The Psychopath Inside: A Neuroscientist's Personal Journey into the Dark Side of the Brain Kindle Edition

I heard the author of this book, Jim Fallon, on Fresh Air talking about this book. He is a neuroscientist who discovered that his own brain scans are very much like the scans of the psychopaths that he studies. He is forced to recognize that not only is he himself a psychopath; he's also bipolar. He is well into his sixties when he realizes this, although friends and family have been trying to tell him for years that there's a problem.

Fallon admits that he's a narcissist and a psychopath, and he goes into some detail about the havoc this has wrought in the lives of his children and wife especially. He is apparently a deceitful womanizer, a sometimes drunk, a cold revenge-seeker, and a party animal extraordinaire. His candor about these character problems is admirable and chilling at the same time. In the end, unable to avoid the truth about himself, though, he just says, "I don't care." This is one of the most disturbing and revealing parts of the book.

The odd thing, though, is that he ends the book by claiming that psychopaths are on the whole good for society (if bad for the individuals around them) because they make life more fun, or something. This is the least convincing part of the book. He has just shown us how he callously tricks his family and colleagues, to the point that some of them refuse to associate with him any more. Then he claims it's all for the greater good! And he doesn't seem to see that this attitude is in itself psychopathic.

The most important point that he makes, for those of us who are parents, is that he would have been a much worse psychopath--possibly a criminal--if his parents hadn't raised him so well. In other words, he went from believing that genes are destiny to believing that the environment, one's upbringing, is the real determinant of whether or not a person with the "warrior gene" and the psychopathic brain scan will go on to be a serial killer or just a party animal scientist like himself.

I'm sure he's correct that childhood experiences, especially in the first few years when the brain is growing rapidly, are extremely important in shaping personality and character. But I think he underestimates the damage he's done to the people around him, or perhaps, as he says, he just doesn't care. I think Mr Fallon is not quite as benign as he sees himself, despite his professional success and lack of a criminal record. He was very lucky not only to have good parents, but to have married an extremely patient and loyal woman. I wonder what her book about him would be like.

Interesting read. Written like a true psychopath. He may not be a serial killer, however he is on an emotional level. He destroys lives emotionally and cannot see it. Because he is a psychopath. Very disturbing read as a mental health professional. The vast majority of us practice because we care. He claims insight but his true lack of insight is frightening.

Before I read this book I knew a little about psychopaths. In fact, I have worked with some. Not just the kids in the tough love school where I spent too many years, but also the adults who worked with them and a lot of seemingly normal people walking around like the rest of us.

This is what I know about psychopaths. Psychopathy seems to be a neurological problem. The visible symptoms are a lack of empathy, a lack of conscience, an inability to anticipate effect from cause which results in being unable to learn from mistakes. Psychopaths tend to be self involved to the point of monomania. This, of course, makes them boring–something I should have remembered when I picked up this book.

The psychopath inside is the story of a man, Jim Fallon, who is a neuropsychological researcher. He took his own brain scans as a control in a contemporary study on alzheimer’s and discovered that his scan looked a lot like the scans of psychopaths in a study he had done on psychopathic killers.

This book is incredibly technical. One can not expect, or shouldn’t, a psychopath to write about depth of feeling for the same reason one can not expect a Down Syndrome child to explain the genetic and environmental factors of their success or failure. So Jim talks about his work, and his observations. The only insight we get into the reality of being a psychopath is when he tells us he could change, but he doesn’t care enough to try–except in a clinical study.

Long story short: this book is a good technical introduction to psychopathy, but it doesn’t make any effort to be comprehensible for the lay reader, nor does it have any deep insight. This is, of course, the reality of life as (or with) a psychopath. It is a not a pathetic existence, if only because of the lack of awareness of pathos.

The story about James Fallon's discovery about his brain (and his family history) is compelling. The book isn't, though. One of the characteristics of a psychopath is a sort of superficial lack of emotional depth. To me, this book lacked depth and color. Like a psychopath. I thought that observation, in itself, was interesting. However, I would have preferred the book to be more interesting. Robert Hare's books on psychopaths are far better. Probably because Dr. Hare himself is not a psychopath. I'm glad to know that biology is not destiny, and that (like Fallon) a happy childhood can ameliorate the effects of a psychopathic brain. However, it's clear that some characteristics (egocentricity and shallow emotions) are indelible.

The personality type the author describes for himself is common in my family. I had always put this down to nurture. However the author's premise that lack of empathy can be explained by a genetic predisposition to an underdeveloped limbic system is intriguing. One would certainly be more understanding of certain behaviors if the inability to appreciate pain in others were on par with someone who is color blind not being able to appreciate the color blue. That said, I find most of the book to be a narcissistic romp of self-justification by James Fallon.

This is not actually a book you love. The author, a neuroscientist who is also a psychopath (though not a killer), is not likable, and the traits that characterize a psychopath show on every page. For that reason, it's a very useful look at the mind of a psychopath who is not a serial murderer, and maybe a sort of field guide for spotting the psychopaths around you.