I am an insensitive bastard
I almost ran over a pedestrian today on the way to work, by inches.
I had been listening to NPR, driving down a commerical road (road in a business district). I was coming upon an intersection where I had to make a right. There was very little traffic on either roads. I had left my house late and ran into some accident related congestion to boot, so most people were happily working away in their office building by this time. I pulled up to the corner, braked a little while looking left, saw no traffice, and proceeded to accelerate and turn (I had a red light at this point but you can turn on red in Jersey City unless otherwise noted). In doing so, I nearly ran over this woman who started to cross the intersection with the light in her favor (i.e. directly in-front of my car). I braked, waved at her, rolled down my windows and yelled that I was sorry. She checked herself, gave me a disgusted look, and proceeded to cross.
The problem is, all of my actions were... functional. There was no adrenaline rush when I had to brake. There was no empathy or emotion underlying the appology, nor was there recrimination. I just didn't feel a thing. In a couple of seconds, I had noted the situation, done as much as I could to prevent it from getting worse, evaluated the causes of the situation, made a mental note not to repeat it. I then acknowledged my fault to the other participants. At that point, as far as I was concerned, the incident was over. No replays in my head. No "what if" scenarios. It was what it was and that was it.
I have gotten very good at identifying externalities and then completely ignoring them. Am I heading down the road to becoming a sociopath or am I there already?
I had been listening to NPR, driving down a commerical road (road in a business district). I was coming upon an intersection where I had to make a right. There was very little traffic on either roads. I had left my house late and ran into some accident related congestion to boot, so most people were happily working away in their office building by this time. I pulled up to the corner, braked a little while looking left, saw no traffice, and proceeded to accelerate and turn (I had a red light at this point but you can turn on red in Jersey City unless otherwise noted). In doing so, I nearly ran over this woman who started to cross the intersection with the light in her favor (i.e. directly in-front of my car). I braked, waved at her, rolled down my windows and yelled that I was sorry. She checked herself, gave me a disgusted look, and proceeded to cross.
The problem is, all of my actions were... functional. There was no adrenaline rush when I had to brake. There was no empathy or emotion underlying the appology, nor was there recrimination. I just didn't feel a thing. In a couple of seconds, I had noted the situation, done as much as I could to prevent it from getting worse, evaluated the causes of the situation, made a mental note not to repeat it. I then acknowledged my fault to the other participants. At that point, as far as I was concerned, the incident was over. No replays in my head. No "what if" scenarios. It was what it was and that was it.
I have gotten very good at identifying externalities and then completely ignoring them. Am I heading down the road to becoming a sociopath or am I there already?