The phrase nature and nurture relates to the relative importance of an individual's innate qualities ("nature" in the sense of nativism or innatism) as compared to an individual's personal experiences ("nurture" in the sense of empiricism or behaviorism) in causing individual differences, especially in behavioral traits. The alliterative expression "nature and nurture" in English has been in use since at least the Elizabethan period and goes back to medieval French. The combination of the two concepts as complementary is ancient (Greek: ἁπό φύσεως καὶ εὐτροφίας).
The phrase in its modern sense was popularized by the English Victorian polymath Francis Galton, the modern founder of eugenics, in discussion of the influence of heredity and environment on social advancement. Galton was influenced by the book On the Origin of Species written by his half-cousin, Charles Darwin.
The view that humans acquire all or almost all their behavioral traits from "nurture" was termed tabula rasa ("blank slate") by John Locke in 1690. A "blank slate view" in human developmental psychology assuming that human behavioral traits develop almost exclusively from environmental influences, was widely held during much of the 20th century (sometimes termed "blank-slatism"). The debate between "blank-slate" denial of the influence of heritability, and the view admitting both environmental and heritable traits, has often been cast in terms of nature versus nurture. These two conflicting approaches to human development were at the core of an ideological dispute over research agendas during the later half of the 20th century. As both "nature" and "nurture" factors were found to contribute substantially, often in an extricable manner, such views were seen as naive or outdated by most scholars of human development by the 2000s.
With Longing I recall
Yearning for a caress hollow and empty,
Unsheltered by the pain of the rest
Not without justification, torn down for my compassion
Free formed in emptiness
Have I been cheated?
Has all I have worked for been stolen away by disregarding what I most
Yearned for?
Relinquished all I deserve
Fearing not for suffering, is my home and pain my native tongue?
Loss and rejection are my family
Nurture
You are not the reason for my weakness
Lost I hold you to blame for fearing love
For my failure... accompany disaster and inherit the pain
Torn down for my compassion now I stand alone
Not sympathy just understanding I am shown
Too far gone now, my thoughts are wise
All alone because your taken so far
A graceful end to life
But its not over
Disguised in a full mask of truth
Those old words are denied
With longing I recall
Yearning for a caress hollow and empty, unsheltered by the pain of the rest
Not without justification, torn down for my compassion, free formed in
emptiness
Repent what I feel