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The dark side: Why moral psychology is the greatest source of evil Sage Lecture #5 Dec. 8, 2008

Jonathan Haidt University of Virginia. The dark side: Why moral psychology is the greatest source of evil Sage Lecture #5 Dec. 8, 2008. 11/10: What is morality and how does it work? 11/17: The righteous mind: Why good people are divided by politics and religion

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The dark side: Why moral psychology is the greatest source of evil Sage Lecture #5 Dec. 8, 2008

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  1. Jonathan Haidt University of Virginia The dark side: Why moral psychology is the greatest source of evil Sage Lecture #5Dec. 8, 2008

  2. 11/10: What is morality and how does it work? 11/17: The righteous mind: Why good people are divided by politics and religion 11/24: The positive moral emotions: Elevation, awe, admiration, and gratitude  12/1: Hive psychology, group selection, and leadership 12/8: The dark side: Why moral psychology is the greatest source of evil   12/15: The light side: How to pursue happiness using ancient wisdom and modern psychology ppt files available at www.JonathanHaidt.com, at bottom 6 Lectures on Morality

  3. Morality as harm reduction: “Morality is an informal public system applying to all rational persons, governing behavior that affects others, and has the lessening of evil or harm as its goal.” (Gert, Stanford Encycl. of Phil.) “If, as I believe, morality is a system of thinking about (and maximizing) the well being of conscious creatures like ourselves, many people's moral concerns are frankly immoral.” (Harris, 2008)

  4. Morality is..... “prescriptive judgments of justice, rights, and welfare pertaining to how people ought to relate to each other.” (Turiel, 1983) Fairness/ Justice Harm/Care

  5. Morality re-defined: “Moral systems are interlocking sets of values, virtues, norms, practices, identities, institutions, technologies, and evolved psychological mechanisms that work together to suppress or regulate selfishness and make social life possible” (Haidt, in press, Handbook of social psych)

  6. Keeping together in time, fascist

  7. Three Models of Human Nature

  8. The Cynical View Be warned that if you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature. Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. --Dawkins, The Selfish Gene

  9. The Rationalist View At the heart of this tradition is a twofold intuition about human beings: namely, that all, just by being human, are of equal dignity and worth... , and that the primary source of this worth is a power of moral choice within them, a power that consists in the ability to plan a life in accordance with one's own evaluation of ends... [Political theory should be based on] the conception of human beings as essentially rational agents. ---Nussbaum, 1999, p. 57

  10. The Intuitionist View • Tis not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.... (Hume, Treatise) • The ultimate ends of human actions can never, in any case, be accounted for by reason, but recommend themselves entirely to the sentiments and affections of mankind. (Hume, Enquiry)

  11. Three Models of Human Nature

  12. Three Models of Human Nature

  13. The Intuitionist view 1) Intuitive primacy (but not dictatorship) 2) Moral thinking is for social doing 3) Morality binds and builds 4) Morality is about more than harm and fairness

  14. The Social Intuitionist Model (Haidt, 2001) 6 A’s Intuition A’s Judgment 2 A’s Reasoning 1 5 4 3 B’s Reasoning B’s Judgment B’s Intuition Four main processes: 1) the intuitive judgment link 2) the post-hoc reasoning link 3) the reasoned persuasion link 4) the social persuasion link Two rare processes: 5) the reasoned judgment link 6) the private reflection link

  15. Sympathy ...sympathy...forms an essential part of the social instinct, and is indeed its foundation-stone.--Darwin, Descent The play of sympathy and antipathy is a sufficient cause for practical reason to become conscious of reciprocity. --Piaget, Moral Judgment of the Child

  16. Psychic Numbing (Slovic)

  17. How should we value lives?

  18. How should we value lives?

  19. How might we value lives?

  20. How DO we value lives?

  21. The collapse of compassionSmall, Loewenstein, & Slovic, 2006 Identifiable Lives Condition: Rokia, a 7-year-old girl from Mali, Africa, is desperately poor and faces a threat of severe hunger or even starvation. Her life will be changed for the better as a result of your financial gift. With your support, and the support of other caring sponsors, Save the Children will work with Rokia’s family and other members of the community to help feed her, provide her with education, as well as basic medical care and hygiene education.

  22. The collapse of compassionSmall, Loewenstein, & Slovic, 2006 Statistical Lives Condition: • Food shortages in Malawi are affecting more than 3 million children. • In Zambia, severe rainfall deficits have resulted in a 42% drop in maize production from 2000. As a result, an estimated 3 million Zambians face hunger. • Four million Angolans — one third of the population— have been forced to flee their homes. • More than 11 million people in Ethiopia need immediate food assistance.

