Nazi Germany was a true source of critical inquiry for academics worldwide. The work of Adorno et al. about authoritarianism through psychoanalytic theory, and the work of Stanley Milgram about obedience influenced by situational factors are at the core of modern forensic psychology practice. Authoritarianism can be described as an attitude spectrum encompassing all types of prejudices, that is, xenophobia; as well as extreme ideologies in regards to discipline and traditions, that is, conventionalism (McAvoy, 2012). This essay seeks to explore the studies conducted by the mentioned above pioneers of forensic psychology during the post-war period in relation to the holocaust events.
Xenophobic conventionalism was the main motivation driving the mass assassination of innocent people during WWII. This inspired Sanford to invite Adorno, Frenkel-Brunswik and Levinson to join his psychological investigation project in the US, and they became a team often cited as “Adorno et al.” due to Harvard alphabetical referencing rules. They were interested in uncovering the unconscious psychopathology of war criminals, and this led them to create the F-scale (McAvoy, 2012). Based on psychoanalytic theory, they administered questionnaires and interviews to the masses in order to validate their hypotheses which drew a correlation between extreme childhood trauma and overboard adult attitudes to authority (McAvoy, 2012). The trials being held at Nuremberg, Germany, were a powerful motivator behind social psychology research after the war (Bayard, 2012). Stanley Milgram studied Adorno et al.’s work meticulously and was interested in understanding authoritarian obedience and how it related to irresponsible cruelty. After watching the globally broadcasted trial of Adolf Eichmann in television during 1961, Milgram realised that ordinary people were capable of committing great acts of violence when following orders (Banyard, 2012). Through systematic procedures and pressure from authoritarian figures, a death toll that today approximates seventeen million minority individuals was achieved. Homosexuals, dissenters, jews, activists, disabled people, and foreigners; all brutally discriminated against and murdered (Holocaust Encyclopedia, 2019). Milgram designed a social experiment in order to better understand the link between conscience, executive obedience, and authority in organised war crimes.
Adorno et al. (1950, p. V) saw prejudice as a mental health virus: “Even a social disease has its periods of quiescence during which the social scientists […] can study it […] to prevent or reduce the virulence of the next outbreak”. They devised the F-scale with its subscales of ethnocentrism, politico-conservatism, and antisemitism (McAvoy, 2012). They used both, quantitative and qualitative methods: “Individuals were studied by means of interviews and special clinical techniques for revealing underlying wishes, fears, and defenses; groups were studied by means of questionnaires” (Adorno et al., 1950, p. 12).Tests had statements with predetermined scores that individuals could agree or disagree with. The interviews allowed the researchers to double-check whether a participant’s general demeanor matched the anti-democratic scores.Nevertheless, the overall study was not enough to determine the direction of the effect of authoritarianism, nor could this predict whether someone with the potential for fascism would actually act on their attitudes and join a fascist movement (McAvoy, 2012). “The modification of the potentially fascist structure cannot be achieved by psychological means alone. The task is comparable to that of eliminating neurosis, or delinquency, or nationalism from the world” (Adorno et al., 1950, p. 975).
Social psychologist Stanley Milgram was impacted by such results. He modified the F-scale that Adorno et al. had created (Milgram, n.d.). After witnessing the trial of ordinary-looking Adolf Eichmann, Milgram (1962) wanted to understand the difference between free and forced obedience in everyday life. He (Milgram, 1965, p. 57) reported: “In its more general form the problem may be defined thus: If X tells Y to hurt Z, under what conditions will Y carry out the command of X and under what conditions will he refuse [?]”. Questions like these had led him to design the base condition to test 40 normal-looking young males in 1962. They each would arrive at Yale University and would be greeted by an experimenter wearing a white coat. An actor played the role of fellow participant. Everything was standardised, from the laboratory, to the confederates, and the apparatus (Banyard, 2012). Participants were asked to administer potentially lethal electric shocks to the actor playing learner. The electric shock machine looked realistic, but was only a prop. Milgram found that indeed normal people had the potential to harm with some pressure from an authority figure. Milgram (1963, p. 371) called this phenomena “destructive obedience in the laboratory”. He then administered the questionnaires to ratify the participants’ valence.
