So I looked into it.

It turned out that, on that day, Cooper had done a segment with James Fallon, the neuroscientist who, in the process of studying the genetics and brains of psychopathic killers, discovered that he himself, despite being a successful non-violent researcher, had many of the genetic and brain markers associated with psychopathy.

I wrote a very detailed post about Fallon and his fascinating story last year called “Neuroscientist James Fallon’s Work & Life Shed Light on How Psychopathic Killers are Made…and Perhaps Prevented.” So I won’t cover that in any more detail here.

But Fallon has recently released a book about his story called The Psychopath Inside: A Neuroscientist’s Personal Journey into the Dark Side of the Brain. And, in the wake of the book’s release, he has been showing up more frequently in the media, sharing his insights about psychopathy, its impact in the world, and what his story tells us about the possibility of reducing the number of psychopaths that develop, which is wonderful.

The interview with Anderson Cooper is below and, even though this clip is only five minutes long, it could be five of the most important minutes I’ve ever seen on television.

Early in the interview, Fallon:

• Shares a bit about his story
• Talks about the psychopathic traits that can be recognized by looking at brain scans
• Explains the difference between the “cognitive empathy” that he and psychopaths have and “emotional empathy,” which they tend to lack

The upshot of Fallon’s story is that, despite having the genetic and biological markers for psychopathic traits, he did not become a full blown psychopath. In fact, he became a very productive, contributing member of society. He believes the reason is that he had a very loving upbringing, which counteracted his destructive biological predispositions. And he believes that such an upbringing can have the same beneficial impact on others with similar biological predispositions.

As Fallon tells Cooper:

“I thought everything was driven by genetics, biology. And I didn’t think nurture had anything to do with it. Once I realized, because of the genes I have, that if you’re brought up in a very nurturing environment, you can offset the biology.”

I agree that Fallon’s case offers us hope that, at least in a subset of cases, people with biological propensities for psychopathic traits can be prevented from becoming full-blown psychopaths. However, I still think a lot more research is needed to determine how generalizable his case is. Is Fallon representative of all or most people with these markers or is he in some way a rare or special case?

Contrast Fallon’s statement that a caring upbringing can offset biological predispositions for psychopathic traits with this quote from Evil Genes: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed, and My Sister Stole My Mother’s Boyfriend by Barbara Oakley:

“Oddly enough, one study has shown that murderers who have a normal family upbringing have even lower function in their right orbitofrontal cortical areas than murderers who were abused during childhood. Perhaps murderers without a psychosocial ‘push’ toward violence require a greater neurobiological ‘push.’ In other words, children with less severe neurological problems may be helped by having a normal upbringing – but children with more severe neurological difficulties may not be.”

The study Oakley cites for this claim in the book’s footnotes is:

Adrian Raine et al., “Reduced Prefrontal and Increased Subcortical Brain Functioning Assessed Using Positron Emission Tomography in Predatory and Affective Murderers,” Behavioral Sciences and the Law 16 (1998): 319-32.

I would like to see work to determine how Fallon’s claims and those of Raine’s study, which Oakley cites, can be reconciled.

The entire five minute clip of Cooper’s interview with Fallon is important. But, its last two minutes, from 3:13 on, take that to an even higher level, consisting of about as significant an exchange as I’ve ever seen aired.

Anderson Cooper basically admits to being convinced of the central point that many advocates of ponerology, from Andrew Lobaczewski on, have been trying to bring to public attention for decades now – that the influence of psychopathy and psychopathic traits in our world, including in circles of power – and specifically in the very highest circles of political power – is much greater than most people recognize.

Cooper says:

“I find this whole topic of psychopaths really interesting because I’m convinced there’s a lot more people out there who are psychopaths than we realize and particularly successful people, accomplished people, people on TV, people in the political sphere. I’m convinced there are tons of psychopaths.”

