The Scale of Evil-Interjudge Reliability and Associations with Predictor Variables

Sten Levander

doi:10.31031/fsar.2018.03.000555

Abstract

Forensic Science & Addiction Research The Scale of Evil-Interjudge Reliability and Associations with Predictor Variables Eva Lindström1, Mikael Olausson2, Bengt Persson2, Eva Tuninger3 and Sten Levander4* 1Department of Neurosience, Uppsala University Hospital, Sweden 2Forensic Psychiatric Clinic, Sweden 3Department of Clinical sciences, Lund University, Sweden 4Department of Criminology, Malmo University, Sweden *Corresponding author: Sten Levander, Department of Criminology, Malmö University, S-20506 Malmö, Sweden Submission: March 16, 2017; Published: March 23, 2018 DOI: 10.31031/FSAR.2018.02.000555 ISSN: 2578-0042 Volume2 Issue5

Highlights

Some years ago, Knoll [1] wrote about Evil and warned in strong words for inviting Evil into forensic science, the project to develop a ”Depravity scale” by Welner [2], who later rebutted eloquently to Knoll’s arguments [3]
As expected Scale of Evil (SoE) correlated with PCL scores, but stronger with a diagnosis of Antisocial Personality Disorder, and item H1 and H8 of the HCR-15
Viewed as shared variance around 85% of the total variability is shared between the raters

Summary

Introduction

Knoll [1] wrote about Evil and warned in strong words for inviting Evil into forensic science, the project to develop a ”Depravity scale” by Welner [2], who later rebutted eloquently to Knoll’s arguments [3]. Knoll claimed that Evil is an exclusively religious concept created by man (a non-essentialist and value nihilistic position) and incompatible with science This is definitely not a view that is unanimously shared among philosophers or for that matter anthropologists and sociologists. The process of natural selection and survival of the fittest may be viewed as a purely mechanistic process, still, the concept of evil may be built into humans in a way that Jung conceptualized as the “collective unconscious”-and is “objective” in that sense It is reproducible and has causal power; a concept discussed by the philosopher Harré [4], over a wide range of individuals, settings and cultures. The Scale of Evil (SoE) was constructed 1993 but has not yet been studied empirically

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Conclusion