The studies conducted by Adorno et al. (authoritarianism) and Stanley Milgram (obedience) gave forensic psychologists much detail in terms of personality, situational factors/influences, authority, and compliance in the system (Byford, 2017). Monetary incentives were offered to participants in both studies: “This was the only way to insure that the staff of the Study would not be conscience-stricken” (Adorno et al., 1950, p. 26). WWII was a common theme in both approaches: “Gas chambers were built, death camps were guarded, daily quotas of corpses were produced with the same efficiency as the manufacture of appliances […] Obedience is the psychological mechanism that links individual action to political purpose” (Milgram, 1963, p. 371). Both experiments were carried out in the US, made use of pen and paper questionnaires, and included qualitative assessments; although the conditions, apparatuses, and procedures were completely different. The results were controversial enough to elicit a lot of attention from the general public in both cases. Adorno et al.’s work was criticised for being based on psychoanalytic theory, and for the risk of acquiescence response bias (McAvoy, 2012). Milgram’s work got him in serious ethical trouble due to what he was able to uncover about his subjects; and how this impacted their real life, identities, and reputations (Banyard, 2012). Both teams reported their findings through writing, although Milgram also created a documentary about his experiment (Obedience, 1962).
As it can be observed, there are many substantial similarities between Adorno et al.’s and Milgram’s experiments, even if these are different when it comes to structure. One preceded the next, and one added to the other. Authority and its relation to obedience can be better appreciated by drawing a correlation between the two approaches studied above. The results shed light on personality, and how adult behaviour can be a result of individual differences, as well as of contextual circumstances. Adorno et. al studied the master, and Milgram studied the slave. The general conclusion? Both sides are equally dangerous.
References
Adorno, T.W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D.J. and Sanford, R.N. (1950) The Authoritarian Personality, New York, Harper.
Banyard, P. (2012) ‘Just following orders?’, in Brace, N. and Byford, J. (eds) Investigating Psychology, Oxford, Oxford University Press/Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 61-95.
Byford, J. (2017) ‘The importance of replication’, in McAvoy, J. and Brace, N. (eds) Investigating Methods, Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 47-82.
McAvoy, J. (2012) ‘Exposing the Authoritarian Personality”, in Brace N. and Byford, J. (eds) Investigating Psychology, Oxford, Oxford University Press/Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 14-56
The developmental trajectory is the progressive continuum through which a human ability develops in life (Hewson, 2015). For instance, research suggests that theory of mind (ToM)– the ability to attribute mental states (e.g. false beliefs) that differ from one’s own to other people begins to develop around age 4- and becomes more complex/sophisticated with maturity (e.g. second order beliefs; Hewson, 201). “It’s not until age 7 that we get what looks more like an adult [moral] response” (The Open University, 2019a). Furthermore, it is believed that when mentally disordered offenders (e.g. schizophrenes; Davey)- and those with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD; Lyndsay et al., 2018)- fail to understand other people’s mental states, they have a ToM deficit resulting either from childhood trauma which thwarted the normal developmental trajectory of executive functioning skills (Davey, 2018; Hewson, 2015); from biological/neurodevelopmental disorders such as Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD; Mugno et al., 2018; Lyndsay et al., 2018), and/or from personality disorders such as psychopathy (The Open University, 2019b); therefore these people need special support tailored to their needs in adulthood to help them be independent, and to find happiness. Sometimes these needs are of criminogenic nature (Barker et al., 2017; Harkins et al., 2018), and this is why those lacking ToM are given attention and protection to prevent the potential escalation of maladaptive behaviours (Ward and Willis, 2018; Schug et al., 2018); as well as the risky methods for coping with stress (Taylor and Reeves, 2017).
References
Barker, M.J. and Cooper, T. (2017) ‘Mindfulness’, in Vossler, A., Havard, C., Pike, G., Barker, M.J. and Raabe, B. (eds), Mad or Bad? A Critical Approach to Counselling and Forensic Psychology, London, SAGE Publications, pp. 238-250.
