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I’ve often wondered given what we now know about psychopathy (it’s heritable, has a biological basis) if humanity, and especially it’s social order, isn’t locke

I’ve often wondered given what we now know about psychopathy (it’s heritable, has a biological basis) if humanity, and especially it’s social order, isn’t locked in a kind of evolutionary arms race between these two forms. Essentially, psychopaths push for forms of social ordering that allow them the greatest latitude, entrench hierarchical power, and normalize their antisocial nature, while the prosocial rest of us struggle to resist them through more communal and consensus-oriented forms. There’s obviously a continuum between the two poles from which all conflict and failures arise, but given how much of success in modern society seems oriented around the antisocial pole, I’m often left wondering which side is winning.

jacobush 7y ago
Yep - and keep in mind winning in the evolutionary game is (local) offspring, not the state of the world at large. A true psychopath would gladly trigger WW3 to gain some local optimum.
cobbzilla 7y ago
The late, great Pieter Hintjens touches on this point in his book "The Psychopath Code" [1]. Psychopathy seems to exist along a spectrum -- it's present in all of us to varying degrees, and may not become "activated" for most people, in most situations. There is a good argument that this cat-and-mouse game has been going on for as long as "freeloading" has been going on, which is to say it is probably older than humanity. [1] https://www.gitbook.com/book/hintjens/psychopathcode/details https://www.gitbook.com/book/hintjens/psychopathcode/details
jariel 7y ago
"psychopaths push for forms of social ordering that allow them the greatest latitude," This is an interesting idea, but I fully disagree that it's reality. We can debate about 'how much', but some aspects of social order require hierarchy and power - it's unavoidable. The 'psychopaths' are the one's who wield it without regard for the inherent responsibility. 'Concentrations of power' are not inherently bad, but they provide a much more potent opportunity for corruption.
FabHK 7y ago
There’s a wonderful interactive online game (for lack of a better work) that lets you explore and experience a game theoretic analysis of that tension. Very instructive. When trust collapses, everyone is much worse off. https://ncase.me/trust/ https://ncase.me/trust/
PavlovsCat 7y ago
As you said it's not actually that black and white, but for the sake of argument, I would say one of these sides cannot "win", it can only destroy, and if they do that thoroughly enough, they just fall into the well of their own sickness for good. Sure, they can then define that as healthy, but that doesn't change their condition. > No matter how much lip service those committed to power (psychopaths) may pay to the principle of equality (empaths), they can never approach their fellow human beings on an equal footing; their relationships with others are defined solely in terms of power and weakness. Therefore, they must accumulate as much power as possible, with the aim of becoming invulnerable and proving this invulnerability. -- Arno Gruen > And so one passes on one's own victimization through the act of punishing the stranger out there, the one identified as being everything one has learned to hate in oneself. The result is what we characterize as normal behavior in our culture: the life-long attempt to gain control over the painful part of our nature - the part of us that we have lost and that keeps on making us feel impotent and helpless - by making victims of others in order to punish them for the pain we are not permitted to feel and for the victim in us that we are not allowed to be. -- Arno Gruen, "The Need to Punish", http://arnogruen.net/the_need_to_punish_--_article_by_arno_gruen.pdf http://arnogruen.net/the_need_to_punish_--_article_by_arno_g...

jacobush 7y ago

Yep - and keep in mind winning in the evolutionary game is (local) offspring, not the state of the world at large. A true psychopath would gladly trigger WW3 to gain some local optimum.

cobbzilla 7y ago

The late, great Pieter Hintjens touches on this point in his book "The Psychopath Code" [1]. Psychopathy seems to exist along a spectrum -- it's present in all of us to varying degrees, and may not become "activated" for most people, in most situations. There is a good argument that this cat-and-mouse game has been going on for as long as "freeloading" has been going on, which is to say it is probably older than humanity. [1] https://www.gitbook.com/book/hintjens/psychopathcode/details https://www.gitbook.com/book/hintjens/psychopathcode/details

jariel 7y ago

"psychopaths push for forms of social ordering that allow them the greatest latitude," This is an interesting idea, but I fully disagree that it's reality. We can debate about 'how much', but some aspects of social order require hierarchy and power - it's unavoidable. The 'psychopaths' are the one's who wield it without regard for the inherent responsibility. 'Concentrations of power' are not inherently bad, but they provide a much more potent opportunity for corruption.

FabHK 7y ago

There’s a wonderful interactive online game (for lack of a better work) that lets you explore and experience a game theoretic analysis of that tension. Very instructive. When trust collapses, everyone is much worse off. https://ncase.me/trust/ https://ncase.me/trust/

PavlovsCat 7y ago

As you said it's not actually that black and white, but for the sake of argument, I would say one of these sides cannot "win", it can only destroy, and if they do that thoroughly enough, they just fall into the well of their own sickness for good. Sure, they can then define that as healthy, but that doesn't change their condition. > No matter how much lip service those committed to power (psychopaths) may pay to the principle of equality (empaths), they can never approach their fellow human beings on an equal footing; their relationships with others are defined solely in terms of power and weakness. Therefore, they must accumulate as much power as possible, with the aim of becoming invulnerable and proving this invulnerability. -- Arno Gruen > And so one passes on one's own victimization through the act of punishing the stranger out there, the one identified as being everything one has learned to hate in oneself. The result is what we characterize as normal behavior in our culture: the life-long attempt to gain control over the painful part of our nature - the part of us that we have lost and that keeps on making us feel impotent and helpless - by making victims of others in order to punish them for the pain we are not permitted to feel and for the victim in us that we are not allowed to be. -- Arno Gruen, "The Need to Punish", http://arnogruen.net/the_need_to_punish_--_article_by_arno_gruen.pdf http://arnogruen.net/the_need_to_punish_--_article_by_arno_g...