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How is it that otherwise intelligent people can inflict such terrible harm upon others? Simon Baron Cohen believes that we should examine the effect on empathy on human behavior, rather than blindly lumping it into abstract categories like "good" and "evil."

Simon Baron-Cohen is Professor of Developmental Psychopathology at the University of Cambridge and Fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge.

He is Director of the Autism Research Centre (ARC) in Cambridge (www.autismresearchcentre.com). His books include Mindblindness (MIT Press, 1995), The Essential Difference (Penguin UK/Basic Books, 2003), Prenatal Testosterone in Mind (MIT Press, 2005), Zero Degrees of Empathy (Penguin UK/Basic Books, 2011) and Autism and Asperger Syndrome: The Facts (OUP, 2008). He is a Fellow of the BPS and the British Academy.