Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 249 posts

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#21

Post by olavk »

etherael wrote: post #15
lusr wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you believe emotion is useless? I cannot think of any aspects of our psychology that are useless (they evolved for a reason). Negative emotions are fundamentally indicators of a cognitive dissonance and are absolutely invaluable in maintaining a healthy system of introspection. Your profile shows you're also a programmer so here's an analogy I use internally: negative emotions are part of a monitoring system b…

I believe emotion is useless because it is largely a distraction. By this I mean that if there are reasons other than emotional to take a course of action, the positive enforcement of emotion to push you in that direction is unnecessary. However, if there are no reasons other than emotional in order to undertake an action, that's a good indicator that the action is not a good path to take. This doesn't mean that an a…

> there are reasons other than emotional to take a course of action

Which reasons? Why would you choose one action over another if no emotions are associated with any outcome?

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#22

Post by olavk »

japhyr wrote: post #2

I cringe every time I hear perpetrators of mass shootings described as "evil". Evil implies a presence of something bad. It's an easy label that allows people to hate the perpetrator. It's much more accurate to describe the perpetrators as cold, empty, detached. That is frightening, because there is no hope of reasoning or bargaining with someone who is truly detached from emotion. There is no such thing as evil. I a…

Perpetrators of mass killings seem to be very much emotional, filled with anger, resentment and bitterness. I don't think you would go through the trouble of killing other people if you are detached from emotion. Why would you?

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#23

Post by _delirium »

scotty79 wrote: post #8

I think of the murderers as having some kind of hardware bug. We have evolved special safeguard that prevents us form killing the people we live with and people we meet daily. It's crazy that we do live in proximity of other people and meet them if you think how dangerous single person can be when this safeguard fails. All the search for reasons why the person killed is little bit like creating fake narratives to kin…

Do you mean murders in general, or only these spectacle-type spree murders? It seems like much of the discussion is trying to generalize about murder based on these very rare spree killings, but imo it'd be more productive to look at where we have a lot more data, even if it's less spectacular. It's very unusual for someone to shoot up a school or a movie theatre, but it is not, alas, particularly unusual to "[kill] the people we live with and people we meet daily": there are about 12,000 murders annually in the US. If that's due to a hardware bug, there are a lot of bugs!

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#24

Post by _delirium »

lusr wrote: post #4
japhyr wrote: post #2

I cringe every time I hear perpetrators of mass shootings described as "evil". Evil implies a presence of something bad. It's an easy label that allows people to hate the perpetrator. It's much more accurate to describe the perpetrators as cold, empty, detached. That is frightening, because there is no hope of reasoning or bargaining with someone who is truly detached from emotion. There is no such thing as evil. I a…

> It's much more accurate to describe the perpetrators as cold, empty, detached. The article states that, according to the Secret Service, 78% of these school shooters are NOT cold, empty, detached (which would describe socio/psychopaths). Instead, they are severely depressed individuals. If you haven't ever been severely depressed (I have) it's probably quite difficult to understand, but these are people whose minds…

If anything, they seem less detached than many "normal" murderers who are for some reason less often seen as "evil". There are many people in the US who have killed multiple people, but in separate individual killings, which requires being able to treat killing as something you're able to do repeatedly, perhaps even over the course of years. Particularly common in organized crime or in drug gangs; just becomes part of the job. That's a bit scarier to me than someone snapping in a single incident. (Scarier both in psychology of the killer, and in a fear-for-personal-safety sense: I am much more likely to be shot by a gang member than in a Columbine-style incident.)

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#25

Post by chandlerQ »

scotty79 wrote: post #8

I think of the murderers as having some kind of hardware bug. We have evolved special safeguard that prevents us form killing the people we live with and people we meet daily. It's crazy that we do live in proximity of other people and meet them if you think how dangerous single person can be when this safeguard fails. All the search for reasons why the person killed is little bit like creating fake narratives to kin…

>> I think of the murderers as having some kind of hardware bug.

Must you geeks relate everything to computers?

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#26

Post by arturadib »

Think outside the box.

I've lived in the US for 10 years, and I follow plenty of world news. It is clear that Columbine-like shootings are (mostly) an American phenomenon. [1]

So what is it so special about the US that makes this a recurring problem?

Is it poor parenting, without much communication? Is it societal pressure, i.e. Mr Popular vs Mr Loser? Is it easy access to guns? Is it the disproportionate amount of media attention that these cases give to depressed folks with low self-esteem? Is it all of the above? None?

I imagine severe depression happens everywhere, but there's got to be something in the US that turns depression into mass murder. I wish someone would analyze the problem from outside the box, not inside.

[1] Before someone jumps the gun about international news, note that terror and drug/gang crimes are very different. They have clear, consistent motives. Columbine-like stuff is puzzling- their motives seem to be all over the place, hence why to this date experts are still trying to figure them out.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#27

Post by paraschopra »

I'm getting convinced about an interesting new theory on free will. Our free will isn't exactly "free", and is not certainly a conscious act. What we will is determined by the genetic predispositions and a historical interaction of the self with environment. This creates a feedback loop and the self takes one of the trajectories for which it is NOT responsible. Yet, the consequences of the actions are faced by the self in an immediate sense (imprisonment, sadness, happiness). This creates an unfair situation.

So, in a way, _I_ am not responsible for my actions, yet the blame is put on _me_.

EDIT: grammar

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#29

Post by Ygg2 »

etherael wrote: post #15
lusr wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you believe emotion is useless? I cannot think of any aspects of our psychology that are useless (they evolved for a reason). Negative emotions are fundamentally indicators of a cognitive dissonance and are absolutely invaluable in maintaining a healthy system of introspection. Your profile shows you're also a programmer so here's an analogy I use internally: negative emotions are part of a monitoring system b…

I believe emotion is useless because it is largely a distraction. By this I mean that if there are reasons other than emotional to take a course of action, the positive enforcement of emotion to push you in that direction is unnecessary. However, if there are no reasons other than emotional in order to undertake an action, that's a good indicator that the action is not a good path to take. This doesn't mean that an a…

Actually no.

Emotions help us by allowing quick shortcuts in decision. Without them a person loses ability to think within normal limits. Remember last time you wrote your signature on a contract. Imagine taking half an hour to write your signature ? Impossible, well without emotion you will completely rationally debate whether or not to use blue, red or black pen, which ink color is better, etc.

Here is a quote:

For 30 minutes the patient enumerated reasons for and against each of the two dates: previous engagements, possible meteorological conditions, virtually anything that one could reasonably think about. "He was now walking us through a tiresome cost-benefit analysis, an endless outlining and fruitless comparison of options and possible consequences. It took enormous discipline to listen to all of this without pounding on the table and telling him to stop," Damasio wrote.

http://www.smh.com.au/national/feeling-our-way-to-decision-2...

Knowing when to keep your emotions in check is another thing.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#30

Post by coenhyde »

arturadib wrote: post #26

Think outside the box. I've lived in the US for 10 years, and I follow plenty of world news. It is clear that Columbine-like shootings are (mostly) an American phenomenon. [1] So what is it so special about the US that makes this a recurring problem? Is it poor parenting, without much communication? Is it societal pressure, i.e. Mr Popular vs Mr Loser? Is it easy access to guns? Is it the disproportionate amount of m…

I know American's do not like to hear this but I am of the opinion that it's easy access to guns which is the cause of these mass murders. Now that Australia has gun control, the crazy's just stab a few people. It's very hard to kill so many people with a knife.

If you take away easy access to guns then sure the hard criminals will still have guns but the wannabe criminals and the lunatics will do less damage.

Post reply on HN