MikeSamsa

Part of the problem here is that even if testosterone had absolutely no effect on aggression at all, we would still see people taking testosterone injections acting more aggressive. Why? Because the common belief is that testosterone will make you more aggressive. Give them saline and tell them it's testosterone and they'll start bumping people in the street as well.

To test whether there is an actual effect going on here, they'd need to look at what how two different groups of FtM transsexuals respond when one is placed on a placebo, and one given testosterone. The article linked to by Gwern discusses this effect of perception on behavior:

Folk wisdom holds that testosterone causes

Then "human behaviour is predictable" doesn't apply to life in general.

Yes it does since we know that human behavior is predictable. Scientists don't need to add "in controlled environments" because that's necessarily the case. Nothing, absolutely nothing, is predictable in uncontrolled environments. So if you're saying that human behavior is unpredictable because it can't be predicted in uncontrolled environments, then you've simply defined human behavior (and everything) as being unpredictable. How did you describe this kind of argument? "And 11 fingered people have 11 fingers"?

Predictability in controlled experiments isn't taken by physicists to prove a sweeping statement like "the universe is predictable". Some physical system are well known to be unpredictable.

Your analogy... (read more)

It ipredicts where it predicts and doesn't where it doesn't. If you are going to ask whether something is predictable without adding any riders about to what extent,and under what circumstances , the quesiton would reasonably be taken to apply in the raw, to "free range" behaviour. I would not be taken to mean "under controlled circumsrtances"

All science only makes predictions within controlled circumstances. If you booby-trapped a billiards table, so there were unknown valleys and crests on the surface of the table, you wouldn't disprove physics because suddenly a physicist can't predict the motion of a billiard ball.

In uncontrolled circumstances our predictions become less accurate because there are literally millions of... (read 389 more words →)

Your example is a bit absurd - why would the prediction of human behavior necessarily entail the prediction of behavior in a completely uncontrolled environment, with near-to-zero information on any relevant variables?

Your question is comparable to asking: If physics was so good at predicting the movement of physical bodies, then why can't it predict earthquakes? If it can't predict when an earthquake will occur, then it is not successful at predicting the movement of physical bodies.

The point is that we know that humans are incredibly predictable. The reason why humans appear to be unpredictable is simply a product of the vast number of unknown variables acting upon us at any given... (read more)