Fallon responds:

“If you look at, there was just a study done, a scientific study of all our presidents. And all the biographers answered all these questions about them and it was on a scale of psychopathy. And on the scale of psychopathy, in sort of the one part of psychopathy, not the criminality part but the other part which is a big part of psychopathy, the ones who scored very high were Theodore Roosevelt, JFK, FDR, Bill Clinton very high. The ones who had no psychopathy at all in this were people like Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford.

And when you look at the association of those psychopathic traits with leadership, it’s like we want these people, right, because they do things that are…they take chances, they lie at the right time. You know, FDR was lying all the time but he saved us so it was OK. So if you look at people that we choose to be leaders I think a lot of them have these traits and they’re part of leadership skills.”

Cooper then adds:

“I also think what it takes to propel somebody into the public sphere or propel somebody to success, I mean, it’s not, they are not normal impulses, I think and I think a lot of them are psychopathic impulses.”

Fallon responds:

“If you have that grand vision, cause psychopaths will have a grand vision – not all of them, some are just lousy rats – but people have that grandiose, narcissistic need and they’ve got something to prove and they’ve got something they say I’m gonna save the world. That’s part of it. Doesn’t make you psychopathic but it’s one of the traits that fits into this puzzle of psychopathy.”

Anderson Cooper is one high-profile journalist that seems to have realized the tremendous importance of ponerologic topics. Not long ago, he did a segment about Ariel Castro, the man who abducted three girls and held them captive for nearly ten years, in which the topic of psychopathy was front and center. Kudos to Cooper for recognizing how crucial it is that we educate the public on this subject and for courageously covering it on his show.

And the huge traffic surge that I saw as people looked for information in the wake of his interview with James Fallon?

That shows how much interest there is among the public about this topic. And it’s very heartening to see that interest increasingly being met not just by sensationalized fiction or news focused on titillating crimes, but by objective science disseminated by competent researchers and clinicians.

As for the psychopath test:

Well, after the interview with Fallon, not shown in the clip in this post, Cooper said:

“As I said, I find this just amazing. If you’re curious about where you fall on that scale of psychopathy, you can actually take a test to find out. We’ve posted it on our web site AC360.com. It just takes a couple of minutes. I’ve taken it. Pretty much everyone on our staff has taken it and let’s say the results are very, very interesting.”

The link he references on the AC360 blog is here.

And, from that page, it links to the quizzes page associated with Channel 4’s episode “Psychopath Night”, which features tests devised by Kevin Dutton, author of The Wisdom of Psychopaths.

Several researchers, such as Adrian Raine, have done work studying the brains and neurological responses of children who exhibit traits often found in psychopaths and today we look at another such researcher.

Abigail Marsh is an assistant professor of psychology at Georgetown University who directs the school’s Laboratory on Social and Affective Neuroscience. This lab uses cognitive neuroscience methods to explore, among other things, the roots of empathy.

Marsh’s path to interest in this topic is, as is true for many of us who have been drawn to it, a compelling one. As she explains in her profile on her lab’s website, when she was 20 years old, she was in an accident, after which a stranger saved her life. And, as she explains in another interview, a few years later, a different stranger punched her in the face, breaking her nose.

Events like these led her to wonder why some people help others and some harm others. Her quest for answers led her to earn a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Harvard and to do post-doctoral work with James Blair, another leader in the field who has done great work on these subjects.

As described by Georgetown University News, Marsh’s latest research – which also involved the National Institutes of Health, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and several other researchers including Blair – showed that “young people with conduct problems and psychopathic traits such as callousness and remorselessness show less activity in the regions of the brain associated with empathy.”

Specifically, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to measure brain activity as two different groups of adolescents looked at photographs of other people experiencing pain-inducing injuries while imagining either that the body in the photo was their own or someone else’s.

The first group consisted of adolescents with both:

• Psychopathic Traits
• Conduct Disorder or Oppositional Defiant Disorder

The second group was a control group of youngsters of matched age, gender and intelligence.

