Автор: Битарх

How the state’s imposition of AML/KYC encourages fraud

One of the requirements from the state is the identification of individuals participating in financial transactions and the sources of their funds. KYC (Know Your Customer) and AML (Anti-Money Laundering, consisting of transaction history analysis) procedures are explicitly stated in the laws of many countries. Usually, when someone wants to exchange cryptocurrency through a “white” exchanger or exchange platform, their transaction is checked by AML tools and, if it is assessed as high-risk, the client is required to undergo KYC—provide their passport details and information about the source of funds. All this is justified as a fight against various crimes, fraud, and even terrorism. However, as we will now see, such procedures can, on the contrary, encourage fraudulent activity.

One of the fraudulent schemes directly linked to AML/KYC is revealed by the creator of the cryptocurrency exchange monitor antiswap.info. When someone wants to perform a crypto exchange, exchangers conduct an AML check of the transaction via third-party services. But the methods used by such services raise doubts. For example, you yourself may not be involved in criminal activity in any way, but if the coins you currently hold were involved in it a dozen transactions ago, they will already be considered “dirty,” and you will have to deanonymize yourself and somehow prove the legality of the origin of the funds.

One of the users of the kurs.expert monitor points to cases where people were simply withdrawing funds from closing exchanges, and these were flagged by AML verification services as stolen. The essence of AML checks was also well described by one of the commenters on the miningclub.info forum: “I sold a bicycle to Vasya and bought a car from Masha. A year later, it turned out that Vasya was dealing drugs and making drops while riding the bike he bought from me with drug dealers’ money. It turns out I am an accomplice and Masha is the owner of ‘dirty’ money. Consequently, will her account be blocked, as well as the cash register of the store where she bought sausage yesterday?”. Furthermore, many commenters there point out that AML verification services may assign a transaction risk without any basis at all, since no one checks how they conduct this procedure.

Naturally, if you fail the AML check and the exchanger does not like your arguments during KYC (or if you simply do not wish to deanonymize yourself), your funds may simply be stolen, or you may be charged a huge commission for their return. As the creator of Antiswap writes, a third of the exchangers listed on the popular Bestchange monitor were caught doing this. But why then do almost all exchangers there have a perfect rating? The reason is that Bestchange considers the seizure of coins due to failure to pass AML/KYC to be solely the client’s fault, and all complaints regarding this are moved from negative reviews to neutral ones, which do not affect the exchangers’ rating.

At the same time, you are unlikely to go to state authorities to complain about such exchangers, as they will likely also have questions regarding the origin of your funds, and thus you may only create new problems for yourself and recover nothing. Thus, exchangers with dishonest owners and employees can practically legally engage in theft and fraud.

The website antiswap.info contains a list of such fraudulent exchangers, as well as a list of those who can be trusted. Of course, among the trusted exchangers, very few openly state their readiness to conduct exchanges without forcing the user to undergo AML/KYC, because many are still afraid of repression from the stationary bandit and publicly report their compliance with its requirements, even if they actually perform no checks. This creates difficulties in finding exchangers that are truly ready to conduct anonymous transactions. However, it is still important to separate blatantly fraudulent exchangers from those who can be trusted with high probability.

Voluntarist, Bitarch

Review of Mikhail Pozharsky’s video about how he grew to love war

Voluntarist, Bitarch

Mikhail Pozharsky released a video in which he began to justify violence and war as entirely normal human phenomena and tools for solving problems, while insulting opponents of war in every way and accusing their position of being untenable. Of course, it is first and foremost the position of Pozharsky himself that can be called untenable, which we will now examine in more detail.

He started well by criticizing the works of Steven Pinker, who claims that the level of violence has decreased throughout history, and that prehistoric humans suffered from chronic wars that could claim the lives of the majority of the population. Pinker was indeed wrong; he drew conclusions by considering only examples that were convenient for his argumentation. But if one considers all archaeological and anthropological evidence, we see that prehistoric populations did not suffer from wars—only 2% of representatives of past hunter-gatherer tribes died as a result of violence. After the agrarian revolution and the emergence of states, the level of lethal violence rose to 5%, after which it began to decline, amounting to only 3% for the 20th century (and this including the bloody conflicts that occurred within it). As anthropologist Douglas Fry believes, the level of violence in history changed according to an “n-type curve.” Pozharsky does not mention these data at all, and they do not align with his argumentation.

