On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society

Dave Grossman's On Killing is an interesting book that is ultimately unpersuasive in its central claims — namely (i) that human beings have a strong innate resistance to killing, and (ii) that violence in the media and in society is helping to break down this aversion. Nonetheless, Grossman's exploration of the techniques used by the military to train killers is useful.