The study found that:

• As the injuries depicted became more painful, the youngsters with psychopathic traits showed reduced activity in the rostral anterior cingulate cortex, ventral striatum (putamen), and amygdala, all of which are brain regions associated with the experience of empathic pain.
• Amygdala activity was especially reduced when perceiving the injury as happening to another person rather than oneself.
• Youngsters whose scores on the PCL:YV (the Youth Version of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist) were higher, indicating more severe psychopathic traits, showed less activity in the amygdala and rostral anterior cingulate cortex, specifically.

The researchers also discovered that, in the group with psychopathic traits, lower responsiveness was predictive of psychopathic symptom severity.

The formal title of the study is “Empathic responsiveness in amygdala and anterior cingulate cortex in youths with psychopathic traits.” It is published in the March 12, 2013 issue of the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.

In the Georgetown University News piece, Abigail Marsh says that, in her future work, she hopes to help tease out even more fully the various types of different mechanisms underlying helpful and harmful behavior. She explains, “I will continue to use brain imaging, genetic and behavioral research paradigms in healthy adults and adolescents as well as adolescents with conduct problems to try to understand the origins of empathy, aggression, and altruism.” Such important goals position her work squarely in the realm of ponerology.

Well, it just came to my attention over the weekend that now there is a way that you can!

“What is it?” you ask.

Well, it’s Narcissist cologne.

That’s right, Narcissist cologne.

The January 2013 Mensa Bulletin features a profile, on page 18, of Kim Taylor, its creator. In the article, Kim describes how, while living in Paris and traveling the French countryside, she was inspired to create a cologne.

Narcissist for Men Cologne Admiring Itself
(Used with permission of Kim Taylor)

As for the cologne’s name, she says:

“The image for the brand comes from the classical character Narcissus, who fell in love with his own reflection in a pool of water. A men’s cologne just seemed like a good vehicle for a comical depiction of the classic narcissist, who just happens to be male. It’s tongue-in-cheek, but it comes from years of experience dealing with people, learning languages, and trying to make sense of it all. Sometimes the simple answer is: Narcissist.”

Even more comical: there is now a Narcissist fragrance for dogs.

The full fancy French name of the cologne for men is Narcissist: Eau de Toilette pour Homme.

The full name of the cologne for dogs is Narcissist: Eau de Toilette pour Chien.

For those concerned about sexism, Taylor says that she is considering a women’s fragrance, as well.

The description on the About page of the cologne’s website says:

“Narcissist pour homme is developed especially for the man whose ego is unsurpassed…in other words…homme vainglorious, half-awake in his limited awareness, self-absorbed victim of flattery, ruled by pleasure, drenched in scent, basking in hedonism.

Give the gift of self-love.”

Taylor also sells a Narcissist t-shirt through the main site.

The cologne has a Facebook page, as well, which blends promotion of the product with humor and education about narcissism.

I think this is, overall, a brilliant idea. Ponerologic topics are intense so sometimes you just need some comic relief. They can also put people on the defensive and humor can help relax those barriers to learning and understanding.

With just under 1000 likes on Narcissist’s Facebook page as of this writing, it appears that, even as she helps make the world smell a little better, Taylor is making people laugh and, at the same time, actually spreading some knowledge and encouraging people to learn more about this quite serious character trait.

Perhaps the best part is that Taylor seems to truly care about the ethics involved in this issue and to be a strong advocate for compassionate and just interactions. An article in the Savannah Morning News quotes Taylor as saying:

“My themes seem to return to the message of fair play. I’d like to be remembered for that message and for never letting anyone off the hook who doesn’t play fair.”

And, about that, she isn’t just kidding. She is the author of Play Fair! The Art of Relationship and Friendship and the company through which she runs her cologne business is called Fair Play Products.

I must say that when I started this site to help educate people about the science of “evil” and the role of pathological conditions in our systems, I never dreamed I’d be writing about men’s cologne, much less cologne for dogs. But count this as yet another of those fun, unforeseeable twists in the road that you encounter whenever you boldly journey into a subject as vast and complex as ponerology. And kudos to Kim Taylor for using a creative and fun approach to try to contribute to improving the world at what is actually quite a key leverage point.

