You have justified Charlie Manson. If it's true for you, why isn't it true for them?
That leaves the question of how Penn actually knows that Chalie Manson was acting based on what his heart was telling him.
Psychopaths are frequently bad at empathy or "listening to their hearts". It might even be the defining characteristic of what makes someone a psychopath.
You missed the point entirely. 'Listening to their (own) hearts' is not empathy, it's just giving credibility to your instinctive beliefs, regardless of wether they have a basis or not. How is believing that everyone is connected by a network of magical energy tethers and acting according to that any different than believing that my soul will be saved if I massacre 40 people and acting on that?
The only difference is the actual acts that you take due to the beliefs. Mind you, it's a very important difference, but the quote is not talking about that, it's talking about beliefs themselves and using them as a sufficient justification for acts.
Another month has passed and here is a new rationality quotes thread. The usual rules are:
And one new rule: