Mindscape 227 | Molly Crockett on the Psychology of Morality
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- Опубліковано 19 лют 2023
- Patreon: / seanmcarroll
Blog post with audio player, show notes, and transcript: www.preposterousuniverse.com/...
Most of us strive to be good, moral people. When we are doing that striving, what is happening in our brains? Some of our moral inclinations seem pretty automatic and subconscious. Other times we have to sit down and deploy our full cognitive faculties to reason through a tricky moral dilemma. I talk with psychologist Molly Crockett about where our moral intuitions come from, how they can sometimes serve as cover for bad behaviors, and how morality shapes our self-image.
Molly J. Crockett received her Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology from the University of Cambridge. She is currently Associate Professor of Psychology and University Center for Human Values at Princeton University. She is a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science and the Society for Experimental Social Psychology.
Mindscape Podcast playlist: • Mindscape Podcast
Sean Carroll channel: / seancarroll
#podcast #ideas #science #philosophy #culture - Наука та технологія
Excellent conversation! Thank you Molly & Sean.
I'm 99% certain I went to the same grade school as her. How surreal to suddenly run into this podcast three decades later.
One of my favorite convos on here! My friend even wrote a paper on collective effervescence so I was so excited to hear that phrase!
Good conversation. Although I got fixated on the guest's pronounced vocal fry and probably missed half of what was said :)
What I'd like to know is why the terms "mad scientist" and "evil genius" are so commonly used in our entertainment when most activities we might describe as evil seem to be perpetrated by people of limited intelligence, often under the guise of religion. Why are science and intelligence so suspect in the general population?
Because people who know everything are terrified of the unknown?
Just a guess. ;)
Because as you say people of limited Intelligence have limited reach.
But an evil genius or mad scientist!?
I don't think it's true that most people we describe as evil are of lower or average intelligence. Often, they are above average. And I don't think most of them are under the guise of religion. Mad scientists and evil geniuses are popular archetypes for science fiction and superhero movies. You may as well ask why good guys have to seem so polite all the time, and evil people need to seem rude. In reality, it's often not obvious that someone is evil. They usually hide it well.
But evil is a complex topic that you need to really pay attention to in the context of the situation. Are meat eaters evil? Will they, in 100 years, be considered evil? I honestly think there are very few people who would describe themselves as evil. Hitler is described as evil. But he wouldn't have described himself as evil. During the same time, the United States dropped 2 nuclear bombs on Japan's citizens. Is that evil? People at the time thought it was justified.
Now I'm getting off topic, but I guess evil is just a complex topic. It's true that people use religion for power and that many abuses occur in places of concentrated power. I can only wonder what goes on in some places like North Korea. We know a little, but not a lot.
I think your point was more whether we are scared of intelligence and see it as bad. I think so. For instance, ai is popular these days. Are we right to be scared of it? Intellect is a form of power, and people could use it for their own gain, or simply with neglect for other people. It could also just get out of hand like Frankenstein monster. One of the main themes of "Frankenstein" is the danger of playing God and the unintended consequences of scientific discovery. This theme is also relevant to AI, as many people are concerned about the potential risks associated with creating intelligent machines that are capable of surpassing human intelligence and control.
Because the Industrial Revolution, the nuclear bomb and AI are man-made existential threats.
@@trout3685 you are not correct. Prisons are filled with people with low intelligence. The Hannibal Lecter silent and controlled psychopath is a creation of fiction. Most of the real ones suffer with very poor self-control and low intelligence.
BIG LOVE AND THANKS for this marvelous conversation. Sean Carroll, such a font of knowledge, such a generous, good hearted person. Still, kind of fun to see him so bothered by the strong likelihood that he's missing out on something by not practicing meditation.
Hello Molly & Sean
On meditation or mindfulness being transformative and Sean’s friends being seemingly unchanged, I would askon:
“How much did they IMMEDIATELY attempt to use their new action space compared to others within the group, or other groups
When trying to increase the range of mobility of a joint the most important practice to affect change is perhaps to:
Immediately use that new space
Immediately.
You must engage the joint while it is primed for change to see any noticeable gains.
There is a temporal component that can not be ignored.
1-Reset - Alignment
2-Restore - Open Doors to Potential Space
3-Reprogram - Use That Space
My assumption is that there is something like this going on with attempts to change the neurology of a brain instead of the neurology of a joint.
How much reprogramming did Sean’s friends immediately engage in?
Would it have mattered?
Molly, I can not wait to see your paper coming out.
Wishes
John
I love her hair! It's wyld 😆 . Chaotic Entropy at its finest. I find perfection in pure disorder.
Holy heck.. she's on to something. When both parties realize that 'they' want us to fight with one another and the two party system is meant to distract and divide.. only then can we ascend for the better.
Morality is relative, and throughout history it has been used to justify issues that today, we would consider to be "immoral." Morality is generally whatever current society agrees upon on at the time. Imagine all of the things deemed perfectly "moral" in modern times, and then imagine someone from a different era/moral context arriving in the future. There's a good chance that they would be disgusted by many things, and find the current human porject unrelatable. The point being, we don't know what will be considered moral, or immoral in the distant future because t's not up to us. Many of the important things we think we are fighting for right now could easily be seen as mere ideological/moral panics by future generations. Religious proponents should be all too familiar with this phenomenon. Look what is deemed acceptable now, compared to what they thought would lead to the end of the world if accepted?
