The idea of bio-sociology that culture and biology are inseparable can be shown to be true on some occasions in the human life. Nature of an individual has the potential adaptive characteristics for some different behaviours. The behaviour of an individual will be affected either negatively or positively by the type of environment the individual is found in. A child exposed to criminal activities in his/her early life will be tempted to enter into that life to adapt to what his/she sees as normal life and way of doing things. Biology and culture are a mirror image of each other. All human biological traits were chosen for them by the cultures that existed in the past. Human culture reflects their human biological wants in the society. From these, we can tell that the human traits that were seen undesirable in the society were not allowed to be passed from one generation to another. With time, the bad human traits were exterminated along the way. Every individual in the culture must live according to the culture's demands and requirements. Those individuals who go against the norms of the culture will be punished or excommunicated. Culture has overtaken biology in our ongoing evolution. Culture being the overall understanding of ourselves as humans, both as individuals and as the society has overtaken biology in our evolution. The religion, stories, language and the rituals of the society is a dynamic aspect as it changes all through. They way humans behalf themselves in the environment they are found in changes each time but biology changes slowly each time. The norms of the past societies are not what is being considered normal in the current societies. The human biology has existed unchanged for centuries and if there are any changes they are so minimal. This aspect has resulted in biology being overtaken by culture. Human beings are born unfinished. Biologically humans are complete when born but as a whole, they still need culture to mould them into a whole being. Individuals will be guided by the certain circumstances found in the environment they are in. The culture will determine the behaviours of all individuals in it (Petryszak, 11).
Many have shown that criminality is a hereditary behaviour. It shows that the human genes carry many behaviours that are inherited from their ancestors all along through their parents. According to Lombroso, whom according to many is regarded as the father of criminology, says that it is the nature of an individual to commit a crime. It has been established that criminals have a few specific traits and features. As per the Darwin theory, humans evolved from animals, and their genes have mutated through many generations. Darwin tells us that some humans are predisposed to criminality, and they are not in any way the same species as the human-beings. Criminals are made through the tough conditions they go through in their lives. Committing crime gradually grows in the person over time due to certain circumstances that life throws the person to. Certain things such as child abuse make one a criminal. Children who were abused earlier in their lives are likely to be criminals as they grow because of the hatred and pain they have lived with over time. They don't know how to handle this hate, and they see the only way to it is to be violent. Parents can stop their children from being criminals by being close to them and stop from being exposed to criminal activities, protect them from abusers (Gottschall, 44).
Poverty affects human nature as it develops negatively. Poverty means that the basic human needs are not fulfilled, and this is dangerous in the development of human nature. In the hierarchy of needs by Maslow, it says that when the basic needs of an individual are not meet then the individual will act in a way to counter the threat sensed in the process. Some of these individuals will see stealing and rob as the only option to meet the basic needs not met. Poverty also threatens the self-esteem of an individual and these will make them act and behave in certain weird ways to enable them to live certain lifestyles that will restore these. Individuals might go for criminal activities if that will make them achieve the good balance between good life and poverty-stricken life (Gottschall, 23).
Works cited
Gottschall, Jonathan. "The tree of knowledge and Darwinian literary study." Philosophy and Literature 27.2 (2003): 255-268.
Petryszak, Nicholas. "The biosociology of the social self." The Sociological Quarterly 20.2 (1979): 291-303.Spradlin, Wilford W., and Patricia B. Porterfield. Human biosociology: from cell to culture. Springer Science & Business Media, 2012.
