Radcliffe Dean's Lecture - Asquith Hall (Longfellow
Hall), Radcliffe College, Cambridge, MA -- 7 April 2005 - 4:30 pm

Abstract:

Conceptions of innateness, and of a meaningful distinction between innate
and acquired, between nature and nurture, are so widespread as to seem to
many to belong to a universal folk-biology.  It has even been suggested
that such distinctions are the products of a hard-wired (i.e., innate)
mental module, a feature of human biology programmed in our genetic makeup,
and serious research efforts are being made at identifying and clarifying
the nature of such a module.  But what if our attribution of innateness to
such generic tendencies is itself an expression of those tendencies?  When
scientists claim that the distinction between innate and acquired is itself
innate, are they speaking as scientists or just as ordinary folk, caught up
in their own folk biology?
Questions about innate and acquired, about nature and nurture, are not only
highly charged but also, I will argue, subject to such intrinsic confusion
that it may not be possible to address (let alone answer) them scientifically.