 If this analysis is correct, then the resolution of debates over nativism should be straightforward. It should be sufficient to point out that the two perspectives are complementary: that both “internal” and “external” factors contribute to development. The problem with this analysis, however, is that it threatens to trivialize the debate. Could it really be the case that such intellectual heavyweights as Lorenz and Lehrman were engaged in nothing more than a verbal dispute? Fiona Cowie (1998), for one, sees this as a red flag. Although verbal disputes are not unheard of in science and philosophy it is uncharitable to assume that all historical debates over nativism can be understood so simplistically. As Cowie puts it, “[v]iewing nativists and empiricists as quarreling merely over how ‘important’ the various factors in belief and concept acquisition are can incline us to see their dispute as insubstantial” (1998, 22). We are well advised, she argues, to search for more substantial stakes in these debates.