Areas where you'd respectfully disagree with Chuck

[Dragon Ball Fan]

okay, there is such thing as justified homicide but I meant it's impossible for a empathetic person to hurt an innocent.

Seems to me this is going back on what you said earlier, since it's precisely different values that allow people to rationalize that the people they are hurting aren't innocent. Innocence is a value judgement and different values lead to different definitions of innocent.

So even If I agreed with you about it being "impossible for a empathetic person to hurt an innocent", and I very much don't, it doesn't matter because innocent is subjective.

maybe I am being a bit to black and white but what about serial killers? they don't commit their crimes because of ideology, they just enjoy hurting people for it's own sake.

and back to fiction, again, I gave the example of Zamasu from Dragon Ball Super to show that "different values" and being written as "just a monster" are not mutually exclusive. if your values lead you to think an all individuals in a certain group of evil or inferior and you never consider the individuals, you are clearly a psychopath and are just using ideology as an excuse to hurt people.

also @clearspira. no, there is no such thing as selective empathy. if someone's empathy is diminished or outright non existent, that would apply to their "loved ones" too. I refuse to believe Hitler truly loved his wife, mother or niece.

and pure evil monsters do in fact exist in real life, again, the first recorded serial killer in the United States said "I was born with the Devil in me." and another early American serial killer, Jane Topan, said she wanted to kill more people than anyone else in history and the only way to accomplish that goal would be the complete extinction of the human race.

Of course selective empathy exists, that is a ridiculous thing to say. I would kill to protect my mother, I wouldn't kill to protect a stranger. This is selective empathy; I care less about your life than I do about the lives of my own blood.
And as you brought up Hitler, he is a great example. There are reels of footage of him petting his dog. The man was (and yes this sounds unbelievable but go and Google it) a staunch animal rights advocate and a vegetarian. Whilst he was killing men by their millions he was safeguarding the lives of animals which included laws against animal testing and hunting. This is selective empathy.

And BTW, I never said that evil people did not exist, I said that they were the minority.

no, selective empathy would be you having empathy for your family but absolutely none for anyone else not just less of it for non family but that just is not how the human brain works. you either empathize with everyone or no one.

and all the stuff about Hitler advocating for animal rights and loving his mommy was just propaganda.

and even if I'm wrong on this. Chuck is still wrong too because he said in "Lethe" that ALL bad things are simply the result of differing values when we have established that there are individuals out there that do horrible things for shits and giggles.

[clearspira]

okay, there is such thing as justified homicide but I meant it's impossible for a empathetic person to hurt an innocent.

Seems to me this is going back on what you said earlier, since it's precisely different values that allow people to rationalize that the people they are hurting aren't innocent. Innocence is a value judgement and different values lead to different definitions of innocent.

So even If I agreed with you about it being "impossible for a empathetic person to hurt an innocent", and I very much don't, it doesn't matter because innocent is subjective.

maybe I am being a bit to black and white but what about serial killers? they don't commit their crimes because of ideology, they just enjoy hurting people for it's own sake.

and back to fiction, again, I gave the example of Zamasu from Dragon Ball Super to show that "different values" and being written as "just a monster" are not mutually exclusive. if your values lead you to think an all individuals in a certain group of evil or inferior and you never consider the individuals, you are clearly a psychopath and are just using ideology as an excuse to hurt people.

also @clearspira. no, there is no such thing as selective empathy. if someone's empathy is diminished or outright non existent, that would apply to their "loved ones" too. I refuse to believe Hitler truly loved his wife, mother or niece.

and pure evil monsters do in fact exist in real life, again, the first recorded serial killer in the United States said "I was born with the Devil in me." and another early American serial killer, Jane Topan, said she wanted to kill more people than anyone else in history and the only way to accomplish that goal would be the complete extinction of the human race.

