It is an issue. There’s heavy overlap between analytical approaches to regarding other human beings and psychopathy. That’s what the “creepy” signal, in part, is signaling. It’s “creepy” in a there’s-a-spider-wearing-a-human-face-looking-at-me sense—human beings don’t do that kind of thing, thus, you can’t be a human being. As a rule, you don’t want to communicate that you’re not a human being. There are… severe social recriminations for doing so.
Intimidating somebody on those grounds is like having the spider pull its human face off and stare at you with mandibles clicking. It’s no longer concerned with looking human; you’re now food. So no, it’s not something you want to do, in any case, including when looking for other “spiders wearing human faces”. If you’re merely analytical, you’re sending the wrong signals.
If you think about other human beings analytically, and want to signal that to find other people who think about other human beings analytically, there are socially safer signals to use. Cynicism, for example.
There’s heavy overlap between analytical approaches to regarding other human beings and psychopathy.
Not sure how true this is. It’s a trope, to be sure, thanks partly to Hannibal Lecter and his various imitators. But I haven’t seen much in the wild to show that analytical thinking about other people is well correlated even with basic lack of empathy towards them, let alone full-blown psychopathy.
(Lack of sympathy, sure, but that points towards a cluster of personalities more in the neighborhood of autism or Asperger syndrome. Perhaps what’s going on in pop culture is some sort of outgroup homogeneity/all-weird-people-are-equal effect.)
Empathy is basically about engaging in actions because you feel an emotional impulse to engage in the action.
The person who can push the fat man from the bridge needs to shut of their empathy to do so.
Psychopaths are generally charming and manipulative. “Hannibal” is probably closer to a true psychopath than the “I will calculate your love for me” concept, because Hannibal doesn’t -need- to calculate, he already knows; he’s read it in your body language. Knowing what you’re thinking is what -enables- him to be charming and manipulative.
It’s important to distinguish that psychopaths aren’t necessarily analytic, they just share the most dangerous qualities in common with analytic people—the ability to tell, at a glance, that a man used to be fat, and a subtle suggestion that he’s letting himself go will result in an emotional breakdown later that evening.
I wonder if psychopaths are actually charming and manipulative in general, or if this is survivorship bias; any psychopaths that aren’t would get immediately caught and destroyed, either literally or figuratively.
In our society we have few lynch mobs that kill psychopaths.
To the extend that we succeed in catching psychopaths, those people that get caught are the basis for psychologists who study the traits of psychopaths.
Consider what’s going to happen to a psychopath who isn’t charming and manipulative. He’s going to try to take advantage of people, but without the traits that make him able to do so successfully, he’s going to constantly get caught doing it, fail, and burn through all his social capital. Constantly trying to take advantage of people and failing has a good chance of leaving you dead, in jail, in poverty, or homeless.
You may be right in the sense that nobody diagnoses him with psychopathy, but being caught doing bad things without a diagnosis is still being caught doing bad things, and still has a pretty negative effect.
The best he’s going to be able to do is recognize that he doesn’t have the skills to take advantage of people and not do it, in which case he’ll be mostly indistinguishable from a normal person.
You seem to be assuming a particularly stupid psychopath, one who doesn’t realize in which way he is different from neurotypicals.
Let me offer you some alternatives. A “psychopath who isn’t charming and manipulative” can enlist into the armed forces (or become a prison guard, a cop, etc.). He can lead an entirely normal life faking socially-acceptable amount of interaction and be considered just an introvert. He can become an extremist for a cause.
Constantly trying to take advantage of people and failing has a good chance of leaving you dead, in jail, in poverty, or homeless.
Studying psychopaths who are in prison is easier for psychologists than studying psychopaths who aren’t in prison.
Being in prison doesn’t get one out of the reference category but more likely to be in the reference category.
The best he’s going to be able to do is recognize that he doesn’t have the skills to take advantage of people and not do it, in which case he’ll be mostly indistinguishable from a normal person.
If you go throw the Hare checklist, how many of the points only apply when a person actively tries to take advantage of others? Maybe the point about “Cunning/manipulative” and “Parasitic lifestyle” but most of the items don’t.
It seems to me that you argue against a concept of psychopathy that doesn’t have much to do with it’s clinical definition.
If you go throw the Hare checklist, how many of the points only apply when a person actively tries to take advantage of others?
Of course you are correct. So change that to “The best he’s going to do is hide it, because he doesn’t have the skills to take advantage of it and not hiding it will get him into trouble.”
I assume ‘you’ refers to any reader. To be sure, just for the record: I do think analytically about everything—including people. But I’m not very good at putting myself into other peoples shoes, so I have difficulty modelling them. Thus my analysis of individuals is probably not better then most peoples modelling by experience. But one can still analyse peoples behaviors on average—and that is what I do and what I immediately (mis)read from the OP. How do people react on average? What can I expect over the long run. I do empathize strongly just in case you are wondering. So no, I’m no spider wearing a human face.
If you think about other human beings analytically, and want to signal that to find other people who think about other human beings analytically, there are socially safer signals to use. Cynicism, for example.
That is actually a good recommendation. It doesn’t help me because I can’t stand the negativity but it gives ideas how to signal. Comments about politics probably also count. Or meta comments about social activity in general. Do you have any positive examples?
You’re interested in more than a partner who thinks analytically—they have to be reasonably optimistic, as well. So comments about optimistic philosophies might work; Leibniz, maybe. “Progressive” ideologies are generally fairly optimistic, so politically, you’d want to talk about, say, John Dewey, Ralph Nader, Lester Ward, etc. Nietschze is a mixed bag; his early stuff is quite pessimistic, but his latter works are much more optimistic.
