Trespassers You and the Law

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Posted June 2nd, 2012 at 11:18 PM by KillCarneyKlansman
Criminal Psychology - A MANUAL FOR JUDGES, PRACTITIONERS, AND STUDENTS
BY HANS GROSS, J. U. D. _Professor of Criminal Law at the University of Graz, Austria. Formerly
Magistrate of the Criminal Court at Czernovitz, Austria_

WHAT Professor Gross presents in this volume is nothing less than an applied psychology of the judicial
processes,−−a critical survey of the procedures incident to the administration of justice.

The old and still dominant thought is, as to cause, that a crime is caused by the inscrutable moral free
will of the human being, doing or not doing the crime, just as it pleases; absolutely free in advance, at anymoment of time, to choose or not to choose the criminal act, and therefore in itself the sole and ultimate causeof crime ... Thus the great truth of the present and the future, for criminal science, is the individualization of penal treatment,−−for that man, and for the cause of that man's crime.

Let this be our fundamental principle: _That we criminalists receive from our main source, the witnesses,many more inferences than observations_, and that this fact is the basis of so many mistakes in our work. Again and again we are taught, in the deposition of evidence, that only facts as plain sense−perceptions should be presented; that inference is the judge's affair. But we only appear to obey this principle; actually, most of what we note as fact and sense−perception, is nothing but a more or less justified judgment, which though presented in the honestest belief, still offers no positive truth.
``Amicus Plato, sed magis amica Veritas.''

Series of assertions ... made with utter certainty [by witnesses] ... when these are
successively subjected to closer examinations, tested for their ground and source, only a very small portion can be retained unaltered. Of course, one may here overshoot the mark. It often happens, even in the routine of daily life, that a man may be made to feel shaky in his most absolute convictions, by means of an energetic attack and searching questions. Conscientious and sanguine people are particularly easy subjects of such doubts.

Now one of the most difficult tasks of the criminalist is to hit, in just such cases, upon the truth; neither to accept the testimony blindly and uncritically; nor to render the witness, who otherwise is telling the
truth, vacillating and doubtful. But it is still more difficult to lead the witness, who is not intentionally
falsifying, but has merely observed incorrectly or has made false conclusions, to a statement of the truth as Socrates leads the slave in the Meno. It is as modern as it is comfortable to assert that this is not the judge's business−−that the witness is to depose, his evidence is to be accepted, and the judge is to judge. Yet it is supposed before everything else that the duty of the court is to establish the material truth−−that the formal truth is insufficient. Moreover, if we notice false observations and let them by, then, under certaincircumstance.

Of the criminalist's tasks, the most important are those involving his dealings with the other men who
determine his work, with witnesses, accused, jurymen, colleagues, etc. These are the most pregnant of
consequences. In every case his success depends on his skill, his tact, his knowledge of human nature.

One of the criminal judge's grossest derelictions from duty consists in his simply throwing the witness the question and in permitting him to say what he chooses. If he contents himself in that, he leaves to the witness's conscience the telling of the truth, and the whole truth; the witness is, in such a case, certainly responsible for one part of the untruthful and suppressed, but the responsibility for the other, and larger part, lies with the judge who has failed to do his best to bring out the uttermost value of the evidence, indifferently for or against the prisoner. The work of education is intended for this purpose,−−not, as might be supposed, for training the populace as a whole into good witnesses, but to make that individual into a good, trustworthy witness who is called upon to testify for the first, and, perhaps, for the last time in his life.


Analyzing Character - Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb, June 18, 2004

Adjustment to environment means very largely the ability successfully to associate with, cooperate with, and secure one's way among one's fellow men. In order to be successful in life, we must first live on terms of mutual cooperation.

Honesty is laid down by all authorities on employment as absolutely essential to success in any vocation, but there are many kinds of honesty and many standards of honesty. As a matter of fact, each man has his own standard of honesty.

Honesty is a complex virtue. It means, fundamentally, just and honorable intentions. But it involves, also, knowledge of what is right, a keen and discriminating sense of justice, a true sense of values, courage and will-power to carry out honest intentions, and, finally, sufficient earning power to meet all righteous obligations.


http://en.wikipedia...._(spirituality)
In spirituality, and especially nondual, mystical and eastern meditative traditions, the human being is often conceived as being in the illusion of individual existence, and separated from other aspects of creation. This "sense of doership" or sense of individual existence is that part which believes it is the human being, and believes it must fight for itself in the world, is ultimately unaware and unconscious of its own true nature. The ego is often associated with mind and the sense of time, which compulsively thinks in order to be assured of its future existence, rather than simply knowing its own self and the present.

