Australian Politics Forum - Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil

MeisterEckhart

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #105 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:02pm

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 4:35pm:

Simplistic and severely reductionist.
And the physiological reaction is not about ethno-cultural differences but general disgust/disdain - one would recoil from a bunch of unruly, aggressive scandinavian tough eggs in a dark lane and not from a group of fuzzy wuzzy angels at the battalion reunion.

Dangerousness is not exhausted by racial or ethnic characteristics. The physiology of recoiling from white or black or brindle danger would be identical. There is no physiological marker for ethnic recoil in the amygdala nor the anterior insula.

Agatha Frank (they/them) read the thread topic and OP.

No dark lane - average commercial street in your region. In your case, you can trim it back to an average commercial street in your region where the ethnic(s) are walking towards you.

And, yes, visible ethnic differences can trigger recoil in the amygdala and the anterior insula.

Without an amygdalic/anterior insula response, higher brain functions cannot register disdain, disgust... etc, just an unchanged demeanour or even friendliness, as Williams Syndrome sufferers, whose amygdals do not respond effectively to any perceived threat, exhibit.

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MeisterEckhart Gold Member Online Australian Politics Posts: 15850 Gender:	Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil Reply #106 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:03pm .
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Frank

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #107 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:32pm

MeisterEckhart wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:02pm:

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 4:35pm:

Simplistic and severely reductionist.
And the physiological reaction is not about ethno-cultural differences but general disgust/disdain - one would recoil from a bunch of unruly, aggressive scandinavian tough eggs in a dark lane and not from a group of fuzzy wuzzy angels at the battalion reunion.

Dangerousness is not exhausted by racial or ethnic characteristics. The physiology of recoiling from white or black or brindle danger would be identical. There is no physiological marker for ethnic recoil in the amygdala nor the anterior insula.

Agatha Frank (they/them) read the thread topic and OP.

No dark lane - average commercial street in your region. In your case, you can trim it back to an average commercial street in your region where the ethnic(s) are walking towards you.

And, yes, visible ethnic differences can trigger recoil in the amygdala and the anterior insula.

Without an amygdalic/anterior insula response, higher brain functions cannot register disdain, disgust... etc, just an unchanged demeanour or even friendliness, as Williams Syndrome sufferers, whose amygdals do not respond effectively to any perceived threat, exhibit.

I think it is a severely reductionist, back to front construct, like the biochemical explanations of love, religion, and other abstract values in human live - oh, it's just a hormonal, chemical process. It's like Bbwiyawn's hobby-horse of no races in DNA, ev as racial characteristics are transmitted genetically.

You - or the boffins whose research you are convinced by - reduce complex human encounters and exchanges to brain chemistry. But of course brain chemistry doesn't interpret anything. You are flogging the amygdala horse as if it actually made judgements, as if it wasn't responding to interpretations of danger and attraction, suspicion and trust and the rest.

Do you interpret a bunch of ethnics as dangerous, indifferent, attractive and then communicate that judgement to your amygdala? Are you separate from the amygdala that then controls, through neural feed back, your behavioural response? This is like a mechanical or computer model of person hood. But we are not clocks nor computers.

It is not the amygdala that responds to the bunch of ethnics but you.

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« Last Edit: Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:41pm by Frank »

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Frank Gold Member Offline Australian Politics Posts: 52590 Gender:	Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil Reply #108 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:39pm Behaving badly or well, appropriately or inappropriately - by ethnics or by you - is the result of complex and conscious moral judgements. No amount of MRI scans, biopsies or biochemical analysis of the amygdala will locate those moral judgement.
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MeisterEckhart

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #109 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:39pm

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:32pm:

MeisterEckhart wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:02pm:

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 4:35pm:

Simplistic and severely reductionist.
And the physiological reaction is not about ethno-cultural differences but general disgust/disdain - one would recoil from a bunch of unruly, aggressive scandinavian tough eggs in a dark lane and not from a group of fuzzy wuzzy angels at the battalion reunion.

