The Righteous Mind - Jonathan Haidt - BBC interview 2012.04.10

[See also the CBC interview at http://concen.org/tracker/torrents-details.php?id=29650 and the book itself at http://anonym.to/?http://concen.org/tracker/torrents-details.php?id=29628).]

This item is intended as a supplement to the CBC TV documentary recently posted by yeti - CBC Doc Zone - The Truth About Liars (2009) (http://concen.org/tracker/torrents-details.php?id=28760). This interview begins with the BBC news presenter, Robin Lustig (see right hand photo below), suggesting that all of us lie and deceive in various ways on a very routine basis.

A recent book review in the New York Times says:

You’re smart. You’re liberal. You’re well informed. You think conservatives are narrow-minded. You can’t understand why working-class Americans vote Republican. You figure they’re being duped. You’re wrong.

This isn’t an accusation from the right. It’s a friendly warning from Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist at the University of Virginia who, until 2009, considered himself a partisan liberal. In The ­Righteous Mind, Haidt seeks to enrich liberalism, and political discourse generally, with a deeper awareness of human nature. Like other psychologists who have ventured into political coaching, such as George Lakoff and Drew Westen, Haidt argues that people are fundamentally intuitive, not rational. If you want to persuade others, you have to appeal to their sentiments. But Haidt is looking for more than victory. He’s looking for wisdom. That’s what makes The ­Righteous Mind well worth reading. Politics isn’t just about ­manipulating people who disagree with you. It’s about learning from them.