Eckhart Tolle comments that, to the extent that the ego is present in an individual, that individual is somewhat insane psychologically, in reference to the ego's nature as compulsively hyper-active and compulsively (and pathologically) self-centered. However, since this is the norm, it goes unrecognised as the source of much that could be classified as insane behavior in everyday life.


http://en.wikipedia....ral_development
The picture of human nature Kohlberg begins with is that humans are inherently communicative and capable of reason. They also possess a desire to understand others and the world around them. The stages of Kohlberg's model relate to the qualitative moral reasonings adopted by individuals, and so do not translate directly into praise or blame of any individual's actions or character. Arguing that his theory measures moral reasoning and not particular moral conclusions, Kohlberg insists that the form and structure of moral arguments is independent of the content of those arguments, a position he calls "formalism".

Kohlberg's theory centers on the notion that justice is the essential characteristic of moral reasoning. Justice itself relies heavily upon the notion of sound reasoning based on principles.

Progress through Kohlberg's stages happens as a result of the individual's increasing competence, both psychologically and in balancing conflicting social-value claims. The process of resolving conflicting claims to reach an equilibrium is called "justice operation". Kohlberg identifies two of these justice operations: "equality," which involves an impartial regard for persons, and "reciprocity," which means a regard for the role of personal merit. For Kohlberg, the most adequate result of both operations is "reversibility," in which a moral or dutiful act within a particular situation is evaluated in terms of whether or not the act would be satisfactory even if particular persons were to switch roles within that situation.

Knowledge and learning contribute to moral development. Specifically important are the individual's "view of persons" and their "social perspective level", each of which becomes more complex and mature with each advancing stage. The "view of persons" can be understood as the individual's grasp of the psychology of other persons; it may be pictured as a spectrum, with stage one having no view of other persons at all, and stage six being entirely sociocentric.


http://en.wikipedia.....al_development
Kohlberg (theory of cognitive development) who studied child behavior, psycholgy, moral reasoning came up with this

Level 1 (Pre-Conventional)
1. Obedience and punishment orientation
(How can I avoid punishment?)
2. Self-interest orientation
(What's in it for me?)
Level 2 (Conventional)
3. Interpersonal accord and conformity
(Social norms)
(The good boy/good girl attitude)
4. Authority and social-order maintaining orientation
(Law and order morality)
Level 3 (Post-Conventional)
5. Social contract orientation
6. Universal ethical principles
(Principled conscience)


Moral Science; A Compendium of Ethics By Alexander Bain July 15, 2004

The REPUBLIC starts with the question--what is JUSTICE? Justice as 'rendering to every man his due,' and afterwards amends it to 'doing good to friends, evil to enemies.' Another gives 'the right of the strongest.' A third maintains that Injustice by itself is profitable to the doer; but, as it is an evil to society in general, men make laws against it and punish it; in consequence of which, Justice is the more profitable.

The division of the human mind into (1) REASON or Intelligence; (2) ENERGY, Courage, Spirit, or the
Military Virtue; and (3) Many-headed APPETITE, all in mutual counter-play--is transferred to the State,
each of the three parts being represented by one of the political orders or divisions of the community. The happiness of the man and the happiness of the commonwealth are attained in the same way, namely, by realizing the four virtues--Wisdom, Courage, Temperance, Justice; with this condition, that Wisdom, or Reason, is sought only in the Ruling caste, the Elders; Courage, or Energy, only in the second caste, the Soldiers or Guardians; while Temperance and Justice (meaning almost the same thing) must inhere alike in all the three classes, and be the only thing expected in the third, the Working Multitude.

If it be now asked, what and where is Justice? the answer is--'every man to attend to his own business.'
Injustice occurs when any one abandons his post, or meddles with what does not belong to him; and more especially when any one of a lower division aspires to the function of a higher. Such is Justice for the city, and such is it in the individual; the higher faculty--Reason, must control the two lower--Courage and Appetite.Justice is thus a sort of harmony or balance of the mental powers; it is to the mind what health is to the body. Health is the greatest good, sickness the greatest evil, of the body; so is Justice of the mind.


Pragmatism A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking By William James

THE TENDER-MINDED
Rationalistic (going by 'principles'), Intellectualistic, Idealistic, Optimistic, Religious, Free-willist, Monistic,
Dogmatical.
THE TOUGH-MINDED
Empiricist (going by 'facts'), Sensationalistic, Materialistic, Pessimistic, Irreligious, Fatalistic, Pluralistic,
Sceptical.

Everywhere, these teachers say, 'truth' in our ideas and beliefs means the same thing that it means in science. It means, they say, nothing but this, THAT IDEAS (WHICH THEMSELVES ARE BUT PARTS OF OUR EXPERIENCE) BECOME TRUE JUST IN SO FAR AS THEY HELP US TO GET INTO SATISFACTORY RELATION WITH OTHER PARTS OF OUR EXPERIENCE.