Of course selective empathy exists, that is a ridiculous thing to say. I would kill to protect my mother, I wouldn't kill to protect a stranger. This is selective empathy; I care less about your life than I do about the lives of my own blood.
And as you brought up Hitler, he is a great example. There are reels of footage of him petting his dog. The man was (and yes this sounds unbelievable but go and Google it) a staunch animal rights advocate and a vegetarian. Whilst he was killing men by their millions he was safeguarding the lives of animals which included laws against animal testing and hunting. This is selective empathy.

And BTW, I never said that evil people did not exist, I said that they were the minority.

no, selective empathy would be you having empathy for your family but absolutely none for anyone else not just less of it for non family but that just is not how the human brain works. you either empathize with everyone or no one.

and all the stuff about Hitler advocating for animal rights and loving his mommy was just propaganda.

and even if I'm wrong on this. Chuck is still wrong too because he said in "Lethe" that ALL bad things are simply the result of differing values when we have established that there are individuals out there that do horrible things for shits and giggles.

No, that is not selective empathy.
Propaganda? So you didn't Google it then. The laws he passed are documented fact.

[Dragon Ball Fan]

okay, there is such thing as justified homicide but I meant it's impossible for a empathetic person to hurt an innocent.

Seems to me this is going back on what you said earlier, since it's precisely different values that allow people to rationalize that the people they are hurting aren't innocent. Innocence is a value judgement and different values lead to different definitions of innocent.

So even If I agreed with you about it being "impossible for a empathetic person to hurt an innocent", and I very much don't, it doesn't matter because innocent is subjective.

maybe I am being a bit to black and white but what about serial killers? they don't commit their crimes because of ideology, they just enjoy hurting people for it's own sake.

and back to fiction, again, I gave the example of Zamasu from Dragon Ball Super to show that "different values" and being written as "just a monster" are not mutually exclusive. if your values lead you to think an all individuals in a certain group of evil or inferior and you never consider the individuals, you are clearly a psychopath and are just using ideology as an excuse to hurt people.

also @clearspira. no, there is no such thing as selective empathy. if someone's empathy is diminished or outright non existent, that would apply to their "loved ones" too. I refuse to believe Hitler truly loved his wife, mother or niece.

and pure evil monsters do in fact exist in real life, again, the first recorded serial killer in the United States said "I was born with the Devil in me." and another early American serial killer, Jane Topan, said she wanted to kill more people than anyone else in history and the only way to accomplish that goal would be the complete extinction of the human race.

Of course selective empathy exists, that is a ridiculous thing to say. I would kill to protect my mother, I wouldn't kill to protect a stranger. This is selective empathy; I care less about your life than I do about the lives of my own blood.
And as you brought up Hitler, he is a great example. There are reels of footage of him petting his dog. The man was (and yes this sounds unbelievable but go and Google it) a staunch animal rights advocate and a vegetarian. Whilst he was killing men by their millions he was safeguarding the lives of animals which included laws against animal testing and hunting. This is selective empathy.

And BTW, I never said that evil people did not exist, I said that they were the minority.

no, selective empathy would be you having empathy for your family but absolutely none for anyone else not just less of it for non family but that just is not how the human brain works. you either empathize with everyone or no one.

and all the stuff about Hitler advocating for animal rights and loving his mommy was just propaganda.

and even if I'm wrong on this. Chuck is still wrong too because he said in "Lethe" that ALL bad things are simply the result of differing values when we have established that there are individuals out there that do horrible things for shits and giggles.

No, that is not selective empathy.
Propaganda? So you didn't Google it then. The laws he passed are documented fact.

no, you said you would have more empathy for a family member then me but you didn't say you have absolutely no empathy for me at all and only because you don't know me personally. for a serial killer, they may try to empathize with others they consider off limits but their empathy would be just as diminished for their "loved ones" as their victims because they wouldn't be a serial killer otherwise. I cannot fathom it working any other way.

and I didn't say Hitler didn't make those laws but he did not believe in the cause behind them and just wanted people on the outside to think he had a nice side. part of being a mass murder or serial killer is making people you aren't killing think you are a sweatheart. and Hitler obviously only cared about himself as he murdered even his own fallowers and probably killed his own niece.

