The author takes you on a journey through moral philosophy and evolutionary psychology to make sense of what we see as values today. He makes a lot of sense for the most part, and opens an exciting path to rarionalising contemporary socio-political processes and the values they rely on.

The book is near perfect except the end in which he does not spend as much detailed work on motivating his ideas and counterarguments. But nevertheless I found many moments totally enlightening in their candid views, I think this is a must read book. ( )

I made it to page 200 before my revulsion at the emerging narrative became so intense I couldn't finish. Bogus experimental technique, errors of fact (John Stuart Mill did not justify slavery), treating institutional racism, misogyny and patriarchy as valid "moral" positions just got to be too much. Think Social Darwinism mixed with moral relativism. The "Dark Enlightenment" folks would love this - a virtual blueprint for justifying fascism. Two stars only for the writing which was decent enough and recommended from a know your enemy perspective. ( )

I wasn't particularly looking forward to reading this for book club, but it actually turned out to be fascinating. The author's experiments and explanations about how people develop their morality systems and why we can view the world in such different ways made a lot of sense. I especially liked his suggestions for how to communicate more effectively with people who think differently than you do. ( )

This was pretty entertaining and interesting. It is about morale psychology and trying to determine why we believe what we believe. There are some very entertaining study results (some of them pretty humorous) that the author uses as evidence in a debate between emotion/intuition vs reasoning. Later, there is a discussion about Moral Foundations - the basic moral principles we all rate and how they map to our political leanings. There is also a discussion of how our ancestors' anthropology/evolution may be influencing our morality today which also had some interesting points.

It's not overly technical and he has some good metaphors for explaining his theories. ( )

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interesting first three parts that go into current understanding of the physical and evolutionary basis of human psychology. Really frustrating through this part whenever the author reveals, consciously or not, just how much of a liberal he is. The final part gets to the point, and says that a political atmosphere in which there are both liberals and conservatives is good, almost necessary, as long as they can and do respect and talk across party lines. liberals look at how to improve society, often mostly for those who have no voice or are marginalised, while conservatives remind us not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. ( )

Really good, but the last few chapters feel weirdly out of place. It goes from super-detailed psychological and biological analysis to political opinion out of nowhere. Otherwise, pretty mind-blowing. ( )

A 5 not so much because its wonderfully written (though it is well-written), but because of the information it contains and how clearly it is explained. ( )

I disagree with the use of Lord of the Flies experiments of school age children as proof of any kind of human nature.

The author maintains a WEIRD (really Sorkin West Wing) view of history and politics. He has failed to reaassess the last 400 years with new information and it makes the final parts of the book a sad drop off from something otherwise interesting. He falls for the false dichotomy of liberals and convervatives and doesn’t even scratch the surface of industrialization beyond an anechdote about leaded gasoline. Quoting adam smith in earnest should come with a trigger warning. ( )

A great book, but not perfect. Haidt addresses questions I'm really interested in and gives reasonable explanations for the way we behave in political and religious contexts. I've never seen a book that better addresses these issues from an evo psych perspective. ( )

This is an interesting book about the psychology of morality, politics, and religion. The author is knowledgeable and well researched. He provides logical arguments regarding people’s tendency to have instinctual responses to moral questions and to only secondarily rationalize their opinions. He provides logic as to why varied systems of morality have developed and examined commonality. The author provides insight into the morality and values of the left and right political views. He examines the evolutionary development of religion, its value, and purpose. One of the most important points I found was in the need to understand and value opposing political views. I liked the book and found it interesting and educational. ( )

This is a wonderfully even-handed and well-researched explanation of, well, why good people are divided by politics and religion. I've been struggling to understand the 2016 election for the last seventeen months, and I now empathize with both sides - something I wouldn't have thought possible before reading this book. ( )

It's only April, but this may well end up being the most important book I read this year.

The Righteous Mind is about morality, but it's about descriptive morality, not normative morality. It does not tell us what moral system we should have, instead, it's a deep dive into what moral systems are and why they exist. This is an important distinction. It would be easy, using the framework in this book, to describe a functionally effective moral system that you and I would consider to be immoral. Given that the driving example of this book is politics, if you're strongly partisan, you'll likely see such an example right in front of you. That is, in fact, the value of this book: it gives you a framework for understanding the persistence -- and perhaps even the value -- of systems that you might otherwise be inclined to just label as evil and illogical.

Haidt's book is organized around three central claims and accompanying metaphors.