It was all I could do to refrain from titling this article “Woman Makes Scents of Narcissism”

In our recent piece about Dr. James Fallon, we discussed the three ingredients that Fallon believes are required for the creation of a psychopathic killer.

These included:

• Certain structural and functional characteristics of the brain
• Certain variants of particular genes
• An environment that triggers the expression of these biological predispositions

While psychopathic killers can cause great harm to a certain number of people, they are relatively rare. The greater danger, from the perspective of society at large, is the emergence of “evil” on a broader scale within systems. And, as Andrew M. Lobaczewski makes clear in Political Ponerology, for that to happen, not only must people with disorders other than psychopathy be drawn into harmful activities, but so must some percentage of biologically healthy, normal people.

Zimbardo’s work has primarily focused on investigating how this latter event occurs – how everyday, average people can end up participating in destructive events.

Zimbardo has been a psychology professor at Stanford University for over forty years. He is best known for leading the team that conducted what has come to be known as the Stanford prison experiment back in 1971.

The study was actually funded by the U.S. Office of Naval Research because they wanted to understand more precisely why military guards and prisoners come into conflict.

In the study, part of the basement of the Stanford psychology building was set up to resemble a dungeon. 75 participants were considered and, out of these, 24 male college students who were assessed as the most psychologically stable and healthy of the bunch were chosen. They were then randomly assigned to one of two roles – prisoner or guard.

Once divided into these roles, the participants were treated very much as their assigned role would normally entail.

• “Prisoners” were suddenly arrested by actual city police at an unexpected time, taken to the mock prison, fingerprinted, photographed, searched and dressed in uniforms, just as might take place in a real prison.
• “Guards” were dressed in professional uniforms, complete with batons, and instructed to do what it takes to maintain order.

Then the drama was allowed to unfold.

Zimbardo’s original hypothesis was that the conflicts in the scenario would arise due to the inherent personalities of the “guards” and the “prisoners.”

But instead, the study showed that these relatively healthy, normal participants quickly and deeply internalized their assigned roles within a system that justified and supported them in doing so.

• “Guards” began to treat prisoners poorly, with a third of them acting in genuinely sadistic ways.
• “Prisoners” became subdued and submissive, even turning against fellow prisoners who resisted the guards’ abuse.

Even Zimbardo himself was surprised by how extreme some of the situations became.

At its inception, the study was expected to last for two weeks. But some participants were so upset that they quit early and, after only six days, the entire experiment had to be shut down because of the excessive emotional trauma being manifested.

Decades later, during the Iraq War, when the abuse of prisoners by American personnel at Abu Ghraib prison came to light, many recognized the relevance of Zimbardo’s research to the case. So did Zimbardo himself. In fact, so much so that he became an expert witness for the defense of one of the accused Americans, Army Reserve Staff Sgt. Chip Frederick. In that role, he attempted to show that Frederick and some of the other perpetrators were not inherently evil people, but that, just as in the Stanford prison experiment, the systemic and situational forces involved played a significant role in generating the horrific activities that took place.

Zimbardo discusses the lessons of the Stanford prison experiment and his experience with the Abu Ghraib trials in his book, The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. The book uses the story of Lucifer, God’s favorite angel who fell and was transformed into Satan, as an allegory about how good people can, in certain situations or if intoxicated with power, become corrupted.

Zimbardo’s work is somewhat controversial. Some have criticized his methodology, while others have conducted similar studies using different methodologies and come to different conclusions. But Zimbardo himself is a strong advocate for the need to take into account systemic and situational factors when analyzing why harmful activities occur.

Now, the reason that all of this came up at this time is that, as mentioned earlier, Zimbardo was just featured by The Huffington Post.

The page, posted last Friday, features his 2008 TED talk entitled “The psychology of evil”, seen below:

The talk’s relevance to ponerology is immediately evident, as it begins with Zimbardo telling the audience:

“Philosophers, dramatists, theologians have grappled with this question for centuries: what makes people go wrong?”

while standing in front of an image of an ominous looking face superimposed with the words “Evil: What Makes People Go Wrong?”

