Hey, we want to be part of the hate!
POSTED BY: dreamtrove
UPDATED: Tuesday, January 20, 2009 02:14
VIEWED: 18566
PAGE 19 of 23
Quote:M'kay. So what IS the complete interpretation?
Not completely.
Quote:Not sure how you got from "there" to "here". I don't think people are "intrinsically" selfish. The lizard-brain is capable of all kinds of emotions. Even the most solitary of mammals have to get together long enough to mate, and females to raise young. So a certain amount of altruism is built in, otherwise the species would have died out a long time ago.
But it’s interesting to note that both you and HK seem to agree with the Christian interpretation of Original Sin.
But like I said, there are peeps whose brains work differently. And what if the treatment for PTSD, for example, turned out to be something as simple as a beta-blocker?
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Quote:So you think that there is something distinctly different about Ted Bundy, or do you feel that the potential for Teds exist within all of us?
Originally posted by SignyM:
Not sure how you got from "there" to "here". I don't think people are "intrinsically" selfish. The lizard-brain is capable of all kinds of emotions. Even the most solitary of mammals have to get together long enough to mate, and females to raise young. So a certain amount of altruism is built in, otherwise the species would have died out a long time ago.
Quote:As usual, HK is making assumptions about the world view of men like Finn.
Originally posted by SignyM:Quote:M'kay. So what IS the complete interpretation?
Not completely.
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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Quote:My view of the world is very different from yours. I think there is something very different about Ted Bundy. Any characteristic ... hair color, intelligence, empathy, sexual orientation, height, glucose tolerance ... is described by a bell curve. Most people mostly fall within a couple of standard deviations away from the norm. But in a population of six billion, about 5% are "born" waaaaaaay off the charts in one way or another: the two-headed women in Minnesota. Albinos. Einstein. That's the way it is.
So you think that there is something distinctly different about Ted Bundy, or do you feel that the potential for Teds exist within all of us?
But the way we are born also interacts with the environment. The "average" person certainly has the capacity to be made into a killer because we are, after all, programmable. We have the capacity to cooperate AND the capacity for aggression built in. (Peeps mostly are cooperative: Look at how 95% of us behave.) But some peeps are so lacking in empathy that they must be dealt with differently than the way we'd raise most of us. I think Ted Bundy falls into this "at the end of the bell curve" category.
Quote:But when I ask YOU to explain your view, you sidestep. So how are we supposed to know what to think?
M'kay. So what IS the complete interpretation?-Signy
As usual, HK is making assumptions about the world view of men like Finn.- Finn
BTW- I've met a killer. He beat his wife to death with a wire coat-hangar. Too bad he was an untreated manic-depressive 'cause he screwed up his whole family.
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Quote:I get tired of explaining and re-explaining the same thing over and over again because I don’t tell people what they want to hear. It doesn’t get us anywhere in the discussion, and it’s not like you can’t scroll up to see exactly what I said earlier.
Originally posted by SignyM:
[But when I ask YOU to explain your view, you sidestep. So how are we supposed to know what to think?
In any event, I don’t disagree with you.
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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I'm not sure we really agree.
Personally, I think people are mostly NOT responsible for their actions. Between their inborn "set" and their environment and that busy lizard-brain there is very little "free will" involved. Self-programming is beyond most people. It takes a great deal of insight and a life-changing event to self-program. And even then, initial inclinations tend to re-emerge during times of stress.
The point is: What do we DO about that? Punishment works, for some. But look at repeat offenders (which is most offenders): what have they learned???
NOTHING.
The prospect of jail time is not a deterrent. Not even the prospect of death. For people who don't have the capacity to think ahead and to control their impulses "future punishment" is a non-entity.
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Quote:Yeah, we disagree on that.
Originally posted by SignyM:
I'm not sure we really agree.
Personally, I think people are mostly NOT responsible for their actions. Between their inborn "set" and their environment and that busy lizard-brain there is very little "free will" involved. Self-programming is beyond most people. It takes a great deal of insight and a life-changing event to self-program. And even then, initial inclinations tend to re-emerge during times of stress.
Quote:This is the second time you’ve made an argument for capital punishment in the last couple of weeks.
Originally posted by SignyM:
The prospect of jail time is not a deterrent. Not even the prospect of death. For people who don't have the capacity to think ahead and to control their impulses "future punishment" is a non-entity
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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"Personally, I think people are mostly NOT responsible for their actions."
Sig,
So nothing is ever someones fault, right? There is no such thing as responsibility, self-control, discipline or personal accountability....right?
I'm sure you are not the only one who believes that.
Which is probably why this country is so fraked up.
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Quote:So we should kill people because they've been victimized in the past, or been born wonky?
This is the second time you’ve made an argument for capital punishment in the last couple of weeks.
Quote:There is. But the peeps who need it the most are the least likely to be able to exercise it. Like I keep trying to say: everything is on a continuum. No such thing as "no such thing"!
Sig, So nothing is ever someones fault, right? There is no such thing as responsibility, self-control, discipline or personal accountability....right?
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Quote:According to you, people aren’t responsible for their own actions and there’s little possibility of rehabilitation. This, of course, is one of the major arguments for capital punishment. If a person isn't responsible for his or her actions and can't be changed, then it would be horribly irresponsible for society just to leave such a person at large, and seemingly pointless to incarcerate them.
Originally posted by SignyM:Quote:So we should kill people because they've been victimized in the past, or been born wonky?
This is the second time you’ve made an argument for capital punishment in the last couple of weeks.
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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Quote:But that's not what I said. People CAN change, just not always on their own. There are several promising modes of retraining (BTW "boot camp" is not one of them), different programs for different problems. To give you one example: It is a well-known fact that people will tolerate all kinds of abuse, but not tolerate the abuse or suffering of someone else. I've heard three programs that take advantage of that fact by giving angry youths someone else to care about. These programs have <10% recidivism.
little possibility of rehabilitation
Quote:Only if you're a Nazi. Then it's OK to kill the feeble-minded and moral deviants and the very old. For those who are TRULY beyond rehabilitation isolating them is a humane way of keeping others safe. True, it's not very "efficient"... but what are we really interested in anyway? Ultimate efficiency? The perfect race?
This, of course, is one of the major arguments for capital punishment. If a person isn't responsible for his or her actions and can't be changed, then it would be horribly irresponsible for society just to leave such a person at large, and seemingly pointless to incarcerate them.
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Let's party like its 1929.
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