NOTE: This is a visualization of Episode 090 of The Corbett Report podcast, first released on June 14, 2009.
Comment: Political Ponerology is a seminal book that describes what is quite probably THE great problem of our time.
From everything I have read about pychopaths they all seem to have one element in common: they treat life and their experiences as a computer simulation such that conscience becomes irrelevant.They don't "treat life like a computer simulation". That's just how they think. Just because an animal can think, doesn't mean it can think like a human with a conscience. It's not as if the hardware is irrelevant.
Now certainly we are capable of convincing ourselves we understand how psychopaths think. But we fail over and over again at that task, as any psychopath can demonstrate readily.Good point. History shows us that humanity hasn't got a clue about psychopathy, otherwise, surely 6% of the population would not have imposed its rather desolate world view on 94% of the population. They would not occupy just about every position of influence in just about every sphere of human activity.
People are being desensitised to observing unpleasant experiences. The norms of behaviour shift accordingly.Yes, the ponerization of the masses of normal people. There is an article today, about a group of teenagers who watched a man drown, and did nothing. They were laughing, and posted the clip on social media. Complete disassociation. Confirms your point above.
and who votes?Many, for different reasons. Some hoping to maintain the status quo, others hoping to change things for the better, whether deluded or not, doesn't make one a psychopath. That seems rather simplistic.