In the talk, he discusses:

• How his early life experiences taught him that the line between a “good” and an “evil” person is not as fixed as some would like to believe
• His view that the world will always be filled with a yin/yang mixture of good and evil
• The paradox of the fact that, mythologically, God created Hell as a place to store evil, including His once favorite angel, Lucifer
• His definition of “evil”
• His experience working as an expert witness for the defense of Abu Ghraib perpetrator Staff Sgt. Chip Frederick
• The individual (dispositional) vs. situational vs. systemic factors involved in the abuses of Abu Ghraib
• The famous Milgram experiment, in which a surprisingly large percentage of participants were – if told to do so by a supposed authority figure as part of an ostensible “learning experiment” – willing to administer shocks to another person, even up to a dangerous degree of voltage. This experiment is often paired with the Stanford prison study as a famous example of the power of situational factors in the generation of harmful behavior.
• The relevance of the Milgram experiment to the Jonestown tragedy, in which hundreds committed suicide or were murdered as a consequence of their obedience to the People’s Temple founder and cult leader Jim Jones
• His Stanford prison study
• How anonymity changes behavior amongst warriors
• “7 social processes that grease the slippery slope of evil”
• Why harmful behavior must be studied using a public health model that assesses systemic and situational aspects rather than just focusing on individuals
• How we can promote heroism, especially by recognizing everyday heroes

The video is accompanied by a blog post written by Zimbardo entitled “Journeying From Evil to Heroism,” in which he covers much of the same material, but also tells the story of the TED talk itself, which was, apparently quite dramatic. Zimbardo says he ran over the strict time limit just as he was about to launch into the uplifting conclusion of his speech. Only after a special exception was made for him, because of the moderator’s belief in the importance of his message, was he able to complete his talk, explaining why it is so important that we not only study evil, but also focus on the other side of the coin, heroism, so as to better understand and promote it.

The enthusiastic response to this conclusion of his TED talk helped inspire and support Zimbardo in scaling up his current endeavor, the Heroic Imagination Project. This is a non-profit organization, of which he is president, “dedicated to promoting heroism in everyday life.” They also conduct investigations into how reformed people, who were previously involved in violent activities, were motivated and able to change.

Few people have made more of a name for themselves when it comes to the study of “good” and “evil” than Dr. Philip Zimbardo. And even at almost 80 years old, he is still continuing to do so. His work does not focus as much on the very important biological aspects of ponerology. But when it comes to thinking about the non-biological influences relevant to the field, Zimbardo has given us a lifetime of work to consider.

One of the first such people I “met” after starting this website was Jack Pemment who runs the brilliantly titled Blame the Amygdala site. Jack is an eloquent writer and a graduate student at the University of Mississippi who passionately studies, among other things, the neurological basis for moral decision-making. This includes consideration of autism, psychopathy and antisocial personality disorder. He is also investigating the biology of aggression.

All of these subjects lie right at the heart of ponerology and are talked about often on this site.

I highly recommend you check out Jack’s site.

It only took me a short time reading his site to realize that Jack has a talent for thinking and writing about these crucial matters in novel ways. But that was really confirmed when I discovered that recently he released an actual novel about these matters.

It’s called Seeing Red.

As Jack explains it, the novel was spawned from the recognition that people with atypical neurology, who see the world in ways startlingly different from most of us, make for intriguing characters.

And so he created Daniel Harris, a man with synesthesia, a condition in which stimulation of one sense triggers responses in other senses. A synesthete may, for example, experience a visual color in response to a sound or a taste in response to a spoken word. Harris’ synesthesia consists of him experiencing different colors around the bodies of particular people he meets, with each color evoking an associated taste.

What makes the story relevant to ponerology is that Harris’ quirk turns out to enable him to instantly identify psychopaths. Soon he is being engaged in the search for a psychopathic serial killer.

Pemment’s tagline for the novel says it all:

Synesthesia is learning to kick psychopathy’s ass!

