Here’s a summary of what I learned in Step 3 using the Open Mind app:
- Our minds are divided into two parts that sometimes conflict: the elephant represents our quick, automatic intuitive thinking; the rider represents our slow, effortful reasoning.
- We often fall prey to post hoc reasoning, the process in which our elephant makes a snap moral judgment, and our rider works to justify it.
- A common form of post hoc reasoning is when we seek or interpret information in a way that confirms our preexisting beliefs, which is called confirmation bias.
- Our reasoning becomes even less reliable when we are motivated to reach a particular conclusion, especially when a moral issue is at stake.
- As a result, it can be difficult to convince other people to change their minds, especially on moral issues—because their brains, just like ours, are wired in these ways.
In our next post in this seried, we will explore the moral matrix. Stay tuned.