Are Babies Born Good Essay

Are Babies Born Good Essay? The question on whether babies are born good or are made good is an incredibly deep question that was thought to have been too difficult to test, due to their inability to communicate efficiently and limited ability to express thoughts and feelings. This packet gives shocking information about how this question has been addressed using processes of observation and experimentation, exploring the idea on whether or not babies are able to make “ethical judgments,” and then whether the baby is born with these abilities. Throughout the packet, different experiments such as Crackerz and Big Mother Study helped show that these experiments were incredibly effective in exposing that fact that babies have a very good chance in being born with and altruistic attitude. The packet then continues to talk about the plethora of criticism that this hypothesis has undergone, including New Zealand’s attempt to recreate the experiment and saying that it failed. The packet as a whole was a very interesting read and proposes some very serious questions. Two passages that really stood out as being significant were: The ball pit incident and the helper and the “Crackerz” experiment. First the experiment: the psychologist students at Yale University had a small puppet scene that babies would watch where a puppet would attempt to open a box and either another puppet would come and slam it shut, or a puppet would come and assist the struggling puppet in opening the box. This would be repeated six times so the baby could absorb what it was seeing, and then the “good guy” puppet and the “bad guy” puppet would each offer the baby a graham cracker. Babies consistently picked the cracker from the good puppet. The significance in the experiment lies in the nature of how it was done and the remarkable results that came with it. Crackerz was a very simple, primitive experiment that depicted of a scene that required a very young baby (12-13 months) to focus and process