Mind of a criminal

It pathologizes men when we assume something is wrong with a guy who doesn’t like sports, isn’t tall, dark, and handsome, or otherwise doesn’t fit a manly stereotype. It also pathologizes men when we assume the worst transgressions of a few are characteristics of all. It doesn’t help women (or blacks or LGBT individuals) to engage in the sport of putting down men. We might begin by extending to men our sensitivity about the harm done by microaggressions. It could open the door to compassion and help us build a more humane world. … [Read more...] about Misandry: The Invisible Hatred of Men

What does this mean to the criminal investigator? It means that an eyewitness account of the color of a given vehicle, in feature-intensive terms, is more likely to be reliable than an account of the vehicle model, generally based more in Gestalt terms, in the verbally-inaccessible shapes of vehicle components which are similar among vehicle brands. Red is red (with obvious variability in shade and other color characteristics); but the shapes of fenders will probably be processed very differently by different witnesses, in Gestalt rather than feature-intensive terms.   … [Read more...] about Finding the Bad Guy’s Car

We think it’s possible to characterize societies using only the consequences—costs and benefits—of defection, and we think that this approach might be more useful than such terms as “capitalism” and “socialism,” two terms that have almost lost their meaning. What does “socialism” mean? What Lenin put into practice in Russia? What the current Social Democrat-led government of Denmark does to ease the imbalances of the market system? Or does it mean what Bernie Sanders envisions when he dreams of equality? What does “capitalism” mean? The word began as an epithet, something Karl Marx hissed when he thought of rapacious factory owners. Now, for some, the word seems to signify the source of all progress and the guarantor of all freedom.  … [Read more...] about Defection and Its Dilemmas