Science a GoGo's Home Page Forums General Discussion Not-Quite-Science Forum Normal Human Behaviour

There is a reasonably horrifying story in today's Seattle PI, Section B, Page 5 from which I would like to quote (and yes this will get around to science before it ends):
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"A man told investigators he beat a woman to death with a hammer, slit her throat and kept the body in his closet for three weeks, moving it to a trash bin only when the smell became unbearable, according to police.
....
Relatives and friends of Hamill at the court hearing said they didn't believe he intended to harm the woman, whom he had met in an alley behind Jimmy Z's, a bar, the night she was killed.

"He did a terrible thing, but he's not a terrible person," said Lindsey Hamill, his sister."
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Now I bring this up here in a science forum because in my mind this is no different from the self-delusion of those who reject the advice of climatologists (with respect to global warming) or biologists (with respect to evolution).

I mean give it a break sister. You don't hit someone over the head three times with a framing hammer, slit their throat, and not intend harm.

And it is pure insanity to say "he did a terrible thing, but he's not a terrible person."

The human capacity for self-delusion may be one of the things that does truly separate us from the other animals on this planet. And perhaps our failure to deal with it the reason why history continues to repeat itself millenia after millenia.

Here's a quiz for everyone. Who is the person that started the group that initially spearheaded the war in Iraq? You only get 3 guesses. Bush? No! Cheney? No! Wolfowitz? No! Rumsfeld? No. It was a corporate office of Lockheed Martin ... the very same company that has made billions off of the war. The ability to engage in self-delusion is in need of some serious study.

Wonder what the chances are of a drug that cures this delusional state making it to market in a phramacy near you? Zero!

Do you have a link that lockheed martin started the war.

climatologists are the ones that are saying that the earth's weather has cycles. They are the ones that know about how the climate a million years ago was more or less. they are the ones that are signing that letter saying that the global warming is a bunch of hot air. They are the ones that are complaining that IPCC did not use their summeries instead of the political one they made.

too bad they dont have that drug. it might get rid of all of the hopla and political manuvering around the global warming.

No offense, but this seems a little more like politics than science.

Must be political science!

Someone recently informed me that any science that has the word "science" in its name, is NOT science. As a soil scientist, I was obligated to beat him with my auger.

Christian Science? Scientology? You may be in trouble

christian science is a name. scientology is the same. any name that has science in it is likely not actually science. soil science is not a name.

I do have to agree that in that I believe this is political rather than science.

This world is not so decipherable.

I have serious doubts we understand even a fraction of things that nay effect peoples behavior. Why is it many people living next to some horendous fiend will come forward to tell us what a sweetheart he was? Why does an everyday hero go bad "for a day"? This is not about repeaters it is about the first timers that become repeaters.

I do not like to admit it but, to me, the history of the bad people suggests some measure of mind capture to give a person the mind-set to go forward with these truly in-human crimes.
Not a popular idea.
jjw

according to some, everyone has the capacity to be "evil" (not the biblical version, just the variety that makes people sick to read what he does). according to this view, the people are normal until something goes wrong in their head and they change to the type that does bad things.

according to other theories, the people that are bad know they are and know that what they do is unacceptable, so they seperate their "true" selves from what they show their family and friends and others people they see often. these people are great actors.

then there is the ones that have seperated it so far, they dont even know they are doing it. fortuantely, these are the rarest.

dehammer wrote:
"Do you have a link that lockheed martin started the war."

No because I never said Lockheed Martin started the war. Please read what was written and if you come to the same conclusion see your family physician: That is not what it says.

Twosheds wrote:
"No offense, but this seems a little more like politics than science."

No offense taken but this is not a Republican, Democrat, or Libertarian issue. It is just a demonstration of, unless you disagree, incredible self-delusion. And self-delusion that I've no doubt everyone has read over-and-over-and-over again in your own local newspapers.

Not a single response, above, relates to the subject I wanted to discuss, self-delusion.

Perhaps everyone is. Or is it just me? ;-)

you may not have stated it, but thats the implied statement. If they were part of the group that pushed for it, then they were the instigator. If this is not what you mean, then you better make it more clear.

if that was the subject of discussion, then it should have been made clear.

to quote one of my favorite fictional characters, "man has an amazing capacity to rationalize things he cant understand, and to forget what he cant rationalize."

In the case of the neighbor of a killer, I dont know if its so much self delusion so much as the capacity of some people to delude others with a strong image of something they want others to believe. If they were being self deluded, they would not believe he was guilty after the evidence.

Hey, someone mentioned politics, didn't they?

Over my lifetime, I've come to the conclusion that many decisions are made based on sub-conscious feelings, and later facts are cherry-picked to back the decisions with *reasoning.*

It's hard for people to admit they've been fooled, or that they need to re-evaluate the way they perceive.

I can appreciate that it is hard to acknowledge being fooled. But the above statements such as:

"said they didn't believe he intended to harm the woman"
and
"He did a terrible thing, but he's not a terrible person"

Fly in the face of even a cursory look at reality.

It is possible for a good person to do bad things. If you care about someone, you really want to believe that is the case. Some times that is not the case, but it takes time to realise that.

Yes, that's true. But these statements are probably from people who haven't had a lot of time to reflect yet. They have to get their minds around: "I accepted a horrible social deviant as an OK guy for most of my life. I need to re-evaluate my relationships with all people."

Denial is the first defense. Some stick with it forever, rather than reflect.

As a Democrat or Republican you really want to believe your party is good and other guys demons. As fans of the Chicago Cubs you really want to believe they are going to win the World Series.

But doesn't anyone find it troubling that self-deception is so thorough and so easily embraced?

soilguy wrote:
"But these statements are probably from people who haven't had a lot of time to reflect...."

My thought exactly. Contact with the truth, if it ever comes, is not the initial response.

It is not a case that lies and deception come with consideration of the events ... but rather self-deception and dissembling is the instinctive response.

not really. if it were not that easy, we would not be human. id rather have all the foliblies and such of humans than not have humans. In case you had not notice, we are (as a group) rather missed up. but then again its the only game in town.

Please define 'missed up'. I have no idea what that means.