Psychopaths

We all know that somewhere in the world, at this exact moment, repulsively evil acts are being done by people that are unable to feel empathy for others (though not exclusively by them). I'm writing this because... Well, even though I know those things happen, it is really something else when I obtain information about such cases (I won't link to anything specific).

For someone like me, it is deeply disturbing and frustrating. I've lost my sleep before. I really wanted to do something about it and prevent these things, but I'm simply powerless.

I know that psychopaths are not necessarily being evil all the time but I'm afraid most of them will jump at an opportunity to sadistically dominate others if they feel empowered enough. I'm not a psychologist, but, from what I've read it seems like life is just a game to them and people are simply tools, as they are unable to acknowledge the feelings of other minds (perhaps a form of solipsism?)

I just wanted to raise a few questions:

Is it possible to actually prevent these acts altogether, in some way?

Is there a reliable way to detect psychopathy early?

Given a reliable way to detect psychopathy early, what is the best way to deal with it?

And, finally: will it ever be possible to cure psychopathy?

edited 17th Sep '13 6:06:46 AM by Teraus

"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."

To answer your second question:

Many times people who fall into this category (say a serial killer like Jeffrey Dahmer) grow up in a bad environment, such as with abusive parents or in a broken home.

Chidren in these cases may be withdrawn and find it hard to make friends. Some may also develop some traits that can constitute as warning signs (violence, cruelty to animals, etc.) early.

Hope this was helpful!

edited 16th Sep '13 8:12:17 PM by Explosivo25

I don’t even know anymore.

Well, okay, I'll cop to giving me power in any quantity is a bad idea.

Though I will say that unethical parasite is a new one.

I fall into the category that is simply nascent. I don't want to do anything "Evil", because I know how that ends. I've seen enough Criminal Minds and CSI to know risks outweigh rewards. Any behavior that could be construed as villainous ends badly.

I haven't chosen good because I like it, or out of "empathy". I simply don't like the alternative's end result.

Me personally, I cannot understand choices made by people with empathy, like you. And I especially cannot understand people who espouse the necessity of empathy, but then rage and advocate garbage like Euthanasia or what would amount to Arkham City, as if the "greater good" covers everything.

tl;dr: you and I might have more in common than you think.

Repulsively evil acts are also being committed by people who are very capable of feeling empathy for others.

Apparently psychopaths are very good at manipulating people, but are otherwise so driven by impulsiveness that they often act in quite stupid ways. They suffer a mental deficit that makes them both lack empathy and lack a normal level of clear thinking.

They are dangerous people, but I wouldn't waste my time worrying about them over sociopaths or homocidal religious fanatics or any other kind of social menace. It seems irrational to focus on psychopaths as if they somehow represent the gravest threat anyone will face.

A big problem with "psychopathy" is that it's about as precisely defined as "female hysteria" was back in the day. There's a lot of talk how psychopaths can't feel empathy, yet are oh-so-good at faking it, or how they're violent and unpredictable, unless of course when they're methodical and manipulative. It's not even all that clear where a psychopath ends and a sociopath begins. And that's not even going into the borderline mystical powers attributed to them by Hollywood Psych. In the context of violent crime, psychopathy is almost always a post-hoc diagnosis, and not too reliable at that.

Bottom line - penal laws deal with criminals. As in, people who have commited a crime, with conviction based mostly on the nature of the deed, rather than that of the doer. As much as it would be wonderful to pre-judge and euthanise people without them actually doing anything wrong to deserve it, I think that crime prevention is better facilitated through other means and in other areas.

edited 16th Sep '13 9:18:12 PM by indiana404

Agreed.

What you really want is this: antisocial personality disorder. Please note: "psychopath" and "sociopath" are old, inexact definitions, used for comfort and out of habit.

See also borderline personality disorder: for when somebody doesn't quite tick all the boxes for... well, anything much. But, is hardly in the normal range of behaviour, either. However, strictly speaking... a lot of "normal" people can test out as being in the lower ranges of borderline, if your testing criteria and procedures are even just slightly fudged.

In short: there are flavours, mate. A lot of "normal" people walk around with both "sociopathic" and "psychopathic" tendencies. They... just don't go into the deeper parts of the pool enough to get a label slapped on them. There is an old saw in isometric testing circles: if somebody tests out as totally average and extremely normal, they're as crazy as hell, hiding something... or both.

edited 17th Sep '13 12:32:18 AM by Euodiachloris

That's why I asked questions instead of establishing a definitive opinion. I've heard a lot of bullshit on the subject from many people (even professionals) and read it in many places.

Did you completely ignore the part between parentheses in that thing you quoted?

