Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Power hungry

A reader asks why sociopaths are so power hungry, do I suspect any historical or contemporary figures were/are sociopaths, e.g. Machiavelli, and how to learn to think like a sociopath.

I honestly don't know why sociopaths are so concerned with gaining power. I don't think it is necessarily unique to sociopaths, obviously, but I would say that it seems to apply to the vast majority of sociopaths. Perhaps there is something evolutionarily implicated here, that for the same reasons that sociopaths were evolved to not have a conscience, they were also evolved to crave power?

There's something very primitive about the sociopath's drive for power, like the sex drive, but it can manifest itself in many ways. For instance, I think a lot of sociopaths just want to make people jump, or at least know that they can. Some of them want the classical form of power, for example some political or business position or the money that can buy the power. Some of them, like me, channel the drive for power to include power over oneself, one's impulses and inclinations.

I do think that Machiavelli was a sociopath. There are a lot of people that I sort of suspect are sociopaths, but it's really hard to tell if anyone is without being privy to their thought processes. Anything else is complete speculation. For instance, I got in this idle debate once about whether Angelina Jolie was sociopath leaning. In my mind she had some of the clear identifying factors: creepy attachment to family, volatile, bisexual, and loves Ayn Rand (libertarian leaning politically). The person I was arguing with could not get over her humanitarian work, which to me is a nonstarter because there could be plenty of reasons why she does that. You know? Like why do I write this blog? People always want to know stuff like that, but there could be a million reasons, including accumulating power, respect, being able to influence the dialogue about a particular subject, etc. And with Angelina Jolie, how can you explain the other stuff? Like the fact that she has a look that makes people want to cry and she can be equally seductive with straight women as she is with men? But really I could go either way with her, and without looking inside her head there's no way to know for sure.

There are few people that I would feel confident to say are sociopaths, most of them literary because we actually get to see the "honest" picture of how they think, e.g. Tom Ripley, Cathy from East of Eden, and some others I have mentioned on the blog.

How to learn to think like a sociopath? I don't know, find one to apprentice with? But I would be careful. I think after you learn to think like a sociopath, there is something about you that changes and you can never really go back. I think this is particularly true if you learn to think like a sociopath at a young age and had all of those sociopathic neurological pathways reinforced instead of the "normal" ones.


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Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Childishness

I've been meaning to write a post on the childlike qualities of sociopaths for a while, but luckily a reader did it for me:
I'd like to prod something on which I haven't found a discussion on the blog, yet. To wit, the issue of the emotional childishness of the (apparently) typical sociopath. Personally, I find that despite my relative intelligence, rationality, education (and modesty~), etc., there's an undercurrent of selfish, childish rage beneath many of my actions—and even the associated thought patterns. I refer to the people in my sphere of influence as my "toys" and so on. Standard objectifying/dehumanizing nonsense. I doubt I need to explain it in any great detail, but it frames my following thoughts. Like a child, I become unreasonably angry (and violent) when people damage my toys. Like a child, I am fickle and become easily annoyed when they don't meet my needs, e.g., they're busy or unresponsive when I want them to spend time with me, even (or especially?) when the reason they can't is outside their control. It tends to be a short-lived annoyance, as I usually find something to do eventually, but it's irritating nonetheless.

On another level, there are benefits to this (rather literal) inner child. Datamining is a commonality between us, but this may be where our methods diverge. When collecting data, I am of two minds; in the developed, relational part of my datamining process, I am calculating, rational, blah blah blah; in the instinctive collection phase, however, I can take in large amounts of "raw" data, uncolored by preconception, overthinking, or other noise. I can then feed it through the relational mechanism and form otherwise disparate data into a cohesive whole, or I can leave it unprocessed if the situation calls for it. In this way, it is possible to prioritize information. The brain being as it is, this is a mostly instantaneous and automatic process. I imagine it would be a bit of a chore if it were more deliberately conscious.

I gather from your writings that some of this will seem familiar, but I'm curious about your thoughts.
Childish traits include being heavily self-involved, pettiness, manipulation as a primary social tool, tantrums, anger issues, impulsivity, an overindulgence in certain things without knowing when to stop (like eating the equivalent of candy until we get sick), among others. There are also childlike traits, like love, naiveté (until disabused of it), a perhaps overly simplified way of looking at the world, and a sensitivity to rejection and its corresponding desire to please.

Sociopaths share a lot in common with children, it's why we can get along so well with them. In fact, I think child sociopaths only really learn their opportunism and jaded mentality by attending the school of hard knocks. That's one reason why I think the comparison between sociopaths and aspies is so potent for me. I have wondered if I would have ended up seeming like a helpless, clueless aspie if only I were raised on a deserted island isolated from the harshness of the world, Blue Lagoon style.

I'm looking at you, society.


