Stephen Jay Gould Quote
Errors of reductionism and biodeterminism take over in such silly statements as Intelligence is 60 percent genetic and 40 percent environmental. A 60 percent (or whatever) heritability for intelligence means no such thing. We shall not get this issue straight until we realize that the interactionism we all accept does not permit such statements as Trait x is 29 percent environmental and 71 percent genetic. When causative factors (more than two, by the way) interact so complexly, and throughout growth, to produce an intricate adult being, we cannot, in principle, parse that being’s behavior into quantitative percentages of remote root causes. The adult being is an emergent entity who must be understood at his own level and in his own totality. The truly salient issues are malleability and flexibility, not fallacious parsing by percentages. A trait may be 90 percent heritable, yet entirely malleable.
Errors of reductionism and biodeterminism take over in such silly statements as Intelligence is 60 percent genetic and 40 percent environmental. A 60 percent (or whatever) heritability for intelligence means no such thing. We shall not get this issue straight until we realize that the interactionism we all accept does not permit such statements as Trait x is 29 percent environmental and 71 percent genetic. When causative factors (more than two, by the way) interact so complexly, and throughout growth, to produce an intricate adult being, we cannot, in principle, parse that being’s behavior into quantitative percentages of remote root causes. The adult being is an emergent entity who must be understood at his own level and in his own totality. The truly salient issues are malleability and flexibility, not fallacious parsing by percentages. A trait may be 90 percent heritable, yet entirely malleable.