Davey, G. (2018) Psychopathology, West Sussex, British Psychological Society and John Wiley & Sons, pp. 236-558.
Harkins, L., Ware, J. and Mann, R. (2018) ‘Treating Dangerous Offenders’, in Davies, G.M. and Beech, A.R. (eds), Forensic Psychology: Crime, Justice, Law, Interventions, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, pp. 547-570.
Hewson, C. (2015) ‘Mindreading’, in Turner, J., Hewson, C., Mahendran, K. and Stevens, P. (eds), Living Psychology: From the Everyday to the Extraordinary, Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 15-56.
Lindsay, W.R., Taylor, J.L. and Michie, A.M. (2018) ‘Interventions for Offenders with Intellectual Disabilities’, in Davies, G.M. and Beech, A.R. (eds), Forensic Psychology: Crime, Justice, Law, Interventions, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, pp. 603-628.
Mugno, A.P., Malloy, L.C. and La Rooy, D.J. (2018) ‘Interviewing Witnesses’, in Davies, G.M. and Beech, A.R. (eds), Forensic Psychology: Crime, Justice, Law, Interventions, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, pp. 203-223.
Schug, R.A., Gao, Y., Glenn, A.L., Peskin, M., Yang, Y. and Raine, A. (2015) ‘The Developmental Evidence Base: Neurobiological Research and Forensic Applications’, in Crighton, D.A. and Towl, G.J. (eds), Forensic Psychology, 2nd edn, West Sussex, British Psychological Society and John Wiley and Sons Ltd, pp. 115-128.
Taylor, P. and Reeves, A. (2017) ‘Self-harm and Suicide’, in Vossler, A., Havard, C., Pike, G., Barker, M.J. and Raabe, B. (eds), Mad or Bad? A Critical Approach to Counselling and Forensic Psychology, London, SAGE Publications, pp. 268-281.
Ward, T. and Willis, G.M. (2018) ‘The Rehabilitation of Offenders: Good Lives and Risk Reduction’, in Davies, G.M. and Beech, A.R. (eds), Forensic Psychology: Crime, Justice, Law, Interventions, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, pp. 663-682.
According to the European Institute for Gender Equality (n.d.), psychological violence includes “isolation from others, verbal aggression, threats, intimidation, control, harassment […] insults, humiliation and defamation”. This essay discusses how challenging the status quo is key to advancing global development and peace by extrapolating research conducted by Oates, Edgar and Edgar, and Custance (2012); to recent world events. “Forensic psychologists […] are well placed to challenge inappropriate policies and practices” (Towl and Crighton, 2015, p. 9).
The idea that psychology could be used to design better systems is not new (Edgar and Edgar, 2012). Many people choose to ignore the deep side of policy, and instead attend to more superficial aspects, why is that? This type of selective attention is considered to be a form of bias (Seguin, 2016). Research conducted by psychologists in the 1950s and 1960s as explored by Edgar and Edgar (2012), gave light to how difficult it can be for the human mind to attend to several stimuli simultaneously. This might explain why individuals choose to overlook complex signals such as “injustice”, especially since the definition of “justice” is socially constructed (Faulkner, 2015). The meaning people extract from media stories influences the importance they attribute to such events; and this is shaped by their expectations, political memory filters, and cognitive styles (Edgar and Edgar, 2012; Değirmenci and Kaya, 2018). For instance, although media coverage of Brexit gained full attention from the UK public, it generated confusion at the status quo level; eliciting confounding variables such as division, conscious racial prejudice, and ideologically driven violence (OHCHR, 2018). It can be said that such unpredictable uncertainty hit the nervous system of the UK (Mohdin, 2019; Bailey and Budd, 2019; Ishkanian, 2019), causing interference and overwhelming the collective capacity to process the magnitude of the situation at hand.
