Psychopathy. Behavior as a result of neurology

[haidcat]

I was wondering what transmission theory's advocates thoughts were on how psychopathy relates to the filter theory of consciousness. This link really made me wonder how this all fits in: Psychopaths' brains wired to seek rewards, no matter the consequences.

If the filter theory is true, and there is an afterlife, I wonder how a psychopath who exhibits hyper impulsivity would experience the afterlife? For it seems that the hyperimpulsivity and desire for pleasure at any cost is a result of dopamine imbalances in the nucleus accumbens. After the death of the brain, this dopamine imbalance will not be an issue anymore, so will the "soul" still have psychopathic tendencies and still have the sadistic desires they had during life(sadistic desires being in reference to criminal psychopaths only), or have a different personality all together?

Also, read this article too: http://phys.org/news137770929.html
I appreciate your thoughts on this matter.

[Guyman]

Was the brain hardwired for their behavior, or was their behavior what rewired their brain? There seems to be a good amount of evidence that we can change the structures of our brains by changing our behaviors.

I have been reading the book Brain Wars by Mario Beauregard. A good portion thus far is about how brain structures change when the person decides to change their behavior. Mainstream science tends to believe that the brain structure influences the mind but not the other way around. However things like neuro-feedback are showing us that this isnt a one way thing. The brain can effect the mind, but the mind also seems to be able to affect the brain.

[Craig Weiler]

Originally Posted by haidcat

I was wondering what transmission theory's advocates thoughts were on how psychopathy relates to the filter theory of consciousness. This link really made me wonder how this all fits in: Psychopaths' brains wired to seek rewards, no matter the consequences.

If the filter theory is true, and there is an afterlife, I wonder how a psychopath who exhibits hyper impulsivity would experience the afterlife? For it seems that the hyperimpulsivity and desire for pleasure at any cost is a result of dopamine imbalances in the nucleus accumbens. After the death of the brain, this dopamine imbalance will not be an issue anymore, so will the "soul" still have psychopathic tendencies and still have the sadistic desires they had during life(sadistic desires being in reference to criminal psychopaths only), or have a different personality all together?

Also, read this article too: Nature or nurture -- Are you who your brain chemistry says you are?
I appreciate your thoughts on this matter.

I realize that you are looking at the psychopath as someone who is driven by what their brain is doing, but I would interpret this as this person's consciousness having an effect on their brain chemistry.

We all have deeper levels of consciousness and some people are better at accessing them than others. Psychopaths would be very, very poor at being aware of these deeper levels. They are obsessed with physically based experiences and things, indicating that they are very much stuck in shallow end of the consciousness pool.

When they die, they will have access to the deeper levels of consciousness and it won't much matter what they did in life. It's like an actor playing a villain. It's just a role that they played. They will be aware of how they fit in to the big picture. They learn from it and move on.

[haidcat]

"but I would interpret this as this person's consciousness having an effect on their brain chemistry"- could you explain further what u mean by this? Many psychopaths are born with different brains, and even exhibit psychopathic behavior at a very young age, indicating that behavior is being influenced by the brain.

"When they die, they will have access to the deeper levels of consciousness and it won't much matter what they did in life." So do you believe that your actions, intentions, states of mind etc, have no influence whatsoever on what the afterdeath state would be like?

Also, please elucidate further what you mean by deeper levels of consciousness/

[David Bailey]

haidcat,

I became somewhat more sceptical of brain research of this sort after reading this paper (mostly fairly easy reading):

http://forum.mind-energy.net/local_l...&catid=11&id=4

Note also the phrase in the original article "may be linked"!

Putting those quibbles aside (though they may be substantial), it is well known that impaired brain functioning does produce changes in personality. Clearly if the transmission theory of consciousness is close to the mark, lots of information - such as rewards - must get fed back (the communication must be 2-way).

People who have had NDE's often comment on how their thinking was much clearer at the time of the NDE, the brain clearly limits that process - sometimes in unfortunate ways.

Remember also, that there is a phenomenon in which some dementia patients become lucid just before death. This is remarkable, because their brains are supposedly messed up beyond use - far more than the psychopaths mentioned in that article.

David

[anonymous]

Originally Posted by haidcat

I was wondering what transmission theory's advocates thoughts were on how psychopathy relates to the filter theory of consciousness. This link really made me wonder how this all fits in: Psychopaths' brains wired to seek rewards, no matter the consequences.

