Considering he deliberately chose creatures he -expected- people to run over, I don’t think this experiment shows what the quote says it shows. Your response implies you already suspect reasons why somebody would run over snakes and spiders, and the turtle-squashing percentage was apparently 1%, which comes in less than the expected number, if we presume psychopaths want to run over turtles. But now I’m curious about the frequency of people with visceral reactions to turtles.
I agree. Snakes are a poor choice of animal for a psychopathy test.
If I see a snake anywhere near my house, a friend/relative’s house, or in a nearby park, then I will go out of my way to grab a shovel or something and kill it. I will not risk some child or someone I know getting bitten by one, and I’m not skilled enough to distinguish which ones are poisonous or potentially harmful to humans so they all go.
A better title would be “5% of people go out of their way to kill dangerous scary animals, 1% are psychopaths as usual.”
And at least one person considers snakes and the time to kill them less valuable than the time it takes to identify dangerous snakes and not kill harmless or beneficial snakes.
Replace ‘snake’ with ‘human’ and ‘[venomous] or potentially harmful to me’ with ‘kittens’ and ‘rabid’, you might realize that the ick factor of reptiles is more important to you than the actual danger.
Considering he deliberately chose creatures he -expected- people to run over, I don’t think this experiment shows what the quote says it shows. Your response implies you already suspect reasons why somebody would run over snakes and spiders, and the turtle-squashing percentage was apparently 1%, which comes in less than the expected number, if we presume psychopaths want to run over turtles. But now I’m curious about the frequency of people with visceral reactions to turtles.
I agree. Snakes are a poor choice of animal for a psychopathy test.
If I see a snake anywhere near my house, a friend/relative’s house, or in a nearby park, then I will go out of my way to grab a shovel or something and kill it. I will not risk some child or someone I know getting bitten by one, and I’m not skilled enough to distinguish which ones are poisonous or potentially harmful to humans so they all go.
A better title would be “5% of people go out of their way to kill dangerous scary animals, 1% are psychopaths as usual.”
And at least one person considers snakes and the time to kill them less valuable than the time it takes to identify dangerous snakes and not kill harmless or beneficial snakes.
Replace ‘snake’ with ‘human’ and ‘[venomous] or potentially harmful to me’ with ‘kittens’ and ‘rabid’, you might realize that the ick factor of reptiles is more important to you than the actual danger.