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
... Better “There are only a few people alive today worth listening to. Robin Hanson is one of them.” —Ralph Merkle, co- inventor of public key cryptography “Brilliantly written and entertaining on every page.” — Alex Tabarrok, author of ...
... Better “There are only a few people alive today worth listening to. Robin Hanson is one of them.” —Ralph Merkle, co- inventor of public key cryptography “Brilliantly written and entertaining on every page.” — Alex Tabarrok, author of ...
الصفحة ix
... central thesis becoming widely accepted among any large population, even of scholars. As better minds than ours have long advanced similar ideas, but to little apparent effect, we suspect that human minds and cultures must Preface.
... central thesis becoming widely accepted among any large population, even of scholars. As better minds than ours have long advanced similar ideas, but to little apparent effect, we suspect that human minds and cultures must Preface.
الصفحة 2
... better at preserving quality of life. Altogether, these puzzles cast considerable doubt on the simple idea that medicine is strictly about health. To explain these and other puzzles, Robin took an approach unusual among health policy ...
... better at preserving quality of life. Altogether, these puzzles cast considerable doubt on the simple idea that medicine is strictly about health. To explain these and other puzzles, Robin took an approach unusual among health policy ...
الصفحة 7
... better to deceive others.” We start with evolutionary psychology, but we don't end there. We continue to seek hidden motives at larger social levels, taking inspiration from Thorstein Veblen, an economist and sociologist writing roughly ...
... better to deceive others.” We start with evolutionary psychology, but we don't end there. We continue to seek hidden motives at larger social levels, taking inspiration from Thorstein Veblen, an economist and sociologist writing roughly ...
الصفحة 8
... better than one really is.”5 Emily Pronin calls it the introspection illusion, the fact that we don't know our own minds nearly as well as we pretend to. For the price of a little self- deception, we get to have our cake and eat it too ...
... better than one really is.”5 Emily Pronin calls it the introspection illusion, the fact that we don't know our own minds nearly as well as we pretend to. For the price of a little self- deception, we get to have our cake and eat it too ...
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