The two-process theories of attention describe: (1) controlled attention as being conscious; and (2) automatic processing as being subconscious (Edgar and Edgar, 2012). Allocating cognitive resources to select what to attend to functions in a similar way to economies, where governments must select and prioritise meaningful aspects that need attending to. For instance, there are problems that do not make it to the priority list in governmental debates, and what is considered a priority is always at the discretion of the legislature (GOV.UK, n.d.a). It is often the resulting circumstances that speak about whether the allocation of resources was appropriate. Broadbent’s (1958) model as explained by Edgar and Edgar (2012) highlighted how information is absorbed and filtered through the limited capacity channel after the senses discriminate inputs based on the stimuli’s physical properties or meaning; and how the mind can become overwhelmed with too much data. This resembles the information processing system of the state apparatus. Some stories get magnified by the media, and others become peripherally encoded (Smith et al., 2018). This has been criticised by human rights defenders (Maier, 2019) as it is clear that media content and representation, as well as spoken words have an effect on societal behaviour (Edgar and Edgar, 2012; Kennedy, 2007), and the audience can either allocate attention to the local media, the global media, or both (Beck, 2018). “Words have consequences, and ill words that go unchallenged, are the first step on a continuum towards ill deeds” (Theresa May gives speech on the state of politics, 2019).
Bandura et al. (1963) cited in Oates (2012) demonstrated through the famous Bobo doll studies how exposure to violence can lead to aggressive behaviours. Several aspects of social learning (observing and copying other people’s behaviour) were explored, among which were: (1) the replication of violent behaviour (imitative aggression); and (2) the selective replication of specific forms of behaviour (partial imitative responses) (Oates, 2012). In light of such evidence, more researchers have added that overexposure to media violence also elicits social disinhibition and desensatisation (Oates, 2012; Marris and Thornham, 2000); increasing tolerance towards aggressive conceptual systems, attitudes, and predispositions. Milgram (1960; 1963; 1965) explored the psychology of destructive obedience in everyday life and Adorno et al. (1950) explored the role of authoritarian prejudice in society. Almost 70 years later, such retrogressive manifestations are resurfacing and permeating the status quo.
For example, The Guardian has been reporting the topic of xenophobia in the UK, which has two convergent strands of continuity. On one hand, more people are exhibiting antisemitic attitudes similar to WWII (Mason, 2019), and on the other hand more whistleblowers are handing in evidence to The Equality and Human Rights Commission about such insular attitudes (Stewart and Jacobson, 2019). Moreover, with the proliferation of social media, monitoring online activity (Oates, 2012) and ideologies (Paul and Dredze, 2017) is easy. Allington (2018, pp. 130-135) posited how a new subculture of antisemitic nationalism is growing through Facebook groups in the UK where comments such as: “Hitler had a valid argument against some Jews” are being disseminated. This all goes hand in hand with Bandura et al.’s theories of social learning and imitation, which posit that exposure to aggressive or emotionally intense role models does influence the extent to which maladaptive behaviour is replicated (Oates, 2012). A good question to ask is: Are there any current world leaders exhibiting prejudice, and promoting psychological violence through their verbal behaviours? The cycle of enquiry is eternal (Pike, 2017).
Harlow’s (1960) approach to understanding mother-infant attachment was unethical. He also verbally admitted to hating animals, using them, and feeling nothing towards them as shown by Slater (2004) cited in (Custance, 2012, p. 212). Many baby monkeys were intentionally psychophysiologically tortured for two decades in the laboratory for research purposes (Custance, 2012). Nowadays, this type of profile would be classed as sadistic, psychopathic (Moul et al., 2012; Pemment, 2013) and/or machiavellian (Czibor et al, 2017). Nevertheless, he (Harlow, 1960) found that attachment in rhesus macaques was based on emotional warmth, and proposed that humans bond similarly, ratifying Bowlby’s claims which had been informing UNCRC (1959) policy. These and more ethological findings were extended to human psychology through experiments. Custance (2012), building on Ainsworth’s work illustrated the immediate and long-term distress children experience when separated from their parents. She also heavily criticised Harlow’s methods and attitudes, explaining that subjecting animals to such conditions would now be illegal. Based on the UK’s Animal Welfare Act 2006 (c.45), owners of domesticated animals have a duty of care when it comes to providing a suitable environment and diet for their pets; ensuring wellbeing and welfare; and providing protection from pain, injury, suffering and disease, especially when it can be prevented (GOV.UK, n.d.).
