I'd like to take a break from chronicling Katnys's moral descent in order to bring to your attention a podcast that a colleague recommended to me recently. In it, Jonathan Haidt discusses some of the psychology that informs certain moral stances, which is a key concept in my consideration of moral issues within Skyrim. While the whole podcast is worth a listen, the following except from the transcript is particularly relevant:
Ms. Tippett: Mm-hmm. You use some really, um, helpful metaphors and analogies. You talk about the moral matrix. Um, give us that. That...
Dr. Haidt: Okay, first, so yeah, that comes straight out of the movie The Matrix.
Ms. Tippett: Right.
Dr. Haidt: The matrix is a
consensual hallucination. And that’s kind of cool. And you know, the
internet, and all that stuff. But, um, it was just the perfect metaphor
for the moral world that we live in. It defines what’s true and what’s
not true. Um, it is a closed epistemic world. What I mean by that is, it
has within it everything it needs to prove itself. And it has within it
defenses against any possible argument that could be thrown at it. Um,
it’s impossible to see the defects in your own moral matrix, so again...
Ms. Tippett: So it becomes impossible to think beyond.
Dr. Haidt: Exactly.
Ms. Tippett: Mm-hmm.
Dr. Haidt: Exactly. And that’s
why foreign travel is so good, getting disoriented is so good, reading
literature can be so good. Uh, so, there are ways of it getting out of
your moral matrix. But it’s hard, especially in the context of any — any
sort of intergroup conflict. Then it — we’re just locked into it, and
our goal is defend the matrix, defeat theirs.
Ms. Tippett: Mm-hmm. You know, I
think a question that gets raised in this country, and I imagine that
it might be on people’s minds in this room right now is, um, that the
people who most would benefit from those relationships...
Dr. Haidt: Mm-hmm.
Ms. Tippett: ...or from stepping
outside or seeing beyond their matrix, are precisely the ones who are
not going to go on the trips to the West Bank, right?
Dr. Haidt: Right. Yeah.
Ms. Tippett: Or whatever the
other examples would be. Now, I think that we in this culture — we tend
to actually focus on the extreme poles, and think that they are the ones
who have to be convinced. And we always center the debates around them,
and maybe that’s what we do wrong. Do we need those — do we need those
extremists, or do we...
Dr. Haidt: No, we don’t.
Ms. Tippett: ...start without them and that’s fine?
Dr. Haidt: Yeah. So, first, uh,
let me be clear, that while each side, uh, can’t see the flaws in its
own matrix, there is a symmetry here, and left and right are similar in
some ways. But one of the clearest differences between left and right,
psychologically, is that the left is generally universalist, almost to a
fault. And the right is parochial. Um, often to a fault. And what I
mean by parochial isn’t just narrow-minded, and dumb. What I mean is,
um, the — so we have a survey at yourmorals.org where we ask like how
much do you care about, or think about, or value people in your
community? People in your country? People in the world at large? And,
you know, okay, so, uh, conservatives value people in their nation and
their community much more than people in the world at large.
Ms. Tippett: Mm-hmm.
Dr. Haidt: Well, then you might
say, okay, well, that’s parochial. But what do liberals do? Liberals on
our survey actually say they value people in the world at large more
than people in their own country or than people in their community. So
liberals are so universalist they often don’t really pay much attention
to their own groups, as my mother said about my grandfather, who was a
labor organizer. He loved humanity so much that he didn’t really have
much time to care for his family.
The entire podcast can be found here: http://www.onbeing.org/program/jonathan-haidt-the-psychology-behind-morality/6341
I may have you check out yourmorals.org. I don't normally take those personality test/survey things, but this seems interesting.
ReplyDeleteThanks, DannyJ. I've only taken one survey so far (moral foundations), and the results were fascinating, but not entirely surprising; for example, I seem to value authority like a conservative, but de-value loyalty like a liberal, which squares with Lothar's profile.
DeleteLike you, I don't often do personality quizzes, but I couldn't help but do the Alignment Chart (I forget the site -- something on Facebook): I got Neutral Good. Again, not surprising.
It says that I have the loyalty of a conservative, the harm/care and fairness of a liberal, and I more or less fall directly in the middle point between the two sides for purity.
DeleteWhat made me laugh was the authority score, which I apparently devalue to a shocking degree. Which is true, I guess. I don't exactly consider myself a rebel, but I think anyone who had teachers like mine would develop a distrust for authority figures. Some of the men and women who taught me were legendarily incompetent.
Are you finished posting to this blog? It's been a couple months, and I'm feeling that sad, nostalgia feeling. haha.
ReplyDeleteThe past few months have presented some extra challenges at work -- good challenges, but time-consuming nonetheless. I'm now making a concerted effort to reconnect with my hobbies, so I should be posting more regularly now.
DeleteThanks for checking in!
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