It'll be interesting to see your views on this. I'm in a bit of a philosophical mood today, so I was just thinking about what makes a personality and how much of this is influenced by external factors. Are we already fully formed and comprehensive people on the inside, which experience only uncovers, or are we just a function of relationships and events that happen to us and shape us? Personally I think that while we possess some qualities which can make us more inclined to certain things (such as talents, preferences, etc.), much of the fundamental aspects of our personalities - like values, worldview, social behaviour - can be heavily influenced by things like education, culture, society and our relationships. So I would say that although we're naturally inclined to certain preferences and abilities more than others, so at least a notable part of personality is innate, a great deal of the more intellectual/perceiving side of our personality is shaped by the kind of assumptions we encounter in learning and through other people. Also in addition to this that our personalities flourish most when they interact with others (so you might say that has some communitarian implications). So, what do you guys think about how much external factors shape our personalities?
I feel like this has to be explained to a certain extent with science, but I don't know anything that could back it up. I'd say a large majority is external, but there's got to be some disposition since it had to have started somewhere. I think it's all a result of evolution. We seek pleasure and variation can affect what that entails, but the rest external. I don't know how much is intrinsic and I don't think anyone ever can.
To keep this as short as possible: Personally speaking, it comes down to experience. If I am told or asked to believe something, but discover it doesn't work and something else does, well, fuck it, it's time to change the tactics. But one could say, that willingness to adapt is innate...
I do think a lot can be influenced but on a hole you have to work at it so it also to do with self motivation
I believe it's largely innate, because you can take two people who had similar experiences and ended up very different from each other. For example, both my mother and my paternal grandmother grew up in poor families with lack of a good male role model. They are extremely different. My grandmother is very materialistic and my mother is not at all. My grandmother judges people on obvious accomplishments and my mother isn't that shallow.
I've always wondered this too, but I feel like I don't really have much of a personality these days. Or at least not a particularly interesting one, who knows. So yeah, I'd also like to know how much of our personalities are innate, and if I even have one. Yeah...
I think you can build your own personality, if you're observant and adaptive. I dunno, though, everyone isn't like me.
Our minds consistent of three different entities. You could say that you have three different minds that work in unison. We can call those different entities the predisposed mine, the conditioned mind, and the rational mind. The predisposed mind is the least diverse form of the overall mind. Over ninety percent of our predisposed minds are all the same. There is, of course, the minority percentage of that we differ slightly when it comes down to innate prowess or marginal genetic influence. Then we have the conditioned mind which is created after birth and as we become socialized in the world around us. No matter how hipster, unique, or indifferent to society we believe that we are we all have a very lively conditioned mind. There is no way around it. Likewise, even when we believe that we are nothing like those that we were raised around, our conditioned mindsets are close to exact replicates of those individuals. "But if we know that the personality and mind are not predisposed because all people don't grown into the same person regardless of genetics and we know that all people don't who experienced the same socialization or condition to become the same people either, then how has is psychological diversity primarily created?" It all comes down to that rational mind. It is the rational mind, sometimes called the 'ego' in text, that takes our innate instincts, generic outlines, and dispositions and our social learning and influences and breaks it all together to determine how we think, behavior, reason, etc. You can essentially see the rational mind as a student working on a creative project. We all receive the same or similar instructions, but the way that we interpret and prioritize the information that we receive always differs. Our rational mind manages all sectors of the mind and determines what it is going to take from each, what influences it trusts and what influences it doesn't trust, what are we going to value, how are we going to behavior based on these factors, etc. Our core beliefs and personalities are always comparable for that reason. They are both products of what our rational feels is important (Optimism/Pessimism, Conformity/Individualism, Interdependence/Independence, etc).
My perception is that our brains develops itself the most when we're younger, sensitive to outer stimuli (both physical and non-physical), constructing our very unique neural network in the brain that'll be unique to each one of us. According to only that point of view, two people that'll go through the same stimulis in life will come out as the same person. I don't BELIEVE its true (can't really test it can we), because.... : 1) quantum mechanics (randomness) 2) initial conditions (brain is starting to construct when we're in the womb, how and why i dont think science has the answer to yet)
I suppose the conditioned mind could be. Modified, for example by a change of enviroment or a change in the people who surround us ¿yes?
Reminds me somehow of the question "What makes us human" and that reminds me of the lyrics of an Aesthetic Perfection song/intro: "What makes us human? Are we so different from everything else? Is there anything inside us that makes us truly unique? Is it the ability to feel love? Is it the ability to feel pain? Is it the ability to feel hope? Is it the ability to make our own choices, accepting our own mistakes? Am I who I am because I chose to be? Or am I just a simple combination of random events? Would you still be the same person if you had not lived your life exactly as you did? Has every minor element of your life helped to shape who you are today? Do we have enough control to design the person we want to be? What is it that makes us choose? What makes you change? What makes you human?" Basically in this lyrics you find pretty similar questions about personality and about what makes us the person we are and if we have a choice or not. I think that "the basics" are innately given - such as some preferences, talents, if you're more an introverted or extroverted type, etc. On the other side I think that everything external may have an influence on the personality. Culture, education, society, the surroundings you grow up in, relationships to parents, friends, lovers... Everything we experience helps forming our personalities. Due to that I'm also a fan of second chances, because I think that people can change to a certain extent.
As long as we are still relatively young when we change environments. Our minds become much more stubborn as we age.
I think it's a combination of conscious and unconscious things that is a combination of nature and nurture. For example, I would be inclined to believe that Aspergers gave me most of my eccentricity, and life experiences have had a hand in shaping the person I am today.
