IDEAS ABOUT THE LEGACY OF CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR
Crime
James Q. Wilson & Joan Petersilia (eds.)
ICS Press
1995, 650 pp.
$69.95 cloth-bound
$34.95 paper-bound.
Ever since crime started rising sharply in the 1960s, it has been a subject
of increasingly intensive study by criminologists. Crime, edited by two
of the most highly-regarded authorities on the subject, James Q. Wilson
of UCLA and Joan Petersilia of UC Irvine, is a collection of 20 scholarly
essays by experts, summarizing the current academic understanding of street
crime. Although the authors either ignore the implications of race or
speak of it sotto voce, it is clear that criminologists are shedding some
of the social science illusions from previous decades. Among their findings:
* Criminals almost always share certain characteristics, both genetic
and environmental.
* Poverty and unemployment do not cause crime.
* Rehabilitation does not work.
* The only practical benefit of prison is that it keeps criminals from committing more crime.
* Drug treatment, "crime prevention," and alternatives to imprisonment do not work.
* Early "intervention" to reform juvenile delinquents does not work.
What this boils down to is that certain people are going to commit crimes no matter what society does. Only middle age – not punishment – cures them.
The Criminal Personality
Criminologists are virtually unanimous in agreeing that offenders cannot
be rehabilitated.
The personality of the typical criminal is already established by age
two or three. He is aggressive, refractory, impulsive, unaffectionate,
and difficult to rear. By contrast, a child with a sunny, winning disposition
is very unlikely to become a criminal. As one of the authors explains,
"antisocial personality almost never shows up in adulthood (barring
brain injury or disease) without having been foreshadowed by antisocial
behavior in childhood."
Criminals tend to have sex and try drugs at an early age, and start offending
when they are young, breaking windows and setting fires before they are
teenagers. Nearly every career criminal had a long juvenile record, and
nearly every juvenile with a long record becomes an adult criminal. These
are the chronic offenders who terrorize society; about six percent of
the male population accounts for 50 percent of all arrests. These same
proportions have been found in other countries.
The association between low IQ and crime is now beyond doubt; the typical
offender's score is 10 to 15 points below normal. Low IQ is not, however,
decisive, but must usually be combined with the typical criminal personality.
One telling indicator of future deviance is a school record that is even
worse than a child's low IQ would predict. Disobedience and impulsiveness
combine with dim-wittedness to make bad students, who often become offenders.
Interestingly, the larger the family, the more likely that the children
will be delinquent.
Consistent though these criminal characteristics are, they are not sure
predictors. Many refractory, low-IQ children do not become predators.
These traits indicate a strong propensity for crime but only a minority
act on it. It is extremely likely that these characteristics are hereditary.
Studies in Scandinavia have shown that children of criminals, when given
up for adoption, are considerably more likely than other children to become
criminals. Curiously, this link is stronger for property crime than for
violent crime. If any given criminal has a twin, the twin is more likely
than average also to be a criminal. If he has an identical twin, the chances
are even greater.
Future offender.
There is one genetic condition that essentially proves that crime can
have genetic causes. As Richard Herrnstein points out in this collection,
men who are born with an extra male chromosome are about ten times more
likely to be arrested than men born with just one Y chromosome. This condition
does not run in families and can turn up as an abnormality in families
with no criminal history.
Recent studies reported in this volume have found basic physiological
correlates to crime. "Mesomorphs," or well-muscled people, are
more likely to have typically criminal personalities and to be offenders.
Criminals also tend to have low resting pulse rates and to be unresponsive
to sudden stimuli. Electro-encephalogram (EEG) readings of the brain show
unusual rates of theta or slow alpha waves in the brain, which indicate
low levels of arousal. EEG abnormalities of this kind, which appear to
be congenital, are found in 25 to 50 percent of violent criminals but
in only five to 20 percent of non-offenders. As one of the authors explains:
"Criminals are hypothesized to be biologically under-aroused. One
consequence of this under-arousal is a lack of fear, which allows them
to more easily initiate risky or dangerous behaviors . . . . Biological
under-arousal may also lead to stimulation-seeking behaviors such as gang
involvement and criminal activity that, in turn, raise their arousal to
more optimal, 'normal' levels."
Abnormalities in the frontal cortex of the brain are also associated with
crime and the aggressive personality. Cortical dysfunction can be identified
through computerized tomography, positron emission tomography, and cerebral
regional blood flow analysis, and is particularly likely to be found in
violent offenders, including rapists. Low levels of the neurotransmitter
serotonin are also predictors of impulsiveness and violence.