but this has gotten a bit off topic from my original point, which was a rebuttal to Chuck's implication that ALL of man's evil is caused by different values and truly evil individuals who do horrible things for fun do not exist in real life. I used to be fascinated with serial killers and am still interested in a few individual cases, so, I know the cruelty that some individuals are capable of that have no rime or reason at all behind it. again, H.H. Homes saw himself as the Devil in human form and Jane Topan wanted to wipe out the entire human race just for kicks.

and again, on the fictional side of things, I gave the example of Zamasu from Dragon Ball Super. his reason for turning into a villain were different values but that didn't stop him from being a one dimensional monster. so, giving a character a believable motive to be a villain and them just being plain evil are not mutual exclusive.

[AllanO]

but this has gotten a bit off topic from my original point, which was a rebuttal to Chuck's implication that ALL of man's evil is caused by different values and truly evil individuals who do horrible things for fun do not exist in real life. I used to be fascinated with serial killers and am still interested in a few individual cases, so, I know the cruelty that some individuals are capable of that have no rime or reason at all behind it. again, H.H. Homes saw himself as the Devil in human form and Jane Topan wanted to wipe out the entire human race just for kicks.

Lucky Chuck never said that.

In the review he says at one point something like that this is not to say that some individuals are not taking on extreme views for the sake of short term political gain or something like that, ie personal vice and deviance (like psychopathic lack of empathy). He is just saying that you can't explain a mass violent movement, like an army, a large terrorist group, a faction in a war etc. by reference to personal moral failing alone, not that such moral failings never exist and don't explain some violence.

If personal vice was the only explanation for violence then you could not explain why there was more violence during WWII etc., except as a massive coincidence where for some reason people just got eviler for a while and happened to coordinate at the time and then stopped at the end of the war. Too many people are involved in the mass violence of history (like the Holocaust) for them all to be psychopaths and other deviants, how did the organizers of the mass violence just happen to manage to pick the right people where did they find them all etc. Ordinary people (ie people just like you) in the right circumstances (a war, a fascist regime, a communist revolution, a civil war etc.) do do really horrible stuff and rationalize it in any number of ways and a lot of the explanation of that mass violence is their values and motives at the time in those circumstances.

Anyway in the context of does it make sense for there to be Vulcan terrorists I think Chuck's argument is basically sound, if perhaps a little simplistic (perhaps because he wants to address a narrow question). Terrorist groups and other violent movements have historically arisen in part from strong disagreements in values and motives, Vulcans can have strong disagreements about values and motives, therefore one can in principle at least write well motivated Vulcan terrorists if you want (whether Disco does this is another question). Chuck never said he was explaining ALL violence, criminality etc., he specifically says he was examining a certain kind and asking did it make sense.

[Fianna]

no, you said you would have more empathy for a family member then me but you didn't say you have absolutely no empathy for me at all and only because you don't know me personally. for a serial killer, they may try to empathize with others they consider off limits but their empathy would be just as diminished for their "loved ones" as their victims because they wouldn't be a serial killer otherwise. I cannot fathom it working any other way.

For an outside observer, it's impossible to tell the difference between "complete lack of empathy" and "so little empathy that it doesn't alter their behavior any".

[Dragon Ball Fan]

but this has gotten a bit off topic from my original point, which was a rebuttal to Chuck's implication that ALL of man's evil is caused by different values and truly evil individuals who do horrible things for fun do not exist in real life. I used to be fascinated with serial killers and am still interested in a few individual cases, so, I know the cruelty that some individuals are capable of that have no rime or reason at all behind it. again, H.H. Homes saw himself as the Devil in human form and Jane Topan wanted to wipe out the entire human race just for kicks.

Lucky Chuck never said that.

