #25
No I meant huminoid like things
 
  • #26
[b said:
Quote[/b] (jhaluska @ Feb. 17 2005,1:30)]
[b said:
Quote[/b] (ktulu @ Feb. 16 2005,10:49)]There are a few inherent differences in male and female brains, like size, but interms of true cognition there is not differnce.
Did you read the link I posted?

"He (Michael Gurian) believes there are about a hundred structural differences that have been identified between the male and female brain."

It makes perfect sense to me for evolution to have favored slightly more specialized minds for each gender.
yes i did read the link, however it is from cnn, which often will report(as do most news organizations) things that are first not very scientific, secondly supported by very few people, and third mostly preliminary in their findings. its not that i am saying there is no differnces, its just anthropologist have been looking for many years for true differences, and they have found that there are some slight physical differences between the brians of the sexes(like male brains are bigger by weight) but have yet to find any true conginitive differences between the sexes, especally if the study is done cross-culturally, which helps to eliminate culture biases.

also evolution has favored differences in the brain of the sexes however it has not been shown that they have conginitive differences. Like the larger brain in males is mostly due to an increase in spinal fluid around the brain making males more able to deal with blows to the head because their brains are more padded, the female brain however has its gray matter in a more compact area and is denser making up for the difference in size.
 
  • #27
[b said:
Quote[/b] (TheAlphaWolf @ Feb. 17 2005,1:53)]vampiers aren't either... (again... the living dead are but the central american species that lap blood aren't. There are only three species of vampire bats in the whole world and they only live in Mexico and central america)... and if you consider any organism that sucks blood a vampire, there are also those finches in the galapagos, mosquitoes, fleas, lice, bed bugs, leeches, etc.
dont forget people who practice ritual blood drinking(which is most likely the source of the myth).
 
  • #28
But remember "Temple of the Vampire" (an actual religion look it up online) does not support drinking of blood or in any way harming humans in the name of the religion
 
  • #29
well, I've seen shows about gender differences and read things about the differences in the brains and I do think they're true. once again... I can't stress enough that I don't think one is better than the other...
and it's not just about the physical differences of the brain, it's how they use them. it has been shown through what-do-you-call-them scans that males and females use different regions of their brain when doing certain things.
 
  • #30
[b said:
Quote[/b] (ktulu @ Feb. 16 2005,4:49)]
[b said:
Quote[/b] (TheAlphaWolf @ Feb. 16 2005,6:31)]Men were the hunters and needed to be aggressive and need to be good with directions (to come home and not get lost) while the females have been the gatherers and nurturers and have to have good communication skills etc...
alpha let me just say this you are treding on thin ice here and are making alot of assumptions with these statements. also alot of what we see as typical male or typical female behavior is culturally shaped. the not asking for help thing is mostly a western(prob. american) concept. in other cultures it is prefectly acceptable for a man to ask for help with something or ask for directions. you have to remove culture from people(which is very very unethical) in order to study this fully.

There are a few inherent differences in male and female brains, like size, but interms of true cognition there is not differnce.
Differences between male and female can be seen in all cultures and are generally the same but may present themselves different. The study was done with toddlers so if what you're saying is right there shouldn't have been such a difference between what the boys and what the girls did.
 
  • #31
[b said:
Quote[/b] (TheAlphaWolf @ Feb. 17 2005,2:13)]well, I've seen shows about gender differences and read things about the differences in the brains and I do think they're true. once again... I can't stress enough that I don't think one is better than the other...
and it's not just about the physical differences of the brain, it's how they use them. it has been shown through what-do-you-call-them scans that males and females use different regions of their brain when doing certain things.
i have seen the studies you are talking about, but these studies have never been done cross culturally so the difference could be do to the fact that cultures emphasis different roles for men and women which forces their brains to develop differently. im not saying that there arnt differences im just saying they might not be do to any biological cause but could easily be based on implanted cultural bias.
 
  • #32
and how do you explain the use of the brain for the same thing? if it was cultural then both males and females would use the same areas of the brain for the same purposes but they don't.
 
  • #33
[b said:
Quote[/b] (TheAlphaWolf @ Feb. 17 2005,2:20)]and how do you explain the use of the brain for the same thing? if it was cultural then both males and females would use the same areas of the brain for the same purposes but they don't.
the brain develops differnt because of the cultural roles that males and female begin to learn from a very early age. The studies you are talking about were all done on westerners, which affects the way they think. I has been shown that the parts of the brain that are used more develop more than those that are not.
Also if its genetic how can you explain the fact that either sex can be taught to do exactly what the other can in terms of mental abilities, and thought processes?
 