Harlow experimented on monkeys because psychologically harming humans was illegal in the 1960s (Custance, 2012). Furthermore, It is now recognised that human rights are crucial to the advancement of psychology, and vice versa (Söderström, 2019). Nonetheless, migrants and asylum seekers in the UK have been facing a psychologically violent (ILPA, 2016) reality; being made susceptible to pain, injury, suffering, disease and long-term mental distress due to legislative measures such as the Immigration Acts 2014 (c.22) and 2016 (c.19). These hostile environment policies were a legal reflection of socio-psychological violence with concomitant schadenfreude, and targeted discrimination (Webber, 2019; Williams, 2019). This was initially designed with the intention of thwarting and precluding asylum seekers’ desire to remain in the jurisdiction through enforced discomfort and destitution (Global Justice Now, 2018). Although the policies have recently been adapted and improved to include free healthcare for all (GOV.UK, 2019), some services are still being (unlawfully) denied to migrants by British individuals (EHRC, 2018): From welfare, to security, and the enjoyment of human rights (Webber, 2019). Therefore, it can be argued that domesticated animals have a better quality of life than asylum seekers; resulting in an environmentally degraded, and disadvantaged subculture (Oyserman, 2017). Consequently, UN Special Rapporteur, Professor Tendayi Achiume rigorously challenged the UK for its incongruency with the Equality Act 2010 (c.15; OHCHR, 2018).
All of the above studied phenomena can be further extrapolated and triangulated to analyse the recent media scandal from the US which has received global attention (Kabaservice, 2019) due to border enforcement agents allegedly separating migrant children from their parents, detaining them in slavish conditions at El Paso; whilst also denying them “trauma support […] clean water […] nutritious food”; and engaging in indignities such as forcing women to drink water from toilets(House Hearing Featuring AOC on Child Separation and Detainment, 2019). A congresswoman described the situation as a “manufactured crisis”, and many consider these measures to be “unnecessary” and “callous”. Parental deprivation for a prolonged period of time can cause great harm (Custance, 2012); and the violation of human rights (UDHR, 1948; ECHR, 1950), and of the rights of the child (UNCRC, 1989) does too. This situation, by definition, is a form of state-sponsored psychological violence. Either challenging or complying with such moral crimes is at the discretion of every person’s free will (Milgram, 1963; 1965) and serves as a reference to understand the impact that policy has on individual lives, and the importance of making informed decisions.
To summarise, challenging the status quo is crucial to advancing global development (Williams, 2019), and to understanding how current world events impact on individual and social lives. The media and the attention given to it play a crucial role in socio-behavioural dynamics, whilst also shaping personal and collective attitudes. This is why psychology must iteratively scrutinise what is already established to comprehend the consequences that arise out of public policy.
References
Adorno, T.W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D.J. and Sanford, R.N. (1950) The Authoritarian Personality, New York, Harper.
Beck, M. R. et al. (2018) ‘Attending Globally or Locally: Incidental Learning of Optimal Visual Attention Allocation’, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition. American Psychological Association, 44(3), pp. 387–398 [Online]. Available at https://pmt-eu.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/f/gvehrt/TN_apa_articles10.1037/xlm0000428 (Accessed 17 July 2019).
Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, as amended by Protocols Nos. 11 and 14, ECHR, (4 November 1950) [Online]. Available at https://www.echr.coe.int/Documents/Convention_ENG.pdf (Accessed 15 July 2019).
Custance, D. (2012) ‘Determined to love?’, in Brace, N. and Byford, J. (eds) Investigating Psychology, Oxford, Oxford University Press/Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 193-230.
Edgar, H. and Edgar, G. (2012) ‘Paying Attention’, in Brace, N. and Byford, J. (eds) Investigating Psychology, Oxford, Oxford University Press/Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 325-359.
House Hearing Featuring AOC on Child Separation and Detainment (2019) Youtube video, added by NowThis News [Online]. Available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvCZ8oMOdTs (Accessed 14 July 2019).
Kennedy, B.M. (2007) ‘THINKING ONTOLOGIES OF THE MIND/BODY RELATIONAL’, in Bell, D. and Kennedy, B.M. (eds), The Cybercultures Reader, 2nd edn, Oxon, Routledge, pp. 777-780.
