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[at-l] Hiking Gene

    No offense to the theory of a hiking gene, there may be one, but I 
doubt that it is specifically to drive you to hike.  There are genes 
that make you more adventurous (supposedly) and probably ones that make 
you more likely to hike, by affecting other pyschological features of 
your personality.  These would probably make you more of an explorer and 
that sort of thing.  So, in short, the desire to hike could also be 
caused by a variety of genes.  Also, a variety of psychological factors 
come into play when one talks about things that they like to do.  One 
whole side of my family hunts and camps and fishes and so on almost 
constantly.  I think that I'm the only hardcore backpacker in my family, 
although my brother has done a few good trips, so that makes 2.  When we 
were children we went camping all of the time.  So I became accustomed 
to spending a good deal of time outdoors.  I didn't find that I was 
really drawn to hiking until I was in Boy Scouts, like when I was 12.  
By the time you are 12, a lot of stuff has happened to your psychology 
that affects it forever.  Whats more, I see a variety of people in 
Scouting, who in their early youths did not camp very much, or at all, 
and didn't know their way around, and didn't hike, and came to love it.  
I still think that most of this quality is formed in one's youth, and by 
experience.
    In other words, I'm nodding my head in agreement, but I think that 
genes don't do it all.  When I look at my friends who are hardcore, and 
those that aren't really, the hardcore ones are the ones that have been 
doing it forever, and in a few cases those that haven't.
    Anyways, before I go on talking in psychobable that I learned in 
Psychology (quite possibly one of the most interesting classes that gets 
a reputation for being slack) last year, I think that I will let you all 
leave your computers and recover from my dissertation on the need to 
hike.
-Justin

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