Complications in pregnancy can disrupt neural development in the fetus
in ways that predispose a child towards crime. Some of these complications
can cause visible abnormalities, such as ears that are located low on
the head.
The 19th century Italian criminologist, Cesare Lombroso, taught that criminals
show distinct mental and physical stigmata. He is now generally thought
to be discredited, but new discoveries may yet prove him right. Progress
in the Field
For decades, sociologists have pointed out that criminals grow up in poor,
chaotic, drug-sodden communities, have bad role models, often lack fathers,
are likely to be abused, and go to bad schools. All this is true, and
the conventional view was that these circumstances made little boys into
criminals regardless of genotype.
As this collection shows, criminologists are slowly beginning to note
the possibility that criminals may well be produced in exactly the same
way as the miserable neighborhoods in which they flourish: by incompetent,
irresponsible people who both degrade their surroundings and pass destructive
traits on genetically to their children. Although some of the writers
in Crime use euphemisms like "personal characteristics" to describe
what causes both bad neighborhoods and bad people, there is at least a
hint of hereditarianism in this book.
On the other hand, environment cannot be discounted. Some people are strongly
drawn to crime, and degenerate ghetto neighborhoods cannot but influence
their choices. Many blacks and Hispanics and even some whites are now
born with the gruesome double disadvantage of an unfavorable genotype
and an environment fashioned by people just like themselves.
The Failure of "Intervention"
What can be done about any of this? The authors in this collection are
virtually unanimous in concluding that rehabilitation and crime prevention
have not worked and probably never will. In the concluding essay of the
book, co-editor James Q. Wilson writes:
"Prevention, if it can be made to work at all, must start very early
in life, perhaps as early as the first two or three years, and given the
odds it faces . . . be massive in scope." He writes that current
fads like midnight basketball and summer jobs for young thugs will have
no effect on crime. The idea that lack of jobs causes crime is increasingly
untenable, since criminal proclivities are well established long before
anyone needs a job.
Another author writes that "for all the lip service paid to prevention,
there is still very little hard evidence regarding techniques that work,
or their expected payoff." In fact, some efforts to identify potential
juvenile delinquents and steer them away from crime have back-fired; cajolings
from do-gooders can make rebellious children even worse.
Once people start committing crimes, there seems to be no way to persuade
them to stop. "In the 1970s," writes one author, "a series
of reviews concluded that the available evidence was insufficient to support
the claim that any one particular form of treatment was more effective
than any other, including no treatment at all." Criminologists have
quietly set aside the idea that offenders can be rehabilitated. Some approaches
may reduce recidivism to a small degree but a technique that was reported
to have worked once may never work again. Drug treatment programs appear
to be equally futile; even when they are run in prisons on captive audiences,
they reform virtually no one. Other approaches introduced with much fanfare,
have turned out to be duds. For example, it was long believed that probation
failed to promote good behavior only because probation officers had too
many cases. It is now known that intensive probation with lots of contact
and counseling has practically no effect. Lots of street lighting and
public places designed as "defensible space" have not worked
as promised. Boot camps, community service, and house arrest with monitoring
devices have all been tried as measures short of prison that might keep
young offenders on the straight and narrow; they do not. Some people,
especially in the uplift trade, still manage to work up futile enthusiasms
for such exotica as "parent management training programs" that
are supposed to teach unregenerate parents how to rear sterling children.
Among criminologists, faith in "social engineering" is rapidly
dying.
The Last Twenty Years
Every passing year helps snuff it out. During the 1960s, when crime first
began to skyrocket, silly social theories contributed to an actual decrease
in incarceration rates. There was more crime but it was not punished but
"treated." This mistake was corrected in the next decade, and
the incarceration rate has risen 350 percent since 1970. There are now
over one million people in American jails – four times as many as
in 1970 – and the average prison time served per violent crime tripled
from 1975 to 1989. [N]
According to Crime, the equivalent of about two percent of the male workforce are now behind bars, and close to five percent are on probation or parole. This means that for about every twelve men with jobs there is one man under supervision by the courts.
The last ten years should have been a period of sharply declining crime
rates, and for two reasons. "Get-tough" sentencing keeps criminals
out of mischief for a long time. Also, there was a drop in the number
of men aged 16 to 22 – the peak crime years – which should
have reduced crime. As several of the authors point out, the fact that
overall crime rates declined only marginally indicates that there was
a hugely increased propensity to commit crime. Crack cocaine, which first
became widely available in 1985, seems to have accounted for much of this
increase.