Marris, P. and Thornham, S. (2000) ‘SECTION 4 RECEPTION, (I) FROM ‘EFFECTS’ TO ‘USES’ INTRODUCTION, Media Studies: A Reader, 2ns edn, New York, New York University Press, pp. 421-424.
Oates, J, (2012) ‘Learning from Watching’, in Brace, N. and Byford, J. (eds) Investigating Psychology, Oxford, Oxford University Press/Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 103-137.
Smith, H.M.J., Ryder H. and Flowe H.D., 2018, ‘Eyewitness Evidence’, in Davies, G.M. and Beech, A.R. (eds), Forensic Psychology: Crime, Justice, Law, Interventions, John Wiley & Sons Ltd, pp. 175-192.
United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner (2018) End of Mission Statement of the Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance at the Conclusion of Her Mission to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland [Online]. Available at https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=23073&LangID=E (Accessed 2 July 2019).
Because simply watching the docuseries on Netflix is not enough, I decided to read the book by Michaud and Aynesworth (2019) which contains the transcripts from conversations with Theodore Robert Bundy, also known as the All-American Boy (Loftus and Ketcham, 1991).
This book provides real insight into Bundy’s psychological discourse, and it can be observed that his superego mainly served as a reminder not to get caught. He could not control his impulses, and this is why he left such a high death toll. His moral degeneracy can be appreciated in his described thinking process, where he expresses how he felt it was not difficult at all to maintain such secret life hidden away from the consciousness of those who were part of his personal circle: “I became expert at projecting something very different. That I was very busy. It is clear now, I think, that a huge part of my life was hidden from everyone – secret, as it were. It didn’t take much effort” (p. 16). One thing that can be noticed throughout the conversations is that Ted Bundy had a form of self-serving bias which was compounded by his belief about what he called the psychological “condition”. He expressed his states of narcissistic melancholia mixed with helplessness in relation to what can be described as his criminogenic, sadistic needs and the satisficing of these. He expressed that at times he would lay with the corpses he created until these were putrid.
What I find particularly difficult to comprehend when it comes to studying Ted Bundy as a prototypical psychopath is that at times some of the statements he made about his experience posited that he had the capacity to feel fear, which goes beyond the scope of primary psychopathy: “I thought I was going to die every night the first few days I was in jail back in October of 1975. I was scared to death! Daily. I thought they were going to kill me” (p. 23). Was he saying the truth? I don’t know. However, some of his other statements did reveal his malignant personality, such as when speaking about the way in which he perceived his victims as objects: “Except he is not killing a person. He is killing an image” (p. 65). Whose image? is the question I have. Psychodynamic theorists would of course instantly say that perhaps he wanted to recreate the image of the woman who he had the most contempt against, his own mother.
Bundy truly believed that this “condition”- as he called it- was to blame for all of his behaviour; nevertheless, unable to meet the M’Naghtan rules, he was not found to be eligible to claim criminal insanity and even prominent expert witnesses and forensic psychologists such as Elizabeth Loftus (1991) describe having been disturbed by his sophisticated mannerisms and inappropriate body language and responses to contexts. In other words, Bundy had a theory of mind (ToM) deficit, and a surplus of self-esteem. Moreover, his construct of reality was based on self-justifications and false beliefs. The way in which he described his “disease” in third person was as follows: “what’s happening is that we’re building up the condition and what may have been a predisposition for violence becomes a disposition. And as the condition develops and its purposes or its characteristics become more well defined, it begins to demand more of the attention and time of the individual” (p. 71). Such cluster of personality traits and behaviour is classed in the DSM-5 as antisocial personality disorder (ASPD).