In the review he says at one point something like that this is not to say that some individuals are not taking on extreme views for the sake of short term political gain or something like that, ie personal vice and deviance (like psychopathic lack of empathy). He is just saying that you can't explain a mass violent movement, like an army, a large terrorist group, a faction in a war etc. by reference to personal moral failing alone, not that such moral failings never exist and don't explain some violence.

If personal vice was the only explanation for violence then you could not explain why there was more violence during WWII etc., except as a massive coincidence where for some reason people just got eviler for a while and happened to coordinate at the time and then stopped at the end of the war. Too many people are involved in the mass violence of history (like the Holocaust) for them all to be psychopaths and other deviants, how did the organizers of the mass violence just happen to manage to pick the right people where did they find them all etc. Ordinary people (ie people just like you) in the right circumstances (a war, a fascist regime, a communist revolution, a civil war etc.) do do really horrible stuff and rationalize it in any number of ways and a lot of the explanation of that mass violence is their values and motives at the time in those circumstances.

Anyway in the context of does it make sense for there to be Vulcan terrorists I think Chuck's argument is basically sound, if perhaps a little simplistic (perhaps because he wants to address a narrow question). Terrorist groups and other violent movements have historically arisen in part from strong disagreements in values and motives, Vulcans can have strong disagreements about values and motives, therefore one can in principle at least write well motivated Vulcan terrorists if you want (whether Disco does this is another question). Chuck never said he was explaining ALL violence, criminality etc., he specifically says he was examining a certain kind and asking did it make sense.

I said Chuck mearly implied he he was explaining all violence, that it just came off the way to me.

and the only non psychopaths in the Nazi party were the ones forced to do horrible things under treat of death, the war crimes trial rightfully determined all others had no excuse.

and I know I said this multiple times already but back to fiction, Chuck did explicitly say that writing a villain as a one dimensional monster is a problem even though I gave the example of Zamasu from Dragon Ball Super who had a believable motivation but was still a plain evil psychopath, showing the two things are not mutually exclusive.

[TrueMetis]

You sure are awfully good at reading the minds of people long dead.

[Riedquat]

and the only non psychopaths in the Nazi party were the ones forced to do horrible things under treat of death, the war crimes trial rightfully determined all others had no excuse.

Really? The world is full of people who'll just go with the flow, particularly if it's not right up close and personal. There are a lot fewer who you could hand a gun to and say "kill this person in front of you, who is just sitting there doing nothing right now," but with sufficient persuasion that the person is utterly vile (whether it stacks up or not) certainly some will even without any downside to themselves for not complying. Ones who will happily take the gun and shoot them without further questions, without the slightest bit of guilt, without knowing why, just as long as they're convinved there'll be no negative consequences to themselves are vanishingly rare (thank goodness), certainly far too rare to have all that much impact on the world at large.

[Dragon Ball Fan]

and the only non psychopaths in the Nazi party were the ones forced to do horrible things under treat of death, the war crimes trial rightfully determined all others had no excuse.

Really? The world is full of people who'll just go with the flow, particularly if it's not right up close and personal. There are a lot fewer who you could hand a gun to and say "kill this person in front of you, who is just sitting there doing nothing right now," but with sufficient persuasion that the person is utterly vile (whether it stacks up or not) certainly some will even without any downside to themselves for not complying. Ones who will happily take the gun and shoot them without further questions, without the slightest bit of guilt, without knowing why, just as long as they're convinved there'll be no negative consequences to themselves are vanishingly rare (thank goodness), certainly far too rare to have all that much impact on the world at large.

not sure about that since at the least, Hitler and his inner circle were psychopaths.

but again, I want to also discuss how I demonstrated that in fiction, writing a believably motivated villain and having them be a one dimensional monster are not mutually exclusive.

[TrueMetis]

Psychologists have debated for years whether Hitler had a mental illness at all. But even among the ones that do think he was mentally ill, only a very small minority have actually called him a psychopath.

Also if you want believable villains Dragon Ball is not the place to go. I wouldn't call any of the villains from that series believable, I just don't care because all I want to see is the good guy punch the bad guy when it comes to that series.