Nature vs. Nurture The stories of serial killers have intrigued all of us at times. One of these stories is Devil in the White City written by Erik Larson. It tells the story of the World’s Fair and of America’s first serial killer, H.H. Holmes. Scientists and psychologists have wondered why people like H.H. Holmes do what they do. It brings up the question which has a bigger effect on your personality, the genetics you were born with or the environment you were brought up in. In other words, nature versus nurture. This concept was debated by well respected scientist, Matt Ridley. He looked at both ideas in a chapter he wrote called “Free Will”. Another story where nature versus nurture could be debated was in The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. …show more content…
Matt Ridley also believes this when he says everyone’s fate is determined by their environment: “This dystopia owes nothing to nature and everything to nurture. It is environmental, not genetic hell. Everybody’s fate is determined, but by their controlled environment, not their genes” (Ridley 304). Ridley agrees that everyone’s fate is determined by their environment and that fate determines their behavioral tendencies. In The Devil in the White City Holmes had a traumatic experience as a kid that causes his fascination later in life: “Two older children discovered Mudgett’s (Holmes) fear and one day captured him and dragged him “struggling and shrieking” into the doctor’s office. “Nor did they desist,” Mudgett wrote, “until I had been brought face to face with one of its grinning skeletons, which, with arms outstretched, seemed ready in its turn to seize me. It was a wicked and dangerous thing to do to a child of tender years and health,” he wrote” (Larson 38-39). Herman Mudgett (H.H. Holmes) was exposed to one of his biggest fears of skeletons which could have scarred him as a result, had an unhealthy obsession to human cadavers. This evidence supports that a person’s environment has the biggest effect on their behavioral