The Psychopath Test

The Psychopath Test is a fun, wild ride that at some point will have you questioning your own sanity and that of those around you.

This is one of those fun, popular science books that are like candy--you're able to just gobble it down quickly and then later you're a bit shocked at how quickly you downed such a quantity. I raced through this book.

The author, Jon Ronson, starts investigating a mysterious package that has been sent to academics around the world. In a roundabout way, this leads him to the study of psychopaths and what, if anything, defines this mysterious psychological state. He meets up first with Scientologists (who clearly, are not the most unbiased group of people when it comes to psychology) who introduce him to a man who, after committing a crime, decided to mime insanity to avoid a prison sentence. Apparently he did it too well, because he's now locked up in one of the most heavily guarded prisons in Britain, along with its most notorious and terrifying criminal. The mystery--is this man truly a psychopath and mentally ill, or is he a very clever fake--is so striking. While the author deviates to explain the history of psychopathy and its definitions, treatments, etc, he returns throughout the book to this story. I found myself wondering ever since what the truth is.

That is the most haunting thing about this book--we'll never know. The nature of psychopaths, as defined by the various people interviewed in this book, is that they are incredibly charming and wonderful mimics of genuine emotion, while not feeling any themselves. They are incredibly calculating, have very little memory of emotion, and are often quite ruthless. They are born psychopaths and will die psychopaths. They feel little empathy, feel no shame, and do not feel any hesitation at exploiting the weaknesses and vulnerabilities of others. One of the most amazing examples of these qualities is a Canadian psychopath who was imprisoned after killing 3 people. The day of his release, only hours after leaving prison, he murdered another person. His reason? He wanted to know how it felt to take a life. When reminded that he had, about 12 years earlier, taken 3 lives, he shrugs and says, "Yes, but that was so long ago." It almost as if he needed a rush, could only experience emotion in the fury of the moment. It was frightening.

And yet, at certain points while reading the book, you start to identify certain qualities that you share with alleged psychopaths. While a psychologist assures readers that if you are worried about being a psychopath, you categorically are incapable of being a psychopath, it is cold comfort. And that, I think, is the central question of the book--don't we all have some capacity for cruelty, for selfishness, a certain disdain for the feelings of others at times? So what restrains us? And can those restraints fail? Are we all a wonky synapse away from unspeakable acts? And since psychopaths are so good at mimicking the actions and behaviors of "normal" people, how can you tell who is a danger?

Overall: good read, sticks with you, makes you look askance at the people sitting quietly on the bus and your taciturn coworker

hi

Welcome to yet another blog.

I'm hoping to be better about blogging this time around by freeing myself of restraints.  I realized quickly that I just can't write about librarianship after spending 9-10 hours at a library all day.

Since I love to read, I've decided to collect my thoughts on books I'm reading in one easily accessible place. The posts to come will not be reviews or recommendations, but the ideas and feelings I'm exploring while reading. I will not be writing about everything I read, just the stuff that has some meat to it--the stuff that makes me feel something. Get ready for all the feelings.

I might sometimes get distracted and write about non-reading things, but can almost guarantee that those thoughts are based on a book I've been reading/am currently reading. So much of my experience of the world is tinged by my reading life that to separate them is pointless.

Hopefully this will be interesting to someone! Please comment, especially if you've read the book I'm discussing. Talking to other people about books is one of the great joys in life and continuing online would be really fun.