Do people choose evil or are they born that way?

[ChristIsLord]

last night i watched a show called mindhunter on i think msnbc channel. it’s about an fbi profiler interviewing killers, rapists etc… to get clues on what makes them tick.

last nights episode was about a man who is serving life for raping and murdering two girls around 10 or 11 years old. his M.O. was he would befriend people with girls this age and use that trust to later lure the girls when they were alone.

now it was tough for me to watch, for all intents and purposes this man was simply not human. he described how he has wanted to murder and rape since he was a young child and always had these feelings. he had ZERO regrets for the rapes and murders of two innocent children (ten years apart so i’m sure there’s more victims), claimed he had no regrets other than not taking the one girls body deeper into the woods so he wouldn’t have gotten caught. he claimed he never would’ve stopped and he loved the rapes and murders. and these are children of in one case his best friend he knew since high school. he had zero regret and couldn’t care less. simply not human at all…

now according to him he was essentially born this way, how does this jive with our view of God? this guy was pure evil, he didn’t appear to have free will, he was born evil and knew it from his earliest memories…

 

[RobHom]

By in large, people who commit those crimes are sociopaths. This link will give you an idea of the “mentality” of sociopaths:

mcafee.cc/Bin/sb.html

More:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociopath

wisegeek.com/what-is-a-sociopath.htm

The causes of antisocial personality disorder are thought to be either genetic or environmental. Children who are influenced by antisocial parents may adopt these tendencies. Similarly, role models such as one’s friends or peer group may also influence the behaviour pattern of a sociopath. Antisocial behaviour is more likely to occur in men than in women. About 1% of women have this disorder, while 3% of men are affected by it.

Sociopaths are not considered “mentally ill” such that they are incompetent…they are just “wired wrong”…and their drives are out of the norm, in fact many are extremely intelligent. Bundy is a good example of a sociopath.

 

[ChristIsLord]

i understand what a sociopath is and the classifications for borderline personality disorder, narcisist etc… however that really doesn’t answer the question. to me sociopath is nothing more than a label put on someone who is essentially one mean s.o.b. it in and of itself tells us nothing, it’s just a classification.

are some of these folks simply born this way? i tend to think so and i’m not sure how that jives with my view of god.

 

[RobHom]

are some of these folks simply born this way? i tend to think so and i’m not sure how that jives with my view of god.

My college major was Psychology, and the premise that people are born evil…is pretty much “unsupported”. People as a rule tend to be products of their environment and their upbringing, or a combination of both, and there may be other influences that come into play.

But as to someone “being born evil”…here is some food for thought:

helium.com/items/191246-are-people-born-evil

dailymail.co.uk/news/article-434442/Are-people-born-evil.html

zimbardo.com/downloads/2003%20Evil%20Chapter.pdf

Its a very tricky subject, but you will find that at the bottom line, there is little more than suspicion that people are born “evil”, and that there is a dire lack of empirical evidence to prove it.

Some are born with genes with aggressive traits…and what they do with them determines their life’s course. The same is true if that gene is recessive, or they are genetically predisposed to being non-aggressive. Human traits of conduct are learned as a rule, and are the sum total of a massive soup mixture that cannot be separated into its separate parts…its everything we experience and learn from birth on.

 

[ChristIsLord]

My college major was Psychology, and the premise that people are born evil…is pretty much “unsupported”. People as a rule tend to be products of their environment and their upbringing, or a combination of both, and there may be other influences that come into play.

isn’t that sociology???

anyway there is definitely a clear link to genetics and antisocial personality disorder i.e. sociopathy or psychopathy, so there is definitely clear support for some people just being born downright mean. sure environmental factors can trigger things in some people, but some other folks have simply no history of abuse or anything in their past. and plenty of others were horribly abused and become saints. some folks are simply nasty s.o.b.'s and there’s essentially no explanation for it.

 

[RobHom]

isn’t that sociology???

As I said, people are not born evil…there is little or no psychologically sound empirical evidence to support the notion.

Environment and upbringing are sociological elements, yes. And it is well proven that they are definite causes of people’s life outcomes.

anyway there is definitely a clear link to genetics and antisocial personality disorder i.e. sociopathy or psychopathy, so there is definitely clear support for some people just being born downright mean. sure environmental factors can trigger things in some people, but some other folks have simply no history of abuse or anything in their past. and plenty of others were horribly abused and become saints. some folks are simply nasty s.o.b.'s and there’s essentially no explanation for it.

