Conflict Between Science And Religion Lies In Our Brains

[xSilverPhinx]

Apparently religious people are more likely to engage their empathetic pathways and have greater emotional and social insight whereas non-religious people tend to be smarter, engage more analytical pathways, and be more emotionally aligned with psychopaths.

Don't worry though, we're emotionally stunted but not like psychopaths that go on killing sprees -  because not all psychopaths do that of course - just like your normal garden variety psychopath.

Yep, that's the leap these researchers from Case Western Reserve University and Babson College have made. Science Daily article here.

[Firebird]

So we have less empathy than religious people? Methinks anyone living under the Islamic State or who lived through the Crusades might disagree

[Recusant]

Reading through the paper, which is available for free. The large majority of the study appears to be based on online surveys, for what that's worth. It's interesting to me that the terms "psychopath" and "psychopathy" are used rather extensively, including such statements as the following:

"[T]he current results suggest that non-believers have personality profiles more closely associated with the psychopathic phenotype (i.e., deficits in moral concern) than with the ASD phenotype (i.e., deficits in mentalizing).

Lovely stuff.

[Magdalena]

Re: Conflict Between Science And Religion Lies In Our Brains

Apparently religious people are more likely to engage their empathetic pathways and have greater emotional and social insight whereas non-religious people tend to be smarter, engage more analytical pathways, and be more emotionally aligned with psychopaths.

[Crow]

and be more emotionally aligned with psychopaths.

I'm pretty sure that not only am I aligned emotionally with a psychopaths but actually am one. After seeing a Horizon program featuring James Fallon it correlated with what others had either stated or uttered about me (those that know me well), after reading his book 'The Psychopath Inside: A Neuroscientist's Personal Journey into the Dark Side of the Brain' and reading a few studies and opinion pieces by other neuroscientists and psychiatrists I spoke to a few family members and friends to probe a few things in pretence and the answers I was looking for pretty much came back immediately, these have never been recent personality quirks but have pretty much always existed and what my grandmother attributed to the odd manner of birth I happened to be subject to. Even though I am far from qualified to state such a thing I have a feeling I would pass a psychopathy test with flying colours.

[Magdalena]

and be more emotionally aligned with psychopaths.

I'm pretty sure that not only am I aligned emotionally with a psychopaths but actually am one. After seeing a Horizon program featuring James Fallon it correlated with what others had either stated or uttered about me (those that know me well), after reading his book 'The Psychopath Inside: A Neuroscientist's Personal Journey into the Dark Side of the Brain' and reading a few studies and opinion pieces by other neuroscientists and psychiatrists I spoke to a few family members and friends to probe a few things in pretence and the answers I was looking for pretty much came back immediately, these have never been recent personality quirks but have pretty much always existed and what my grandmother attributed to the odd manner of birth I happened to be subject to. Even though I am far from qualified to state such a thing I have a feeling I would pass a psychopathy test with flying colours.

Your Quiz Results: Whose #Brainchild Are You?
Your confidence, optimism and focus might make you intimidating to be around, but for those who can handle it, your personality is contagious.
I can handle you, and I also agree that your personality is contagious. Believe it or not, sometimes I wish I could be like you.

[Sandra Craft]

I'm pretty sure that not only am I aligned emotionally with a psychopaths but actually am one.

Psychopath or sociopath?  Apparently there's a difference and scientists who care about such things are trying to get the distinction nailed down, and make people (including the mental health community) stop using the terms interchangeably.  As far as I can tell from a few articles I've read, the main difference is that psychopaths have something actually, physically different about their brains than everyone else (including sociopaths). 

They also honestly don't understand the difference between right and wrong, while sociopaths know the difference but don't consider it to apply to them.  Tho it seems to me that distinction doesn't really make much difference since it pretty much sorts out the same in behavior.

[Crow]

Psychopath or sociopath?  Apparently there's a difference and scientists who care about such things are trying to get the distinction nailed down, and make people (including the mental health community) stop using the terms interchangeably.  As far as I can tell from a few articles I've read, the main difference is that psychopaths have something actually, physically different about their brains than everyone else (including sociopaths). 