The same year also marked a spectacular rise in rates of juvenile violence,
especially homicide, though the increase was largely among African Americans.
For blacks aged 14 to 17, the homicide rate climbed from about 32 per
100,000 in 1984 to over 110 per 100,000 in 1991 – more than tripling
in just seven years. This, too, appears to be closely associated with
drug violence, and young killers are particularly volatile. Adults kill
strangers about 20 percent of the time, but juveniles do so 34 percent
of the time.
At first blush, since nothing prevents crime and nothing rehabilitates
criminals, the current practice of locking people up for a long time seems
sensible. "Three strikes and you're out" (mandatory life imprisonment
for the third violent felony conviction) also seems sensible. But, as
the authors point out, it may not be. Whether they are jailed, put on
probation, "treated," or just ignored, almost all criminals
voluntarily stop offending after a certain age. For every ten active burglars
at age 17, nine have retired – at least from burglary – by
age 40
A life sentence means supporting, at a current cost of $25,000 a year,
a dodderer who is no longer dangerous. Given the assumption that rehabilitation
does not work (and the related assumption that jail time does not "harden"
young offenders who would otherwise go straight) the best use for jail
would be as a ten-year holding pen for the 16-year-olds who have shown
every sign that they are among the incorrigible six percent who account
for half the mayhem. As currently practiced, "three strikes and you're
out" is likely to apply to repeat offenders in their mid-20s, who
may already be approaching retirement.
What should the police be doing about crime?
Here, too, this book makes a strong case for positions that run counter
to fashion. For example, many city police departments have made a fetish
of cutting response time to emergency calls. It takes an enormous amount
of money and effort to reduce it from, say, seven minutes to four, but
the number of additional arrests is likely to be small. Robbery and assault
may be over in a few seconds, and even in the case of burglary, a startled
homeowner is not likely to call the police until he has secured his property
and the malefactor is blocks away.
Another misguided view is that all parts of a city deserve the same amount
of police protection. In fact, there are plenty of places the police need
never go. Although not all crimes are as concentrated as this, during
one year in Minneapolis, 100 percent of the robberies happened at just
two percent of the city's addresses. The best thing to do with uniformed
police is to have them patrol a city's "hot spots," where crime
is most frequent. Studies show that the most efficient way to discourage
street crime is to have officers show up at frequent but erratic intervals.
Crack Cocaine
Crime contains a fascinating chapter on illegal drugs, which leaves no
doubt that they are associated with crime. A majority of offenses are
committed under the influence, often of alcohol or a combination of alcohol
and something else. In Manhattan, urine tests show that three fourths
of all criminals were using illegal drugs when they committed their crimes.
Crack users tend to be far more violent than heroin or marijuana users,
and the profits in the trade are so high that some dealers are willing
to kill competitors.
Ever since the appearance of crack, the nation has put a huge effort into
controlling drugs. There are now one million drug arrests per year. More
than half of all federal prisoners and about 30 percent of state prisoners
are drug offenders. The enforcement effort swallows up $13 billion in
federal money alone and untold billions from the states.
Legal but still dangerous.
It has been impossible to wipe out either supply or demand, so we still
have a thriving drug underworld. Moreover, locking up dealers does little
good, since dealing is different from other crimes. If police jail a robber
this does not open up a profitable market niche that was previously closed,
but this is exactly what happens with dealers. If a dozen are swept off
the streets a dozen more spring up to take their places.
Should we give up on enforcement, and legalize cocaine? The two authors
of the chapter on drugs are militantly agnostic: "The effects of
cocaine legalization would be so numerous, so profound, and so unpredictable
that any strongly expressed opinion on the subject must reflect some mix
of insufficient intellectual humility and simple bluff."
Legalization would surely increase consumption, but by how much? Should
cocaine be controlled, like prescription medicine, or should it be sold
in grocery stores? Should the legal price be high, as it is now, or low?
Even if the legal price were low and this reduced property crime committed
by addicts who needed money, mere consumption seems to stimulate crime.
With more people smoking it, would there be more crime or less? As the
authors point out, crack addiction is horrible – the plight of crack
babies is even more horrible – so the unknown benefits of legalization
would have to be substantial to justify an increase in addiction.
No one even knows the best way to enforce prohibition. Going after drug
"king-pins" raises the street price, but that may only make
addicts more violently desperate for money. It may be best to leave "king-pins"
alone so that the supply is high and the price low, but chase dealers
off the streets so that crack is hard to find and difficult to get. This
might discourage new users but keep addicts supplied at a reasonable price.