If you could…please provide a link to that “clear link”… there are many that discount the possibility, because there is no empirical data to support it, or genetic studies that have proven it to be so, in fact this article makes some very salient points on this subject:

dlibrary.acu.edu.au/research/theology/ejournal/aejt_2/Curran.htm

***The attempts to link traits such as intelligence, aggression and criminality with genes show that the evidence has been much less convincing than studies that have shown the link between physical characteristics and disease to genes. The connection between crime and genetics probably has its source in the often-quoted causal link between aggressive prisoners and a chromosomal abnormality known as XYY. Suzuki and Knudtson (1989:155) dismiss such a theory, as they point out that 96% of XYY males “are thought to lead relatively ordinary lives, never seeing the inside of a prison or mental institution.” Clearly there is a need to appreciate that there are complexities that “underline human difference; we are often too quick to judge one another on the basis of fragmentary genetic clues” ** (Suzuki and Knudtson 1989:155). Thus, the idea of linking genes and criminality is dangerous, and is perhaps a throwback to the 1930s - 40s where the Nazi regime developed a broad policy of eugenics in which a number of socially and culturally unacceptable behaviours were incorrectly linked to genotypes and genetics. In this way, that State could justify the discrimination against Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, non-Nazis and in fact anyone who opposed it. *

One fellow in this article says there is “empirical data from several sources” but doesn’t name or provide any:

rinr.fsu.edu/spring96/features/evil.html

One thing that has stymied researchers is how two or more children can come from the same family gene pool, same parents, same environment, etc…and one goes bad, the other is an angel… But what I think is strange, is that it seems that they fail to really delve into the character of the “angel”.

I wonder if they have ever bothered to ascertain whether or not the “angel” was the abuser of the other, or the manipulator…of the bad one?

The “lack of history” of abuse, or other aberrant happenings isn’t surprising. Lots of people have lots of skeletons in their closets that are never found out…so the lack of history is not a valid piece of data in an empirical study or any study for that matter.

 

[ChristIsLord]

As I said, people are not born evil…there is little or no psychologically sound empirical evidence to support the notion.

Environment and upbringing are sociological elements, yes. And it is well proven that they are definite causes of people’s life outcomes.
.

the texas adoption study and studies between fraternal and identical twins both show that socipathic traits are greatly affected by ones genetics, possibly as much as 50% if these studies are accepted. Socipaths who were adopted overwhelmingly shared socipathic traits with their birth mom rather than adoptive parents. Read “The Sociopath Next Door” for the study names, they are all referenced in the book. Environment, genetics, parents, etc… all share an undeniable link to socipathy, but what actually makes a socipath we don’t know. but the evidence is impossible to ignore that genetics plays a significant role.

what makes sociopaths especially strange is upbringing seems to have little effect on them if any. for non-socipathic criminals they tend to enter the criminal justice system at 24 if from a stable background, and much much earlier if from an instable family. If from an unstable family they tend to enter the criminal justice system at 15 this is an expected result. sociopathic criminals on the other hand regardless of their upbringing tend to begin entering the criminal justice system at 14 regardless of whether they were abused, neglected, or raised by mother of the year. they seem to blossom into the criminals they are all by themselves.

 

[Michael_David]

Can we go back to the nine months before birth?

Say genetics was fine, but fresh fruit and veggies were short (winter and spring), could some nutritional shortage stunt the development of the fetus? Also, say the mother had some wine on the weekends, or even liked to smoke… how would this affect the development of the fetus? (Say another is in the womb during the summer and fall, with a lot of fresh fruits and veggies.)

If environment can link to disease, is the mind included in the scope of disease?

So, by the time the baby is born, there already has been nine months of “effect” on it and how it developed… at it’s most “susceptible” influence and time.

So, perhaps, defining “born that way” needs to include the previous nine months also. Here, genetics does not say it all, but also life-style has to be looked at. And, what is the actual environment in the womb for each birth?

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

last night i watched a show called mindhunter on i think msnbc channel. it’s about an fbi profiler interviewing killers, rapists etc… to get clues on what makes them tick.

last nights episode was about a man who is serving life for raping and murdering two girls around 10 or 11 years old. his M.O. was he would befriend people with girls this age and use that trust to later lure the girls when they were alone.

now it was tough for me to watch, for all intents and purposes this man was simply not human. he described how he has wanted to murder and rape since he was a young child and always had these feelings. he had ZERO regrets for the rapes and murders of two innocent children (ten years apart so i’m sure there’s more victims), claimed he had no regrets other than not taking the one girls body deeper into the woods so he wouldn’t have gotten caught. he claimed he never would’ve stopped and he loved the rapes and murders. and these are children of in one case his best friend he knew since high school. he had zero regret and couldn’t care less. simply not human at all…

now according to him he was essentially born this way, how does this jive with our view of God? this guy was pure evil, he didn’t appear to have free will, he was born evil and knew it from his earliest memories…

I doubt very much that one can generalise… ​

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

i understand what a sociopath is and the classifications for borderline personality disorder, narcisist etc… however that really doesn’t answer the question. to me sociopath is nothing more than a label put on someone who is essentially one mean s.o.b. it in and of itself tells us nothing, it’s just a classification.

are some of these folks simply born this way? i tend to think so and i’m not sure how that jives with my view of god.

Some people are total dratsabs (Robert Mugabe, the late unlamented John Geoghegan, scum like that). I don’t see how the existence or birth of sociopaths & other delightful people who deserve to be put up against a wall & shot is any more serious a problem for Judaeo-Christian theism than any other objection to that theism based on the reality of moral evil. This God allows unborn infants to be damaged for life by the behaviour of their parents - so why is letting unborn infants be sociopaths a problem ? A God who allows civilians to be bombed with napalm is surely more than capable of letting them become sociopaths who will one day ruin the lives of others. Life is full of horrors - & that is just one of them. ​