They also honestly don't understand the difference between right and wrong, while sociopaths know the difference but don't consider it to apply to them.  Tho it seems to me that distinction doesn't really make much difference since it pretty much sorts out the same in behavior.

Well let me say I don't see anything as right or wrong. I understand peoples usage of it and ultimately is just something I can use to manipulate people with if I desire but to say I see right and wrong in the same manner in which people use it would be false of me as it appears as nothing more than a construct that you can learn the rules of because it is observable. But I see no distinction.

I am pretty much entirely emotionally disconnected, unlike somebody with autism I see and understand emotional states as I still have emotions and have a strong grasp of what they are, they are just very self involving and don't require others to sate. Empathy is potentially a part where it falls down but I never feel a bond with a person, I see a person is happy I know approximately how they feel as I have felt many varieties of happiness but there is no connection there. When I see emotions again my mind automatically goes to how I can take advantage of that person or situation, it isn't really a concious either it is an automatic state. I do lack the ability to mentally walk the mile in peoples shoes that I can't grasp, overly emotional people.

Once I started reading about the subject I went pretty deep into it as I find it fascinating but the distinction between sociopathy/psychopathy is marginal, essentially boiling down to one is due to environment (sociopathy) and one is down to genetics (psychopathy). As I had as good an upbringing as one could have I would rule out sociopathy plus I don't fit any development models for that.

What I find most fascinating is how common it is. We all probably know multiple individuals with it but what I find most interesting is why don't psychopaths exhibit their supposed leanings towards hurting people in the extreme more often. I think I know the answer and it is that like a normally emotionally balanced people there it often isn't necessary, often it is self defeating and ultimately you can seek thrills elsewhere. There is an interesting book I read on the subject (can't even remember the one that said it) that stated if religions are the collective conciousness of the people then Buddhism and Taoism are the collective conciousness of the psychopath.

[xSilverPhinx]

Once I started reading about the subject I went pretty deep into it as I find it fascinating but the distinction between sociopathy/psychopathy is marginal, essentially boiling down to one is due to environment (sociopathy) and one is down to genetics (psychopathy).

It's probably best to say that one is acquired whereas the other is innate. Even so, I don't entirely agree with this as you can't really separate nature from nurture and say that one is genetic and the other is environmental. Experiences (environment) can and do rewire the brain to an extent and the environment also can and do turn turn on certain genes.

[xSilverPhinx]

My sister is a psychopath (diagnosed) and I can say that living with one was very difficult at times, to say the least. They are emotionally draining.

pathological liar;
steals whatever money is lying around;
tries to manipulate people (not very good at it);
does not form any meaningful bonds with people, she uses people and then discards them;
owes thousands to family members, companies and government but has no intention of honouring her debts and also doesn't see any problem with this;
she works, but spends all her money on booze and weekends, then asks to borrow more money
objectifies people (it's difficult to explain, but she doesn't see people as people, more like things);
has hardly any emotional range (I've never seen her ecstatically happy or extremely sad);
has impulse control issues (probably due to a malformed frontal lobe).

Maybe one of the most telling is that she has no desire to change. And I mean actually change, not mimic what she thinks people want so that she can drain them some more. 

[Crow]

Once I started reading about the subject I went pretty deep into it as I find it fascinating but the distinction between sociopathy/psychopathy is marginal, essentially boiling down to one is due to environment (sociopathy) and one is down to genetics (psychopathy).

It's probably best to say that one is acquired whereas the other is innate. Even so, I don't entirely agree with this as you can't really separate nature from nurture and say that one is genetic and the other is environmental. Experiences (environment) can and do rewire the brain to an extent and the environment also can and do turn turn on certain genes.

Not necessarily. Even though plasticity does occur and has been observed it isn't significant enough to rewrite entire genetic make ups. The most important periods of development is when the epigenome is at its most venerable and open to methylation which is during conception, then birth, then the third and fourth trimester. After that it is the first 2 years of life when development can be interrupted. By the time a person hits puberty they are pretty much set. After that it is extreme events, the older you get the more extreme it has to be. If you are genetically predisposed to certain character traits it is safe to say there are certain things that should be avoided for the person whilst in developmental stages such as abuse and war. Things that can often disrupt a well balanced individual into sociopathy will often push a prosocial psychopath into the realms of prototypical/primary psychopathy and prototypical psychopath into the really dark realms that scare the shit out out of people. But even with this kind of plasticity not everything can be changed, a lot of things are set in the third and fourth trimester and this is when psychopathy has been linked to becoming set. Psychopathy has been linked directly to genetics rather than environment, children aren't born a sociopath but can be born a psychopath. Now if that has a violent or abusive outlet that could be down to environment.