On the other hand, marijuana and heroin can be substitutes for crack and
seem to provoke less violence. Perhaps it would be best to keep them cheap
and crack expensive so that users will switch. Then again, short-term
effects of price changes may be different from long-term effects. No one
knows; the police stumble along in the dark.
Perspective on Imitation: Empathy and Criminal
Responsibility
by Dr Anne Ruth Mackor
Recent research suggests that empathy plays an important role in normal
social awareness and behaviour. What does this mean in regard to criminal
responsibility? Do judges and forensic experts consider the capacity for
empathy to be a precondition of criminal responsibility? Given the fact
that recent investigations suggest capacity for empathy is required to
behave "normally", lacking this, is a person who commits a criminal
act responsible?
Within the last 15 years, debates have occurred in philosophy of mind
and psychology. How are human beings capable of understanding the mental
states and actions of their fellow beings? Is it because they develop
a folk theory (use rules), or because they are capable of imagining what
it is like to be another person (use intuition)? If imagining what others
think and feel is important, it follows that this ability is required
for at least some moral and legal interpretations and judgments - if I
know whether Joe is angry and jealous and hit me on purpose, then I can
pass a moral and, if necessary, legal judgment on Joe.
The disorder of autism plays an important role in this debate. Normally-intelligent
autists have some understanding of the mental states and behaviour of
other human beings, as well as of moral and legal rules. However, their
knowledge is impoverished when compared to the "norm". As an
example:At some point in her conversation with Oliver Sacks, the well-known
autist Temple Grandin remarks that she could logically infer that a colleague
was jealous of her because she noticed that he was sabotaging her work,
but she said that she could not see any jealous look on his face.Autists
apparently use a more explicit and inferential, "theoretical"
route than "normal" human beings to understand others. For most
people, social knowledge is largely a matter of implicit practical knowledge.
The following two examples illustrate the detached nature of autistic
social understanding:Whereas a normal child would have to think hard to
tell how he knows that his father is angry, he "just knows"
it (that is, he sees and feels it), it turns out that autistic children
infer that their father is angry - for example from the shape of his moustache.
Their knowledge is also fragmented, for the children only look at, for
example, the moustache and do not have an integrated "holistic"
picture of their father's angry face and bodily gestures. Even more convincing
perhaps are the reports of autistic children who tell their teacher that
another child is "making a strange noise" when the other child
is crying.Developmental studies show that the innate capacity to simulate
in newborn babies is the building block of social knowledge and that this
capacity does not work properly in autistic children.
There is also physiological research that shows that subjects who are
instructed to describe the negative emotions of others are better at the
task if some of their physiological states "resonate", that
is become similar to, those of the people they observe. The discovery
of mirror-neurons is relevant in this respect. Mirror-neurons not only
fire when you do something or when something happens to you (for example,
when you prick yourself with a needle), but also when you observe someone
else doing the same thing (pricking himself with a needle). Thus, these
neurons "resonate". Some theorists think deficiencies in the
mirror-neuron system play a crucial role in the disorder of autism.
Research on autists shows that physiological changes do not occur in autistic
children; similar physiological changes are also absent in psychopaths.
Thus, disorders such as autism and psychopathy seem to offer a serious
argument in favour of the claim that empathy plays an important role in
understanding social expectations. Purely inferential and detached knowledge
of mental states, actions, and social rules is impoverished and insufficient
when compared to the seemingly practical, seemingly automatic and intuitive
knowledge of "normal" human beings.
Moral psychologists argue that a capacity for empathy is necessary for
the development of moral emotions - compassion, shame, guilt, feelings
of justice and the like. If someone lacks the capacity for empathy, he
is not capable of precisely those emotions that form the foundations of
ethics and criminal law. The question is, to what extent do these deficiencies
affect his culpability and responsibility? There are two categories of
people who have serious deficiencies in their capacity for empathy: psychopaths
and autists. (Other categories of people with empathic deficiencies are:
people with prefrontal damage, fronto-temporal dementia, and anorexia
nervosa.)
Psychopathy is characterised by "an early onset of extremely aggressive
behaviour that is not tempered by any sense of guilt or empathy with the
victim." Although most serial killers and rapists are psychopaths
(for example Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs is supposedly
a psychopath), many psychopaths perform less extreme anti-social behaviour.
Some commit only white-collar crimes (fraud), or even manage to keep within
the boundaries of criminal law. All are characterised, however, by the
fact that they have very shallow emotions and do not experience feelings
of empathy and guilt.