Alternatively, you can find correlations. My experience suggests you might find exactly what you’re looking for in Swing dancing partners.
It is an issue. There’s heavy overlap between analytical approaches to regarding other human beings and psychopathy. That’s what the “creepy” signal, in part, is signaling. It’s “creepy” in a there’s-a-spider-wearing-a-human-face-looking-at-me sense—human beings don’t do that kind of thing, thus, you can’t be a human being. As a rule, you don’t want to communicate that you’re not a human being. There are… severe social recriminations for doing so.
Intimidating somebody on those grounds is like having the spider pull its human face off and stare at you with mandibles clicking. It’s no longer concerned with looking human; you’re now food. So no, it’s not something you want to do, in any case, including when looking for other “spiders wearing human faces”. If you’re merely analytical, you’re sending the wrong signals.
If you think about other human beings analytically, and want to signal that to find other people who think about other human beings analytically, there are socially safer signals to use. Cynicism, for example.
Not sure how true this is. It’s a trope, to be sure, thanks partly to Hannibal Lecter and his various imitators. But I haven’t seen much in the wild to show that analytical thinking about other people is well correlated even with basic lack of empathy towards them, let alone full-blown psychopathy.
(Lack of sympathy, sure, but that points towards a cluster of personalities more in the neighborhood of autism or Asperger syndrome. Perhaps what’s going on in pop culture is some sort of outgroup homogeneity/all-weird-people-are-equal effect.)
Empathy is basically about engaging in actions because you feel an emotional impulse to engage in the action. The person who can push the fat man from the bridge needs to shut of their empathy to do so.
Psychopaths are generally charming and manipulative. “Hannibal” is probably closer to a true psychopath than the “I will calculate your love for me” concept, because Hannibal doesn’t -need- to calculate, he already knows; he’s read it in your body language. Knowing what you’re thinking is what -enables- him to be charming and manipulative.
It’s important to distinguish that psychopaths aren’t necessarily analytic, they just share the most dangerous qualities in common with analytic people—the ability to tell, at a glance, that a man used to be fat, and a subtle suggestion that he’s letting himself go will result in an emotional breakdown later that evening.
I wonder if psychopaths are actually charming and manipulative in general, or if this is survivorship bias; any psychopaths that aren’t would get immediately caught and destroyed, either literally or figuratively.
In our society we have few lynch mobs that kill psychopaths.
To the extend that we succeed in catching psychopaths, those people that get caught are the basis for psychologists who study the traits of psychopaths.
Consider what’s going to happen to a psychopath who isn’t charming and manipulative. He’s going to try to take advantage of people, but without the traits that make him able to do so successfully, he’s going to constantly get caught doing it, fail, and burn through all his social capital. Constantly trying to take advantage of people and failing has a good chance of leaving you dead, in jail, in poverty, or homeless.
You may be right in the sense that nobody diagnoses him with psychopathy, but being caught doing bad things without a diagnosis is still being caught doing bad things, and still has a pretty negative effect.
The best he’s going to be able to do is recognize that he doesn’t have the skills to take advantage of people and not do it, in which case he’ll be mostly indistinguishable from a normal person.
You seem to be assuming a particularly stupid psychopath, one who doesn’t realize in which way he is different from neurotypicals.
Let me offer you some alternatives. A “psychopath who isn’t charming and manipulative” can enlist into the armed forces (or become a prison guard, a cop, etc.). He can lead an entirely normal life faking socially-acceptable amount of interaction and be considered just an introvert. He can become an extremist for a cause.
Studying psychopaths who are in prison is easier for psychologists than studying psychopaths who aren’t in prison. Being in prison doesn’t get one out of the reference category but more likely to be in the reference category.
If you go throw the Hare checklist, how many of the points only apply when a person actively tries to take advantage of others? Maybe the point about “Cunning/manipulative” and “Parasitic lifestyle” but most of the items don’t.
It seems to me that you argue against a concept of psychopathy that doesn’t have much to do with it’s clinical definition.
Of course you are correct. So change that to “The best he’s going to do is hide it, because he doesn’t have the skills to take advantage of it and not hiding it will get him into trouble.”
I assume ‘you’ refers to any reader. To be sure, just for the record: I do think analytically about everything—including people. But I’m not very good at putting myself into other peoples shoes, so I have difficulty modelling them. Thus my analysis of individuals is probably not better then most peoples modelling by experience. But one can still analyse peoples behaviors on average—and that is what I do and what I immediately (mis)read from the OP. How do people react on average? What can I expect over the long run. I do empathize strongly just in case you are wondering. So no, I’m no spider wearing a human face.
That is actually a good recommendation. It doesn’t help me because I can’t stand the negativity but it gives ideas how to signal. Comments about politics probably also count. Or meta comments about social activity in general. Do you have any positive examples?
You’re interested in more than a partner who thinks analytically—they have to be reasonably optimistic, as well. So comments about optimistic philosophies might work; Leibniz, maybe. “Progressive” ideologies are generally fairly optimistic, so politically, you’d want to talk about, say, John Dewey, Ralph Nader, Lester Ward, etc. Nietschze is a mixed bag; his early stuff is quite pessimistic, but his latter works are much more optimistic.
Alternatively, you can find correlations. My experience suggests you might find exactly what you’re looking for in Swing dancing partners.
Thank you very much!