A New Theory on Human Behavior, Chapter 1.

"What differences us from animals is our rational will, our capacity to differenciate and prefer good over evil".

"Animals dont act motivated by bad intentions, humans do".

I have heard and read these two ideas, obviously antagonic, several times along my lifetime, and they have always called on my attention. 

I have asked myself several times: In human behavior, which is the last factor in decision making, his rationality, or his animal instinct? Are these factors contributing differently in different circumstances?

The concepts of good and bad are connatural to human beings.

They are profoundly rooted in all aspects of social life, along our history on earth, and throughout all cultures. The concepts of justice, rights and responsibilities, appropiate social behavior, etc , are tought to children from very early in their lives, with the purpose of raising them in a way that will produce people that, ideally, will respect and make respect these good ways of life, for the benefit of each one of them and society as a whole.

Religions, on their part, are also based in a very strong valoric structure, and promote behavior towards good and against evil, and at all times encourage their followers towards the path of virtue, and, if possible, very far from the path of sin, promising different types of rewards for those who respect their commandments, and punishment for the others.

As we can see, there is a very important valoric foundation in the different societies, that aims to achieve a certain order, both in individual and social behavior, that is necessary because although we may be naturally inclined to good, we dont always follow it.

Are we not, then, so naturally inclined towards good and right?

The fear of human punishment (courts of law and jail) and divine punishment, final trial and different types of hell, according to each religion, are an important factor to disuade many people who could be "tempted" to incline towards evil or the illegal, and it is a known fact that some humans are capable of the most terrible atrocities when no law or order prevails.

Even when coercitive systems exist, and law and order is enforced, there is a variable number of people that go for the abusive, the illegal, and trespass others rights. And they are more concerned about their conduct not being revealed to society than to refrain, and of course, very concerned of evading the punishments that they could deserve.

Why is it that there are assasins, rapists, pedofiles, thiefs, swindlers, unfaithful husbands, driving psycopaths, wealth pretenders, etc, among those many "less inclined" to the good and right?

What makes that in a wealthy and high society family, suddenly appears a "black sheep", with extreme revolutionary ideas, that could take him even to risk his own life in following his quest? 

Why, in the opposite side, are there people born in very poor and deprived families, who feel very comfortable in absolutely unequal societies, join right wing parties and support powerful economic groups? 

Up to the second half of the 20th century, psychiatry was a medical speciality that studied “mental illness” and “mental disorders” through an almost purely psychological perspective, rather than an organic or biological one. Many different psychiatric schools appeard, most of which studied their patients with a purely mental approach and designed their therapies using only empiric criteria, which lead to select different therapeutic tools, that could include psychotherapy, electroshock, tranquilizers, depressant or stimulant drugs, according to the diagnosis of each patient and the effects that the psychiatrist wanted to achieve. 

Each day more, with the approach of the 21st century and the development of neuropsychiatry and all the highly technological tools that have come to contribute to neuroscience, more scientists and doctors have recognized the importance of studying the organic substrate of mental illness, both at the systemic and brain levels. This is so because each day it appears harder to believe that there can coexist a healthy brain with an ill mind.

All the precedent considerations, and the questions that come along with them, have been suggesting me, in a progressively stronger way, the need to search for a theoretical alternative that can achieve a better and more rational explanation for this dilemma: why things happen the way we see them day by day, and, in doing so, make more understandable the apparent inconsequences that characterize human life, some of which have been presented here.

It is my belief today that not only physical characteristics of an individual are determined genetically, but that the achievable IQ, and the psychological drives and tendencies of each person also have a genetic origin.

Thus, genetics could not only determine the appearence, size, strength, resistance to illness of a person, but also his drives towards human values. Sense of justice, responsibillity, respect for the rights of others, honesty, audacity, sexual preferences, political positioning, religiousness, etc, would all, among many others, have a genetic origin, while the participation of the environment would be of lesser importance than what is normally accepted.

This theory has the potential virtue of allowing us to advance in the understanding of many facts that havent been, up to now, fully explained by science or religion, but, at the same time, weakens the strength of concepts like good and bad as pure and undeniable entities in which we have traditionally based our valoric structure, along with our so far unchallenged “absolute free will”, concept that today appears to me as beautiful and idealistic as untrue.

As the enormous advance in DNA study goes on, and as the possibility of approaching the fully understanding of the intimate mechanisms of brain function comes nearer, a new path is being opened: that of studying our genetic codes not only to explain our organic constitution, towards the understanding and cure of illness, but also the study of genetic patterns linked to cerebral and behavioral patterns. The immense perspective of this can not be fully imagined right now, but we can certainly begin to dream…and get concerned about its implications.

Jorge Lizama León.

January, 2011, Santiago, Chile.

Note: this is a translation of the original first article on this subject published by me in spanish, in july 2006, at http://conductahumana.blogspot.com where it is still available.