In view of the deficiencies of psychopaths, it might seem right to accord
a crucial role to affective empathy in moral cognition and conclude that
Kantians are wrong to emphasise the feeling of respect for the "categorical
imperative" as the only foundation of ethics. [Immanuel Kant was
the 18th-century sage of Konigsberg whose iron reverence for absolute
truth as the core value of human nature defeated many a dialectical opponent.]
But autists are much more morally responsible persons than psychopaths
and this fact can only be accounted for from Kantian perspective.
Autism, too, is characterised by lack of empathy. However, although autists
can exhibit aggressive behaviour as a consequence of their deficiencies,
autism is not characterised by aggressive behaviour. Moreover, autists,
unlike psychopaths, do adhere to rules, distinguish between merely convential
and moral rules, experience feelings of guilt and have a strong sense
of justice. The following example serves to illustrate the differences
between psychopaths and autists:An autistic boy was still on the platform
when the conductor asked for his train ticket. The boy refused. Things
got out of hand and the boy ended up being picked up by the police. Had
the boy been a psychopath, he might have had a fight with the conductor
"just for kicks." The autistic boy, however, was not trying
to provoke the conductor. Unlike psychopaths, autists are socially very
naive and they are incapable of complex social interactions such as provoking.
In the boy's rigid perception of the situation, the conductor had a right
to see his ticket if, and only if, he was in the train, but not when he
was still on the platform. The boy was not a "rebel without a cause."
His refusal was a matter of principle.Thus, although autists apply rules
too rigidly and are incapable of weighing interests appropriately, they
seem to be moral agents in a Kantian sense of the term, precisely because
they have such a rigid view of the world.
An important question to be addressed therefore is how to account for
the fact that although both autists and psychopaths lack empathy, autists
perform much less anti-social behaviour and are much more responsible
beings than psychopaths. What role does empathy play, and what roles do
other criteria, such as respect for the law, play in normal behaviour?
The answer will help determine whether empathy should be a precondition
of criminal responsibility.
Christine Rosen is a senior editor of The New Atlantis and resident fellow
at the Ethics and Public Policy Un-natural Selection
How did dysgenics come about? Simple. By
a process that might well be called "un-natural selection,"
because it is a reversal of natural selection resulting from society's
corrupting influence. In a nutshell:
(1) Modern societies quite understandably take care of sickly people who
previously would have died, but then these people go on to have children
with a high incidence of the same illnesses, and
(2) although contraception is available to everyone, it's more consistently
and effectively used by all of the "best" and the most admirable
people, i.e., the smartest, most responsible, hard-working people who
make a positive contribution to the larger society.
A high percentage of the "worst" and least-admirable people
either don't know, or don't care, that unprotected sex brings babies into
the world, so they have sex with little or no thought of contraception.
They include: psychopaths; sociopaths; criminals; psychologically disturbed
people of all varieties; alcoholics; drug addicts; irresponsible, short-sighted,
and selfish people; the mentally retarded; just-plain-dumb people; and
people who are too lazy to take a trip to the corner drugstore. Because
of their negligence, they contribute a disproportionate share of their
least- admirable genes to future generations.
Professor Richard Lynn of the University of Ulster conducted a study in
which he found that despite lengthy sojourns in prison, London criminals
still managed to produce more children on average than ordinary, law-abiding
citizens (Lynn, 1995). Lynn calculated the increase in crime that would
be expected, given the degree to which criminal behavior is a function
of heredity, and estimated the increase in crime which should result (other
factors being equal) by the excess fertility of criminals. His excellent
book, Dysgenics, is the most comprehensive and authoritative work on the
issue of eugenics and dysgenics to date.
Instead of implementing a eugenics program of incentives and disincentives
in order to rectify the problem of dysgenics, most governments are making
it worse by subsidizing the reproduction of the least-productive segment
of society, and taxing heavily the most productive segment.
Farmers and breeders have utilized the principle of "select the best"
for their crops, livestock, and pets, and this has given us bountiful
crops of every variety, high-yield milk cows, fast, beautiful, and gentle
horses. Yet we take far less care when it comes to human beings, and in
effect, we "select the worst." It would be unconscionable to
breed stupid, sickly, and vicious dogs -- surely it's at least as cruel
to do this to human beings.
Faulty Gene May Affect Behaviour of Abused Children
by Paul Recer
Washington - Abused children who become violent criminals as adults may
be influenced by a gene that fails to make enough of an essential brain
chemical, a study says. Based on a 26-year analysis of the lives of 442
males in New Zealand, the study found those men who had a combination
of abuse and a less active brain chemical gene were about nine times more
likely to commit criminal or anti-social acts as adults than others in
the group.
