What if there were a third element between the observer and the psychopath, that does not lend itself to rational inquiry, yet is causal to the behavior being observed.
Given that the differences in observations I'm talking about are observed in brain scans of which parts of the brain activate while answering moral decisions and physiological responses, any third element influence would exist outside of the difference.
It's also found practical applications in police-squad rooms. Soon after he delivered a keynote speech at a conference for homicide detectives and prosecuting attorneys in Seattle three years ago, Hare got a letter thanking him for helping solve a series of homicides. The police had a suspect nailed for a couple of murders, but believed he was responsible for others. They were using the usual strategy to get a confession, telling him, 'Think how much better you'll feel, think of the families left behind,' and so on. After they'd heard Hare speak they realized they were dealing with a psychopath, someone who could feel neither guilt nor sorrow. They changed their interrogation tactic to, "So you murdered a couple of prostitutes. That's minor-league compared to Bundy or Gacy." The appeal to the psychopath's grandiosity worked. He didn't just confess to his other crimes, he bragged about them.
Now, being morally handicapped, alone, does not make one do evil. There are no doubt psychopaths who lead harmless and productive lives by virtue of rational morality and following the social conventions of moral people around them but the evidence suggests that those things alone, without a visceral and emotional conscience to back it up, is a weak and insufficient deterrent to doing evil and that a person relying only on the rational consideration of consequences and the deterrent effect of social conventions will do a very poor job of resisting doing evil things.
You said that you weren't a fundamentalist or a literalist, but you seem to be familiar with the Bible.
21From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. 22Then Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee. 23But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.
When Christ said "Get thee behind me, Satan," he was literally talking to Satan, yet, he was looking at Peter, and the words came from Peter's mouth. This is a very significant part of Scripture as far as I'm concerned, and I don't think most people understand the depth of the meaning here.
There are a variety of ways that I can interpret this scene, both in isolation and in the larger context of Jesus' story, including casting out demons, forgiving sins, and other cases where he disagreed with others. I'm not sure what particular point you are trying to make here but none of the interpretations I can imagine conflicts with my basic point. Please note that I have been acknowledging from the beginning that the innate human conscience, alone, is not sufficient to guarantee moral behavior and that the human conscience can be shaped and even erased through education and social conditioning.
There is more going on here than what we can understand and demonstrate rationally, no matter how smart we may think we are.
If your point is one about the role of Satan and demonic influences on human evil, I have not suggested anything that would stop those things from playing a role in human moral decisions. My point is about people being aware of right and wrong and as I'm sure you know, people choose to do things that they know are wrong all the time.
Thanks for the response, and let me just say that you know much more about this subject than I. Judging from your posts, you seem to have professional training in this field, but I still think there's much more going on here than what we can deduce or induce rationally and empirically. I'm also not convinced that such physical correlations as you describe above are causal. I don't believe that our minds are simply an epiphenomenon of physical activity in the brain. Correlations, yes; causal, no. I know that conflicts with the evidence so far, but that's just what I believe. In that quote that I provided from Matthew 16, those words that Peter spoke to Christ probably also had a physical correlate, but they were not Peter's words or thoughts, and Christ knew that. Let emphasize also that I'm not alluding to possession here, at least not in the case of Peter. If memory serves me correctly, there is part in the New Testament, I forget where, in which Christ talks about Satan's influence on our reason...so much so that he is almost reasoning for us and through us. I don't quite understand it all myself, but then, who does.
I wish I could respond to your post in a lengthly, informed, and academic manner, but again, I have no knowledge in this field, and I sincerely appreciate your very informative response.