User blog comment:CoolCat123450/Character Sheet 19/@comment-4867780-20160401084105

Now, that is one Troperific character ^ ^

Maybe Intelligence Equals Isolation should be added to the list, seeing how emotionally disconnected Rrichard's artificial enlightenment seems to have made him. Any idea how he ended up this way ? Brain damage I never quite understood the popular dissociation of intelligence and emotions in fiction, for even the most brillant mind is also hardcoded with affects of all kinds and a strong need to belong.

Maybe it's physical ? Maybe Richard suffered some kind of brain damage during the process, and is now neurologically unable to relate to the world and others the way he used to ? I read that real-life TBI (Traumatic Brain Injuries) can lead to serious empathy-related defficiencies. Sometimes the reaction is still there but weakened and delayed, making them emotionally desoriented and socially out of synch. Other times the system simply broken and doesn't work anymore, and all they can feel when faced with others' suffering is annoyed boredom at best, and thrilled excitement at worse.

While they are definitely victims and thus worthy of compassion on this regard, these accounts remain super-creepy to read about, and gives the distinct impression they have been reduced to the emotional maturity of a two years old.

More generally, I can't shake the feeling that if you don't care about others' wellbeing, then no one in the world should care about yours - a truly dreadful thought to such personalities, since defficient empathy usually goes hand in hand with extreme levels of narcissism (probably some kind of natural compensation mecanism, refocusing all the ability to care on oneself alone).