The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion (Your Coach in a Box)

by Jonathan Haidt

The bestseller that challenges conventional thinking about morality, politics, and religion in a way that speaks to conservatives and liberals alike—a “landmark contribution to humanity’s understanding of itself” (The New York Times Book Review).

Drawing on his twenty-five years of groundbreaking research on moral psychology, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt shows how moral judgments arise not from reason but from gut feelings. He shows why liberals, conservatives, and libertarians have such different intuitions about right and wrong, and he shows why each side is actually right about many of its central concerns.

In this subtle yet accessible book, Haidt gives you the key to understanding the miracle of human cooperation, as well as the curse of our eternal divisions and conflicts. If you’re ready to trade in anger for understanding, read The Righteous Mind.
 

• ISBN10: 0307455777
• ISBN13: 9780307455772
• Publish Date: 12 February 2013 (first published 1 January 2012)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Random House USA Inc
• Imprint: Random House Inc
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 528
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780307455772

Reviews

[Jeff Sexton]

Does NOT Predict July 2024 Assassination Attempt of President Trump. This is a book I've had for a few years now - apparently I purchased my copy in 2020, several years after it had been out, and I just this month read it after an Acton Institute Fellow claimed on Twitter that this book "predicted in 2012" that something like the assassination attempt of President Trump would occur.  

 

To be clear, if there is any indication at all of such a prediction, I must have missed it somehow.

 

Instead, what this book *does* do is show Haidt's own work as a psychology based sociologist, studying both societies and how the brain gets to the decisions it makes. Here, Haidt actually has a lot of seemingly solid ideas... though it is clear in looking through the one star reviews that few on the left appreciate his candor, despite his own admitted background (and presumptive leanings at the time of writing this, at minimum, back in 2011 or so) being as a leftist himself.

 

Yet Haidt makes his points clearly and logically, and actively builds concepts up rather than just expecting the reader to understand complex points from the get-go. The narrative is well laid out, and the overall writing is such that nearly anyone should be able to follow along reasonably well.  

 

I can't speak to the bibliography, as I listened to the Audible form of this book and thus don't have access to that particular information.

 

Thus, all that I can see here, all that I experienced here, was a reasonably well written, clearly thought out narrative structure that made clear Haidt's own work and the work of others in his field in a way that proves particularly illuminating and worthy of conisderation.

 

Indeed, in the points Haidt actually makes within this text, we can all learn to understand each other quite a bit better... which actually leans to this book *not* predicting any assassination attempts on current or former Presidents.

 

Still, I'm glad I finally got around to reading this book, and I absolutely recommend you do too... just don't think it makes any predictions on current events. (It doesn't.)

 

Very much recommended.