What’s interesting is that Bundy describes having been influenced by his peers’ concepts of the attractive woman when choosing his victims. This was perhaps the case because as a malignant narcissist, his desire to have complete control over such beautiful images meant that he needed to kill them in order to control everything about their interaction. According to Bundy he murdered his victims because he wanted to leave no living witness of his sexual atrocities. As the moral imbecile that he was, he even washed some of his victims’ hair and did their make up in order to have sex with their corpses until the rotting nature of death made it impossible to do so. This shows the utter perversion of this individual, and this is synthesised by his own words: “A certain amount of the need of that malignant condition had been satisfied through the sexual release. That driving force would recede somewhat, allowing the normal individual’s mental mechanisms to again begin to take hold” (p. 90).
What makes this a great book is that it is made up of transcripts mainly and this allows the reader to see the pathetically perverse side of Bundy that is so easily forgotten when watching his charming ways on camera right until the evening before he was finally executed in 1989. It truly feels like talking with this serial killer. A truly recommended reading for anyone interested in this particular case study or in understanding antisocial personality disorder more deeply.
References
Michaud, S.G. and Aynesworth, H. (2019) Ted Bundy: Conversations with a Killer, London, Mirror Books.
Loftus, E. and Ketcham, K. (1991) Witness for the Defense: The Accused, the Eyewitness, and the Expert Who Puts Memory on Trial, New York, St. Martin’s Press, pp. 61-91.
According to the Online Etymology Dictionary (n.d.a), the adjective “artificial” originates from 14c France meaning “not natural or spontaneous”, and it began to be used in the English language from 16c to describe “anything made in imitation of, or as a substitute for, what is natural”. The etymology of the noun “mind” is rooted in late 12c, when the word “mynd” was used to describe“that which feels, wills, and thinks; the intellect”(Online Etymology Dictionary, n.d.b); a derivation from the Old English word “gemynd” which encompassed the concepts of memory, conscience, intention, and purpose among other things. This essay explores the concept of “artificial minds”, some of its psychological perspectives and what all this reveals about human minds.
What is an artificial mind? Based on the above explained, if the word artificial has for centuries carried the meaning of imitation and substitution for- in this case- human nature; it is not surprising that some people have reported feeling afraid about the possibility of robots taking over the world (McDonald, 2019). Assuming that machines think in the same way as humans is like anthropomorphising (ascribing human qualities to nonhuman animals; Hewson, 2015). Yasemin J. Erden defined this phenomenon as “problem of other minds” in her chapter of Living Psychology: From the Everyday to the Extraordinary (2015, p. 109), where she posed the question“how do you know that the author of this chapter is a person?”. Her name is written as the author of the chapter, and the paragraphs are written in a meticulously eloquent manner. The content is highly specialised. Yet, the reader is invited to question all this, and to consider the possibility of her identity being robotic. Once her name is searched though, it can be seen that she is human, as well as a philosopher at St. Mary University in London (Google, n.d.). Nevertheless, her question should not be underestimated in any way, as there exist bots that can rigorously write essays for humans (Essaybot, n.d).
If mind is software and body is hardware (Computational modeling of the brain – Sylvain Baillet, 2016), does that mean that the two work independently? Descartes initially questioned whether matter (body) was the result of mind (imagination). He stated “I think, therefore I am”, claiming that body was a manifestation or hallucination of thought (Erden, 2015, pp. 111-112); and eventually evolved his perspective to say that mind and body are connected specifically through the pineal gland of the brain. Under the same token, dualist theorists believe that the strongest evidence for the existence of mind as a separate entity from brain is the concept of qualia- coined by Chalmers (1996) as cited in Erden (2015)- which encompasses the subjective, first-person experience of the individual. Erden illustrates this concept with an analogy of eating and enjoying chocolate (2015), explaining that one thing is to understand how the body absorbs and digests chocolate, and another thing is to enjoy the taste of it. Could a bot understand the experience of enjoyment? After all, not even some legislators seem to understand the concept of enjoyment in relation to- for example- human rights law (United Nations, n.d.; ECHR, 1950).