Instead, he decided to talk in detail about the violent nature of chimpanzees and cite primatologist and anthropologist Richard Wrangham, who believes that humans have an innate predisposition to cruelty, which he explains as an evolutionary legacy. But as Robert Sussman and Donna Hart write, the evolutionary paths of humans and chimpanzees diverged 8 million years ago. Meanwhile, the paths between chimpanzees and bonobos diverged only 2.5 million years ago, which did not prevent the latter from being peace-loving creatures. Pozharsky also mentioned bonobos, but spoke only of the aggressiveness of their females, failing to mention that their aggression is predominantly defensive, as well as the fact that they fundamentally do not have killings. Furthermore, many researchers, including anthropologist Brian Ferguson, believe that most violence in chimpanzees is provoked by human interference in their habitat, and that they have no innate predisposition to commit murder, just as humans do not.

Pozharsky also cites the Dani people as an example, among whom wars and killings are quite common. However, one could with equal success cite examples of the Paliyar, Semai, and many other peoples who are complete pacifists. Moreover, as Douglas Fry notes, research data shows that the majority of cultures (376 out of 590 studied) were either absolutely non-warlike or not inclined toward war (participating only in minor military actions). And only a third of the cultures participated significantly in wars, pursuing specific political or economic goals.

Next, Pozharsky provides individual examples of violence in history, which is an approach similar to that of Pinker (using episodes convenient for one’s argumentation while ignoring the full picture), claims that war can be just if a set of rules is adopted to reduce the harm it causes (but only suggests following them, without guaranteeing their execution in reality), and also attacks pacifists, portraying them as literally the worst people in the world by groundlessly attributing to them practices that only promote violence, such as appeasing the aggressor or waging war against a proclaimed “evil” without sparing any effort and ignoring the rules.

Of course, Pozharsky never once mentioned the position of anthropologists who quite reasonably do not consider war to be something natural for humans, or the position of military experts, according to which most healthy people possess a strong internal resistance to committing murder (or as researchers of human psyche and neurophysiology call it—the violence inhibition mechanism), and only a tiny fraction of individuals with high psychopathic predispositions are capable of engaging in such activities easily. All of this was ignored.

Animal cruelty, violence against people, and psychopathy

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Actions that are cruel to animals or lead to their death without a justifiable reason—for example, torture, torment, mutilation, poisoning, or abandonment—will seem to many as a clear sign that the person resorting to them has psychological abnormalities and could very well be just as capable of committing violence against humans. In fact, many studies have found a link between animal cruelty and various forms of violence. One of them also investigated the connection with the level of psychopathy in detail.

As demonstrated by one Swiss study, people who were cruel to animals in childhood are 3 times more likely to commit serious acts of violence, such as robbery, kidnapping, or assault, throughout their lives[1]. Another study conducted on two samples of women showed a link between the propensity for such treatment and proactive aggression, sadism, psychopathic predispositions, and traits of callous-unemotionality[2]. About 60% of individuals who state that they witnessed or participated in animal cruelty in childhood also report experiences of child abuse or domestic violence. As it turns out, animal cruelty is a “red flag” for domestic violence[3]. Finally, according to various studies, between 23% and 77% of households where intimate partner violence occurs also exhibit the presence of animal cruelty (and if threats to resort to it are added to actual cruelty, this figure becomes 21% to 89% of such households)[4].

People who are cruel to animals have, on average, higher scores for psychopathy. At the same time, the use of torture on animals is most strongly associated with psychopathy. The average score for individuals who committed such actions on the PPTS test was 13.04 points, while for those who did not, it was 10.19 points (an average difference of 2.85 points). The next strongest connection is the killing of animals (average difference of 2.65 points), followed by harming animals (average difference of 2.34 points)[5].