Dangerousness is not exhausted by racial or ethnic characteristics. The physiology of recoiling from white or black or brindle danger would be identical. There is no physiological marker for ethnic recoil in the amygdala nor the anterior insula.

Agatha Frank (they/them) read the thread topic and OP.

No dark lane - average commercial street in your region. In your case, you can trim it back to an average commercial street in your region where the ethnic(s) are walking towards you.

And, yes, visible ethnic differences can trigger recoil in the amygdala and the anterior insula.

Without an amygdalic/anterior insula response, higher brain functions cannot register disdain, disgust... etc, just an unchanged demeanour or even friendliness, as Williams Syndrome sufferers, whose amygdals do not respond effectively to any perceived threat, exhibit.

I think it is a severely reductionist, back to front construct, like the biochemical explanations of love, religion, and other abstract values in human live - oh, it's just a hormonal, chemical process. It's like Bbwiyawn's hobby-horse of no races in DNA, ev as racial characteristics are transmitted genetically.

You - or the boffins whose research you are convinced by - reduce complex human encounters and exchanges to brain chemistry. But of course brain chemistry doesn't interpret anything. You are flogging the amygdala horse as if it actually made judgements, as if it wasn't responding to interpretations of danger and attraction, suspicion and trust and the rest.

Do you interpret a bunch of ethnics as dangerous, indifferent, attractive and then communicate that judgement to your amygdala? Are you separate from the amygdala that then controls, through neural feeds back, your behavioural response?
This is like a mechanical or computer model of person hood. But we are not clocks nor computers.

It is not the amygdala that responds to the bunch of ethnic but you.

Agatha Frank (they/them) reread the thread... It's been covered.

Neither the amygdala nor the anterior insula makes value judgments... that is done by higher brain functions responding to amygdalic/ anterior insula recoil signals of threat or pathogenic/ immoral (in humans) stimuli perceived usually through sensory organs, or persistent, intrusive memories as with PTSD.

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MeisterEckhart

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #110 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:45pm

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:39pm:

Behaving badly or well, appropriately or inappropriately - by ethnics or by you - is the result of complex and conscious moral judgements. No amount of MRI scans, biopsies or biochemical analysis of the amygdala will locate those moral judgement.

The recoil from perceiving immorality in humans is controlled by the insula... It's why we describe withessing immoral acts as 'made me sick' and the nose often cripples at the sight or thought of an immoral act.

Again, the insula doesn't make the judgment; it merely signals pathogenicity (e.g. in humans, the sight/smell of sh!t) or immorality. If you ever suffer dementia that destroys your insula, you will not be fazed by eating your own sh!t or coming on to the orderlies in the home.... so watch out!

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Frank

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #111 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:58pm

MeisterEckhart wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:39pm:

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:32pm:

MeisterEckhart wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:02pm:

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 4:35pm:

Simplistic and severely reductionist.
And the physiological reaction is not about ethno-cultural differences but general disgust/disdain - one would recoil from a bunch of unruly, aggressive scandinavian tough eggs in a dark lane and not from a group of fuzzy wuzzy angels at the battalion reunion.

Dangerousness is not exhausted by racial or ethnic characteristics. The physiology of recoiling from white or black or brindle danger would be identical. There is no physiological marker for ethnic recoil in the amygdala nor the anterior insula.

Agatha Frank (they/them) read the thread topic and OP.

No dark lane - average commercial street in your region. In your case, you can trim it back to an average commercial street in your region where the ethnic(s) are walking towards you.

And, yes, visible ethnic differences can trigger recoil in the amygdala and the anterior insula.

Without an amygdalic/anterior insula response, higher brain functions cannot register disdain, disgust... etc, just an unchanged demeanour or even friendliness, as Williams Syndrome sufferers, whose amygdals do not respond effectively to any perceived threat, exhibit.

