Killology Glossary

Glossary of Killology Terms

Acquired Violence Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AVIDS): The "violence immune system" exists in the midbrain of all healthy creatures causing them to be largely unable to kill members of their own species in territorial and mating battles. In human beings this resistance has existed historically in all close-range, interpersonal confrontations. "Conditioning" (particularly the conditioning of children through media violence and interactive video games) can create an "acquired deficiency" in this immune system resulting in "Acquired Violence Immune Deficiency Syndrome." As a result of this weakened immune system, the victim becomes more vulnerable to violence-enabling factors such as poverty, discrimination, drugs, gangs, radical politics, and the availability of guns.
Behavior Modification (also behavior therapy and conditioning therapy): A treatment approach designed to modify a subject's behavior directly (rather than correct the root cause), through systematic manipulation of environmental and behavioral variables thought to be related to the behavior. Techniques included within behavior modification include operant conditioning and token economy.
Behavioral Psychology (also behaviorism):The subset of psychology that focuses on studying and modifying observable behavior by means of systematic manipulation of environmental factors. In its purest form behaviorism rejects all cognitive explanations of behavior.
Classical Conditioning (also Pavlovian and respondent conditioning): A form of conditioning in which a neutral stimulus becomes associated with an involuntary or autonomic response, such as salivation or increased heart rate.
Conditioning: A type of training that intensely and realistically simulates the actual conditions to be faced in a future situation. Effective conditioning enables an individual to respond in a precisely defined manner in spite of high states of anxiety or fear. It is applied clinically in behavior modification. There are generally two types of conditioning: operant conditioning and classical conditioning.
Chariot: A two-wheeled platform pulled by horses (usually two) generally carrying a driver and a passenger. Of limited value for commerce due to its small capacity, the chariot was primarily an instrument of war and the hunt. Its greater mobility gave it a high degree of utility in the pursuit of a defeated enemy. The passenger was usually an archer who would fire from the platform while on the move or during brief halts.
Evacuation Syndrome: The paradox of combat psychiatry. Psychiatric casualties must be treated, but if soldiers begin to realize that psychiatric casualties are being evacuated, the number of psychiatric casualties will increase dramatically.
Fear: A cognitive or emotional label for nonspecific physiological arousal in response to a threat.
Midbrain: Sometimes referred to as the mammalian brain, it is the primitive part of the brain that is generally indistinguishable from that of any other mammal. During times of extreme stress cognition tends to localize in this portion of the brain.
Operant Conditioning (also conditioning): A form of conditioning that involves voluntary actions (such as lifting a latch, following a maze, or aiming and firing a weapon) with reinforcing or punishing events serving to alter the strength of association between the stimulus and the response. In recent human usage operant conditioning has developed into a type of training that will intensely and realistically simulate the actual conditions to be faced in a future situation. Effective conditioning will enable an individual to respond in a precisely defined manner, in spite of high states of anxiety or fear.
Parasympathetic Nervous System: The branch of the autonomic nervous system that is responsible for the body's digestive and recuperative processes.
Phalanx: A mass of spearmen in tight ranks, carrying spears approximately 4 meters long and protecting themselves with overlapping shields, highly trained to move in a formation organized in depth (i.e., moving and fighting "in column" as opposed to "in line") and trained to strike the enemy as a coherent mass. First widely utilized by the ancient Greeks.
Psychological Enabling Factors: The processes that can be manipulated as a weapon to psychologically enable a human, or a group of humans, to kill. These can be broken down into posturing, mobility, distance, leaders, groups, and conditioning.
Physical Limitations: The physical limitations of the human body which, when overcome, will assist in physically enabling killing. These can be broken down into force, mobility, distance, and protection.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD): A psychological disorder resulting from a traumatic event. PTSD manifests itself in persistent re-experiencing of the traumatic event, numbing of emotional responsiveness, and persistent symptoms of increased arousal, resulting in clinically significant distress or impairment in social and occupational functioning. There is often a long delay between the traumatic event and the manifestation of PTSD. PTSD has been strongly linked with greatly increased divorce rates, increased suicide rates, and increased incidence of alcohol and drug abuse.
Posturing: In the territorial and mating battles of every species the individual who puffs itself up the biggest or makes the loudest noise is most likely to win; this process is referred to as "posturing." Humans engaged in close-combat are invariably profoundly frightened, and in such individuals primitive, midbrain processing often causes the actual battle to be, from one perspective, a process of posturing until one side or another turns and runs, after which the real killing usually begins. Thus posturing is critical to warfare and victory can be achieved through superior posturing. Bagpipes, bugles, drums, shiny armor, tall hats, chariots, elephants, and cavalry have all been factors in successful posturing (convincing oneself of one's prowess while daunting one's enemy), but, ultimately, gunpowder proved to be the ultimate posturing tool.
Psychological Enabling Factors: The processes that can be manipulated as a weapon to psychologically enable a human, or a group of humans, to kill. These can be broken down into posturing, mobility, distance, leaders, groups, and conditioning.
Psychiatric Casualty: A combatant who is no longer able to participate in combat due to mental (as opposed to physical) debilitation.
Purification Ritual: A set of symbolic social mechanisms that help returning veterans come to terms with their actions in combat and successfully integrate back into peacetime society.
Reinforcement: The presentation of a stimulus (i.e., a reinforcer) that acts to strengthen a response.
Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS): The branch of the autonomic nervous system that mobilizes and directs the body's energy resources for action.
Weapon: A device or system that is designed to permit humans to overcome natural physical and psychological limitations in order to enable the killing and domination of other creatures, particularly their fellow human beings.
Weapons Evolution: The process of Darwinian natural selection in the development of a series of ever-more-effective weapons.
Weapons Lethality: A factor of the effectiveness of the weapons used to kill and the ability of medical technology available to save lives. Thus, weapons lethality can be thought of as a contest between weapons effectiveness (the state of technology trying to kill you) and medical effectiveness (the state of technology trying to save you).

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