It can be confidently asserted that animal cruelty is indeed linked to a greater propensity for a person to commit violence against other people. There is also a significant link with psychopathic predispositions, which may indicate the presence of psychological abnormalities. Particular attention should be paid to impairments in the mechanism of violence inhibition, which some researchers use to explain the inability of certain individuals to perceive the suffering of animals, as well as a callous and dismissive attitude toward them[2].

How corporate psychopaths affect working conditions and the long-term success of a company

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In businesses with high staff turnover and relatively superficial assessments of personality traits when appointing employees to various positions, unscrupulous and deceitful corporate psychopaths often find opportunities to promote themselves. Such characteristics as ultra-rationality and a lack of emotional distress and empathy for other employees may even initially seem useful in activities aimed at generating profit. However, in the long run, the actions of corporate psychopaths can lead to catastrophic consequences.

To begin with, many employees cannot psychologically endure being their subordinates. Under psychopathic managers, staff turnover increases significantly. Additionally, they cause a decrease in the level of cooperation between different departments within the company. For example, psychopathic managers may order employees not to interact with other departments in any way except through their mediation. This is done to hide the fraudulent schemes they are implementing. Another management trait of corporate psychopaths is the bullying and intimidation of subordinates to draw them into their schemes, as well as the forced dismissal of anyone who refuses to obey them unconditionally.

At the same time, as counterintuitive as it may sound, psychopathic managers appear to be excellent employees to senior management, as they are proficient at reducing the company’s monetary expenses. Of course, in reality, this is not their own achievement; they appropriate it from other managers whom they have forced to participate in their schemes. They are adept at deceiving senior management and concealing the bullying they inflict on their subordinates.

Of course, in the long run, such manipulations and the creation of unbearable working conditions only cause harm. It is believed that corporate psychopaths are often the cause of company bankruptcies. Talented and skilled good people resign under their leadership, the company’s ethical reputation plummets, and product quality declines, leading to the loss of customers. Furthermore, through deception and manipulation, corporate psychopaths obtain positions for which they are unfit, while “silencing” truly experienced employees for the sake of their own personal interests.

Research often cites the example of American turnaround manager Albert Dunlop, who specialized in “saving” companies, which consisted of bringing them into a saleable condition while completely ignoring their future. Many researchers believe he was a psychopath. On Wall Street, he was known for his ruthless and intimidating approach to cost-cutting and heartless indifference toward firing employees. After becoming the CEO of Scott Paper, he disposed of assets worth about 2 billion dollars, fired a third of the workforce, and successfully sold the company to a competitor a year later. However, the company proved to be non-viable, and its headquarters were closed. In the end, about 11,000 people lost their jobs. Dunlop, meanwhile, walked away with a 100 million dollar severance package. Dunlop acted similarly with the company Sunbeam. After a year of his management, the company reported a huge increase in sales, and its shares rose by 50%. However, it was later revealed that this was a deception. At the very beginning, Dunlop created the impression that the company was incurring huge losses so that it would later seem that its situation had sharply improved. In the end, he faced trial for fraud, and the company went bankrupt.

Executives who exhibit psychopathic traits, such as ruthlessness and heartlessness, create unbearable working conditions and, in pursuit of purely personal gain, may even destroy a company. Such individuals should be feared; they should never be given leadership positions, at least until they undergo therapy to correct the dysfunction of the violence inhibition mechanism, which is why they are ruthless psychopaths.

Why physical “punishments” of children are absolutely unacceptable

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So-called physical (corporal) “punishments” or spanking are a barbaric practice of applying violence to children in order to change their behavior. Unfortunately, there are still parents who consider such a practice acceptable, or even absolutely normal. It is also supported by some public figures with ultra-conservative and authoritarian views, such as the American psychologist James Dobson. He believes that gentle parenting methods alone are not enough—they must be mixed with inflicting pain on children for disobedience and challenging parental authority, as this is the best method for preventing bad behavior. Furthermore, in his opinion, authoritarian upbringing should contribute to the maintenance of public order and the prevention of social unrest similar to those that occurred in the USA in the 1960s. Most people will surely find Dobson’s position extremely cruel, misleading, barbaric, inadequate, or even completely delusional. Nevertheless, we will examine the specific arguments against the use of violence toward children.

