People act in predictable ways that can be traced to basic instinctual motivations: envy, greed, avarice. Enlightened people hope they can rise above such base & selfish behaviors, but intellectual honesty demands we accept that we are all predictably flawed. Indoctrination in our youth makes most of us subject to minor enumerated penalties to control our behavior: sanctions, fines, and even incarceration; but some people are immune to these kind of ephemeral persuasions. When people have nothing to lose, no esoteric threat will consciously deter them from acting out, and penalties that seem reasonable to suburbanites are not effective on folks who ignore summonses & blow-off community service. Tickets certainly don't prevent irresponsible people from acting irresponsibly & imprisonment doesn't enter their thinking. Even draconian penalties don't accomplish anything but satisfy our own desire for vengeance & control. However, the silver-lining to this minimalist view of psychology is t