[xSilverPhinx]

Once I started reading about the subject I went pretty deep into it as I find it fascinating but the distinction between sociopathy/psychopathy is marginal, essentially boiling down to one is due to environment (sociopathy) and one is down to genetics (psychopathy).

It's probably best to say that one is acquired whereas the other is innate. Even so, I don't entirely agree with this as you can't really separate nature from nurture and say that one is genetic and the other is environmental. Experiences (environment) can and do rewire the brain to an extent and the environment also can and do turn turn on certain genes.

Not necessarily. Even though plasticity does occur and has been observed it isn't significant enough to rewrite entire genetic make ups.

Entire? No, of course not. It probably wouldn't make a psychopath's brain neurotypical.
It's like pathological liars, who usually have more prefrontal white matter in their brains than non-pathological liars. I don't think neuroplasticity would really change that constitution past a certain age.

However, I do think that experience does play a major role in personality development. Take identical twins for instance. Their genetic makeup is almost 100% the same yet their personalities can differ, sometimes drastically.

The most important periods of development is when the epigenome is at its most venerable and open to methylation which is during conception, then birth, then the third and fourth trimester. After that it is the first 2 years of life when development can be interrupted. By the time a person hits puberty they are pretty much set. After that it is extreme events, the older you get the more extreme it has to be. If you are genetically predisposed to certain character traits it is safe to say there are certain things that should be avoided for the person whilst in developmental stages such as abuse and war. Things that can often disrupt a well balanced individual into sociopathy will often push a prosocial psychopath into the realms of prototypical/primary psychopathy and prototypical psychopath into the really dark realms that scare the shit out out of people. But even with this kind of plasticity not everything can be changed, a lot of things are set in the third and fourth trimester and this is when psychopathy has been linked to becoming set. Psychopathy has been linked directly to genetics rather than environment, children aren't born a sociopath but can be born a psychopath. Now if that has a violent or abusive outlet that could be down to environment.

Physiological and biochemical environments count as environment as well.

I couldn't find any reference stating that peoples' personalities have a critical period that short. Do you have any references? 

According to Terraccino (here) personality stabilises at around age 30. 

[Icarus]

There may be some substance in the report but some of the conclusions are bullshit. I refer particularly to the suggestion that non believers are less empathetic. 

[Crow]

Personality does stabilise around the ages of 20 to 30 depending on the individual (as far as we know) and why one of the current psychological recommendations is for no one under the age of 25 to be allowed into active military service, police or similar jobs where they are going to be confronted by extreme situations. But we are talking about something that is genetically active for a persons life, if for some odd reason the gene did turn on (like it can with schizophrenia) or off the brain structure is set and if it has gone past the critical stages of development well that isn't really going to do much.

For the notes on the critical period this is a review paper on the different studies done on the subject: Critical periods of vulnerability for the developing nervous system: evidence from humans and animal models [links to PDF]. Also for a general overview of what I said in the rest of my prior post this paper: Trajectories of brain development: point of vulnerability or window of opportunity? [links to pdf].

In the second paper it links to the works of Mcguffin who has done a lot of work on twins, to me what his paper highlights is that certain factors are highly genetically related whilst others are environmental. Personality for example is highly environmental based (60%) but if those twins are both autistic which is primarily genetics (90%) their autism should express itself in different ways if growing up in different environments, but one wont be autistic and another not if they are both genetically disposed to it. For environment to take effect on autism in it being active or not it would have to take place within the womb where they are both being exposed to the chemicals unless something unusual happens, environment afterwards can have an effect in its expression.

[xSilverPhinx]

Thanks.

Yep, I am aware that autism is primarily genetics (it's a developmental disorder, not a personality type). Though like true psychopaths they are not neurotypical in their brain structure.