The first claim is that intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second. Metaphor: The mind is divided, like a rider on an elephant, and the rider's job is to serve the elephant. This metaphor came from Haidt's earlier book and has become pretty popular, so it may sound familiar. This means that any explanation of human behavior that assumes that individuals are led by their rational mind is just plain wrong. This doesn't mean that human behavior is irrational in the sense of being baseless or absurd. It does mean that the reasons people think they are acting on are often incorrect or incomplete.

The second claim is that there's more to morality than harm and fairness. Metaphor: The righteous mind is like a tongue with six taste receptors. In most cultures, morality is concerned with a combination of harm, justice, liberty, loyalty, authority, and sanctity. The morality of western liberals tends to rely heavily on the first two, lightly on the third and, to varying degrees, reject the last three. Whether or not you agree all six of these are good moral foundations, it's important to understand that for much of the world -- including American conservatives -- morality is much more complex than preventing harm and increasing fairness.

The third claim is that morality binds and blinds. Metaphor: Human beings are 90 percent chimp and 10 percent bee. It's been assumed for several decades that most altruism and group positive behavior is due to enlightened self-interest -- people only do things to help the group if they can also intuit that it will help them as individuals. However, the influence of group goals and culture has helped humans evolve into creatures that can sometimes truly act in self-sacrificing ways. However, this switch cannot be flipped arbitrarily. Humans are groupish -- they'll only sacrifice for those that they see as part of their own group.

There is a lot more to the book than this, but these are the central ideas. I highly recommend reading it to see the rest. ( )

I had mixed feelings about this book. All in all, I liked it. It made me think about political discourse and want to learn more about some topics raised. That is what, for me, makes a good book.

That said, his outline of the history of moral philosophy was complicated and dry. It was when I got to the moral foundations chapter and the book grabbed me. I spent some time enthused by the insight that liberals rely on primarily two moral pillars (caring and fairness) and conservatives rely on those, along with authority, loyalty and sanctity. It explained why I often find it so hard to argue morality with conservatives.

Upon further reflection, I became less enthused. I don’t like the implication that conservatives have a broader moral base. I think liberals and conservatives have different definitions of sanctity (e.g. over our own bodies -- leading to issues around reproductive rights and sexual consent), and loyalty, and definitions of legitimate authority.

I think Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow gives a superior understanding of intuition vs. reasoning. It’s not that a reasoning rider is serving an intuitive elephant….it’s that the elephant reacts faster….necessarily so in many cases…but it isn’t in charge.

I was intrigued by the idea of a genetic basis for political ideologies. I found the discussion of both moral and group evolution fascinating, but not yet convincing….I’d need to learn more. ( )

(10) I read and enjoyed 'The Coddling of the American Mind' and came across another mention of this author and a snippet of his work and decided to read this - and I am glad that I did. It is an accessible work about moral psychology written for non-psychologists, but not dumbed down like much popular non-fiction is these days. The ideas about the evolution of morals are described in order for us to understand religion and politics - hence the subtitle - "why good people are divided by politics and religion.' And I think the book really does answer that question.

I have been struggling with internal doubts and push-back of the liberal philosophy and outlook that I have adhered to since engaging in a liberal arts education and living amongst "WEIRD" people (Westernized, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) in particular around or in academia in recent years. This book helped me to see that it is not just because I am reverting to evil-type, but instead perhaps growing wiser, more well-rounded and able to see a more full picture of human nature. This book, however, was written before Trumpism. Would love Haidt's insight on that phenomenon.

Anyway, there were a few times the book was hard to follow. Some long sentences and logic that required close reading and flipping back to previous chapters, so at times my mind wandered. I loved the story-telling from other times and cultures in history as well as the descriptions of the experiments and questionnaires that were administered. I loved the insight re: people care much more about appearing virtuous than being virtuous. And also that reasoning is done post-hoc intuition and action. Our reasoning is no more than our own internal press secretary trying to justify our actions. Great, its not just me...

Very interesting and will inform my thinking going forward. I can't give a higher rating because it was a bit dry and felt a bit dated given the moral outrage on both sides that has engulfed our world for the last 5 years. ( )

Interesting, eye-opening. I do worry that the folks to the right of me politically (nearly everyone) will not be as interested in understanding me as I am in understanding them. ( )

This ought to be required reading for anyone who truly seeks to understand "the enemy," rather than vilify. Timely, in this American age where we divide us against them, liberals versus conservatives, Democrats versus Republicans, by so many cultural memes. Well written, with short and helpful summaries/ recaps of every chapter. I listened to the audio read by the author, and he is a skilled and enthusiastic reader.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
( )

A cautious 3 stars but probably more like 2.5.

