The Scientific Dissection of Evil and Why We Need Empathy

Evil. Monster. Heartless. Simply unhuman. These are words that are commonly thrown around to describe people whose actions are unexplainable. Sometimes we use these words for someone who committed atrocities, like dictators or serial killers. Other times we use these words to describe people we see everyday. However, with more free time to think, I’ve been tackling the subject of empathy; is the extent of our empathy supposed to be conditional? Should we try to understand the unimaginable? It seems difficult to try to comprehend the actions of people we despise, but I’ve found that diving into the science of evil blurs the lines between human and monster.

 

Let’s begin with something small: oxytocin. Oxytocin is a hormone used to transmit messages through our brains and bloodstreams. Simply put, with the release of oxytocin, people tend to show kindness, generosity, and empathy. This balance is essential in everybody’s life, telling our body how to respond to certain situations. 

 

For 95% of the population, the production and reception of oxytocin function normally. However, the other 5% lacks the oxytocin receptors to behave morally. Starting as a baby, our receptors need to be stimulated, or else they wouldn’t develop properly; therefore, people who had a severely traumatic childhood grow up with a lessened ability to receive oxytocin. Apart from environmental factors, others are born with genes that don’t allow them to process oxytocin. These people are known as psychopaths.

 

A psychopath’s inability to empathize with others stems from both heredity and upbringing. Neuroscientist and professor at University of California, Irvine James Fallon found that psychopaths showed low activity in areas of the brain that determined an individual’s level of empathize and self-control. Fallon also studied the “Warrior Gene” in psychopaths, the reduced form of the MAO-A gene located on the X chromosome which leads to an increased risk of aggressive behavior. However, through his studies, Fallon found that his own brain scans and genetics had the same patterns the psychopaths had. He discovered that he is a pro-social psychopath, someone who functioned normally in society but is unable to fully empathize with others. 

 

So what separates people like Fallon from the psychopaths who commit premeditated crimes? Like the receptors of oxytocin, the “Warrior Gene” and the development of the brain are susceptible to environmental factors. The only barrier preventing Fallon from becoming a “full blown psychopath” was the fact that he grew up in a loving household.

 

Now, perhaps the lines between evil and good have become a bit more blurred. No matter your definition of evil, there’s no denying that sometimes there’s very little standing in the way of socially functioning people like Fallon from becoming violent criminals.  

 

However, even with an understanding of these biological processes, we have yet to establish the role of free will. Even if someone is diagnosed as a psychopath, are they totally helpless in the face of their predestined conditions? And psychopathy is only a small portion of personality and mental disorders that violent criminals can suffer from. How do factors like genetics and childhood environment affect people diagnosed with other disorders like borderline personality disorder and conduct disorder? For average people who don’t suffer from mental disorders, how does ignorance and education influence how they treat others?

 

These are all important questions to ask. When we are willing to discuss such complex issues, we refuse to blindly pass judgment on others, and we refuse to dehumanize those whom we call monsters.

 

It’s important to know that empathy isn’t the same as justification; there is no way to justify atrocities like slavery or the Holocaust, nor can we justify the actions of a murderer or a rapist. But it would be naive of us to group these people or these events to the actions of a few delusional individuals. In doing so, we delude ourselves into thinking that this different group of evils is just that: different. We ignore the influence of psychopathy, upbringing, and social norms. We ignore the bigger picture and instead point fingers to the ‘evil’ individuals as we dehumanize them and believe that we are more human than they are. Russian novelist and Nobel Prize winner Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said it best: “If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?”

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References

Bonn, S. A. (Ed.). (2016, May 9). Understanding psychopathic criminals. Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/wicked-deeds/201605/understanding-psychopathic-criminals

Diamond, S. A. (2014, December 20). How mad was Hitler? Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/evil-deeds/201412/how-mad-was-hitler

Fragkaki, I., Verhagen, M., Van Herwaarden, A. E., & Cima, M. (2019). Daily oxytocin patterns in relation to psychopathy and childhood trauma in residential youth. Elsevier, 102, 105-113. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306453018306036

Goode, E. (1998, November 17). Insane or just evil? A psychiatrist takes a loook. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/1998/11/17/science/insane-or-just-evil-a-psychiatrist-takes-a-new-look-at-hitler.html

MAOA Gene. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/gene/MAOA#conditions

Psychopaths' brains show differences in structure and function. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.med.wisc.edu/news-and-events/2011/november/psychopaths-brains-differences-structure-function/

Stromberg, J. (2013, November 22). The neuroscientist who discovered he was a psychopath. Retrieved from https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-neuroscientist-who-discovered-he-was-a-psychopath-180947814/

Wensley, D., & King, M. (2008). Scientific responsibility for the dissemination and interpretation of genetic   research: Lessons from the "warrior gene" controversy. Journal of Medical Sciences, 34(6), 507-509. Retrieved from JSTOR database.