The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion

Jonathan Haidt's book, "The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics" explores the psychological underpinnings of morality, politics, and religion. Haidt challenges the rationalist view of morality, arguing instead for the "social intuitionist model," where moral intuitions (the "elephant") come first, and strategic reasoning (the "rider") serves primarily to justify those initial gut feelings. The text discusses the Moral Foundations Theory, suggesting that human morality is built upon a finite set of innate and universal psychological foundations beyond just Care/harm and Fairness/cheating, introducing concepts like Loyalty/betrayal, Authority/subversion, Sanctity/degradation, and Liberty/oppression. Furthermore, Haidt introduces the "hive hypothesis" to explain human groupishness and collective emotions, which bind groups together for competition and cooperation, asserting that political ideologies like liberalism and conservatism are based on different weightings of these moral foundations.