Morality is objective. :) try making a coherent argument without taking for granted that we all objectively know what is meant by something being good/bad
I am a terrible Human Being.
another reason health care and particularly mental healthcare needs more money, cos mental health affects the morality of the future.
if someone has hallucinations that they have to kill someone then they have to be separated from society, but really it's the chemical imbalance or neurological imbalance that should be in the cell - there have been cases of drastic personality changes due to outside forces - the guy who got the spike through his head, and another who had a brain tumour which was removed - it's the spike and the tumour that require incarceration, not the person.
as molly says _some_ people love the idea of punishment.
hopefully one day medication / surgery / other therapies will be effective to the point where the need to incarcerate people is at least minimal, but then that begs the question, how far do you take "cures" for "undesirable behaviors" - who you vote for as an example. i'm close to two people who could be diagnosed as schizophrenic and i wonder how much their respective personalities would be altered if "cures" where possible, because the each have entirely different symptoms. one is incredibly creative, the other has no interest in just about anything.
is curing folks of mental illness - or even ANY criminal behavior - dicking with their "free will".
Thank you Molly and Sean for sharing the conversation with us, Dr. Crockett, you might enjoy the work Gregg Henriques is involved in today, on his UTOK channel on utb. About 37 minutes Molly you said that someone else might say "this isn't real because it wasn't real yesterday". Is dismissive of the very nature of your work, human beings have been questioning things and learning from the beginning, evolution isn't going to stop working, because of the news provide today. If I could recommend another individual it would be John Vervaeke. Peace
@20:30 Regarding the evolutionary challenge to moral realism (ECMR) as stated, consider making the same argument regarding basic mathematical reasoning. Most humans and some nonhuman animals understand how to reason using addition. But on ECMR, isn't it odd that evolution converged on addition? I don't see what ECMR could possibly buy us in considering moral realism or non-realism, since the same argument would apply to logical and mathematical reasoning (and most people advancing ECMR are not antirealists regarding logic and math).
Isn't the difference that mathematical realists believe all mathematical objects are real (whether people or animals use them or not), whereas moral realists believe there are objective moral facts? One has to do with a whole system being real and the other has to do with only specific statements in a system being real.
'I go to Burning Man, but it's not about the psychedelia.' well then what's the point?
I've learned that the Burning Man community encourages sharing everything, no litter, and things that differ from "other festivals" so maybe there's a specific type of data coming from that source?
Do not harm the weak , the vulnerable, the oppressed, or any sentient being. Causing NEEDLess suffering to a non human animal is wrong. Regardless of your upbringing, norms, culture. Change is inevitable.
Assured priorities change after being exposed to substances so they do have permanent changes in ones life. Sean, you’ve not see this because your still working working working working……….
What do orcs and demons do on their days off?
Be bad of course. What
Why are all the Prof's female guests so beautiful?
@@mrnarason Well, _he_ chooses to have their photos displayed prominently. I thought it merited comment.
@@mrnarason Like you didn't notice.
♉
From the start she sounds more like a politician then a scientist.
Lol how?
more like a teen starbucks waiter, to me.
her tone and accent gave me a very hard time trying to get her ideas, and even to the end of the episode.
"Rallies on the right"
Yawn. Do I bother continuing listening?
@@epochalypsemeow5732 "how"?
😂😂😂
@Morality Psychology of Morality does not exist rather spirituality of morality that exist which is subjective, soul based and vertical between you/creature and Creator based on your faith regardless of loyal/non loyal or believer/non believer so it is clear the real world is in moral decay like corruption of soul. Ethics is human/institutional construct even this is not working because of hypocrisy let alone in centralized non local institution even in decentralized local institution around the world. Norm is social/culture construct that exist even before modern institution existence including mediation unlike litigation or negotiation in solving human affair problem are not working due to external interference and generation gap. so if you do not know the real problem and then you do not know real world solution which is sleep walking to human extinction called wake up by making movement.
Bias affects everyone as evidenced by the only negative mobs she could name or chose to name at the 7:50 mark. She could have easily added the many violent mob protests throughout 2020 but she leans that way politically so those were positive mobs I guess.
I think the reason behind a protest is important. BLM protests comes from a much different place than Nazi rallies. That being an imagined threat vs an experienced one
@@seionne85 I think that a lot of protests that might have started as BLM protests based on righteous reasons turned into thug run smash and grabs and the unlawful burning of businesses mostly belonging to the people they were purporting to support. Additionally given that the entire movement of BLM seems to be devolving into a financial fraud makes the entire thing suspect despite its birth in good intentions. The moment you start burning businesses and destroying cities you lose all credibility, add to that the theft involved and well, it's pretty clear that the virtues of the few were not the intent of the many.
@@JohnnyProv sure, but her point wasn't to show how a justified movement can be corrupted, but how a group of people can be driven to action based on an imagined threat. Ie Nazis, Jan 6 rioters, and people who think all Mexicans are criminals
Exactly.
@@seionne85 marxism?
I was skeptical when she said that science isn't really objective and that she's interested in moving from the descriptive to prescriptive. And then she revealed that her thinking is very politically motivated. Highly problematic, even though I probably agree with some of the prescriptions she implies, she goes about advocating for her ideas in an indirect, dishonest, motivated manner.