Fun, Easy, Quick Read
In this intriguing little book Jonah Lehrer explores the interplay between emotion and logic in decision making. When should we force back our emotions and engage in logical cost-benefit analysis? Credit cards, totally new situations that we have no experience in, when we can't outrun the fire, etc. When should we rely on instinct and turn our brain off? (When we have a lot of experience and no time to think, such as Tom Brady on his 3rd read with a linebacker closing in, or an opera singer halfway through the song, etc.) When should we get some data, sleep on it, and then decide based on emotion? (When buying houses, cars, or furniture).
Chapter 7 caught my interest the most, as he discussed the brain issues involved with Mormons and Republicans. well, he didn't call it that, he called it political partisans who have the sin of certainty, and it works in all ways, but I have been observing and contemplating such minds daily since I returned to Utah after law school in December 2006, and in my zip code, it is Mormons and Republicans who are overcertain about everything, big and little.
Contrast all of what follows with Abraham Lincoln as described in 'Team of Rivals', as he purposely filled his cabinet with intellectual and ideological diversity as much as he can. And with Colin Powell, who always asked for 1- what you know 2- what you don't know and 3- what you think, emphasizing that all 3 must always be kept seperate.
A brain that's intolerant of uncertainty- that can't stand the argument- often tricks itself into thinking the wrong thing. You just can't short-circuit the process. Unfortunately, the mind often surrenders to the temptation of shoddy top-down thinking. Voters with strong partisan affiliations are a case study in how not for form opinions: their brains are shoddy and impermeable, since they already know what they believe. 9 of 10 registered members of a political party vote for the same party 15 years later.
They put partisans in a fMRI machine and exposed them to inconsistencies and conflicting evidence regarding their preferred candidate. The brains showed them use reason to reinforce their certainty. "Once the subjects had arrived at favorable interpretations of the evidence, blithely excusing the contradictions of their chosen candidate, they activated the internal reward circuits in their brains and experienced a rush of pleasurable emotion. Self-delusion, in other words, felt really good. Partisans twirl the cognitive kaleidoscope until they get the conclusions they want, and then they get massively reinforced for it, with the elimination of negative emotional states and activation of positive ones."
This flawed thought process plays a crucial role in our lives. Partisans are convinced that they are rational- and the other side is irrational- but actually, all of us are rationalizers. They can prove this all the time. Politically active Republicans, involved and informed, by large margins, got basic facts wrong about things like the direction of the deficit under Clinton. People assimilate facts that agree with what they already think and reject the rest.
"Voters think they are thinking, but what they're really doing is inventing facts or ignoring facts so that they can rationalize decisions they've already made." The world is edited to fit the ideology. At this point, rationality actually becomes a liability, because our prefrontal cortex is just a filter, allowing us to justify practically any belie
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