Experts say the finding, appearing this week in the journal Science, could
lead to new ways of helping abused children become responsible, nonabusing
adults.
The men in the study group were tested for the activity of a gene, called
monoamine oxidase A, or MAOA. It produces an enzyme that regulates chemicals
in the brain which transmit signals between neurons. Among those studied,
279 were found to have normally active MAOA genes, while 163 showed a
low level of action from the gene.
The study found that 64% of the men were not abused in childhood, while
the balance experienced either "severe" or "probable"
maltreatment - defined as rejection by the mother, frequent changes in
primary caregivers and physical or sexual abuse.
At the conclusion of the research, the researchers found that the abused
children with low MAOA gene activity - 12% of the study group - accounted
for 44% of the violent crime convictions among all of those in the group,
said Terrie E Moffitt, a psychologist at the University of Wisconsin,
Madison, and a co-author of the study.
"As adults, 85% of the severely maltreated children who also had
the gene for low MAOA activity developed anti-social outcomes, such as
violent criminal behaviour," Moffitt said in a statement. The abused
children with normal MAOA genes were no more likely to be anti-social
than those who were not abused, the study found.
The findings provide evidence that genetic characteristics "can moderate
children's sensitivity to environmental insults" such as abuse, Moffitt
said in an e-mail. "These findings may partly explain why not all
victims of maltreatment grow up to victimise others." She said the
findings also suggest a new tool for evaluating the risk that a person
may become a problem for society. "The combination of the low-activity
MAOA genotype and maltreatment predicts anti-social behaviours about as
well as high cholesterol predicts heart disease."
Dr John M Leventhal, professor of pædiatrics at Yale University
School of Medicine and medical director of the child abuse program at
the Yale-New Haven Children's Hospital, said the study was interesting
and important because it suggests a biological factor may play a role
in causing some abused children to become abusive adults. "If this
paper is confirmed by other studies and we have a better understanding
about what the biology means, then this may play a role in clinical evaluations
in the future," he said.
"We know that not all abused children grow up to be violent. This
study supports that observation," said Sid Johnson, president of
Prevent Child Abuse American, a Chicago-based group that conducts child
abuse research and has chapters in 39 states. "This finding could
to lead to a very effective prevention approach."
Paul Recer is the Science Writer for Associated Press
Source: NandoTimes 1 August 2002 © AP Online
Why Genes Matter in Sentencing
by Matt Ridley
A very nice example of this, which is still quite a controversial study,
is Terrie Moffitt's work on antisocial behaviour and the mono-amine oxidase-A
gene on the x-chromosome, which is going to set the standard for how to
understand the genes involved in personality and behaviour. I write about
it in Nature via Nurture. She's done a study of a cohort of New Zealanders
in Dunedin who've been followed ever since birth. All the kids in this
town were followed every year of their life to see what happened to them.
It's about a thousand kids. If you take the 400 boys in the sample who
have all-white genetic ancestry up to the grandparent level - boys because
we're talking about a gene on the x-chromosome - and you look at their
mono-amine oxidase-A gene, and you look at whether it's the high-active
or low-active version - there are essentially two versions of this gene
according to how active they are, according to whether the promoter on
the front of the gene has got a certain number of repetitions or a lesser
number - does the less active version of the gene correlate with ending
up a young adult who is antisocial and who's in trouble with the law?
No, it doesn't, in significant correlation. If you then break the data
down, though, into those who were abused in their childhood and those
who weren't, you find a very strong correlation with this gene. It turns
out that if you have the low-active version of this gene, and you had
an abusive childhood, then you're going to end up with an antisocial adult
- not deterministically, but with a high probability. That seems to me
to be a terribly important study, because it shows that when you parcel
out the gene-environment interaction, you can find genes in here that
you wouldn't have found with the conventional gene-hunting techniques
- genes that correlate with behaviour, but that react to the environment.
What are the social implications of finding this? Well, essentially there
are none, because we were against child abuse before we knew which genes
were involved, and we're against child abuse afterwards. It's possible
that you can start to say to a kid who has been abused and it's too late
to intervene, "You are going to be all right, because you don't have
the particularly responsive version of the gene," or "You're
not going to be all right, and therefore we should start putting you on
Ritalin or Prozac to try and adjust your brain chemistry during your life."
We're a long way from that yet, but that's the kind of social implication
you could pull out of it.
