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Among the least psychopathic professions were teachers, artists, doctors, nurses and accountants. The survey is not a very well controlled one, but is reasonably robust because it has a very large sample size.

The important problem, or thing about psychopaths is that such people lack the moral dimension in their intuitive experience, a thing that non-psychopaths find difficult to comprehend. A psychopath may conduct himself in a perfectly legal and moral manner in all things, but this is a purely intellectual choice and not an emotional one. He is able to comprehend the emotional states of others but the evaluation of such states is, again, unemotional. However the psychopath is usually intrinsically driven by personal gain and as a result, the comprehension of others' emotional states is often used in a manipulative and exploitative way.

The article by Wolf, however, deals with how our social system has been geared to favour psychopaths because in all probability it was designed by psychopaths:

We can retain our innate skills at surviving alone, or we can adopt a different pathway and join a cooperative society. Unaware of this choice, it is therefore thrust upon is in our early childhood. Failing to develop to our potential is disease, and a disease plagues humanity which is heretofore unrecognized in its gravity and effect on our society, largely because the effects have long been experienced. Our very paradigm is defined by this disease. That disease, psychopathy, is no more than the failure of some to develop empathy, that skill necessary to the continuing peaceful existence of a cooperative society. And having run its course unchecked for centuries, this disease has completely altered humanity so profoundly, that our very paradigm is based in large part on the erroneous conclusions by those affected by the disease both directly and indirectly.

He attributes the origins of this social system to the Roman Empire which favoured leaders that were successful warriors. Theirs was a meritocratic system, as is ours today. The difference is that today's merit is political prowess as opposed to military and strategic prowess. To my understanding, Michael Wolf is proposing that neither of these should be considered to be 'merit'. He goes on to show that fundamental social constructs we have are designed to erode society's defences against psychopaths:

A democracy with our style of justice system is a system designed to fail. Our justice system discourages development of moral reasoning, and as the consequences of abiding by our justice system are loss of all privileges as well as basic human rights; we are compelled to comply and thus highly prone to its influence. We do not develop as we should, and as a result, democracy actually ceases to exist. Anyone who suggests that our effective system is democratic is either a fool, or an outright liar.

The questions I am left with are more fundamental even than those that Michael Wolf asks. The very reason psychopathy is "in charge" right now could well be that, given the physical realities of the world in which we live, this is an advantageous trait, at least in the short term. However in the long term the survival of the species seems to depend on cooperative and collaborative effort that looks after members of society which are weaker in certain respects, but not necessarily others. Some types of diversity are clearly advantageous, but others can pose a critical threat to a society.

One problem in breaking through the blindness of the general population on this is that people have been conditioned into accepting what could be termed as existential subjectivism, which leads to moral relativism. This is the very thing psychopathy thrives on. The psychopath does not recognize moral absolutes, but will use use whatever tool is needed to achieve his goals and will argue that this is the best way, including systematically imposing moral restrictions on others whilst totally ignoring such rules in his own conduct in order to gain advantage. People today have become subjugated to this view and indeed this is promoted in the media, but it is a form of voluntary intellectual enslavement. It is paradoxical, but subjecting one's self to moral absolutes and standing up for them is the one way to demand and achieve real freedom. Moral absolutes must be recognized and enforced at all levels of society, not just the middle classes, if there is to be a hope of improvement of the current social malaise.

Wolf's argument that the justice system is flawed is basically correct. For the purposes of reliably determining the right from wrong in a conflict situation, there is a need for a justice system where judges are unbiased. It is the method of reasoning that is broken, even at the very base level of the affording people "rights" - a product of humanism. The anti-psychopathic way of judging situations is to look at the obligations people have towards each other and assessing whether, given the circumstances presented, people have fulfilled their obligations. Crimes are therefore always ones of omission - failure to protect, respect and support others, especially those who are weaker. In judging merit, likewise we should look at the track record of candidates for leadership in a similar way - have they met their social obligations?

The question of democracy is also touched upon. Indeed nearly all democratic government in existence today is corrupted beyond redemption by blackmail and bribery. A lack of transparency is one reason and is a result of secret associations between individuals and society's failure to address them. This is in contrast to the Roman Empire which had explicit laws banning organized secrecy. Such a law today would break many a modern society. A second failure of modern democracy is the excessive ratio of voters:representatives, which nearly completely dilutes the ability of people to be properly heard.