I liked:

-- his concluding 2-3 chapters,
--his definition of morality,
--his interesting research on diversity and morals(made it worth looking at the 2016 election again),
--his trip to India and drawn conclusions,
--his point about bumper stickers,
-- his explanation of the "two sides," and
--his willingness to admit to changing his opinion/research conclusions.

Now that we've gotten that out of the way...

Haidt struggles. This book presents itself, in the beginning, as a non-fiction book proving just what it says it does in the subtitle. But then it becomes a ideology travelogue, detailing the author's journey from his early years in college to his current beliefs. Solely a presentation of firm, discovered facts this is not. And it irked me. I found myself making sure, more than once, that this was not self-published (It isn't) because it was so long, gave in to so many self-interested detours, and lacked so much direction.

That isn't to say that Haidt doesn't know what he's talking about, even though I think he is crucially wrong on three major points. He's well- and widely- read and does a fantastic job summarizing research. But it lacks polish and he's avoided at least 2-3 of the similarly-minded researchers that I know were studying and publishing about this topic around that same time. Good researchers don't do that. They address all the arguments and try to focus on why their research (not their mental journey) is unique. It is a valiant second attempt at publishing a book. But it could be better.

Side note: I was also interested on why more of his research on moral development didn't make it into his most recent book, [b:The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure|36556202|The Coddling of the American Mind How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure|Jonathan Haidt|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1513836885l/36556202._SY75_.jpg|58291173] That being said, I still think that it is a fantastic book. Better editing, better writing, better direction. It just missed a couple of points that would have strengthened the argument. ( )

The Righteous Mind is psychologist/ethicist Jonathan Haidt's attempt to understand and explain why humans can come to see things so differently from each other and, most importantly, to become so set in our ways that we see people who disagree with us on important matters as enemies and/or fools.

The book, for me, works best in its first half, as Haidt lays out his research and his theories about human perceptions, how we form opinions, and what drives our responses. Essentially, his theory, based on his research, comes down to his belief that our subconscious really provides the bulk of our opinions, which are generally pre-conceived rather than based on new information, and that our conscious mind is mostly responsible for coming up with rationalizations to fit those preconceptions. If you have ever read an essay or article by someone with an opinion that's the opposite of yours, for example, and found yourself actively looking for the faults in the logic rather than trying to learn from the author's experience or perceptions, you'll understand Heidt's basic idea. He calls the subconscious the "elephant," because it's so big and powerful, and the conscious mind the "rider," because it is only nominally able to steer the beast. All this makes for interesting, and somewhat convincing, information, although Haidt's habit of turning the narrative into a semi-memoir by relating his own progression through various theories ("First I thought this, and then I saw different research, so then I thought that.") was distracting to me.

As Haidt describes it (and again, he also details his research), most humans' perceptions of the world are based on five factors, what he calls "foundational concepts," but in different proportions for different people. He identifies these as "Care/Harm," "Fairness/Cheating," "Loyalty/Betrayal," "Authority/Subversion," "Sanctity/Degradation." He says that a major difference between how liberals and conservatives view the world is that Conservatives react strongly to all five of these foundations, but that liberals are driven chiefly by only two: Care/Harm and Fairness/Cheating.

All that's all fine, and there are other interesting points made, as well, especially Haidt's description of the idea that group/societal evolution has gone hand in hand with individual human evolution. His ideas about the benefits of religion seem much more forced, however. And in the book's second half, he seems more to be trying to force all of the foregoing information over his own ideas of politics and culture. He begins doing things like describing another researcher's theory and then proceeding to further conclusions based on that theory as if we had reason to accept the theory as fact. Towards the end, I must admit, I began skimming. So I give the first half of this book 3.5 stars, and the second half 2 stars. I do give Haidt credit for clear writing, relatively free of doze-inducing scientific jargon. ( )

I found this book annoying. The author presents a conservative point of view, and I am a liberal, so that's that! But actually even if the book had presented a liberal point of view, I think I would find it almost as annoying. The fundamental problem is that the subject is profound but the book's approach is slipshod. Probably that is inevitable. It's not like we've really made any progress in the matter since e.g. Plato's Republic. There has been a lot of profound thought on the subject but mostly it just buries itself off lost on some side trail. So Haidt's book does have the advantage of being rather shotgun. It doesn't go deep so it doesn't get lost. It's superficial and casually inadequate about a broad range of important topics. Perhaps it will annoy all readers, but if it motivates folks to dig deeper, to probe various topics more thoroughly... well, that'd make it a valuable book, certainly!

