Science, as it happens, has been hard at work trying to understand the how and the why of what everyone at a college mixer learns: alcohol can make people do, and say, stupid things. But does it make people say things that they do not believe at all, that are, as Mr. Gibson insisted in his statements, antithetical to one’s own views and faith?

Experts generally suggest that the answer is “Nope.”

When asked where those vicious words came from, Dr. Kevin J. Corcoran, a psychology researcher who has studied the effects of alcohol on perception and judgment, replied, simply, “his mouth.”

Dr. Corcoran said comments do not spring from nothing; for example, Dr. Corcoran said, he himself would not make anti-Semitic statements under the influence of alcohol.

“I say other outrageous things when I’m drunk,” he said.

He added that Mr. Gibson “may not fully believe” his statements about Jews, “but they were waiting to be delivered,” once his inhibitions were lowered and he was subjected to the stress of being pulled over by the police.

It seems likely to me (given his background, and the religious views of his father), that Gibson both believes and doesn't believe the things he said. That is, he said things that in some core way he suspects to be true statements about the essence of the world, but he's been successfully socialized against saying things like that outright under normal circumstances, so on an everyday basis he can truthfully say that they're not his real thoughts. He probably would behave in most respects as if he didn't believe them, but they also color his perception of the world in ways that would definitely effect his behavior. So he'd make a film like The Passion of the Christ which (according to reviews I've read) is not overtly anti-Semitic, but which nonetheless has about it an uncomfortable tinge of blaming the Jews for the death of Jesus (a classic anti-Semitic viewpoint).

Gibson is 50 years old -- no amount of therapy or encounter sessions with Jews or gays or women is going to alter his fundamental understanding of the world (the stuff that slipped out when he was drunk and under stress), all it's going to do is reinforce the socialization which prevents him from saying it normally. The stuff he's doing now is basically just careerist P.R. -- as an movie star Gibson relies on people liking him and that's been damaged by this incident. He needs to re-establish his positive connection with his potential audience. That doesn't mean he's not sincere about wanting to reform, both things can simultaneously be true -- I just wouldn't take it too seriously. The Mel Gibson who comes out of the aftermath of this incident proclaimed as a better man will be pretty much the same Mel Gibson who went into it, maybe just a little wiser and wearier, and more apt to STFU.