tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5813525365834911757.post923053987737307367..comments2023-11-05T01:53:40.235-06:00Comments on the Hipcrime Vocab: The Neurochemistry of AmericansUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5813525365834911757.post-25886899175749446862012-12-13T04:04:21.365-06:002012-12-13T04:04:21.365-06:00This comment has been removed by the author.rajnihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06444939579267581761noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5813525365834911757.post-7317672817725305922012-12-02T12:11:33.554-06:002012-12-02T12:11:33.554-06:00@ Dave, thanks Mr. Roosevelt!
@ villageblog - The...@ Dave, thanks Mr. Roosevelt!<br /><br />@ villageblog - The difference between the U.S. and New Zealand, I think, is that the United States attracted people who wanted to get rich and make it big, since it was a rising industrial power with almost unlimited potential. "The streets are paved with gold" was the nineteenth-century saying. It was a winner-take-all society then too, which is why it attracted such risk junkies, with the success stories broadcasted worldwide.<br /><br />Correct me if I'm wrong, but NZ is still more rural and agricultural that industrial, comparatively speaking. I suspect NZ attracted the type of people America attracted before the Great Wave of immigration from 1850-1910 moved Europe's entire peasant class across the Atlantic Ocean - people who marched to the beat of a different drummer. That is, people who wanted to get away from the existing power structures but were not looking to make a killing by climbing over everyone else. Early America before the Civil War attracted much the same sort of people, which is why most still think America's character is fundamentally anticonformist and freedom-loving in the manner of De Toqueville. But industrialism caused a divergence, I maintain, and now we're under the thumb of greedy dopamine-addled fortune seekers rather than what we started as.<br /><br />@ Ian: Good observations. I think you're fundamentally correct that novelty is a substitution for meaning. This is encouraged by our economic system which constantly needs to encourage dissatisfaction with every aspect of our lives. The lack of meaning in our work is well explored in a book called "Shop Class as Soulcraft" that you may want to check out. I don't know if I entirely buy Sheldrake, but the emerging field of epigenetics seems to be confirming some of his ideas - specifically that the environment shapes gene expression to a large extent.<br /><br />My contention with this post, however, is simply to indicate that there is a <i>biological</i> basis for certain behaviors, and that these biological traits are disproportionately represented in certain populations due to historical circumstances. I still think that's true.escapefromwisconsinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02369565788469048090noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5813525365834911757.post-84914544988686522072012-12-01T17:06:46.548-06:002012-12-01T17:06:46.548-06:00If you subscribe to Sheldrake then DNA doesn't...If you subscribe to Sheldrake then DNA doesn't dictate form. It only provides the building blocks for it and alters probability. Even though we Americans may be *predisposed* to that sort of behavior it ultimately boils down to something else.<br /><br />And that something else, I would argue is Addiction. And my definition of an addiction is a compulsive self-treatment of symptoms that does not address the root cause of the symptoms. E.G. Using alcohol to treat the pain *symptoms* of grief.<br /><br />I think Americans are heavily predisposed to using Novelty as a drug to treat the symptom known as boredom. And I believe that boredom is a symptom of the root cause of a lack of meaning in one's life. <br /><br />The point being here, is that addictions can be overcome, even when one has a predisposition to them. I just did a blog post on this very subject before I read this. <br /><br />http://patriotearth.blogspot.com/2012/11/boredom-or-novelty-addiction.htmlIanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09952905475502990962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5813525365834911757.post-23011980205538695302012-12-01T14:47:41.319-06:002012-12-01T14:47:41.319-06:00Nah, sorry mate but I'm from New Zealand - the...Nah, sorry mate but I'm from New Zealand - the last country in the new world to be 'properly settled and civilised' and we're nothing like that. There are similarities but I think they have more to do with the amount of American TV we watch.<br /><br />We have a phrase down here; "only in America" which we use (with an espression of bemused wonderment) every time we hear of another episode of unusually extreme behaviour from your part of the world.<br /><br />I tend to think the things you discuss are the result of distortions in reality caused by the heavy concentration of power in the US. Because there is so much power the efforts to distract through entertainment, create a strong sense of fear and confuse through a remarkably useless media are the strongest in the world. Added to that the higher levels of corruption that extreme amounts of power attract and I think that's your explanation for a lot of the weirdness going on up your way.<br /><br />I'm not saying we've got it all sorted in NZ - far from it - but because we're a little country, with not many people, in a forgotten part of the world it's not so important to keep us confused and distracted.<br /><br />Sure, both countries were settled by people of adventurous and independant spirits but Chonsky et al have explained the considerable efforts made to wipe that characteristic out of the populace and I'd have to say it's been pretty effective down here too.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5813525365834911757.post-58512887488927669722012-11-28T16:20:21.204-06:002012-11-28T16:20:21.204-06:00Don't worry, the only thing we have to fear is...Don't worry, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.Davehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09282324002827440263noreply@blogger.com