criminal psychology-第44章
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vation。 That only the skeptic can be right everybody knows who has at all noticed how various people differ in regard to analogies; how very different the experiences of a single man are; both in their observation and interpretation。 To distinguish these differences clearly is the main task of our investigation。
There are two conditions to consider。 One is the strict difference between what is causally related and its accidental concomitants; a difference with regard to which experience is so often misleading; for two phenomena may occur together at the same time without being causally connected。 When a man is ninety years old and has observed; every week in his life; that in his part of the country there is invariably a rainfall every Tuesday; this observation is richly and often tested; yet nobody will get the notion of causally connecting Tuesday and rainbut only because such connection would be regarded as generally foolish。 If the thing; however; may be attributed to coincidence with a little more difficulty; then it becomes easier to suppose a causal connection; e。 g。; as when it rains on All… souls day; or at the new moon。 If the accidental nature of the connection is still less obvious; the observation becomes a much… trusted and energetically defended meteorological law。 This happens in all possible fields; and not only our witnesses but we ourselves often find it very difficult to distinguish between causation and accident。 The only useful rule to follow is to presuppose accident wherever it is not indubitably and from the first excluded; and carefully to examine the problem for whatever causal connection it may possibly reveal。 ‘‘Whatever is united in any perception must be united according to a general rule; but a great deal more may be present without having any causal relation。''
The second important condition was mentioned by Schopenhauer:'1' ‘‘As soon as we have assigned causal force to any great influence and thereby recognized that it is efficacious; then its intensification in the face of any resistance according to the intensity of the resistance will produce finally the appropriate effect。 Whoever cannot be bribed by ten dollars; but vacillates; will be bribed by twenty…five or fifty。''
This simple example may be generalized into a golden rule for lawyers and requires them to test the effect of any force on the accused at an earlier time in the latter's life or in other cases; i。 e。; the early life of the latter can never be studied with sufficient care。 This study is of especial importance when the question is one of determining the culpability of the accused with regard to a certain crime。 We have then to ask whether he had the motive in question; or whether the crime could have been of interest to him。 In this investigation the problem of the necessary intensity of the influence in question need not; for the time; be considered; only its presence needs to be determined。 That it may have disappeared without any demonstrable special reason is not supposable; for inclinations; qualities; and passions are rarely lost; they need not become obvious so long as opportunity and stimulus are absent; and they may be in some degree suppressed; but they manifest themselves as soon asSchopenhauer's twenty…five or fifty dollars appear。 The problem is most difficult when it requires the conversion of certain related properties; e。 g。; when the problem is one of suspecting a person of murderous inclination; and all that
'1' Schopenhauer: Die beiden Grundprobleme der Ethik。
can be shown in his past life is the maltreatment of animals。 Or again; when cruelty has to be shown and all that is established is great sensuality。 Or when there is no doubt about cruelty and the problem is one of supposing intense avarice。 These questions of conversion are not especially difficult; but when it must be explained to what such qualities as very exquisite egoism; declared envy; abnormal desire for honor; exaggerated conceit; and great idleness may lead to; the problem requires great caution and intensive study。
Section 25。 (c) Skepticism。
Hume's skepticism is directly connected with the subject of the preceding chapter; but wants still a few words for itself。 Though it is not the lawyer's problem to take an attitude with regard to philosophical skepticism; his work becomes essentially easier through the study of Hume's doctrines。
According to these; all we know and infer; in so far as it is unmathematical; results from experience; and our conviction of it and our reasoning about it; means by which we pass the bounds of sense…perception; depend on sensation; memory and inference from causation。 Our knowledge of the relation of cause and effect results also from experience; and the doctrine; applied to the work of the criminalist; may be formulated as follows: ‘‘Whatever we take as true is not an intellectual deduction; but an empirical proposition。'' In other words; our presuppositions and inferential knowledge depend only upon those innumerable repetitions of events from which we postulate that the event recurred in the place in question。 This sets us the problem of determining whether the similar cases with which we compare the present one really are similar and if they are known in sufficiently large numbers to exclude everything else。
Consider a simple example。 Suppose somebody who had traveled all through Europe; but had never seen or heard of a negro; thought about the pigmentation of human beings: neither all his thinking nor the assistance of all possible scientific means can lead him to the conclusion that there are also black peoplethat fact he can only discover; not think out。 If he depends only on experience; he must conclude from the millions of examples he has observed that all human beings are white。 His mistake consists in the fact that the immense number of people he has seen belong to the inhabitants of a single zone; and that he has _*failed to observe_ the inhabitants of other regions。
In our own cases we need no examples; for I know of no inference which was not made in the following fashion: ‘‘The situation was so in a hundred cases; it must be so in this case。'' We rarely ask whether we know enough examples; whether they were the correct ones; and whether they were exhaustive。 It will be no mistake to assert that we lawyers do this more or less consciously on the supposition that we have an immense collection of suggestive a priori inferences which the human understanding has brought together for thousands of years; and hence believe them to be indubitably certain。 If we recognize that all these presuppositions are compounds of experience; and that every experience may finally show itself to be deceptive and false; if we recognize how the actual progress of human knowledge consists in the addition of one hundred new experiences to a thousand old ones; and if we recognize that many of the new ones contradict the old ones: if we recognize the consequence that there is no reason for the mathematical deduction from the first to the hundred…and…first case; we shall make fewer mistakes and do less harm。 In this regard; Hume'1' is very illuminative。
According to Masaryk;'2' the fundamental doctrine of Humian skepticism is as follows: ‘‘If I have had one and the same experience ever so often; i。 e。; if I have seen the sun go up 100 times; I expect to see it go up the 101st time the next day; but I have no guarantee; no certainty; no evidence for this belief。 Experience looks only to the past; not to the future。 How can I then discover the 101st sunrise in the first 100 sunrises? Experience reveals in me the habit to expect similar effects from similar circumstances; but the intellect has no share in this expectation。''
All the sciences based on experience are uncertain and without logical foundation; even though their results; as a whole and in the mass; are predictable。 Only mathematics offers certainty and evidence。 Therefore; according to Hume; sciences based on experience are unsafe because the recognition of causal connection depends on the facts of experience and we can attain to certain knowledge of the facts of experience only on the ground of the evident rel