Sublime

The attentive System 2 is who we think we are. System 2 articulates judgments and makes choices, but it often endorses or rationalizes ideas and feelings that were generated by System 1. You

Thus Carol Gilligan, a psychologist, demonstrates how women’s moral values tend to stress responsibility, whereas men emphasize rights. Women look to context, where men appeal to neutral, abstract notions of justice. In particular, she argues, women endorse an ‘ethic of care’ which proclaims that no one should be hurt. This morality of caring and

The subtlety of this deception is that if the performer fails to fully engage the man’s conscious mind, then the clever volunteer will realize he’s being programmed and decide to choose another card—the trick won’t

How can we make sense of these gradations of moral responsibility when brains and their background influences are in every case, and to exactly the same degree, the real cause of a woman’s death?

Some of the most interesting thinking on this topic comes from David Livingstone Smith, who explores dehumanization from the standpoint of psychological essentialism. He draws on research suggesting that people usually think of themselves and those close to them as possessing a special human essence. But not everyone is seen this way.

People feel (or presume) an authorship of their thoughts and actions that is illusory.

The idea of old age had not come to their conscious awareness, but their actions had changed nevertheless. This remarkable priming phenomenon—the influencing of an action by the idea—is known as the ideomotor effect. Although you surely were not aware of it, reading this paragraph primed you as well. If you had needed to stand up to get

heavily biased towards things we have just encountered. Studies have shown that when people are primed with a concept – like ‘rudeness’, for example – they are then more likely to interrupt someone, and when primed with the concept of old age, they are more likely to walk more slowly.2 Similarly, people primed with the concepts of luxury or thrift

Free will is an illusion. Our wills are simply not of our own making. Thoughts and intentions emerge from background causes of which we are unaware and over which we exert no conscious control. We do not have the freedom we think we have.