Jonathan Haidt Quotes

“Anyone who values truth should stop worshipping reason.”

“Groups create supernatural beings not to explain the universe but to order their societies.”

“If you grow up in a weird society, you become so well educated in the ethic of autonomy that you can detect oppression and inequality even where the apparent victims see nothing wrong.”

“If you really want to change someone’s mind on a moral or political matter, you’ll need to see things from that person’s angle as well as your own. And if you do truly see it the other person’s way—deeply and intuitively—you might even find your own mind opening in response. Empathy is an antidote to righteousness, although it’s very difficult to empathize across a moral divide.”

“If you think that moral reasoning is something we do to figure out the truth, you’ll be constantly frustrated by how foolish, biased, and illogical people become when they disagree with you.”

“Intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.”

“Morality binds and blinds. It binds us into ideological teams that fight each other as though the fate of the world depended on our side winning each battle. It blinds us to the fact that each team is composed of good people who have something important to say.”

“Our moral thinking is much more like a politician searching for votes than a scientist searching for truth.”

“People who devote their lives to studying something often come to believe that the object of their fascination is the key to understanding everything.”

“Sacredness binds people together, and then blinds them to the arbitrariness of the practice.”

“Science is a smorgasbord, and Google will guide you to the study that's right for you.”

“The human mind is a story processor, not a logic processor.”

“Understanding the simple fact that morality differs around the world, and even within societies, is the first step toward understanding your righteous mind.”

“When a group of people make something sacred, the members of the cult lose the ability to think clearly about it. Morality binds and blinds.”