The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion (Anniversary Edition) (Second Edition)

American social psychology master Jonathan Haidt's
Classic work on reforming ethics
 
The mind is divided, like a rider on an elephant, and the rider's job is to serve the elephant.
The righteous heart is like the tongue, with six taste receptors.
Humans are ninety percent chimpanzee and ten percent bee.
Morality unites people, but also blinds them.
 
Why does everyone (except myself) seem like a hypocrite?
Everyone is blind when talking about goals they consider sacred.
 
▲Where do human morality and sense of justice come from?
▲Why does the diversity of morality so easily split a group of good people into several hostile groups unwilling to understand each other?
▲How do the psychological characteristics and moral views of liberals and conservatives differ? Why do right-wing politicians have an inherent advantage in cooking up dishes that voters love?
▲In a world polarized by politics and religion, can we use psychological techniques to remove the "righteous" splinter from our own eyes?
 
Human nature is not only moral, but also preachy, critical, judgmental, and obsessed with righteousness, which inevitably leads to self-righteousness — I am right, you are wrong — creating a dualistic and divisive situation. Politics and religion are two major arenas where people fight each other, as if the fate of the world depends on our side winning every battle.
 
Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt uses twenty-five years of groundbreaking research in moral psychology to demonstrate that moral judgment does not stem from reason, but from intuition. Our mind is divided; the rational rider serves the emotional elephant. The rider invents various arguments and reasons for what the elephant intuitively finds disgusting or sacred, thereby making moral judgments. What is truly just? An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth? Do not do to others what you would not want done to yourself? The basic principles of morality are like the tongue with six taste receptors: care, fairness, loyalty, authority, sanctity, and liberty, which form the various "moral matrices" of the world. People with similar moral matrices gather together to form groups. We are inherently selfish chimpanzees, but at the same time we are also "all for one and one for all" bees, willing to sacrifice ourselves to protect the hive from invaders. This bee-like nature leads to altruism, heroism, and also war, genocide...
 
Morality unites people, but it also blinds them to the facts. This book uses the latest research results from neuroscience, genetics, social psychology, and evolutionary models to explain why humans find it difficult to get along, and then helps us understand our own limitations and potential, let go of moralistic standards, and use psychological techniques to analyze this game of human life. We should all know that we are nothing more than self-righteous hypocrites.