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Career thieves wouldn't scour a park for wallets, no, but many people are opportunistic thieves. If they happen upon money with no one in sight, they'll just ta

Career thieves wouldn't scour a park for wallets, no, but many people are opportunistic thieves. If they happen upon money with no one in sight, they'll just take it, without thinking it's a big deal. The case in the article matches the second model, not the first. Hundreds of people realised they were in a library with no staff. Two-hundred books were taken out, presumably without anyone having to log their names. That would have made it extremely easy for them to just keep the books. But they were returned. Having few opportunistic thieves is, one would think, a good sign of societal trust and well-being. I'll just mention that security at UK university libraries is fairly tight, I know people who have accidently taken out books without logging them, and just kept them, and there have been cases at Cambridge where quite high-value books have gone missing.

kqr 3y ago
> Two-hundred books were taken out, presumably without anyone having to log their names. The article states that every book taken out was returned. I see two alternatives: 1. The staff conducted a full inventory a couple of weeks after the incident and confirmed that every book is still there. (By the way, at what rate are books smuggled out even during regular opening hours?) 2. The books that were taken out were borrowed against a library card using some sort of self-checkout station. I find option 2 much more likely, which meant the names were logged.
- Emma_Goldman 3y ago
  Perfectly possible, but if there were no staff, that means that the denizens of Gothenburg were conscientious enough to police themselves. They checked out their books even though they probably could have just walked out the front door with them.
  - anttisalmela 3y ago
    At least here in northern Finland you could already do that even with staff present. Everyone goes in with backpacks or bags and with self service there's no way to actually monitor if all the books were properly checked out.
- drewcoo 3y ago
  If that's the case, then they cannot know that all items taken were returned. They can only know that the items checked out were.
3seashells 3y ago
>but many people are opportunistic thieves. My father used to think that. Turns out it's mostly untreated paranoid shizophrenia creating self fulfilling prophecies.
shalmanese 3y ago
This has been tested by researchers: https://www.npr.org/2019/06/20/734141432/what-dropping-17-000-wallets-around-the-globe-can-teach-us-about-honesty https://www.npr.org/2019/06/20/734141432/what-dropping-17-00...
apwheele 3y ago
Criminologist here -- both baron and Emma are right! (The question is moreso in terms of rates, you can find anecdotes confirming either behavior.) Two of my favorite related articles: - Serendipity in robbery target selection[1]. Interviews with chronic robbers talks about how they cruise around looking for marks. They are strategic though in their "foraging". - The role of territoriality in crime prevention: A field experiment[2]. Experiment with leaving a $10 gift card on a desk in Uni library. (So similar to here, unlikely people going to library intending to steal.) There were thefts - in one condition 1/30 people who passed by nicked the card. Since a single chronic offender can commit many crimes, the current patterns of car break ins in cities are IMO likely driven by a small number of "professional" offenders, moreso than victim behavior. [1] http://www.d-ddaily.com/images/6-1-15_Serendipity%20in%20Robbery%20Target%20Selection%20Jacobs%202010.pdf http://www.d-ddaily.com/images/6-1-15_Serendipity%20in%20Rob... [2] https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1301910/1/Wortley_%26_McFarlane_2011_territoriality.pdf https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1301910/1/Wortley_%26_...

kqr 3y ago

> Two-hundred books were taken out, presumably without anyone having to log their names. The article states that every book taken out was returned. I see two alternatives: 1. The staff conducted a full inventory a couple of weeks after the incident and confirmed that every book is still there. (By the way, at what rate are books smuggled out even during regular opening hours?) 2. The books that were taken out were borrowed against a library card using some sort of self-checkout station. I find option 2 much more likely, which meant the names were logged.

Emma_Goldman 3y ago
Perfectly possible, but if there were no staff, that means that the denizens of Gothenburg were conscientious enough to police themselves. They checked out their books even though they probably could have just walked out the front door with them.
- anttisalmela 3y ago
  At least here in northern Finland you could already do that even with staff present. Everyone goes in with backpacks or bags and with self service there's no way to actually monitor if all the books were properly checked out.
drewcoo 3y ago
If that's the case, then they cannot know that all items taken were returned. They can only know that the items checked out were.

3seashells 3y ago

>but many people are opportunistic thieves. My father used to think that. Turns out it's mostly untreated paranoid shizophrenia creating self fulfilling prophecies.

shalmanese 3y ago

This has been tested by researchers: https://www.npr.org/2019/06/20/734141432/what-dropping-17-000-wallets-around-the-globe-can-teach-us-about-honesty https://www.npr.org/2019/06/20/734141432/what-dropping-17-00...

apwheele 3y ago

Criminologist here -- both baron and Emma are right! (The question is moreso in terms of rates, you can find anecdotes confirming either behavior.) Two of my favorite related articles: - Serendipity in robbery target selection[1]. Interviews with chronic robbers talks about how they cruise around looking for marks. They are strategic though in their "foraging". - The role of territoriality in crime prevention: A field experiment[2]. Experiment with leaving a $10 gift card on a desk in Uni library. (So similar to here, unlikely people going to library intending to steal.) There were thefts - in one condition 1/30 people who passed by nicked the card. Since a single chronic offender can commit many crimes, the current patterns of car break ins in cities are IMO likely driven by a small number of "professional" offenders, moreso than victim behavior. [1] http://www.d-ddaily.com/images/6-1-15_Serendipity%20in%20Robbery%20Target%20Selection%20Jacobs%202010.pdf http://www.d-ddaily.com/images/6-1-15_Serendipity%20in%20Rob... [2] https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1301910/1/Wortley_%26_McFarlane_2011_territoriality.pdf https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1301910/1/Wortley_%26_...