The Sleepwalking Detective Who Convicted Himself Of A Murder
Bending the idea of responsibility
“I have the killer and the evidence but I lack the motive. It was I who killed Andre Monet.”
—Comment from Detective Robert Ledru, Sage Journal, Edward Podolsky, 1961
I want you to think deeply about this concept for a second. What are you truly responsible for? As a human being, the idea of responsibility permeates our society.
- If you look at people’s job titles, they generally explain what they do. It’s their area of responsibility.
- In a college, everyone has a major, which is their area of study that they’re responsible for concentrating on.
- The goaltender in various sports doesn’t have the responsibility for scoring points.
In law throughout history, people are generally punished for things that are in their control or influence. In Nissim Taleb’s book “Antifragile” he explains the ancient Romans made engineers sleep under bridges they designed for a time. The thought being they’d pay for shoddy design with their lives. In the end, they’re responsible for the bridge.
It seems obvious on its face. We’re responsible for things we have control or influence over. But what happens with things we don’t have…