First and foremost, it must be noted that corporal “punishments” simply do not work. We intentionally use quotation marks because abusive parents use the word “punishment” to mask their violence, to avoid accusations that they openly support causing harm to children. Thus, instead of establishing parental authority, spanking only demonstrates parental weakness and an emotional breakdown. Additionally, an analysis of 75 studies conducted on 161 thousand children demonstrates that physical “punishments” do not eliminate undesirable behavior, but instead lead to 14 significant negative consequences:

– Impairment of the ability for moral reasoning;
– Increased childhood aggressiveness;
– Increased antisocial behavior;
– Increase in destructive or harmful behavior directed toward other people or objects;
– Increase in symptoms of anxiety or depression;
– Child mental health problems;
– Worsening of the relationship between parents and the child;
– Decline in cognitive abilities and worsening academic performance;
– Lower self-esteem;
– Greater likelihood of becoming a victim of physical violence;
– Antisocial behavior in adulthood;
– Mental health problems in adulthood;
– Problems with alcohol or drug abuse in adulthood;
– Support for violence against children in adulthood (here it is appropriate to recall Dobson once more, who was also beaten as a child).

The consequences of physical “punishments” are similar to those arising from trauma caused by other types of childhood experiences—physical and emotional abuse, neglect, sexual abuse, domestic violence, and the presence of mental illness in the family. Also, research has shown that when children encounter harmful experiences, they become hypersensitive to the emotional reactions of other people, as some of these, such as anger, begin to be associated with subsequent bad actions. In children subjected to physical “punishments,” the brain begins to function in the same way as in children subjected to other forms of violence. Moreover, negative childhood experiences may increase the risk of certain physiological problems, such as impaired muscle metabolism.

Finally, some researchers believe that a punitive political stance, including the endorsement of war as a tool of national policy and the death penalty, is a consequence of violent upbringing. Those who were beaten, intimidated, and shamed by their parents in childhood, and who did not overcome the corresponding psychological problems through psychotherapy, tend to project their childhood anger onto political views and other groups of people. There is an opinion that the widespread practice of cruel child-rearing methods in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century played a significant role in the subsequent growth in the number of supporters of Nazi views.

Theory of Moral Nativism and Moral Intuition

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Moral nativism is a theory that, in response to the question of where moral intuition, moral judgment, and other important elements of moral psychology come from, provides the answer that they are to some extent innate and emerged as a result of human biological evolution. Moral nativism relies on a two-stage argument. The first argument is that the mind contains a moral grammar: a complex system of principles, rules, and conceptual building blocks that generate and connect various mental representations upon which moral intuition depends. The second argument is that at least some of the fundamental attributes of this moral grammar are innate and are not based exclusively on experience, but rather come “from nature’s hand.” Cultural factors certainly influence the development of morality; nevertheless, a significant amount of evidence suggests that at least some aspects of moral cognition are innate.

How can we confirm the position of moral nativism? Darwin, de Waal, Kropotkin, and other biologists have emphasized that empathetic and altruistic behavior seems to have deep evolutionary roots. Rats experience stress when they hear the cries of other rats and perform altruistic acts to protect them from harm. Great apes experience evident grief over the death or disappearance of those to whom they were attached, and often comfort victims of attacks. Human infants cry more intensely in response to the crying of other infants than to comparable computer-generated sounds or even to a recording of their own crying; this means that “they react to the awareness of another’s pain, rather than simply to a specific pitch of sound.” Human children are also biologically predisposed to recognize and comfort those experiencing emotional distress. In a broader sense, young children are predisposed to help others achieve their goals, share valuable resources with them, and provide them with useful information. Furthermore, clinical and experimental studies have confirmed that specific areas of the brain underlie moral cognition, and that damage to these areas can lead to impaired moral judgments while leaving other cognitive functions intact.

