What is Gabor Mate’s alternative explanation for the problems of children like Isabelle?

 a) What is Gabor Mate’s alternative explanation for the problems of children like Isabelle?

 b) Show how Mate’s theory/explanation can be applied to Isabelle’s specific case (in other words, translate his general theory into what we know about Isabelle’s social context (meaning her relation to other people and groups, and the history of those relations.)  c)  Give some features, or processes at work in the social world (social context) in which Isabelle’s parents and relatives operate which might create pressures and stresses on them, pressures that are easily communicated to children.  So should we put all blame on the parents?

6. What is your own list of the most pressing problems of our time (my list is on page 18)?

Why do these (sometimes ponderous sounding) issues matter?

7.  Throughout this essay (especially section V and VI), a number of other issues or problems are referred to (like the housing bubble, schizophrenia, etc. etc.) which could be explained either reductionistically, or more holistically (by social context.)  a) Pick  any one of these issues, or one of your own. Explain what the issue or problem is.  Show what an explanation that reduces the answer to a biological factor, or to some form of biological determinism, would look like.

b) Where would you look for a more holistic explanation?

8. a) Pick one other issue or problem that is often explained not by something biological this time, but by putting all the weight of explanation on the individual, or to individual or group mental characteristics (or to some other partof a larger social whole, like those shown in the circles just before page 9.  What issue have you chosen?  b) What would, or does, a more reductionistic explanation look like?  What part of what whole is being used to explain something?  What is missing from such an explanation?  What would a more holistic explanation look like and include?  c) What is wrong with explaining our huge wealth gaps in the US by “greed,” or with explaining Iran’s governmental actions by religion (see especially pages 12, 13, and 14)?