What causes a person to become the person they are? How do seemingly normal people end up to be the most horrible people who have ever lived? When reading about the holocaust or about a gruesome crime, these questions are often prominent in our minds. The factors that shape us are some of the most important events in our lives, but how do they truly influence us? How can it be that someone with a seemingly normal childhood grow up to be someone like Dr. Josef Mengele, a doctor at Auschwitz? He had a normal family and was seen to be a nice person by his neighbors as he grew up. As an adult, however, he conducted thousands of horrible medical experiments on children in the concentration camps, never pausing to consider the consequences of what he was doing. These same questions and situations are addressed in Colin Harrison's book The Finder. In the book, Martz, a wealthy but aging businessman, is losing millions of dollars on Good Pharma company stock. He threatens Tom Reilly, the vice president of the company. Why does he do this? Reilly's wife, a physician gives her opinion, "based on my clinical experience, and a brief interaction, the man you are in trouble with cannot be depended upon to be highly rational! Or kind and decent! I don't care how much money he has! He's an animal under stress! He's got high cortisol levels, increased blood pressure, who knows what" (220). Martz has prostrate cancer and it is affecting the chemicals and hormones in his blood, causing him to become extremely irrational. This is an example of aspects that are beyond one's control, but this is not always the case.
Tom Reilly himself also has drastically changed as a result of the situations he faces in daily life. His job has forced him to change the way to think and has restructured his brain. He has learned a certain way to think and converse with people but it has changed him from the person he used to be. His wife describes how he has changed:
"The overall functioning of his brain becoming, arguably, more specialized in
the exact manner the company required. . . . His sense of humor was
far less subtle, more brutal and dark. Certain of his mental functions
were more highly developed. . . . He was in fact very good with the social
aspect of the job. . . But these were not authentic responses, she'd come to
see. . . . they were algorithmic." (221-222)
He has become a person totally different from the man she married and it has cost him. Under stress, he ordered the murder of two girls that he suspected were contributing to the lowering stock price of his company by stealing information. The strain of his job has caused him to change his morals and the way he conducts business. He could have stopped some of the effects of his job but he chose not to. These are some of the aspects of one's life that influence the type of people they become.
3 comments:
I think this story illustrates how sometimes we just need to take a step back, breath and really look at what is important in life. Often we get so caught up that we start to do things that we know we shouldn't but do none the less. Though having an illness can affects ones outlook, I think that if they are able to take the time to asses the situation from a rational standpoint they will better be able to make a good, moral decision.
I think you did a great job connecting this to what we have done in class, and helped to show us that everyone is capable of horrible deeds when caught up in the moment, and that it is important that we stop and think about the consequences of our actions before we make a huge mistake.
Wow, this is a great post that covers some very deep questions. It shows us how all of us have a history that causes us to become the person we are today. It makes us realize how normal people are pushed to acts of atrocity. It also helps us see how we need to stop and analyze our actions before we do make a decision we will later regret.
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