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Monday, October 28, 2013

The Empath's Cheat-Sheet for What a Sociopath Really Means

I love this, from an anonymous reader:
The Empath's Cheat-Sheet for What a Sociopath Really Means

1. I love you: I am fond of your companionship and put you above most, but never above me. Consider it an honor.

2. I'm sorry, forgive me: I really do not enjoy the fact that your mood has altered. Please revert back to normal.

3. I'd do anything for you: I'd do plenty to keep you right where I want you to be

4. My condolences for your loss: *crickets* ... It's just a body. See you later when you aren't being an emotional train-wreck.

5. S/he fills my heart with joy: I haven't had this much fun playing in a long time, and the sex is more than acceptable.

6. I love my family: They're mine.

7. That's simply shocking: You've touched my morbid bone. No need to stop now...

8. Deep down, I feel I'm a good person: I'm not in prison and I stopped abusing animals, mostly. What more can you possibly demand of me?

9. I'm not a monster, I'm a human too: I'm trying to seem human, give me a break. It's not like this is particularly natural for me.
Does anyone have a number 10?


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Sunday, October 27, 2013

Ennui of a puppetmaster

From xkcd:
I was explaining to a friend last night that although part of me likes the fact that she is damaged because her vulnerability gives me a degree of power over her, it is not necessarily something I need to consummate to enjoy. Sometimes, like in physics, potential power can be just as enjoyable as actually exercised power. In the same way that a classic car collector can enjoy cars he never drives or a wine collector enjoys wine he never drinks, sometimes the achievement of some advantage, either known or unknown by the other person, is not a means to an end, but an end in itself.

Saturday, October 26, 2013

Oxytocin debunked?

I've written on oxytocin before -- the connection some researchers have made between oxytocin and empathy, calling it the "moral molecule" or the "kindness hormone", and the odd coincidence that about 5% of the population do not release oxytocin at the usual stimulants and 1-4% of the population is psychopathic, etc. It seems like a wonder hormone and a justification for empathy and social bonding all at once. Or is it? This was an interesting summary of some recent findings that shed more light on oxytocin, suggesting that its affects are much more complicated than some believe, to be filed in the ever-expanding "empathy not all its cracked up to be" file:

It’s been called the cuddle hormone, the holiday hormone, the moral molecule, and more—but new research suggests that oxytocin needs some new nicknames. Like maybe the conformity hormone, or perhaps the America-Number-One! molecule.
***
In the past few years, however, new research is finding that oxytocin doesn’t just bond us to mothers, lovers, and friends—it also seems to play a role in excluding others from that bond. (And perhaps, as one scientist has argued, wanting what other people have.) This just makes oxytocin more interesting—and it points to a fundamental, constantly recurring fact about human beings: Many of the same biological and psychological mechanisms that bond us together can also tear us apart. It all depends on the social and emotional context.

The article breaks the recent research findings into five main categories:

1. It keeps you loyal to your love—and leery of the rest.

2. It makes us poor winners and sore losers.

3. It makes you cooperative with your group—sometimes a little too cooperative.

4. It makes you see your group as better than other groups (to a point).

5. It does make us trusting—but not gullible.

Some of the interesting quotes include:
  • [O]xytocin plays a critical role in helping us become more relaxed, extroverted, generous, and cooperative in our groups. Sounds utopian, doesn’t it? Perhaps a little too utopian. . . . The oxytocin-influenced participants tended to go with the flow of their group, while the placebo-dosed participants hewed to their own individualistic path. Oxytocin is great when you’re out with friends or solving a problem with coworkers. It might not be so great when you need to pick a leader or make some other big decision that requires independence, not conformity.
  • If a group of researchers in the Netherlands dosed you with oxytocin, you might find yourself developing a sudden affection for windmills, tulips, totally legal soft drugs and prostitution, and tall, blonde, multilingual bankers. You might also decide that the life of a Dutch person is more valuable than that of, say, a Canadian. That’s exactly what Carsten De Dreu found in 2011. His study was sternly criticized for overstating its effects—and yet it’s not the only one to find that oxytocin seems to make us really, really, really like our own groups, even at the expense of other groups.
  • The drug “soma” from Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World probably contained some oxytocin. The two-minutes hate in Orwell’s 1984 probably got the oxytocin pumping as well.
  • We may like being part of a group so much that we’re willing to hurt others just to stay in it. The desire to belong can compromise our ethical and empathic instincts. That’s when the conscious mind needs to come online and put the brakes on the pleasures of social affiliation.
I particularly liked this conclusion that along the lines of every-virtue-is-also-vice:

“We do have to be in the right environment to be virtuous.” That might be the bottom line with oxytocin—and, indeed, any neural system that bonds us to other people: The impulse to join and conform in a group is always very strong in human primates, and so the key lies in choosing the right group—and then not getting carried away. 

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