Anyway, if someone is very capable of feeling empathy, the probability they might torture you horribly for fun is a bit smaller, I guess.

It's very simple to understand, actually. You don't to horrible things to people (who haven't done horrible things to others) because they are capable of feeling pain in the same way you do (or more than you do. I read that psychopaths/sociopaths have diminished capacity for suffering, too, but I'm not sure how true that is. Judge the article by yourself, and tell me how much you think it's accurate)

I didn't "advocate" euthanasia, I considered the possibility. Maybe that was a bit extreme. Read the other option immediately after the "euthanasia" bit, it is probably less extreme.

And yes, when I wrote that I was severely pissed off, because I have empathy and a certain need for feeling that people get what they deserve.

Probably not.

edited 17th Sep '13 3:28:44 AM by Teraus

"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."

Um... actually... depending on the personality quirk, it can be more fun if they can both feel acute empathy, but then wall up their reaction to it. <shuffles feet>

Feeling empathy is not the same as allowing yourself to express a standard response to it, after all. And, some people get kicks out of what would be painful stimuli or cognitive dissonance, otherwise. The human brain: makes the programming of Windows 8 look clear and concise. <_<

If it means they can get stuff done, certain people can "switch off" their emotions for a short time. Not for too long though.

Although, under the right circumstances, I'm sure any "normal" person can act like a psychopath or a sociopath. Infamous examples of this are the Milgram Experiment and the Stanford Prison Experiment.

edited 17th Sep '13 3:32:40 AM by Greenmantle

Keep Rolling On

In that case, both see it as something satisfactory, so it doesn't count.

And what makes you think that the people who proceeded with the experiment until the end were not psychopaths?

edited 17th Sep '13 3:31:42 AM by Teraus

"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."

@Teraus

Someone can have zero empathy, low empathy, high empathy, my point was that someone with a high level of empathy can still do repulsive acts.

I don't really understand why you would imagine who might torture you though. It seems a waste of time.

Anyway, if someone with high level of empathy but a low level of intelligence crashed into my car and left me horrifically injured and in need of reconstructive facial surgery, I think the level at which they empathised with my pain wouldn't interest me. The point being that awful things can happen for all sorts of reasons, why focus on psychopaths?

I think indiana and Euo have great posts on the subject also.

edited 17th Sep '13 3:52:04 AM by editerguy

Because it actually happens. That's why I created the thread in the first place, to specifically discuss this, because of recent cases I've read (and, as a person who feels empathy, was seriously bothered by it). If you think it's a waste of time, simply don't participate in the thread.

Because we are talking about intentional acts of evil, not stupid accidents. Besides, this person would probably try to help you in some way and compensate for the accident, if they felt really sorry about it. A psychopath wouldn't (at least, not without a certain level of social pressure, I think)

"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."

I don't think there is any element of imagining the probabilities of someone torturing you, that makes it indispensible in a discussion of psychopathy. Sorry if you disagree.

OK.

Yes-no. -_- The definition of cognitive dissonance is to hold different states and though processes going simultaneously, some highly contradictory. The brain doesn't just do binary. Life would be simpler if it did, though.

So, you can both hate yourself for feeling strongly for somebody, yet also letting yourself do horrible stuff to them, get a kick out of the fact this hurts both them and you... and, then get depressed with your exultation once the sugar-rush phase has calmed down. And, wonder why you did all of it, anyway: oh, well. What's done is done. All at the same time, or near as dammit. <_<

Thought processes and feedback loops can be very weird things... and, that's before you take into account the blind box, unconscious processing that occurs in tier II cognition.

Uh... I might have to explain that a bit further, huh? <_<

In simple terms: conscious decision-making and other processing, identity... parts of personality, memory and skills processing — in short, most things that go on in the frontal lobes? Tier I processing — some of it is conscious (frontal cortex), some is semi-conscious (other bits of the lobes and parts of the cortex that have nothing to do with kidding us we have self-determination). Everything else? Tier II — and, it's almost all totally under the radar and going on without Tier I having much to do with it. Tier II takes up the vast majority of our brain's time. And, when I say "vast", I mean well over 90%*

.

Processing chains (thoughts) constantly bounce around the brain's neuroanatomy (mainly in the cortices, but not exclusively so) before being completed, spending a little time in tier I territory. Or sidetracked. Or looped. Most of our feelings are solidly in tier II, only handing the frontal cortex a note when the occasion demands it. Usually late. (Say hello: the temporal lobes). If you have problems controlling impulses... there's usually a glitch either here, or in your frontal cortex's ability to talk civilly to the temporal cortex. Well, unless the parietal or occipital border-regions are acting up. <_<

Please note, neurology and cognitive science fans, so I'm well aware that the cut-offs aren't all that clean. I'm using a hefty dose of Lies to Children, here. <_< Forgive me.

edited 17th Sep '13 4:11:20 AM by Euodiachloris

Note that the Milgram experiment doesn't involve torture "for fun".