In contrast, materialist theorists claim that specific parts of the human brain are responsible for intelligent functions such as the processing of sensory inputs (stimuli), and the creation of responses (outputs; Erden, 2015, pp. 115-117). But, what is meant by intelligence? The answer to Alan Turing’s question (1950) cited in (Erden, 2015, pp. 120-121) “can machines think?” depends on the way the words “mind” and “thinking” are used (Erden, 2015, p. 122). For instance, the intelligent nature of human memory is highly complex (Prosecution Witness Janeen DeMarte Explains Why She Does Not Believe Jodi Arias’ Memory Fog Story, 2013). Could a machine learn to absorb, encode, store, and retrieve information similarly to a person? In order to understand this, Naoyuki Sato and Yogo Yamaguchi (2010) from Japan reviewed computational models of the hippocampi, the two organs of the brain mainly responsible for the formation of episodic memory (remembering what, where, and when). Their (Sato and Yamaguchi, 2010) evidence suggests that when the hippocampal system is damaged, the ability for self object-space processing is lost. Nevertheless, they state that more brain regions are involved in the process, and that models which can take into account more than one brain region simultaneously need to be developed.
This is why one of the biggest challenges in computational modeling is to equip artificial minds and robotic bodies with proprioception (Erden, 2015), the human ability to position one’s body within timespace and context. Understanding such computational complications elucidates the everyday complexity of human nature (including perceptual, sensorimotor abilities; Erden, 2015). For humans, working their way from point A to point B in timespace can be relatively straightforward, and if uncertainties or anomalies arise, these can be dealt with successfully (e.g. avoiding an obstacle). However, with no hippocampus and no cognitive map on which to rely; robots find it overwhelming to understand the where, when, and what of situations; especially when it comes to unexpected contingencies or events. John McCarthy and Patrick Hayes (1969) cited in Erden (2015) called this phenomenon the frame problem. As a consequence, psychologists such as Aaron Sloman (The Open University, 2019b) have placed their emphasis on the computational modelling of the human information processing system. Erden (2015, p. 124) defines this framework as computational theory of mind (CTM), and the most advanced artificially intelligent robotic inventions are equipped with proprioceptive sensors which allow them to compute and interact with the world around them more competently (Erden, 2015). Nevertheless, Margaret Boden from the University of Sussex in England states that to model some mysterious processes such as creativity is difficult, because humans do not always understand how they do what they do (The Open University, 2019a).
To summarise, the concept of artificial minds has helped cognitive scientists understand the complex functions of everyday living in humans. Machines can indeed think, they just don’t think in the same way as humans. Human intelligence and its neuroscientific structure is not easy to model in full magnitude, and not all functions are clear enough to warrant replication. The human mind remains somewhat mysterious, and subjective experience remains an area for further research. Could this be what is meant by the philosophical latin concept of DEUS EX MACHINA? (GOD FROM THE MACHINE). The future is uncertain.
References
Computational modeling of the brain – Sylvain Baillet (2016) Youtube video, added by Serious Science [Online]. Available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oW6DN08wwE (Accessed 29 October 2019).
Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, as amended by Protocols Nos. 11 and 14, ECHR, (4 November 1950) [Online]. Available at https://www.echr.coe.int/Documents/Convention_ENG.pdf (Accessed 28 October 2019).
Erden, Y. J. (2015) ‘Artificial minds’, in Turner, J., Hewson, C., Mahendran, K. and Stevens, P. (eds), Living Psychology: From the Everyday to the Extraordinary, Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 109-146.
EssayBot (n.d.) How It Works [Online]. Available at https://www.essaybot.com/ (Accessed 28 October, 2019)
Hewson, C., Ramsden P., and Turner, J. (2015) ‘Animal minds’, in Turner, J., Hewson, C., Mahendran, K. and Stevens, P. (eds), Living Psychology: From the Everyday to the Extraordinary, Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 63-99.
Prosecution Witness Janeen DeMarte Explains Why She Does Not Believe Jodi Arias’ Memory Fog Story (2013) Youtube video, added by PK Report [Online]. Available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlnoRHufmok (Accessed 29 October 2019).
Sato, N. and Yamaguchi, Y. (2010) ‘Simulation of Human Episodic Memory by Using a Computational Model of the Hippocampus’, Advances in Artificial Intelligence, Japan, Future University/ Brain Science Institute, pp. 1-11 [Online]. Available at http://downloads.hindawi.com/archive/2010/392868.pdf (Accessed 29 October, 2019).
