A. Overview
David M. Buss, a much-admired psychological researcher, has analyzed how the human mind has adapted to homicide and how behavioral evolution has altered how humans perceive and react to the act of homicide. He does this by conducting his own national research survey on modern-day people’s thoughts on murder and questions if they have ever considered killing another person before, and if so, why and under what circumstances. He investigates how homicides have changed over the decades, killing someone for survival versus killing someone for dominance. The main criminologically based aspect of Buss’ novel is centered around homicide and how the act of committing homicide is a natural idea that the human brain has. He explains how murdering …show more content…
Buss states that his friend was a normal person, not a person with any sort of psychosis. He proposes that this is what made him decide to start research into the mind of a killer.
Buss has two major premises that he addresses in his novel: One, psychotic killers are not the only people that fantasize about killing someone, for everyone does. Two, behavioral evolution has reformed the way that human minds perceive and respond to homicide.
Buss gives evidence to each of his premises. For premise one, Buss started out conducting a survey for college students questioning if they had ever considered murdering someone, and if they had, he asked them to describe in detail how and why they wanted to commit murder. He was surprised by these results, because most college students had answered that they had thought about committing homicide, so he conducted the largest scientific study ever carried out on people’s homicidal fantasies that was international, and more than five thousand people participated. The results showed that 91% of men and 84% of women have had at least one fantasy about murdering someone. The survey was random among many ages, races, sexes, religions, and …show more content…
Evidence that his research showed was that there were homicides occurring in the Paleolithic Era (10,000 BC – 2000 BC). Fossil evidence shows that cannibalism had taken place. He makes the assumption that homicide has been present throughout all of history, that we know of. A clear point is made that killings from these times offered advantages such as survival and reproduction, whereas today, those advantages of murder are irrelevant. Throughout history, humans have had to fight against three factors: “physical environment” (starvation, natural disasters, falling from heights, and drowning), “Other species” (parasites and predators), and “members of our own species”. (24) In modern times, humans are now the most relevant factor, and from earlier times, humans have built up a defense mechanism from being murdered. Buss states that natural selection has fine tuned these defenses, such as striking back when attacked (example: women carry pepper spray with them when walking alone) and humans have created a law system which deters people from
David M. Buss, a much-admired psychological researcher, has analyzed how the human mind has adapted to homicide and how behavioral evolution has altered how humans perceive and react to the act of homicide. He does this by conducting his own national research survey on modern-day people’s thoughts on murder and questions if they have ever considered killing another person before, and if so, why and under what circumstances. He investigates how homicides have changed over the decades, killing someone for survival versus killing someone for dominance. The main criminologically based aspect of Buss’ novel is centered around homicide and how the act of committing homicide is a natural idea that the human brain has. He explains how murdering …show more content…
Buss states that his friend was a normal person, not a person with any sort of psychosis. He proposes that this is what made him decide to start research into the mind of a killer.
Buss has two major premises that he addresses in his novel: One, psychotic killers are not the only people that fantasize about killing someone, for everyone does. Two, behavioral evolution has reformed the way that human minds perceive and respond to homicide.
Buss gives evidence to each of his premises. For premise one, Buss started out conducting a survey for college students questioning if they had ever considered murdering someone, and if they had, he asked them to describe in detail how and why they wanted to commit murder. He was surprised by these results, because most college students had answered that they had thought about committing homicide, so he conducted the largest scientific study ever carried out on people’s homicidal fantasies that was international, and more than five thousand people participated. The results showed that 91% of men and 84% of women have had at least one fantasy about murdering someone. The survey was random among many ages, races, sexes, religions, and …show more content…
Evidence that his research showed was that there were homicides occurring in the Paleolithic Era (10,000 BC – 2000 BC). Fossil evidence shows that cannibalism had taken place. He makes the assumption that homicide has been present throughout all of history, that we know of. A clear point is made that killings from these times offered advantages such as survival and reproduction, whereas today, those advantages of murder are irrelevant. Throughout history, humans have had to fight against three factors: “physical environment” (starvation, natural disasters, falling from heights, and drowning), “Other species” (parasites and predators), and “members of our own species”. (24) In modern times, humans are now the most relevant factor, and from earlier times, humans have built up a defense mechanism from being murdered. Buss states that natural selection has fine tuned these defenses, such as striking back when attacked (example: women carry pepper spray with them when walking alone) and humans have created a law system which deters people from