We can also refer to norms that are universal across all societies. Research across hundreds of jurisdictions shows that the prohibition of murder appears to be universal and highly invariant. All known justifications and excusable reasons for committing murder consist of a relatively short list of defensive arguments familiar to everyone. Moreover, the attitude toward intentional killings specifically is even stricter. And a study conducted among ten cultures from different parts of the world, including residents of villages, cities, and even representatives of nomadic peoples, shows that battery, rape, theft, slander, and perjury are assessed as unlawful (i.e., “bad” or “extremely bad”) acts by about 95% of people.

Finally, one cannot fail to mention the theory of the violence inhibition mechanism, according to which many animal species and humans possess strong deterrents against causing harm to members of their own species. In animals, these deterrents are most often expressed through the ritualization of combat. In humans, they consist of unconditioned (innate) and conditioned (acquired during socialization) reflexes, primarily causing a reaction of rejection and internal resistance to witnessing the suffering of other people and performing aggressive actions toward them. Many studies, including anthropological and military ones, confirm that the average healthy individual possesses strong internal resistance to committing violence. And only a few, completely dysfunctional individuals, experience no resistance at all, even to committing murder—these are also called psychopaths.

How dominant behavior arises and what is the difference between social and aggressive dominance

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Dominant behavior is the desire to promote one’s own initiative, guide and control the actions of others. Such behavior is characterized by high self-confidence and confidence in one’s decisions. But why do some animals or people behave in a more dominant manner than others? And what is the connection between dominance and aggression? The answers to these questions may be quite unexpected for some.

Let’s start with an interesting experiment. It involved observations of a group of people who interacted with each other for 28 days. With varying frequency, different participants in the experiment took either a placebo or tryptophan—a substance involved in the synthesis of serotonin. Earlier trials showed that taking tryptophan and increasing serotonin levels in general reduce aggressive behavior in animals and humans. However, it was also known that increasing serotonin levels in animals stimulates dominant behavior. This result was also reproduced in humans.

As part of the experiment, the participants’ behavior was divided into 4 categories. Dominant behavior, such as expressing one’s opinion, setting goals for other people, etc., was significantly strengthened when a person took tryptophan. At the same time, grouchy or quarrelsome behavior, characterized by deception, lack of restraint, raising one’s voice at others, etc., was significantly weakened. Submissive behavior (the tendency to avoid responsibility and follow others even when disagreeing with them) also weakened, but only slightly, while negotiating behavior remained unchanged.

Some may believe that a dominant individual must be aggressive by nature. But as we see, taking a substance known for its anti-aggressive effect led to an increase in dominant behavior. However, there is no contradiction here. Even the study of animal behavior, for example, wolves, shows that alpha males should not be aggressive toward their subordinates or coerce them in any way. Attacks by alpha males on subordinate individuals are extremely rare. And the leader of the pack is usually the oldest male, the father of the family; the myth that the hierarchy in a wolf pack is strictly vertical and headed by the most aggressive male who obtained his position through violence is actually based on the study of wolves kept in enclosures, rather than those in the wild. Also, consider which pack has a better chance of survival—one that is cohesive and cooperating, or one in which some forcibly subjugate others and everyone is at odds with one another?

Research also demonstrates that dominance in humans can be divided into two forms—social and aggressive. Both forms of dominance are characterized by self-confident and leading behavior. However, some dominant individuals choose strategies in which they rely on other people (for example, subordinates) and are prone to social learning (using solutions that proved successful for other people). At the same time, other individuals resort to aggressive and Machiavellian strategies. They are not inclined to rely on social information, even if it may be beneficial. Additionally, socially dominant individuals have better relationships with the people around them and receive greater recognition of their leadership qualities than aggressively dominant individuals.

As we can see, a true “alpha” is not the one who is most aggressive and ready to forcibly compel others to submit, but the one who treats others well, sets an example for them, and gains recognition for their leadership qualities without resorting to violent coercion. And judging by research, such healthy dominant behavior is governed by the serotonergic system (the link is bidirectional—increasing serotonin levels stimulates such behavior, and achieving a high social status leads to greater serotonin production), which is also responsible for the functioning of the violence inhibition mechanism that prevents violent behavior and causing harm to others.

