This article is interesting for several reasons, not least of which is that it does a fairly good job of summarizing our current views on psychopathy. One of the more fascinating questions asked is the fundamental "would you want to know?" This is sometimes balanced with the question of "should society be warned?" After reading the article, what do you think? Would you want to know your number? Your child's? How do you feel about the research?
Monday, September 23, 2013
Prompt for September 23rd
An interesting article (found here) popped up in the Chronicle for higher education recently. 
This article is interesting for several reasons, not least of which is that it does a fairly good job of summarizing our current views on psychopathy. One of the more fascinating questions asked is the fundamental "would you want to know?" This is sometimes balanced with the question of "should society be warned?" After reading the article, what do you think? Would you want to know your number? Your child's? How do you feel about the research?
This article is interesting for several reasons, not least of which is that it does a fairly good job of summarizing our current views on psychopathy. One of the more fascinating questions asked is the fundamental "would you want to know?" This is sometimes balanced with the question of "should society be warned?" After reading the article, what do you think? Would you want to know your number? Your child's? How do you feel about the research?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
After reading this article, I think that I would like to know my number and my children's numbers if I had them. This study, and the number that can be assigned to you based on your likelihood of becoming a criminal, outside the normal realm of society is rather interesting to me. As the author states, genes play about a 50% role in determining this, so to know anyone's predisposition for violent crime can serve as a good guideline, but not as something that determines your life. I don't see much of a problem with this, as it really has no bearing on how you choose to live your life. It is only an estimator that you can choose to accept. I suppose it could help out some people who are given high numbers, as they could maybe try to counteract their criminal predisposition with proper diet and therapy during development, as the author states. On the other hand, in my opinion, criminality is just something that we as a society create, so for someone to create a study that predicts "criminality' is somewhat comical to me. Are all criminals bad people? I think this study may go a little far in trying to determine future criminals, just so that we can alter their development and make them "normal" people. But, it is interesting nonetheless and I'd be interested in what my number would be according to this researcher.
ReplyDeleteI loved that sentence, "criminality is just something that we as a society create", what do you mean by that exactly?
DeleteI feel the research is valid. Clearly there is something different in how the general population and psychopaths view things. If tests were made available that could generate results of the likelihood of being a psychopath I think there would be a moral obligation to society to take it. I would have my children tested as well, forewarned is forearmed as they say. This would not be without a healthy dose of self preservation involved, anytime you read anything to do with the crimes committed by psychopaths, serial murders, rapists, whatever, it does not end well for the mother. Self interest aside, if I my dog was rabid (and I don't make this comparison lightly, the idea of animal cruelty upsets me more than crimes against humanity) I wouldn't just let him run free and hope for the best, I would put him down. Sometimes having love means taking a hard line for the greater good. If I had had the testing done and come up within the range I would expect the same response from my parents that I would have for my own children. That is, explore every avenue that would have a chance at negating the "worst case scenario", growing up and into an active psychopath.
ReplyDelete