Lack of confidence is not a chemical imbalance. What gene? What is the evidence for that? When I was young almost all males asked women out regularly; now very few do. Have genetics changed that much in a few decades?
Genes encoding the sensitivity and baseline density of specific receptors are a pretty basic, recurring mechanism for genetic personality differences. The
DRD2 gene determines the sensitivity of the D2 receptor, for one, the weak expression of which is linked to social anxiety.
Anyway, evidence of differences in confidence that are most likely not genetic in nature is not evidence
against differences in confidence that are. I never said that nothing
else affected it.
People have done a lot of things for thousands of years: slavery, surgery without anesthesia, not bathing. Not sure how that bolsters your argument. Yes, we have more sophisticated ways to drug ourselves these days, but I personally experienced a world where most people interacted socially with each other daily without drugs, including dating. Almost everyone found someone to date. Because they tried. If a half-way attractive young woman left the house, at least two men would approach her every day. That had a bad side, for sure, but clearly, people are capable of much higher levels of social courage than they have now. These are the parents of today's young people, so they have the same "genetics."
That's delightfully idealistic, but somewhat beside the point. You said that people have been trying to increase confidence through drugs for thousands of years, and getting mostly bad results. I said that they didn't try very intelligently compared to what we're capable of today. That doesn't help my case outright, but it does counter your argument against it.
I'm also not sure that keeping people from having to think about what they're doing by firmly establishing behavioural patterns and social roles through cultural norms counts as improving social courage in general. You'd have to measure that against an equal mix of familiar and unfamiliar social challenges. I doubt people from that generation would've done half as well at, Iunno, asking directions from a drag queen, or maintaining a reasonable working relationship with a woman who didn't accept their at-that-time suggested role in society.
Lazy? Where do you get that? Pretty insulting. And weird.
You're discounting a whole scientific discipline worth of approaches to a problem, without having exhausted or even
tried any of its options, on account of your general preference for another discipline. That is lazy at best; quite possibly outright prejudist.
Look forward to the information on which "gene" is responsible for social courage. This generation does have less testosterone but to reduce this problem to chemistry seems like an avoidance mechanism. No matter how crisply and pseudo-scientifically people here talk about bio-chemistry, I recognize a giant flight from emotional issues.
Testosterone
is chemistry, on one of its levels. Avoidance
might be one motivation for seeking it there, but genuine curiosity and sound reasoning lead there just as well, and it's just plain unsporting to accuse people of unflattering motivations when justifiable ones are available to explain their choices all the same.
Anyway, there's absolutely no reason why neurological and psychological approaches can't
both be used towards objectives like increasing confidence. They're not competitive in any way other than the sheer limit on time we have available to invest in the problem, and generally highly synergistic when combined.
Edited by Raza, 25 July 2012 - 07:43 PM.