The Dinner question

Paul = Mersault.

Wouldn't it seem that Claire is more apt to sociopathic tendencies than Paul is? That's what I got from the novel. He had little control over his temper due to an unnamed and obviously contrived hereditary disease affecting his impulse control. Claire on the other hand was the one with the plan. The parent who encouraged her child to do whatever was necessary to protect himself from this scandal. Claire who created an alibi, Claire who steered the conversation during dinner. It was also Claire who stabbed her brother in law in the face with a broken glass. Paul's character seemed hesitant to go as far as Claire did. In fact, leaving a scar so he couldn't have a press conference is a long way from an ambulance arriving, and having such disfiguring scars that one must grow a beard. To me, Claire is the scary character in this story.

Named after a German . . . I thought Aspberger's (as inaccurate as that may seem -- I thought that was the author's intent)

My take on the ending-:
Paul's "sickness" is not of being VIOLENT, but it's of being a fantasist.
I.e: I don't think he really beat up the principal (that would have been jail,etc..). I think he was just yelling at him, and his mind made up the rest.
i.e: he smashed a pan on his brothers head..Yet, the brother doesn't remember, and is all WARM.

See..The only violent person is the wife, and she did the only REAL act of violence.

I thought he was bipolar. And that this might be taking place sometime in the future, when things like bipolar disorder might be detectable in an amnio.

I saw someone on another thread mention Huntington's disease. Although I've seen that Koch admitted the disease was not based on any particular true disease, the symptoms and conditions of Huntington's seem startlingly accurate. Google it if you'd like.

Here’s what he told Untitled Books about Paul’s disorder:

“It was going to be a real affliction, and then I thought if I name it in the book, then it’s no longer fiction. People will think it’s this or that, and then doctors will say actually in this condition people are not really that aggressive. Of course I had in mind something like Asperger’s, and the indifference to human suffering that entails. But Paul goes beyond that: let’s say he’s very active in his lack of empathy.”

And here’s what he said about it in an interview for the Delft University of Technology:

“I was deliberately vague about that. I considered certain autistic disorders, particularly Asperger’s. After all, he is rather indifferent about what happens to other people. But if I had stated this explicitly in the book, people would have said, ‘That’s a very crude caricature, people with Asperger’s don’t behave as aggressively and unpredictably as this fictional character!’ I had no wish to engage in discussions of that kind. However, I did consult an expert about whether someone’s DNA might show clear evidence of such disorders. He told me that this is not yet possible, but that it will be in five years’ time. So that’s the only bit of science fiction in the whole book.”

Amniocentesis cannot detect any heritable genetic disorder that would result in violent behavior.

The author said in an interview that I found on the web, that the condition might be something like Asperger's. He didn't want to make it too specific.

Does anyone think that when Claire was in the hospital it was because he put her there? I mean, he did have quite a temper.

Could it be xyy syndrome?--the syndrome that Richard Speck was mistakenly diagnosed with?

The closest diagnosis that seems to fit the framework Koch includes in The Dinner might point to Tourette's Disorder due to being named after a real person(Gilles de la Tourette) and having a possible genetic factor. Koch also mentions a character's tic. I strongly disagree with linking Tourette's Disorder to Psychopathology and take offense that readers are left wondering and possibly misled. If psychological disorders are featured prominently in a story then writers might have the depth to fully research and authentically depict the range of suffering experienced by those with a mental illness. At the very least, do not include so much plot framework that seem to rely on this theme.

No sorry, I asked my teacher because I wanted to know as well and he didn't know either , I suppose you're just meant to guess

There is some evidence that sociopathy is, in part, genetic and thus inherited. I thought it was the fragile x syndrome myself but maybe we're not supposed to know.

Sociopath

It's a heritated mental disorder. No clue what sort it may be ;)