I think it is a severely reductionist, back to front construct, like the biochemical explanations of love, religion, and other abstract values in human live - oh, it's just a hormonal, chemical process. It's like Bbwiyawn's hobby-horse of no races in DNA, ev as racial characteristics are transmitted genetically.

You - or the boffins whose research you are convinced by - reduce complex human encounters and exchanges to brain chemistry. But of course brain chemistry doesn't interpret anything. You are flogging the amygdala horse as if it actually made judgements, as if it wasn't responding to interpretations of danger and attraction, suspicion and trust and the rest.

Do you interpret a bunch of ethnics as dangerous, indifferent, attractive and then communicate that judgement to your amygdala? Are you separate from the amygdala that then controls, through neural feeds back, your behavioural response?
This is like a mechanical or computer model of person hood. But we are not clocks nor computers.

It is not the amygdala that responds to the bunch of ethnic but you.

Agatha Frank (they/them) reread the thread... It's been covered.

Neither the amygdala nor the anterior insula makes value judgments... that is done by higher brain functions responding to amygdalic/ anterior insula recoil signals of threat or pathogenic/ immoral (in humans) stimuli perceived usually through sensory organs, or persistent, intrusive memories as with PTSD.

Without moral judgement this entire thread is meaningless. Moral judgements is at the very core of it.

Whether you recoil reflexively from imminent danger - and large stone flying through the air towards you - or you recoil from something that requires a moral, value interpretation - it's a bunch of rowdy black with machetes over there, not a group of silver haired nuns singing carols - is the result of interpreting and evaluating what you are encountering. You are not a puppet of your amygdala nor of your anterior insula. Not even of your homunculus, lodged in your pineal gland, the little rascal.

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Frank Gold Member Offline Australian Politics Posts: 52590 Gender:	Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil Reply #112 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:04pm Incommensurate. Also a category mistake. Moral judgement is not made by biochemical processes. Values are not chemical and are not reducible to boochemistry. You can change your values. You cannot change your response to an electric current in your amygdala or your testes.
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MeisterEckhart

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #113 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:09pm

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:58pm:

Without moral judgement this entire thread is meaningless. Moral judgements is at the very core of it.

Whether you recoil reflexively from imminent danger - and large stone flying through the air towards you - or you recoil from something that requires a moral, value interpretation - it's a bunch of rowdy black with machetes over there, not a group of silver haired nuns singing carols - is the result of interpreting and evaluating what you are encountering. You are not a puppet of your amygdala nor of your anterior insula. Not even of your homunculus, lodged in your pineal gland, the little rascal.

Agatha Frank (they/them) reread the thread. It's been covered.

The topic is not about blacks with machetes, nor nuns, or dark lanes or psychotic Scandinavians or effeminate African choir boys, it's about the sight of ethnics.

The higher brain functions cannot process fear, anger or disgust without the amygdala/anterior insula first triggering them.

That's true even when with memory recall... the amygdala/ insula will be retriggered by the memory, which is what happens pathologically with PTSD.

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MeisterEckhart

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #114 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:15pm

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:04pm:

Incommensurate. Also a category mistake.
Moral judgement is not made by biochemical processes. Values are not chemical and are not reducible to boochemistry.
You can change your values. You cannot change your response to an electric current in your amygdala or your testes.

Wait till you have dementia that has destroyed your insula when you're chowing down on a turd while exposing yoursef to an orderly in the home... something for you to look forward to, eh, Agatha Frank (they/them)...

Yes, you can train yourself not to respond to amygdalic/insula recoil... so, go out and make as many friends as you can with Aboriginals, Africans, subcontinentals (specifically Pakistanis) and Middle Easterners (specifically Arabs)...

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MeisterEckhart

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #115 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 7:02pm

MeisterEckhart wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:09pm:

That's true even when with memory recall... the amygdala/ insula will be retriggered by the memory, which is what happens pathologically with PTSD.

That's another point about the role of the amygdala...

With normal brain functioning, over time, a memory is uncoupled from the amygdala, which is why painful or threatening memories lessen in their emotional intensity over time, so long as similar experiences don't reinforce them.

