Review of The Righteous Mind

I’ve been a big fan of Jonathan Haidt since seeing his 2013 Boyarsky Lecture, in which he explains his Moral Foundations Theory. – It’s compelling as showing how conservatives can hold morality differently than the social-justice crowd holds it.

I finally got around to reading the actual book, rather than just picking up tidbits from various articles, podcasts and videos.
Very much worth reading.

Compared to Previous Things I’d Read

The book has a somewhat different emphasis than just MFT + explanations of various cultural rifts:
Each part presents a metaphor/model:

• The first part emphasises our morality is guided by intuition: a quick emotional reaction, followed by post-hoc, strategic rational justification.
  As Hume said, rationality should be servant to the emotions. Haidt presents the model of an emotional/intuitional elephant, ‘guided’ by a rational rider: the rider often has little control over what the elephant is doing, but can come up with great justifications.
  – Also emphasised is Glaucon’s stance in Plato’s Republic: People care more about the appearance of being virtuous, than actually being virtuous.

• The second part establishes Moral Foundations Theory, Morality is underlaid by at least six foundations: Care, Fairness, Liberty, Loyalty, Authority, and Sanctity. (Many of the articles I’ve come across emphasise this aspect, as well as e.g. differences between American Left & Right).

  Emphasised is that WEIRD people (Western, Educated, etc.) see objects and individuals where others see relations and groups.
  In terms of US/Western politics: Lefties highly value Care MF, and to a lesser extent Liberty/Fairness. Libertarians care about Liberty and pretty much nothing else. Righties care about each of the MFs. (Given that Righties care about everything Lefties do, but not vice versa, Righties are better able to pass Ideological Turing Test as Lefties than Lefties of Righties; Lefties just don’t see how Authority, Sanctity could affect for morality).

• The third part models humans as “90% chimps, 10% bees”; humans distinctly are able to cooperate in large groups which aren’t necessarily kinsfolk. – The ‘chimps’ aspect is our individuality, the ‘bees’ aspect is our hive-minded nature.
  – This part of the book largely argues the case for ‘group selection’, & that humans’ righteous religiousity allowed our species to work in groups.

The book is filled with interesting tidbits, stories, and occasionally diagrams. One interesting one was this ‘Social Intuitionist’ model:

The takeaway from this model was, as intuition drives our judgement (& reasoning follows judgement), it’s ineffective to try and change someone’s judgement directly through reasoning. (Possible, but rare). More effective was “elephant to elephant”, nudging an intuition from a socially respected source. (Since appearing respectable is important, intuition is more willing to yield). – As discussion progressed, after intuitions had adjusted, reasoning was more likely to persuade.
Haidt later remarks about US Democrats vs Republicans; that Democrats have done so poorly in recent decades because Democrats’ speeches tend to talk to the elephant’s rider, whereas Republicans’ speeches resonate more with the elephant.

“Moral Matrix” is another recurring model in the book: ‘Matrix’ like the film, where under the binding/blinding righteousness, reality is distorted by one’s moral tastes.
– The suggestion is to try and see things from within another’s moral matrix; to first gain social respect, then adjust intuition talking to the elephant, then to the rider.

Diversity & Groups

This was a bit interesting.
I guess it makes sense in terms of, ‘our righteousness binds us together, blinds us to inconvenient truths’, but there was the remark that the more diverse a group, the less capable it was. – It’s not that more diverse groups drew more love of in-group, hatred of out-group, but instead an ‘anomie’: individuals were more socially isolated. (So, in order to get different people to work together, it’s better to emphasise similarities; highlighting differences has negative effects).

– This also came up in terms of the yin/yang of Am-Liberals v Conservatives; under Am-Liberals, society grows more diverse, “falls apart” under anomie. Conservatives valued ‘moral capital’ more, & preserved social/moral order. – Conservatives protect Chesterton’s Fence. – As a selection process, the society which is best able to balance progress vs stability wins.

So, yes, it’s well worth reading “The Righteous Mind” for its ideas even with some awareness of the amazing thing JHaidt tends to say.