Essentialism and Constructivism

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Perhaps, when you were taking political views tests such as PolitiScales, you encountered a scale such as constructivism–essentialism. If someone is unfamiliar with these concepts, we will briefly describe them in this post, including considering them from the perspective of the problems we are studying here.

The constructivist position is that a person is created by the environment (especially the social one) in which they are located, and their personality traits are acquired. In turn, essentialism claims that there are certain innate and natural characteristics that make a person who they are.

Constructivism can be easily traced when someone attempts to explain certain social phenomena, including social relationships between people, by referring solely to the social environment itself as the cause of their formation in the form in which we observe them. The USSR’s approach can be called extremely constructivist, consisting of creating a new “Soviet man” – changing the very psychology of people through their re-education in a new environment with the indoctrination of communist ideology. The same applies to the approach of gender studies currently conducted in the West, based on which the concepts of man and woman themselves are not biologically determined – one is not born a man or a woman, but becomes one. A similar approach is practiced regarding a person’s sexual orientation. In these and a number of other works, essentialism is subjected to enormous criticism, consisting of accusing this idea of fixing a biologically determined difference between men and women, different races, and ethnicities.

Constructivism can hardly be called a productive approach, at least for the reason that it ignores a truly scientific understanding of how a human is structured, their psychology and behavior. Much in a human is still biologically determined, and the environment participates in their development, including personality development, strictly in conjunction with innate biological predispositions, which most often mediate its influence. We will not now consider the confirmation of such a view in all possible forms of social phenomena, but we will nonetheless turn to the data we have on such a phenomenon in social relationships between people as violence.

For example, it is known that while the tendency toward reactive (affective and impulsive) aggression may be equally explainable by genetics and environment, proactive (instrumental and intentional) aggression is predominantly explainable by genetics, and the environment, if it leads to its emergence, generally does so in the presence of a genetic predisposition to it. Also, antisocial behavior in children in conjunction with certain characteristics of primary psychopathy, such as traits of callousness and insensitivity, is observed at an extremely high level of heritability. Furthermore, such behavior, which is often intentional, is extremely resistant to correction. At the same time, antisocial behavior on its own, without traits of callousness-insensitivity, has only moderate heritability, is often not intentional, and is easily corrected during the upbringing of children.

These and other similar evidence align well with the theory of the violence inhibition mechanism, according to which a healthy person possesses an innate tendency to feel aversion to causing harm to other people. And the absence of such a tendency should be regarded as a pathology, rather than something arising purely for social reasons. Of course, improving the social environment can significantly reduce the manifestation of such pathology. However, even in the matter of aggressive behavior, the environment does not influence the manifestation of its different forms equally. Therefore, to guarantee a solution to the problem, the pathology must also be treated, since individuals may appear in any environment who do not experience the slightest internal resistance to achieving their goals through the intentional infliction of harm on other people.

How psychopathic predispositions are linked to authoritarian views and what can potentially be done about it

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It would be quite obvious to suggest that among supporters of authoritarian views and violent methods of achieving goals, the number of psychopathically predisposed individuals is higher than among supporters of libertarian and non-violent views. This assumption stems from the simple fact that a person who feels no internal resistance to causing harm to others and is even ready to commit a violent attack under certain circumstances is far more likely to end up in the first camp than in the second. But what can various studies examining people with both right-wing and left-wing authoritarian views say about this?

Most often, such studies are focused on the study of supporters of authoritarian-right views. For example, one of them showed that right-wing authoritarianism, a tendency toward prejudice, and an orientation toward social dominance (a preference for a society in which group hierarchy and inequality exist) are linked to psychopathic factors such as the interpersonal (a tendency to manipulate others and consider oneself superior to everyone) and the affective (a lack of empathy and guilt). It should be noted that the manifestation of these specific psychopathic factors in an individual is most closely linked to a dysfunction of the violence inhibition mechanism, which makes a person capable of causing harm to people without experiencing any repulsion.

