Human malleability itself depends on evolved neurobiological structures

Evidence

The conception of humans as an agentic, malleable species does not mean that they have no nature (Midgley, 1978) or that they come struc-tureless and biologically limitless. Quite the opposite is true. Changeability, which is intrinsic to the nature of humans, depends on specialized neurophysiological structures and mechanisms that have evolved over time. These advanced neural systems are specialized for channeling attention, detect-ing causal structures in the outside world, transforming information into abstract representations, and integrating and using knowledge for adaptive purposes. These evolved information-processing systems provide the capacity for the very agentic characteristics that are distinctly human—generative symbolization, symbolic communication, forethought, self-regulation, and reflective self-consciousness. Neither the agentic human ascendancy in the coevolution process nor the rapid transformational societal changes we see today would be possible without the biological endowment of abstract cognitive capabilities. — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 190

Categorization

• DEFINE: Bandura reframes the nature/nurture debate: changeability is itself biologically grounded — a ‘nature’ that consists in the capacity for transformation.
• XREF: Resonates with the nature-as-capacity theme threaded through the reader’s interest in biological determinism vs. social construction.