hostelectric.blogg.se

Despite the cruelty of their work, these first neural cartographers established a clear connection between criminal behavior and specific deficits of the human brain.īeliefs about the origin of criminal behavior began to swing away from “blank-slatism” (which often blamed the mother), toward biological determinism, viewing the brain as “hard-wired” from birth and people as little more than meat puppets acting out the directives of our biology.

By the mid-1930s, as the nature versus nurture debate heated up, neuroscience became a widely recognized discipline and the first lobotomists began their gruesome experimentation on “abnormal” brains. Especially in Europe during the late 1800s, serial killers like Jack the Ripper were depicted in dime novels as the natural outcome of the brutish urban experience after the industrial revolution.īeginning in the early 1900s, the notion that violence and murder were simply the outcome of social and cultural factors was challenged as people began to explore the deep interconnection between neural structures and human behavior. Like Doyle’s “empty attic,” the assumption was that our minds were mutable, constructed upon our upbringing and experiences.

Although my academic background is in cultural neurobiology, I didn’t know much about the neurology of serial killers so I decided to take a deep dive into the historical and modern research.įrom the earliest record of neurosurgery in ancient Egypt over 3,700 years ago, until the late 19th century, most people believed that our brains were basically a blank slate of gray matter upon which our personalities were inscribed. While writing my crime thriller about an FBI neuroscientist, I set out to research the history of these questions in the world of neurobiology. From ancient Greek mythological serial killer Procrustes (otherwise known as The Stretcher), to 19th century dime novels about Jack the Ripper, to modern depictions of Dexter and Hannibal Lecter, we wonder, how did these people become monsters? Why do they commit these horrific crimes and how can we stop them?

There is a perhaps instinctual human fascination with the darkest edges of the serial killer mind. “A man’s brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose.” - Arthur Conan Doyle