The idea that conservatives have a broader more complete range of moral concerns than liberals, this is just sloppy. It's a kind of moral gerrymandering. It'd be pretty easy to chop up this moral territory and combine those moral territories to end up with a very differently voting moral Senate. This business of totaling up the scores to figure out who has more and who has less.... well, Haidt I presume has the conservative genetic pattern that drives for answers, while I have the liberal genetic pattern that is more comfortable with open questions and feels stifled by simplistic answers!

No doubt genetics is huge and we humans are built from a bunch of neural modules that somehow negotiate the illusion of an integral personhood. But the whole approach of evolutionary psychology... I find it dubious to the point of absurdity. The whole idea that our rationality is totally post hoc, that we just act on instinct and make up stories so we can look good... of course there is an element of truth in this, but take note: scientists are just as prone to this, no, actually more prone. Scientists like to take a superior pose and they generally get away with it. They exude this aura of knowing more than others, of understanding others better than those others understand themselves. Nothing actually fits the paradigm of evolutionary psychology better than evolutionary psychology itself. Can you imagine folks more like alpha chimps than people such as Daniel Dennett or Richard Dawkins or E. O. Wilson?

Anyway it's a useful enough book, if you can avoid two potential traps: don't let the sloppiness annoy you so much that you just throw the book into the trash before getting through it - it's a handy survey; don't get seduced by the easy logic into thinking anything here is worth adopting. This is huge and profoundly important territory, and this book is just a very high level jaunt through at perhaps high school level. ( )

Halfway through this book, and incredibly frustrated with the rhetorical reaching Haidt undertakes in order to claim that everyone can be equally right and what might look like bigotry has to be something morally valid instead, I decided to search the book for the word "racism". It appears 5 times (in a discussion of divisiveness in American politics, let me remind you) and each time the context is that only a close-minded liberal would think anyone would be racist. Did not continue reading. ( )

Get to know the other side

This book has been a fantastic way to learn how to not only understand the other side but speak the same language. A world tour on moral psychology, Haidt makes it accessible. ( )

I believe Jonathan Haidt has done something here that is truly remarkable. In the pursuit of wisdom, he has been able to suspend judgment long enough not only to listen empathetically but to learn from those he disagrees with. With the constant reinforcement of polarization in the media, this is becoming more and more and lost art. In the process, he offers a framework for understanding our religious and political divisions that has already helped me listen better and empathize more with others. You likely will disagree with him on certain points, but few other places will you find someone who listens and empathizes like he has.

This will be a book I read again soon and will probably purchase.

Ps. I was hesitant to read it since I had heard the 6 moral foundations framework before from others and in his TED talk (which is worth a look). However, The Righteous Mind is really three shorter books and the moral foundations part is just the middle third. In other words, there's much more here than I had heard in the summaries. I hope to give a fuller review after my second reading... ( )

Listened to the first two hours. Lots of pop-sci references, with a heavy focus on self-promotion of studies that the author himself published. Parts of the beginning that discussed morality more from a philosophical point of view were at times enjoyable.

Haidt ends the second chapter with the promise that he would focus more on logic/reason rather than emotion/intuition. Then, the very next chapter starts with him describing a study utilizing hypnosis that had some "interesting results." Honestly, the juxtaposition of those two was so incongruous that at first I thought it might have been provided as an example of poor science. But I was wrong, and Haidt goes on to use the study to further a thesis.

Not recommended. ( )

I'm familiar with Haidts vocal call for more political diversity in social science and listened to some of his talks, which is why I really wanted to read this book for a long time. In the end I wasn't disappointed. Haidt makes a good case for his moral foundations model and made me update on the evolutionary genesis (and usefulness) of religion as he heavily criticises the theories of Dawkins on this topic. Furthermore I was able to gain a better understanding of the discourse on group selection and why everybody hates it, though Haidt prepares a really good defense. Overall I feel much more informed on the nature of human morals and its shaping through the process of evolution than before. Just two minor criticisms: Haidt manages to almost completely evade the topic of kin selection, which is quite sad as I was really curious how he would analyse its importance for our morality. Furthermore I really missed something on differential moral developments based on gene-culture-coevolution for different cultures, but I understand that something like this would have been suicidal to his reputation, career and the general reception of his book. Therefore: Still 5 stars. ( )