Re: "Cross-specifically" - with an example added

Robert Snower (rs222@WORLDNET.ATT.NET)
Fri, 26 Jul 1996 20:13:42 +0000

At 06:07 PM 7/26/96 +0000, Ronald Kephart wrote:
>In message <199607251413.KAA14688@sumter.awod.com> "Jesse S. Cook III" writes:
>
>> I would not consider the maternal instinct to protect offspring as
>> altruistic behavior, even in humans; it is clearly adaptive.
>
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The sociobiologists do not consider the maternal instinct as altruistic
behavior either. But your phrase "(because) even in humans it is clearly
adaptive" would not make any sense to them, because altruistic behavior can
be adaptive.

RS
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>I, for one, wonder there is in fact such a thing as a "maternal instinct."
Does
>anyone else have a problem with this?
>
>Ron Kephart

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There was a long story on National Public Radio this morning, someone just
told me, to the effect that they have just discovered a gene in mice which
turns their maternal instinct on and off. When normal, on, when altered,
off. The fellow who told me thinks the people were from Harvard and Emory.

Best wishes. R. Snower rs222@worldnet.att.net