If the filter theory is true, and there is an afterlife, I wonder how a psychopath who exhibits hyper impulsivity would experience the afterlife? For it seems that the hyperimpulsivity and desire for pleasure at any cost is a result of dopamine imbalances in the nucleus accumbens. After the death of the brain, this dopamine imbalance will not be an issue anymore, so will the "soul" still have psychopathic tendencies and still have the sadistic desires they had during life(sadistic desires being in reference to criminal psychopaths only), or have a different personality all together?

Also, read this article too: http://phys.org/news137770929.html
I appreciate your thoughts on this matter.

People who have NDE's often say that during their NDE they learn that we agree to our life before we are born. It doesn't make sense that any particular life would doom someone to punishment in the afterlife.

http://www.near-death.com/experiences/research01.html

It is not unusual for near-death experiencers returning from clinical death to report having received information concerning their pre-existence before they were conceived in the world. Some experiencers report of learning how they chose various aspects of their lives to be predestined before they were born. Some of the choices people have reported having chosen before birth include the selection of their birth parents, choosing their mission in life, and even choosing how they will die. This knowledge received by near-death experiencers of the past and future shows how some things in life are predestined while other things are not. It shows how free will and predestination both exist and work hand in hand.

The disposition in the afterlife of a psychopath would most probably vary from person to person. Where you go in the afterlife depends on your mental state after you leave the body. This is more like a natural law like gravity than it is a judgment by a conscious entity.

If, after death, the spirit liked being a psychopath and wanted to have another chance of it in a future incarnation he would probably go to a lower level than a spirit that hated being a psychopath even if he couldn't overcome the physical influence of the brain.

My belief is that the spirits of most psychopaths would not really be proud of what they did as a psychopath and so would not be doomed to the lowest levels of the spirit world in the afterlife, but if they are incarnating to experience life as a psychopath they are also probably still in an early stage of development so they wouldn't go into the highest levels either.

But for any particular psychopath, you can't say what their situation is. Some nasty spirits may really want to be psychopaths and are given that opportunity, or an advanced spirit may take on the life of a psychopath for a higher purpose that we may know nothing about.

[anonymous]

Reality is a sham.

Someone once suggested a person could be an isolated brain in a vat controlled by a virtual reality generator and there would be no way the person could tell the difference between that and an objective reality.

I suppose this could be true, but I think it is more likely that the brain is the virtual reality generator.

Neuroscience has shown that the brain produces the sense of self, and the sense of time.

Near Death Experiencers say that they experience love, timelessness, and oneness while retaining their individuality. They say that when out of the body, deformities, disease and its associated pain, no longer exist.

The sense of time and the sense of self, disease and pain we have while incarnated are not real. They are illusions produced by the brain. All the studies by neuroscientists attempting to show how the brain produces consciousness are really showing how the brain produces a sham reality.

Many of the great mystical traditions have said that reality is an illusion. Neuroscience provides the mechanism for that illusion.

[haidcat]

anonymous.

Are you really gonna say that anger and pain, and grief, and negativity are all produced by the brain but dont exist outside of the brain? What do you make of distressing ndes? of every single religion having a hell of some sort, albeit temporal in buddhism and hinduism. What do you make of mystical experiences that encounter the terrifying abyss, or lsd psychotherapy where people go into timeless realms where they encounter their inner demons in a horrific manner? All that is brain based, but lovey dovey light is not?

[Iyace]

Originally Posted by haidcat

anonymous.

Are you really gonna say that anger and pain, and grief, and negativity are all produced by the brain but dont exist outside of the brain? What do you make of distressing ndes? of every single religion having a hell of some sort, albeit temporal in buddhism and hinduism. What do you make of mystical experiences that encounter the terrifying abyss, or lsd psychotherapy where people go into timeless realms where they encounter their inner demons in a horrific manner? All that is brain based, but lovey dovey light is not?

Christianity, at its base roots, has no hell. One does not, according to the bible, go to hell if they don't convert. They merely die a second death. Most religions, by the way, speak of a spirit realm, and not hell. Most of these particular religions are shamanic. Is like to know which religions you believe have hell like features. This sounds to me like an New Atheism unfounded assumption.

[haidcat]

Are you kidding me? Islam has a hell, tibetan buddhism has a temporary hell, most forms of hinduism have a temporary hell. Even if you discount all that, theres the distressing nde, where hell-like aspects have been encountered. I am by no means saying there is a hell. What i am saying is that not everything outside of the brain is rosey.