  • #34
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Also if its genetic how can you explain the fact that either sex can be taught to do exactly what the other can in terms of mental abilities, and thought processes?
because we can learn. You can teach anyone to do math but it's easier for some people than for others. and i'm not talking about differences that are HUGE. men aren't brainless idiots who can't talk and women aren't brainless idiots who get lost in their own house.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]the brain develops differnt because of the cultural roles that males and female begin to learn from a very early age
The differences I'm talking about are things like recognizing faces. men and women use different areas of the brain to recognize faces. How can it be cultural? people aren't taught to recognize faces differently. nor is there anything culturally that would cause them to...
 
  • #35
and like john and I pointed out, at least one of the studies was made on toddlers who couldn't even talk. (that's why they cried... the ones that did). They're young and don't have preconcieved notions about how they should behave. It's no coincidence that babies act according to the "stereotypes" or is that not proof? what kind of proof do you need now?
 
  • #36
oh... and someone said something about bats having better eyesight than humans? I'd be interested to know where you got that from... and what bats you mean (diurnal/noctural)
and... holy cow I hadn't noticed that the CNN article is recent! It's so creepy how there are periods of time when certain themes occur... like with the evolution... I was debating evolution in three sites at once. Then with racism, I had chosen to do a paper (still doing it darn it... nothing to do with black history month by the way) and that comes up. then gender differences pop up in my myth thread, another site, and the study about the brain comes up.
 
  • #37
[b said:
Quote[/b] (TheAlphaWolf @ Feb. 17 2005,2:50)]
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Also if its genetic how can you explain the fact that either sex can be taught to do exactly what the other can in terms of mental abilities, and thought processes?
because we can learn. You can teach anyone to do math but it's easier for some people than for others. and i'm not talking about differences that are HUGE. men aren't brainless idiots who can't talk and women aren't brainless idiots who get lost in their own house.
Thank you for re-enforcing my point that they are learned behaviors.

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]the brain develops differnt because of the cultural roles that males and female begin to learn from a very early age
The differences I'm talking about are things like recognizing faces. men and women use different areas of the brain to recognize faces. How can it be cultural? people aren't taught to recognize faces differently. nor is there anything culturally that would cause them to...
The face study i have never heard about, the studies i know of that were published involved things like spacial relations, ability to listen to multiple stories at once, ability to navigate(which they found was done differntly by men and women not that either was better or worse at it) and a few other mental tasks. If i you have source to site for this information i would like to see it.
 
  • #38
[b said:
Quote[/b] (TheAlphaWolf @ Feb. 17 2005,2:53)]and like john and I pointed out, at least one of the studies was made on toddlers who couldn't even talk. (that's why they cried... the ones that did). They're young and don't have preconcieved notions about how they should behave. It's no coincidence that babies act according to the "stereotypes" or is that not proof? what kind of proof do you need now?
different responses to child by parents. it has been shown in western nations that boys as they grow older get a differnt response from their parents for crying than girls do. Children learn from the minute they are born(some say earlier, but im not gonna go into that) you make it sound like they dont start learning until they start to talk, in which case it must just all of a sudden pop into a child head "oh, this is how to talk".

and im not trying to say that the difference is totally cultural either, but im saying that culture has a huge influnce on people. it is probably a some of both cultural and biological, and neither can be counted out.
 
  • #39
don't really feel like reading through four pages of re's, so here is the one myth that I hate...talking on a cell phone while pumping gas can and will make an explosion occur...yeah, some people will believe anything.
 
  • #40
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Infants have been shown to have differences in behavior at a young and tender age, preceding much environmental influence. One study reported that the least sensitive female infant may be more sensitive than even the most sensitive male. Female infants appear more sensitive to noise and are also more social. "They are more inclined to "gurgle" at people and to recognize familiar faces than baby boys" (8). The behavioral differences between infants of different sexes appear very early in life, indicating that the mechanism controlling these behavioral patterns is innate and not learned from society.
http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro03/web2/asingh.html
"random" site- http://www.womens-health.org/hs/facts_brain.htm
hmm.. I had never heard of the ability to listen to multiple stories at once study.

I can't find the link right now... I'll post it later
 
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