In my opinion, it is very interesting and easy to read. In The Righteous Mind, Haidt presents many of the conclusions he has drawn after years of studying morality. Finally, Haidt suggests that both right and left politics are necessary and compares them to the yin and yang. This means that we are selfish creatures that long to be part of something larger than ourselves and that can be triggered to work for the good of the group.

Haidt uses the metaphor that human beings are 90% chimpanzee and 10% bee. He also argues that people from the left base their morality only on three of the six (Care/harm, Liberty/oppression, and Fairness/cheating Foundations”) while people from the right rest their morality on the six of them.įinally the third part is about the principle that “ morality blinds and binds”. The Sanctity/Degradation Foundation and 6. This is where he explains the Moral Foundations Theory, the six sets of values on which we base moral decisions: 1. In this case, Haidt uses the metaphor of the righteous mind as “a tongue with six taste receptors”. The second part focuses on another principle: “ There’s more to morality than harm and fairness”. So you can’t change someone’s opinion only with reasonable arguments, you have to talk to his or her elephant. In other words, intuitions come first and reasoning just helps us find evidence for what we believe in the first place. To illustrate this principle he uses a metaphor depicting the mind as a rider (reason) on an elephant (intuition) and he explains that the rider’s function is to serve the elephant. In the first one, Haidt explains the first principle of moral psychology: “ Intuitions come first, strategic reason second”. The Righteous Mind is divided into three parts. He also argues that moral psychology is the key to understanding politics and religion. In addition, Haidt has also written three books, one of which is the New York Times Bestseller The Righteous Mind, in which he explains what morality is and its origin. He has given four TED talks as well as published a great number of articles. He has co-developed the Moral Foundations Theory (which he talks about in the book) and the research website.

His research examines the intuitive foundations of morality, and how morality varies across cultures. from the University of Pennsylvania and he also taught for 16 years in the department of psychology at the University of Virginia.

Haidt is a social psychologist at New York University’s Stern School of Business. The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion is a book written by Jonathan Haidt. However, due to the lack of reviews and resources of The Righteous Mind in Spanish, I have also published a Spanish version, which can be found at « La mente de los justos» Reseña. I usually write my reviews in the language in which I have read the book, in this case, in English.

The righteous mind review