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Frank

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #116 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 7:25pm

MeisterEckhart wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:09pm:

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 5:58pm:

Without moral judgement this entire thread is meaningless. Moral judgements is at the very core of it.

Whether you recoil reflexively from imminent danger - and large stone flying through the air towards you - or you recoil from something that requires a moral, value interpretation - it's a bunch of rowdy black with machetes over there, not a group of silver haired nuns singing carols - is the result of interpreting and evaluating what you are encountering. You are not a puppet of your amygdala nor of your anterior insula. Not even of your homunculus, lodged in your pineal gland, the little rascal.

Agatha Frank (they/them) reread the thread. It's been covered.

The topic is not about blacks with machetes, nor nuns, or dark lanes or psychotic Scandinavians or effeminate African choir boys, it's about the sight of ethnics.

The higher brain functions cannot process fear, anger or disgust without the amygdala/anterior insula first triggering them.

That's true even when with memory recall... the amygdala/ insula will be retriggered by the memory, which is what happens pathologically with PTSD.

You do not see ethnics.

It is not a value free perception like an open palm/stone/bird coming rapidly towards your face.

Ethnics is a moral judgement. Socio-cultural Other is a moral judgement. You cannot MRI scans for it or electrically stimulate the amygdala for it.

Your theory is a compartmentalising, reductionist model. But there is no model for being human. Not mechanical, not cybernetic, not biochemical. They are ALL incomplete. You cant model moral, value judgements, they are irreducible to mechanics.

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Frank

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #117 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 7:30pm

MeisterEckhart wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:15pm:

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 6:04pm:

Incommensurate. Also a category mistake.
Moral judgement is not made by biochemical processes. Values are not chemical and are not reducible to boochemistry.
You can change your values. You cannot change your response to an electric current in your amygdala or your testes.

Wait till you have dementia that has destroyed your insula when you're chowing down on a turd while exposing yoursef to an orderly in the home... something for you to look forward to, eh, Agatha Frank (they/them)...

Yes, you can train yourself not to respond to amygdalic/insula recoil... so, go out and make as many friends as you can with Aboriginals, Africans, subcontinentals (specifically Pakistanis) and Middle Easterners (specifically Arabs)...

You like to start out all learned but then very quickly descend into snarling buggerwittery when you encounter disagreement. Is that your amygdala or anterior insula - or you?
Are you snarling because you want to or is it not really you as you but your amygdala?

Please explain.

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MeisterEckhart

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Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil
Reply #118 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 7:40pm

Frank wrote on Jul 4^th, 2025 at 7:25pm:

You do not see ethnics.

It is not a value free perception like an open palm/stone/bird coming rapidly towards your face.

Ethnics is a moral judgement. Socio-cultural Other is a moral judgement. You cannot MRI scans for it or electrically stimulate the amygdala for it.

Your theory is a compartmentalising, reductionist model. But there is no model for being human. Not mechanical, not cybernetic, not biochemical. They are ALL incomplete. You cant model moral, value judgements, they are irreducible to mechanics.

And this thread is not about ethics or the establishment of values or morals... how many more pages will it take before you comprehend that?

The amygdala sends a pre-conscious recoil signal to warn of a threat. The anterior insula sends a pre-conscious recoil signal to warn of pathogenicity and, in humans, immorality.

And the response from higher brain functions is not instant... the limbic response from the amygdala/insula is.

It's why if you hear a loud bang near you while walking in the street, you will instantly cower without needing to think it out.

It's why when you see a person of an ethnicity perceived as a threat coming towards you while walking in the street, you will likely feel tension in your body.

What your higher brain functions do with that recoil signal after the fact is another subject.

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Frank Gold Member Offline Australian Politics Posts: 52590 Gender:	Re: Instinctive Ethnocultural Recoil Reply #119 - Jul 4^th, 2025 at 7:41pm Analyse this for ethnic cultural recoil. Call an amygdala if you must.
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