The Elephant in the Brain: Hidden Motives in Everyday LifeOxford University Press, 01/12/2017 - 288 من الصفحات Human beings are primates, and primates are political animals. Our brains, therefore, are designed not just to hunt and gather, but also to help us get ahead socially, often via deception and self-deception. But while we may be self-interested schemers, we benefit by pretending otherwise. The less we know about our own ugly motives, the better - and thus we don't like to talk or even think about the extent of our selfishness. This is "the elephant in the brain." Such an introspective taboo makes it hard for us to think clearly about our nature and the explanations for our behavior. The aim of this book, then, is to confront our hidden motives directly - to track down the darker, unexamined corners of our psyches and blast them with floodlights. Then, once everything is clearly visible, we can work to better understand ourselves: Why do we laugh? Why are artists sexy? Why do we brag about travel? Why do we prefer to speak rather than listen? Our unconscious motives drive more than just our private behavior; they also infect our venerated social institutions such as Art, School, Charity, Medicine, Politics, and Religion. In fact, these institutions are in many ways designed to accommodate our hidden motives, to serve covert agendas alongside their "official" ones. The existence of big hidden motives can upend the usual political debates, leading one to question the legitimacy of these social institutions, and of standard policies designed to favor or discourage them. You won't see yourself - or the world - the same after confronting the elephant in the brain. |
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الصفحة ix
... less of a claim to originality . Our basic thesis - that we are strategically blind to key aspects of our motives - has been around in some form or another for millennia . It's been put forward not only by poets , playwrights , and ...
... less of a claim to originality . Our basic thesis - that we are strategically blind to key aspects of our motives - has been around in some form or another for millennia . It's been put forward not only by poets , playwrights , and ...
الصفحة 3
... less than fully aware of them . And they aren't mere mouse - sized motives , scurrying around discreetly in the back recesses of our minds . These are elephant - sized motives large enough to leave footprints in national economic data ...
... less than fully aware of them . And they aren't mere mouse - sized motives , scurrying around discreetly in the back recesses of our minds . These are elephant - sized motives large enough to leave footprints in national economic data ...
الصفحة 4
... less than fully conscious of such important motives ? Biology teaches us that we're competitive social ani- mals , with all the instincts you'd expect from such creatures . And con- sciousness is useful - that's why it evolved . So ...
... less than fully conscious of such important motives ? Biology teaches us that we're competitive social ani- mals , with all the instincts you'd expect from such creatures . And con- sciousness is useful - that's why it evolved . So ...
الصفحة 5
... less we know of our own ugly motives , the easier it is to hide them from others . Self - deception is therefore strategic , a ploy our brains use to look good while behaving badly . Understandably , few people are eager to confess to ...
... less we know of our own ugly motives , the easier it is to hide them from others . Self - deception is therefore strategic , a ploy our brains use to look good while behaving badly . Understandably , few people are eager to confess to ...
الصفحة 8
... less savory agendas . As Trivers puts it : " At every single stage [ of processing information ] -from its biased arrival , to its biased encoding , to organizing it around false logic , to misremembering and then misrepresenting it to ...
... less savory agendas . As Trivers puts it : " At every single stage [ of processing information ] -from its biased arrival , to its biased encoding , to organizing it around false logic , to misremembering and then misrepresenting it to ...
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actually advertise altruism ancestors animal apparatchik Arabian babbler asked babblers behavior beliefs benefit better body language bowerbird brains Bryan Caplan Chapter charity cheating coalitions competition consider conspicuous conspicuous consumption consumers costs course CRIMESTOP Do-Right donate effect elephant especially evolutionary psychology example explain fact feel forager friends function Geoffrey Miller give going grooming Haidt Hajj hidden motives human Ibid important incentives individual laugh laughter less listeners look loyalty male mates medicine Miller minds norms ourselves patients peers percent person play political Press Secretary prestige primates prosocial puzzles reasons religion religious Robert Trivers Robin Hanson self-deception selfish signal simply social social grooming someone spend split-brain status Steve Jobs there's things tion Trivers typically voters voting we’re what's words Zhao Gao