  23. The collapse of compassionSmall, Loewenstein, & Slovic, 2006

  24. The collapse of compassionKogut & Ritov, 2005 Mean contributions to help 1 sick child, or to help the whole group of 8 sick children

  25. The collapse of compassionVastfjall, Peters, & Slovic, in prep Compassion and charity decline at 2!

  26. It is a terrible thing to admit, but the more information we consume about Darfur, the less shocking each piece of new information seems. And surely that is a part of the problem. Ignorance is not the only ally of indifference; sometimes knowledge, too, blunts the heart and the will. --Richard Just, 2008, review of books about Darfur

  27. If I look at the mass, I will never act. If I look at one, I will. –Mother Teresa.

  28. Three Models of Human Nature

  29. The Intuitionist view 1) Intuitive primacy (but not dictatorship) 2) Moral thinking is for social doing 3) Morality binds and builds 4) Morality is about more than harm and fairness

  30. A) Hypocrisy --How can you say to your brother, "Let me remove the speck from your eye”; and look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye. (Jesus) --Clean your finger before you point at my spots. (Ben Franklin) --Though you see the seven defects of others, we do not see our own ten defects (Japanese Proverb) --A he-goat doesn’t realize that he smells. (Nigerian Proverb)

  31. FunctionalismsMoral thinking is done in order to... 1. Feel good. (Intrapsychic functionalism: Freud, Cialdini) 2. Find the truth. (Epistemic functionalism: Plato, Kohlberg, rationalists) 3. Succeed socially. (Social-functionalism: Darwin, Tooby, Cosmides, Dunbar) --the “interpreter module” (Gazzaniga, 1985) --the intuitive politician (Tetlock) and the ubiquity of hypocrisy (Batson)

  32. Real politicians

  33. B) Rationalization Rationalization may be defined as self-deception by reasoning. --Karen Horney

  34. The Most Dangerous Rationalization • “Russians may be hungry and short of clothes and comfort, but you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs” • --Walter Duranty, 1932, in the New York Times The road to hell: The ends justify the means Example: Lazar Kaganovich

  35. Rationalization of evil • You must think of humanity as one great body, but one that requires constant surgery. Need I remind you that surgery cannot be performed without cutting membranes, without destroying tissues, without the spilling of blood? Thus we must destroy whatever is superfluous. These are unpleasant acts, granted, but we do not find any of this immoral. You see, all acts that further history and socialism are moral acts. • --Lazar Kaganovich, letter to his American nephew

  36. The Intuitionist view 1) Intuitive primacy (but not dictatorship) 2) Moral thinking is for social doing 3) Morality binds and builds 4) Morality is about more than harm and fairness

  37. The 6 Ultrasocial Animals Hymenoptera: Bees wasps and ants Reproduce only through queen; OFA-AFO Also: termites… and naked mole rats…

  38. The 6th Ultrasocial: Not kinship; Massive in-group cooperation for the purpose of cross-group competition. Held together by norms and emotions.

  39. The Myth of Pure Evil (Baumeister, 1997) • 1) The evil one is purely evil; has no intelligible motive, beyond an enjoyment of harming, or a lust for power. • 2) The victim is purely good, and did nothing to bring about victimization. • 3) The Evil one is an outsider, not part of our group. • 4) Evil is the antithesis of order, peace, stability • 5) Anyone who raises doubts about the purity of either side is in league with evil (e.g., dissent is treason)

  40. Cartoon evil, 1950s

  41. Parody of cartoon evil, 1990s

  42. Manichaeism: the world is an eternal battle between the forces of darkness and the forces of light

  43. Kids are natural manichaeans

  44. Natural Born Manichaean "When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, and you knew exactly who they were. It was us vs. them, and it was clear who them was. Today, we are not so sure who the they are, but we know they're there.“ --GWB, January 21 2000

  45. Mirrored Manichaeans: "You're either with us or against us in the fight against terror.... This is an evil man that we’re dealing with” "Those who believe, fight in the Cause of Allah, and those who disbelieve, fight in the cause of Satan”

  46. The Myth of Pure Evil (Baumeister, 1997) • 1) The evil one is purely evil; has no intelligible motive, beyond an enjoyment of harming, or a lust for power. • 2) The victim is purely good, and did nothing to bring about victimization. • 3) The Evil one is an outsider, not part of our group. • 4) Evil is the antithesis of order, peace, stability • 5) Anyone who raises doubts about the purity of either side is in league with evil (e.g., dissent is treason)

  47. A) The Causes of Terrorism • Americans are asking, why do they hate us?  They hate what we see right here in this chamber -- a democratically elected government.  Their leaders are self-appointed.  They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other. • --G. W. Bush, Address to Congress, 9/20/01

  48. Many people, many motives (Victoroff, 2005) Sometimes crazy and/or blinded by hate

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