What would be more interesting in spotting whateverpaths is the statistics of how many times the people who went through objected (since the experiment was stopped only after 5 objections).

The prison experiment is probably more pertinent to the discussion at hand.

"And as long as a sack of shit is not a good thing to be, chivalry will never die."

Wouldn't just linking to the bystander effect hand out more user-friendly case-study style explanations to go into?

Or, would diffusion of responsibility be better? Meh: one or the other, you'd hit both.

The upshot is: anybody can find themselves able to torture another or stand back and watch it happen, given the correct circumstances. <_<

edited 17th Sep '13 4:21:14 AM by Euodiachloris

Good point. IIRC the 'prison guards' were quite mentally distressed by the experiment, so despite like 'normal' people being uncomfortable about causing pain, they still acted very sadistically.

edited 17th Sep '13 4:21:42 AM by editerguy

You missed the part that some were distressed because they found themselves starting to get into it and enjoy it. Had the experiment gone on longer, a few would have started having serious psychosis issues. -_-

It was one of the reasons it was called off.

edited 17th Sep '13 4:24:49 AM by Euodiachloris

And the one who set up the experiment, Philip Zimbardo was drawn into it as well — he didn't stop things when he could have done.

edited 17th Sep '13 4:30:32 AM by Greenmantle

Keep Rolling On

Oh, is that what happened? Worse than I remember

Was it a big number kind-of-enjoying it though?

edited 17th Sep '13 4:30:31 AM by editerguy

That's one of the problems with the experiment: some may have lied about not enjoying it. <_< And, digging to find out wasn't as thorough as it could have been. The numerical info you can extract, is, therefore... a little dodgy in a number of areas.

One of the problems when the conductor of the piece is a part of it, that. Which is a reason why experiment design tries to avoid that problem these days.

There were some major design flaws with that study. -_- Not least from an ethical standpoint. <_<

Mind you, it's also an exemplar that even a flawed, curtailed study can still provide interesting data.

edited 17th Sep '13 4:46:50 AM by Euodiachloris

Whether or not they enjoyed it, they got quite "into" their roles.

I'm sure there is a vanishingly small number of people who torture for fun, but I don't see why lacking empathy would inevitably lead to that behaviour.

An actually useful indicator of who will commit violent crime is 'male 15-23'*, does it follow that we should lock all young men up until they're a bit older, just in case?

Honestly I think the real problem here is crime shows with lazy writers wanting easy black-and-white monsters for Mackie to beat up. Plus news media constantly accentuating the negative.

It's also kind of funny (in a bleak way) that when a brown guy blows up a school, it's terrorism, but when a white guy shoots up a youth camp he's insane. But that's sort of a tangent.

We should round up such 'people' and concentrate them in camps where they can be more easily dealt with.

---

\*: maybe not that exact age range (can't be bothered to check the exact stats right now), but you get my point, I hope.

edited 17th Sep '13 5:44:51 AM by imadinosaur

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.

Well, I didn't mean it that way. I'm not basing myself on shows, but on actual cases I've read about and what some people say about the issue. I know it's not black and white, either.

Let me make a more reasonable question, now that I'm not disrupted by anger (I had a very specific case in mind when I wrote those): Given a reliable way to detect psychopathy early, what is the best way to deal with it?

Acting like they are not a problem isn't exactly helpful, or honest.

edited 17th Sep '13 6:12:23 AM by Teraus

"You cannot judge a system if your judgement is determined by the system."

My main point really is that psychopaths are a pretty small minority, and violent psychopaths are an even smaller minority within that. It's just not something worth worrying about unless you want to work in this field — you're probably several orders of magnitude more likely to be killed by a drunk driver than a psychopathic serial killer.

I suppose it would come down to the cause of these things — are psychopaths born or made (or a mixture of both)? I suspect there's a strong environmental aspect (though this is mostly a gut feeling, I'm not a psychological professional), in which case it should be treated like any other psychological condition. Treated if possible, managed if not. We've got one person claiming to lack empathy in this thread who (probably) isn't a serial killer, so even if empathy can't be taught it's not the end of the world.

So I would consider this in part a health issue; like any other disability, children lacking empathy need additional support. It's also a social issue: if there are environmental pressures that make this kind of thing more likely, we should work on reducing those. As a socialist, my instinct is to say that we should reduce poverty and inequality, but I'm sure there will have been some research into specifics out there.

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.