PATHOLOGICAL LYING, ACCUSATION, AND SWINDLING A STUDY IN FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGY
BY WILLIAM HEALY, A.B., M.D.
DIRECTOR, PSYCHOPATHIC INSTITUTE, JUVENILE COURT, CHICAGO ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
NERVOUS AND MENTAL DISEASES CHICAGO POLICLINIC; AUTHOR OF ``THE INDIVIDUAL
DELINQUENT''
AND MARY TENNEY HEALY, B.L.

In court work we have been brought face to face with many cases of false accusation and, of course, with plenty of the usual kind of lying. Where either of these has been entered into by way of revenge or in belief that it would aid in getting out of trouble, no further attention has been paid to it from the standpoint of pathological lying.

Several forms of excessive lying, particularly those practised by children and adolescents, are not discussed by us because they are largely age phenomena and only verge upon the pathological as they are carried over into wider fields of conduct. The fantasies of children, and the almost obsessional lying in some young adolescents, too, we avoid. There is much shading of typical pathological lying into, on the one hand, the really insane types, and, on the other hand, into the lying which is to be explained by quite normal reactions or where the tendency to mendacity is only partially developed.

A short career of extensive lying, not unfrequently met with in work for juvenile courts and other social
agencies, seems, judging from our material, to be always so mixed up with other delinquencies or unfortunate sex experiences that the lying, after all, cannot be regarded as purposeless. It is indulged in most often in an attempt to disguise undesirable truths. That false accusations and even self-accusations are engaged in for the same purpose goes without saying.

In our study of a long list of cases, and after review of those reported by other authors, it seems practically impossible to find a case of this. The tendencies soon carry the person over to the production of other delinquencies, and if these do not come in the category of punishable offenses, at least, through the trouble and suffering caused others, they are to be regarded essentially as misconduct.


A List Of Fallacious Arguments
http://www.don-linds....arguments.html

"The jawbone of an ass is just as dangerous a weapon today as in Sampson's time." --- Richard Nixon

Appeal To Force: threats, or even violence.

Argument By Slogan: if it's short, and connects to an argument, it must be an argument.

Argument By Repetition (Argument Ad Nauseam): if you say something often enough, some people will begin to believe it. [liars]

Weasel Wording: this is very much like Euphemism, except that the word changes are done to claim a new, different concept rather than soften the old concept.

Lies: intentional Errors of Fact. If the speaker thinks that lying serves a moral end, this would be a Pious Fraud.

Changing The Subject (Digression, Red Herring, Misdirection, False Emphasis): this is sometimes used to avoid having to defend a claim.

Argument By Fast Talking: if you go from one idea to the next quickly enough, the audience won't have time to think.

Failure To State: if you make enough attacks, and ask enough questions, you may never have to actually define your own position on the topic. [who?]

Argument By Selective Observation: so called cherry picking, the enumeration of favorable circumstances.

Equivocation: using a word to mean one thing, and then later using it to mean something different.

Moving The Goalposts (Raising The Bar, Argument By Demanding Impossible Perfection): if your opponent successfully addresses some point, then say he must also address some further point. If you can make these points more and more difficult (or diverse) then eventually your opponent must fail. If nothing else, you will eventually find a subject that your opponent isn't up on.

Ad Hominem (Argument To The Man): attacking the person instead of attacking his argument.

Poisoning The Wells: discrediting the sources used by your opponent. This is a variation of Ad Hominem.

Needling: simply attempting to make the other person angry, without trying to address the argument at hand. Sometimes this is a delaying tactic.

Special Pleading (Stacking The Deck): using the arguments that support your position, but ignoring or somehow disallowing the arguments against.

Two Wrongs Make A Right (Tu Quoque, You Too): a charge of wrongdoing is answered by a rationalization that others have sinned.

Pious Fraud: a fraud done to accomplish some good end, on the theory that the end justifies the means.

Excluded Middle (False Dichotomy, Faulty Dilemma, Bifurcation): assuming there are only two alternatives when in fact there are more.

Argument By Question: asking your opponent a question which does not have a snappy answer.

Argument by Rhetorical Question: asking a question in a way that leads to a particular answer.

Psychogenetic Fallacy: if you learn the psychological reason why your opponent likes an argument, then he's biased, so his argument must be wrong.

Not Invented Here: ideas from elsewhere are made unwelcome. "This Is The Way We've Always Done It."

Argument By Emotive Language (Appeal To The People): using emotionally loaded words to sway the audience's sentiments ... Many emotions can be useful: anger, spite, condescension, and so on.

Appeal To Widespread Belief (Bandwagon Argument, Peer Pressure, Appeal to Common Practice): the claim, as evidence for an idea, that many people believe it, or used to believe it, or do it. If the discussion is about social conventions, such as "good manners", then this is a reasonable line of argument.

Argument By Half Truth (Suppressed Evidence): this is hard to detect, of course. You have to ask questions. [Self-explanatory]

Amazing Familiarity: the speaker seems to have information that there is no possible way for him to get, on the basis of his own statements.

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