The issue of authoritarian-left views is studied much less frequently; even the existing tools for this purpose are quite new. However, existing research shows that a tendency toward left-wing authoritarianism, and especially its component such as the permissibility of carrying out a violent revolution against the established social system, is strongly linked to psychopathy and antagonistic narcissism (the tendency to believe that the world is a highly competitive place in which one must achieve their own dominance over others). At the same time, neither a tendency toward altruism nor a tendency toward social justice were linked to left-wing authoritarianism. This may indicate that some left-wing politicians are not concerned with social justice and equality, but merely use them to justify violence against other people to satisfy their own egocentric needs.

Interesting results were demonstrated by a pilot study on the influence of psilocybin on a person’s tendency toward more authoritarian or libertarian views. After two sessions of taking the substance, authoritarian predispositions in the subjects decreased significantly, and this effect was maintained to a sufficient extent even after 7-12 months. It is very important to note here that psychedelic substances have long been studied for anti-aggressive and empathic effects. They affect the operation of the serotonin system, which plays a key role in the regulation of aggression and is responsible for the violence inhibitor function—more precisely, they are agonists of its 2A receptors (leading to their activation). However, there are studies suggesting that the empathic effect of psychedelics may be linked to the activation of 1A receptors, for which they are often partial agonists.

Serotonin 1A receptor agonists have demonstrated in a number of studies to be some of the potentially most effective anti-aggressive agents, without leading to the suppression of defensive behavior and other side effects characteristic of many agents, including psychedelics. Since the study of therapy for disorders in the regulation of aggression and dysfunction of the violence inhibition mechanism is oriented precisely toward these agents, their influence on a person’s tendency toward authoritarianism should also be tested. Perhaps, as a result of such therapy, a violent and psychopathic individual will not only stop throwing punches and manipulating other people to their detriment, but will also be inclined to stop supporting fellow sufferers of the mental disorder in society and politics, leaning toward more libertarian positions.

The principle that “ignorance of the law is no excuse” is illegal even within the current legal system

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Everyone has surely heard of the principle that every person is as if obliged to know the laws of the country in which they are located, and that violating the law due to ignorance of it does not exempt one from liability. This principle has been known since the times of Ancient Rome and is adopted today by all states in the world.

It is easy to understand the origin of this principle in Ancient Rome, when all crimes were obvious, such as theft or murder. When committing such offenses, it is indeed impossible to excuse oneself by claiming ignorance of the existence of a law prohibiting it, as all people living in society know from early childhood that such acts are crimes. However, modern states have spawned so many laws that studying and precisely understanding all of them is possible only for a specialist for whom this is a professional activity, but not for the average person. Moreover, laws are constantly changing, which is simply impossible to keep track of. This contradicts another generally accepted principle of the legal system in most countries of the world – the realism of fulfilling the requirements of the legislation. For example, one cannot demand that a sea carrier drain the ocean to raise a sunken ship with valuable cargo. Nor can one be obliged to appear in court, before an investigator, or at a military enlistment office upon a summons within a minute (teleportation currently exists only in science fiction). Even in wartime, a deliberately impossible order is considered criminal, and the guilt lies with the commander who gave it. This legal principle is usually rarely remembered, but recently American lawyers successfully used it in court.

In the USA, the story of a woman from Texas became widely known; she wanted to vote in the 2016 presidential election but did not have the right to do so because she was under supervision (something similar to probation) due to a “tax crime.” She was unaware of this, no one had informed her that she could not vote, and she decided to go to the polls only because her mother convinced her to do so. But the court did not care; her ignorance was called “irrelevant” to the judicial process, and in 2018 she was sentenced to 5 years in prison. Only in 2022 did an appellate court review this decision based on the lack of evidence that she was aware she had no right to vote. Effectively, the court decided to go against the principle that “ignorance of the law is no excuse.”

Considering that the legal system in the USA relies on case law, it can be hoped that such decisions will become much more common in the future. This, in turn, will demonstrate to everyone that people have no obligation to follow and attempt to fulfill the deliberately impossible requirement of being familiar with the countless laws that stationary bandits try to use to intimidate them at every step.