Matt Ridley is an Oxford-trained zoologist and science writer whose latest
book is Nature via Nurture (HarperCollins)
Source: www.edge.org from "The Genome Changes Everything"
Culpability and responsibility in (Dutch) criminal law
The principle "no punishment without guilt" is a foundation
of Dutch criminal law. Contrary to civil law, criminal law does not allow
for strict liability for any criminal act. For a defendant to be punishable,
he should be guilty of committing the criminal act. For someone to be
guilty, his act must be culpable. An act is culpable if defendant "could
have done otherwise." Although Dutch criminal law is guilt-based
law, the question whether defendant is guilty is not the first question
to be dealt with. The court must first determine
1. whether the elements of the act are proven as charged and
2. whether the act can be qualified as a criminal fact.If either proof
or qualification fails, the verdict will be "not guilty". Otherwise,
a further question must be answered:
3. whether defendant has raised a special defence.Defences can be either
justifications or excuses. Justifications are defences that take away
the unlawfulness of otherwise criminal facts; excuses take away the culpability.
If the defendant has either a justification or an excuse, he is not punishable
and the court will discharge him from further prosecution.
It should be noted that the distinction between justifications and excuses
is developed more in the theory than in case law. The statutory description
of the special defences in articles 40 - 43 of the First Book of the Dutch
Penal Code reflects another distinction, that is, between internal and
external causes. As a consequence, some of the articles which deal with
external causes deal with both justifications and excuses.
There are two kinds of external causes. They are related to justifications
and excuses, respectively. Some external causes are of such a nature that
in reasonableness we should not ask of any normal human being to refrain
from committing a criminal act (for example self-defence). Therefore such
external causes take away, not just the culpability, but the unlawfulness
of the act. Characteristically, the defendant acted freely and rationally
in such cases.
There are also external causes that affect otherwise normal human beings
to such an extent that they were not capable of acting fully rationally
and freelyat the time of the crime (for example, excessive self-defence).
These external causes do not take away the unlawfulness, but only the
culpability of the act.
Finally, internal causes are conditions in the personality of the defendant
that have caused him to commit a criminal act. The criminal code recognises
two kinds of internal cause: the juvenile age and the insanity of the
defendant. The juvenile age (in the Netherlands under 12 years) takes
away the possibility of prosecution altogether. The insanity of the defendant
might take away the culpability of the act and therewith the possibility
of prosecution. Article 39 says:Not punishable is he who commits a criminal
act for which he cannot be held responsible because of the poor development
or pathological disturbance of his mental capacities.Although it is common
to talk about the responsibility of a disturbed person in general, it
should be noted that article 39 deals with criminal responsibility for
a particular act only. In cases where article 39 might apply, a forensic
expert must determine whether there is a causal relationship between the
mental disorder and the criminal act; the court must then decide whether
the defendant therefore lacked responsibility for his act. Obviously,
whether having a mental disorder results in diminished responsibility
for a particular act will depend on the type of act and the circumstances
of the act. Thus, a psychotic defendant might be liable for tax fraud,
but not for manslaughter.
If there is total absence of responsibility, the court will discharge
the defendant from further prosecution. The court can, but need not, combine
this decision with an order. Article 37 allows for admission into mental
hospital for one year. Articles 37a and 37b allow for placing defendant
at the disposal of the government, and this order can be combined with
an order to stay in a secured hospital.
Finally, although article 39 suggests that criminal responsibility is
an all-or-nothing affair, a five-point scale is commonly used to indicate
the degree of criminal responsibility:
total absence of responsibility
severely diminished responsibility
diminished responsibility
slightly diminished responsibility
complete responsibility
In cases of diminished responsibility a combination of punishment and
an order is possible.
No Hard (Genetic) Feelings
by Adriel Bettleheim
Laboratory mice usually are attentive parents, constantly herding their
pups into nests and crouching over the offspring to nurse them and keep
them warm. So why would the lab mice at the University of Washington start
neglecting their young? Because neurobiologist Steven Thomas and molecular
biologist Richard Palmiter inactivated a gene in the mice that plays a
key role in preparing the brain for motherhood. This gene creates a protein
needed to manufacture the brain chemical norepinephrine, which is believed
to promote nurturing. When the mice with the altered gene gave birth,
they left the pups scattered around the cage, not even bothering to remove
placental material. Nearly 3 out of 4 of the pups died of neglect. But
when the surviving pups were given to foster mothers with the normal gene,
85% survived.