So in conclusion, the article by Michael Wolf is a worthwhile read for those who are interested in the topic of 'what is wrong with the world'. The recognition of the existence and prevalence of psychopaths is being spun as "psychopaths are necessary, and psychopathy is good" by many voices, yet in fact it is an unbalanced and pathological personality trait that, if left unchecked, erodes and weakens humanity ... at least according to a non-psychopath!

have been having some difficulty with my internet connection, so progress has been a bit slower than i would like

set up an apache vhost on my dmz server for the IRCiv website, and coded a little php web app that will allow exec to upload map images to the website using a private key, and displays an image based on a map filename passed in the URL (validated to allow only a alphanumerical chars)

the IRCiv logo is displayed in a gif format (less sexy) on the IRCiv webpage @ http://irciv.port119.net/
thanks to mrbluze for use of his domain and also for some style guidance on the logo

pushed to github: https://github.com/crutchy-/test
note: irciv.php is in scripts directory and contains most of the game functionality

coming up next... making IRCiv upload map images to the website when a player moves

I headed a great precinct yesterday for the election. All of my poll workers did a fantastic job at serving the voters. My lone complaint is the poor voter turn out; less than 10%. Great weather, local polling centers, and significant candidate options should have made for a better turn out in my opinion.

This is a generic journal entry posted entirely so that you can tell me I'm awesome, call me a dick, or impart useful information since SN lacks a messaging feature and I'm not giving out my email address.

updated unit movement, added settler, got active unit cycling working

made up a simple logo to (eventually) go on the IRCiv website
for now its here: http://wiki.soylentnews.org/wiki/IRCiv

pushed to github: https://github.com/crutchy-/test
note: irciv.php is in scripts directory and contains most of the game functionality

coming up next... building/setting up the IRCiv website (to eventually host player map images)

put movement of active unit into a function

created <init> and <quit> reserved aliases in exec (irc.php), which i'll eventually use for loading/saving game data (in addition to timed saves).

used cmd.php (attached to * alias which runs on every received line of data) to fire commands on a 330 numeric event (whois/logged in as) to make startup a bit easier - automatically sets player alias lock to "civ" (in game channel only) and outputs a status command, so that when a player joins a game channel, they can start moving their active unit pretty much straight away (after a 2 or so second delay in processing login script).

IRCiv wiki page created: http://wiki.soylentnews.org/wiki/IRCiv

latest source pushed to github: https://github.com/crutchy-/test

next up... adding a settler unit and getting the active unit cycle function working

IRCiv is a little game (and game engine of sorts) for building stuff like in "Civilization"-branded games.

Currently it piggybacks as a couple of scripts for the exec bot. Refer to the wiki for more info on exec: http://wiki.soylentnews.org/wiki/IRC:exec

Implemented some basic unit movement last night. Can use "up" or "u" action on the active unit (along with equivalents in the 3 other directions).

The game is being gradually developed/tested most nights (Australian time) in the #civ channel of Soylent IRC. Feel free to join, but be aware that you may get pinged by the bot a fair bit (you're always free to duck in and out whenever you like of course).

Other stuff that has been implemented already:
- auto-login on join/logout on part
- logins based on nickserv account name (using whois), so means that players must be registered with nickserve
- supports nick changes
- map generator has been developed (random landmasses based on a couple of parameters)
- map image dump
- map text file dump
- player settings and flags system
- player active unit status output to either game channel or private message (based on "public_status" flag)

Currently development is mainly in PHP, but using the exec bot system, game features/modules can be developed in any language.
Each command runs as a separate script in its own process instance, but can easily communicate with IRC and access persistent game data.
The project is open-source (GPL2) and can be found here: https://github.com/crutchy-/test
Feel free to fork or pilfer, but please share your changes/derivatives.
Anyone interested in contributing to the current project, look for crutchy in #soylent or #civ on IRC.

I am on the certification kick again, more Cisco this time.

I am finding this time to be much more difficult to find adequate time to study and practice.

As a result I am going to have to push the test date back a few weeks. I hate pushing back dates like these but it's the only option when the list of commitments is too long.

The torrent has ended. We lost Crewman Willikers in the wash. He had tied himself to the helm, and tried to keep course. We lost the wheel too; but the carpenter had a spare; and was able to patch it up. On the other hand he's not so sure of the patch to the hull, and wants us to find port. The sails will need patching, but for the most part the ship is sound.

The navigator says we're more than 200 off course; but the damn man wont provide any units. Could be parsecs for all I know. or Milliliters. or Pascals. bastard.

where's the damn grog?