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Jonathan Haidt

Jonathan Haidt Quotes

Psychologist

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Famous Jonathan Haidt Quotes

“Over and over again, psychologists find that the human mind reacts to bad things more quickly, strongly and persistenly than to equivalent good things. We can't just will ourselves to see everything as good because our minds are wired to find and react to threats, violations, and setbacks.”

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Book:The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom
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“Here is Epictetus, in the first century CE, lamenting the human tendency to let others control our emotions: If your body was turned over to just anyone, you would doubtless take exception. Why aren't you ashamed that you have made your mind vulnerable to anyone who happens to criticize you, so that it automatically becomes confused and upset? Anyone who checks their "mentions" on social media, or has ever been thrown for a loop by what somebody posted about them, will understand Epictetus's concern.”

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Book:The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness
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“To understand most important ideas in psychology, you need to understand how the mind is divided into parts that sometimes conflict. We assume that there is one person in each body, but in some ways we are each more like a committee whose members have been thrown together to do a job, but who often find themselves working at cross purposes.”

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Author:Jonathan Haidt
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“The social intuitionist model offers an explanation of why moral and political arguments are so frustrating: because moral reasons are the tail wagged by the intuitive dog. A dog’s tail wags to communicate. You can’t make a dog happy by forcibly wagging its tail. And you can’t change people’s minds by utterly refuting their arguments.”

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