The researchers' work is part of a fast-growing field that is attempting
to answer the age-old nature-nurture question: does biology or the environment
playa greater role in determining behavior? More than 130 years after
Austrian monk Gregor Mendel formulated the laws of heredity while studying
pea plants, researchers continue to disagree over how much genes control
destiny and what that means for public policy.
Research in behavioral genetics is different, but no less controversial,
than the burst of cloning research that has dominated news in recent months.
Though both come under the rubric of "barnyard biotech," the
developmental research does not involve the creation of new organisms.
Instead, it explores how genes in DNA carry chemical messages that may
influence behavioural traits. Scientists since the mid-1930s have known
that certain mutant genes, acting alone or in combination with one another,
can cause hereditary diseases. Technology has since been perfected to
identify the precise genetic code for conditions such as cystic fibrosis,
Huntington's chorea and Tay-Sachs disease, and, in limited cases, physicians
are applying gene therapy to treat symptoms.
But over the last two decades researchers have found ways to isolate and
characterise DNA sequences from individuals. With these new tools, some
scientists now are searching for biological explanations to far more complex
phenomena, such as sexuality, risk-taking and violence. Popular attention
to the field was sparked by the publication of the controversial 1994
book The Bell Curve in which authors Richard Hermstein and Charles Murray
asserted that IQ is largely hereditary and that poverty is a function
of inherited low intelligence.
Biologists, psychologists and others drawn to the field say they are concerned
about drawing similar broad societal conclusions from limited studies
that could have weaknesses in methodology. But their work is nonetheless
presenting headline-grabbing evidence that genes may account for previously
unexplainable, but commonplace, behaviors. In 1996, a research team reported
discovering a link between anxiety-related behaviour and a gene that controls
the brain's ability to use a neurochemical called serotonin - the same
neurotransmitter targeted by Prozac and other antidepressants. Researchers
at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the University of Wurtzburg
in Gerinany found that individuals who have a slightly shorter version
of the gene for the serotonin transporter tend to be more anxious and
harbor more negative thoughts and feelings.
That same year, two groups working independently at NIH and in Israel
reported a link between excitability, thrill-seeking and quick temper
and a gene involved in the activity of the neurotransmitter dopamine,
which, among other things, transmits sensations of pleasure. The studies
focused on a segment of the gene's molecular code that is repeated either
4 or 7 times in a row. Novelty-seeking seemed more common in people with
the sevenfold repetition.
Since then, there have been near monthly announcements of newly discovered
suspect genes, often with the caveat that they act in tandem with other
genes and the environment to express a trait. Arguably the most controversial
connection between genes and behaviour concerns suspected links to crime
and violence. Researchers studying a dysfunctional Dutch family announced
in 1993 that aggressive behaviour may be linked to a single faulty gene
that causes a shortage of enzymes needed to break down serotonin. Since
then, scientists and policymakers have engaged in a stormy debate over
the roots of crime and possible solutions.
Proponents of continued research say that while the concept of a single
"criminal gene" may be the stuff of science fiction, biological
markers exist that could make a person more likely to commit crimes or
provide clues about populations that are more at risk. Gene therapy to
correct any inborn problems could also make an attractive and humane alternative
to incarceration, they argue. But critics say labeling a group as predisposed
to violence recalls the eugenics movement of the early 20th century, which
led to the sterilisation of convicts and some mental patients in the hope
of reducing crime among future generations. Many social scientists say
researchers, in a rush to "biologise" behaviour, are ignoring
environmental influences, such as poverty, broken families and racism.
"We tend to seek quick and easy technological conclusions that aren't
always for the public good," says Dorothy Nelkin, a New York University
sociologist. "Clearly, there are some genetic factors that contribute
to behavior. (But) it's easier to blame the individual than take up what's
wrong with the social system."
Many researchers in the pro-gene camp are uncomfortable with such criticisms
and take pains to note they are only seeking to study specific biological
systems, not prescribing broad solutions. "When you study how a biological
pathway works, you know the details, but you're not always able to see
the forest from the trees," says Judith Greenberg, director of the
division of genetics and development biology at the National Institute
of General Medical Sciences. University of Colorado psychologist Gregory
Carey says talk about genetic advances is oversimplified and contributes
to a misunderstanding of DNA's power, especially when it comes to predicting
individual traits.
"We may be able to say a certain percentage of the population is
predisposed to a condition, but I doubt we'll ever be able to identify
whether Joe Smith will have it or not," Carey says. " Any big
headlines have to be taken with a lot of caution."
Source: Congressional Quarterly 1st quarter 1998
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