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Hans Reiser Arrested On Suspicion of Murder
Many readers wrote about the arrest today of Hans Reiser, author of ReiserFS, by Oakland, CA police on suspicion of murdering his estranged wife. From the San Francisco Chronicle: "Hans Reiser, 42, was taken into custody at 11 a.m., hours after Oakland police and FBI technicians searched his home in the Oakland hills. His estranged wife, Nina Reiser, 31, has been missing since Sept. 3, when she dropped off the couple's son and daughter at his home on the 6900 block of Exeter Drive... Police made the arrest based on circumstantial evidence and have not found Nina Reiser's body, [Hans Reiser's attorney] Du Bois said. 'I have no idea what the circumstantial evidence is,' he said. 'When I hear what the evidence is against him, I'll make a decision as to whether he'll talk to them.'" kimvette writes, "While the disappearance (and possible murder) of his wife is tragic, Linux users will wonder where this will leave Reiser 4. If Reiser is found guilty, will Novell or IBM pick up the pieces and finish up Reiser 4 for inclusion in the kernel or is this the end of the Reiser filesystem project? Will there be any future for the Reiser filesystem, and if Hans is found guilty and the project is continued, will the project be renamed to avoid notoriety?"
n/t
no really. wtf?
I know a lot of Slashdotters are antisocial, but "what will happen to t3h filesystem?!??" is not a reasonable question to ask when a wife and mother has disappeared and possibly been murdered. And being a famous Linux geek is not a suitable reason to drop an investigation against a murder suspect.
"Very... Being that there is no body yet, I'm hoping that she isn't dead and your tasteless comment proves, in a way, true."
That still leaves one question open. Were is she?
Did Hans use CVS?
If it doesn't commit, you must acquit.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Show me that the world is filled with empathy, compassion, and remorse.
Show me the level of global guilt, because if you were an alien species looking at this world, you would think that psychopath was the natural state of human existance.
To presume all who commit crimes are suffering from mental illness, or are in some way less human, is a common error. We wish to distance ourselves from those we consider evil, by claiming that we could never do such a thing. But make no mistake; this is denial, plain and simple.
I never said psychopaths were LESS human, in fact they may actually be MORE human.
Criminality is a mental illness, or not being a criminal is a mental illness, pick.
I never said all psychopaths are criminals. I never said all psychopaths are violent. Read precisely what I said, psychopaths do not feel guilt, remorse, or empathy, and there are a lot of people who don't feel guilt, remorse or empathy, enuogh that I'd say it's normal. I'd guess around 20% of the population, this is a guess and it could be wrong, but it's enough people that there are people in your family, friends, people at work (like your boss), and ex-girlfriends/ex-boyfriends who were/are psycho. It's as common as any other trait, like fat people, everyone knows a few, or like short people, or tall people, etc.
That's not to say that there aren't criminal psychopaths in the world; rather it is to admit that average, mentally healthy people, under the right conditions, can do things we as a society consider monsterous. For every psycho killing people at random, there are a dozen "average" people killing for revenge, for profit, for ideology, or for any number of other reasons.
The average people almost always commit suicide immediately after they commit violent acts. The average person can kill sure, but not willingly, and not out of greed. If you kill for money, that's a sign of lack of empathy right there. If you kill out of passion, in an angry outburst, or in a suicidal rage, or in a fight, or in self defense, these are normal situations.
Like I said before though, psychopaths are more normal and MORE human than everyone else. This is why you say that murder and other acts are normal, it's normal because empathy, compassion and remorse are abnormal in human nature, very much like altruism is abnormal, or self love is abnormal. Let's face it, it's never rational to commit these sorts of act's when a person who isnt a psychopath commits these acts, however a psychopath can more easily rationalize the taking of a life because there is less value placed on life, partially because if you can kill something and not feel any remorse, or have any nightmares, yeah, you'll be able to do it clinically.
Most soldiers, they actually fear killing and actually do feel fear on the battlefield, but you always have that elite group that feels absolutely no fear at all, this group will literally take the battle to the enemy, run into the line of fire, and kill over and over again with no remorse. This is not something everyone can do, it's a very specific and special talent that requires psychopathy. Like I said, not all psychopaths are violent, but a psychopath can simply handle killing better because if you don't feel guilt, well you can kill and smile while you are doing it.
The majority of psychopaths arent in the killing business, but if the killing business were the only business in town, or were the most profitable, this would change overnight.
Well, I don't know about anyone else, but I certainly wouldn't use any software written by a felon.
(That noise is not me giggling insanely waiting for someone to bite. Really)