I haven’t read the book, but it sounds fascinating and reminds me of one of the great science fiction stories relevant to ponerology, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Phillip K. Dick, which was the basis for the film Blade Runner. As long as it is done with responsibility, taking care to convey the science with basic accuracy, I think embedding ponerologic science in gripping or entertaining art is a fantastic way to get these ideas out more widely to the public. And having read Jack’s site and seen his writing talent, I suspect Seeing Red will prove worth a read.

Most who work in the fields that study aspects of this question take the view that the answer involves some combination of the two.

But this still leaves us with another question. In what proportion do each of these factors contribute in which people?

One remarkable case offers some fascinating insight on the subject.

Dr. James Fallon

James Fallon, Ph.D. is a highly decorated neuroscientist and Professor Emeritus of Anatomy and Neurobiology at University of California, Irvine. Dr. Fallon has several areas of expertise. One is adult stem cells. Another is psychiatry. Specifically, he is interested in the relationships between brain imaging (he has served as Director of UC Irvine’s Human Brain Imaging Center), genetics and various psychiatric conditions, including schizophrenia, depression and addictions.

An Extraordinary Experiment

Aware of his specialties, for many years, Fallon’s colleagues have sent him brain images they wished to have him analyze.

At one point this interchange took the form of an experiment.

Colleagues sent him 70 MRI scans of brains belonging to people ranging from healthy to mentally ill. Included in the batch were scans of brains belonging to killers, including some notorious ones. But Fallon had no idea which scanned brain belonged to whom.

Nonetheless, he was able to identify differences in five of the scans so dramatic that he could recognize them as the markers of psychopathy. And it turned out that he was correct. The five scans on which he zeroed in actually were those from the brains of psychopathic serial killers.

Signs of the Psychopath’s Brain

How could Fallon distinguish the serial killers’ brain scans from the others? He says that all five had some tell-tale signs:

• A lack of activity in the orbital cortex, the brain area just above the eyes, which he says is in the circuit coding for ethics, conscience and impulse control
• A lack of activity in the anterior part of the temporal cortex, where we find the amygdala, a structure deeply involved in processing emotion
• Underfunctioning in the narrow strip of limbic cortices that connect the orbital cortex with the amygdala, namely:
  • The cingulate cortex, which codes for social cues
  • The hippocampal area, which, along with the amygdala, codes for emotional memories
  • The insula, which processes empathy and “gut feelings”

This makes sense. These areas are considered part of the limbic system, the brain complex primarily responsible for our emotional lives. When these areas are underactive or inactive, a person might feel driven – like many killers – to compensate by repeatedly pursuing extreme activities simply to feel satisfied and alive.

Violence-Related Genes

In addition to his study of killers’ brains, Fallon has also studied the genetics of aggression and violence.

Psychological traits are affected by multiple genes. And Fallon says that perhaps a dozen have been identified as high-risk, violence-related genes. These include genes affecting dopamine and norepinephrine neurotransmission and androgen (testosterone) receptors.

The most well-known of these violence-related genes is a particular version of the Monoamine Oxidase A (MAOA) gene. Because it was the first such gene discovered, it was labeled, and has become popularly known as, “the Warrior Gene,” although Fallon stresses that this nickname can be misleading since all of the various genes associated with violence and aggression could be considered, in a sense, warrior genes.

Most humans have an MAOA gene and it helps regulate serotonin, a neurotransmitter that Fallon says helps relax and calm us. But those with the “Warrior Gene” form of it receive too much serotonin during development in utero, which desensitizes the brain to its effects. That means that later in life, when serotonin would otherwise inhibit behavior, it is unable to do so, resulting in impulsivity and violence.

The MAOA gene is on the X chromosome. This has important implications for how its effects express themselves in males vs. females. Girls get an X chromosome from both their mother and father, so even if one parent passes along the “Warrior Gene” variant, they are likely to get a normally functional MAOA variant from the other parent that offsets its potentially dangerous consequences. But boys get only one X chromosome – the one passed down from their mother. If that X chromosome has the “Warrior” version of the MAOA gene, that will be the only version of it that the boy receives.

This means that violence related to the MAOA “Warrior Gene” is usually passed genetically from mother to son. Fallon believes it also explains why boys and men are much more likely to be very aggressive or psychopathic killers.

Moreover, Fallon says that the reduced empathy seen in psychopathy may be associated with the influence of low acting genes related to the hormones oxytocin and vasopressin.

Can Biology Alone Create a Psychopath?

So, putting this together, Fallon recognized patterns in both the brains and genetics of psychopathic killers.

1. Loss of function in the orbital cortex, anterior temporal lobes and the strip of limbic cortices connecting the two
2. Having one or more of several high-risk, violence-related genes (like the so-called “Warrior Gene”)

But a crucial question remained. Are these biological markers alone enough to create a psychopath?

Fallon suspected not. But little did he know that he would receive some validation for this suspicion from so close to home.

A Shocking Fallon Family Pattern is Revealed

Based on his work, Fallon was giving many presentations about psychopathic killers. His mother said that, since he was doing this, he should probably know about the release of a new book called Killed Strangely: The Death of Rebecca Cornell.

The Cornells, you see, were direct ancestors of Fallon’s father. One of them, for instance, was Ezra Cornell, the founder of Cornell University. But Killed Strangely is about another, more sinister Cornell: Thomas Cornell, who killed his mother, Rebecca, and was hanged for it in 1673, the first case of matricide, Fallon says, recorded in the new American colonies.

Investigating further, Fallon discovered that the rabbit hole went even deeper. There were actually seven murders committed by those within his father’s family line. This line also included Lizzie Borden, his cousin, who was controversially acquitted of killing her father and stepmother with an axe in 1892.

Testing Enlightens the Fallons

After learning of his family’s bloody history, James Fallon decided to have brain imaging – PET scans and EEG’s – as well as genetic analyses carried out on himself and nine family members, including his parents, wife and children, to see if any had the markings of killers.

The results:

• All of the images of the family members’ brains were normal when analyzed for markers of potential violence…except for the images of one, Fallon’s own. His scan looked identical to those of the serial killers he had studied, with a malfunctioning limbic system lacking activity in the orbital cortex, anterior temporal lobes and areas connecting them.
• The entire family exhibited a typical mix of genes related to aggression, impulsivity and other relevant traits…except one member. Fallon himself not only had high-risk genes associated with violence, but he had far more of them than many psychopaths and killers. In fact, he says, he had almost all of them.

His family’s reaction to these results is quite interesting:

His son said that he always knew there was something “off” about his father and that, at times, he had feared him because he is a “hothead” with all the traits you’d expect in a serial killer. He said this makes more sense now that he knows that his father has the brain and genetics of a psychopath.

Fallon’s wife said the results were surprising, yet not surprising because he is, in a way, two people, with a funny, gregarious side mixed with a standoffish side.

James Fallon himself does admit to some macabre interests, a predilection for risk-taking and a superficial charm, which you might see in psychopaths and murderers. And he also admits he may sometimes be drawn to behavior that he knows is wrong but “still doesn’t care.”

The Third Ingredient

But, however imperfect, James Fallon is not violent or a killer. And this has enormous implications.

How is it that, despite having so many biological markers for violence, Fallon ended up a scholar rather than an aggressor or even a murderer?

Fallon has come to believe that, in addition to particular brain and genetic patterns, there is a third ingredient involved in the development of a violent psychopath. The environment, he explains, can help determine whether violence-related genes and certain brain processes, such as those involving mirror neurons, are triggered towards aggression. Specifically, he believes that abuse – especially severe early childhood sexual, physical or emotional abuse – is instrumental in this process. And he also believes that the precise timing of when various factors come into play is critically important in determining whether one becomes a psychopath and, if so, exactly what type of psychopathological behavior is exhibited.

As for why he himself is not a violent man, Dr. Fallon credits his upbringing in a highly nurturing environment, in which he was not only not abused, but was showered with wonderfully loving family support.

Some of Dr. James Fallon’s Appearances

Fallon has spoken on these topics in a number of forums, including:

• This television interview
• A TED talk entitled “Jim Fallon: Exploring the mind of a killer”Here, Fallon talks about his research and his story.

  He also gives a brief synopsis of a talk he did in Israel about his theory of transgenerational, sex-linked violence in perpetually conflicted world regions. His theory is that severe trauma before the onset of puberty triggers violent expression in those with violence-related genes such as, for example, the “Warrior” version of the MAOA gene. When this happens frequently in an area, the environment becomes increasingly threatening, so aggressive men, capable of physical protection and more likely to carry these genes, become more and more attractive to females. In consequence, violence-related genes become relatively highly concentrated in the population’s gene pool, sparking a vicious cycle.

  This theory is consistent with a similar, somewhat stunning, phenomenon that I discussed in my own writings on psychopathy.

• An episode of Reason TV called “Three Ingredients for Murder: Neuroscientist James Fallon on Psychopaths and Libertarians”Here, in addition to sharing his story, Fallon discusses the implications of work like his for our views of free will and responsibility, as well as for our legal system, especially in regards to psychopaths. He also discusses how our increasing ability to recognize each person’s unique makeup will challenge our capacity for creating standards in public policy and drive us toward individualized medicine. And he explains why he is a libertarian and how that may correlate with the function and/or lack of function in certain brain areas.

• A September 2011 episode of the BBC program Horizon entitled “Are You Good or Evil?”In these clips from the show, Fallon talks about his research on the brain scans of murderers, the tests carried out on him and his family and his discovery that his results showed the brain and genetic patterns seen in psychopathy.

  The first video also contains a quote that I found very powerful which serves to crystallize Fallon’s study of killers:

  It really indicated that there was a biological basis – a really hardcore brain basis – for this urge to kill.

  
  The second video includes the comments about his personality attributed earlier to his son and his wife.

• A segment called “Confessions of a Pro-Social Psychopath” produced by the World Science Festival in conjunction with The Moth, a non-profit that promotes storytelling.The title of this talk grabbed me because I had often wondered whether there could be “pro-social psychopaths,” but I had never heard the term used elsewhere. I also found this to be a nice overall telling of his story by Fallon.

Dr. Fallon also appeared on a November 18, 2009 episode of Criminal Minds, the CBS drama about FBI profilers. In the episode, which was based on his TED talk, he played himself giving a lecture about his theory of transgenerational violence in areas of conflict, which was mentioned earlier.

What Fallon May Tell Us About a Possible Future with Less Psychopaths and Killers

What are the implications of Fallon’s research and his story for society at large?

Well, there are some conditions for which we screen early in life. If we detect that a person has or is at risk for such a condition, we can then intervene in time to prevent or best manage it.

A good example is phenylketonuria (PKU). This is a genetic disorder in which an enzyme needed to properly metabolize a particular amino acid, phenylalanine, is rendered nonfunctional. As a result, a person with PKU who eats a normal diet can experience severe consequences including mental retardation.

Luckily, in most countries, newborns are screened for PKU. If it is detected, they can be put on a special diet in which phenylalanine is restricted and special supplements are provided. As a result, the person with PKU can live a normal, healthy life.

Fallon’s case raises the possibility that, as advocated by Adrian Raine, we may someday be able to screen children for a predisposition to psychopathy and, when they are identified as at-risk, intervene with special measures to prevent or best manage the development of violent or other dangerous propensities in at least some of them. Further research could be done to more specifically identify the types of measures that bring about the healthiest outcomes for such individuals and those around them. But it’s likely that these would include conscientious provision, throughout these youngsters’ upbringings, of the abundance of love and care for which Fallon credits his own nonviolent lifestyle.

In other words, we may someday see a future when all, or at least at-risk, families will be tested for the markers of violence just the way Fallon’s was so that those who do have the brains and genes we find in psychopaths can more often develop into, say, professors like James Fallon rather than killers like too many others – including some of those he has studied for a living and quite a few of his recent ancestors.