{"slug":"philosophy-of-psychology","title":"Philosophy of psychology","date":"2026-04-22T08:43:18.535Z","excerpt":"","tags":["psychology","philosophy"],"order":69,"published":true,"content":"

Systematic reasoning errors

A realistic view would take into account the fact that rational agents can make reasoning errors, such as the occasional performance error that is attributed to some interfering factor (e.g., lack of concentration) (see Box 1B), but they do not make systematic reasoning errors. Thus, rationality is compatible with occasional reasoning errors, but it is not compatible with systematic reasoning errors

Competence vs Performance

When you attempt a task and fail, one of two things may be happening: either you do not have the capacity to accurately perform the task due to some knowledge-gap, or you have the capacity to accurately perform the task but fail to perform it accurately on a particular occasion due to external factors (such as a distraction).

Example: Gina and Tommaso were asked to calculate the square of four by their teacher. Gina did not answer at all because she did not know that the square of a number is the number multiplied by itself. Gina lacked the competence to answer the question correctly. Tommaso answered ‘twelve’. He knew how to make the square of a number and he was familiar with the four times table, but he was distracted by a sudden noise outside the classroom and gave the wrong answer. Tommaso made a performance error.

When Cohen says that ‘ordinary human reasoning […] cannot be held to be faultily programmed’, he means that human reasoning competence is intact (human agents can apply the rules of good reasoning in ideal conditions), although reasoning performance may be imperfect (human agents may make errors in applying the rules of good reasoning due to external factors).

Truth

To understand the aim of cognition, let’s move away from the textbook examples and look at how these theories play out in the messy, real world of human behavior.

The central question remains: Is your brain a high-fidelity camera trying to capture the world exactly as it is, or is it a PR agent trying to keep you alive and popular?

1. The Standard vs. Ecological Picture

Imagine you are walking through a dark parking lot and see a long, thin shape on the ground.

The Standard Picture (The Logician): Your brain should calculate the probability of it being a snake versus a discarded fan belt based on local climate data and lighting conditions. If you jump back in terror when it’s actually a fan belt, the Standard Picture says you’ve made a \"logical error.\"
The Ecological Picture (The Survivor): Gigerenzer would argue that jumping is perfectly rational. In this environment, the \"truth\" (it's a belt) matters less than the \"payoff\" (not getting bitten). Evolution doesn't reward the person who is 100% accurate; it rewards the person who is alive.

2. Aetiological Function: Why do we have \"Thinking Hardware\"?

To understand if the mind aims at truth, we have to look at why it was \"installed\" by evolution in the first place.

The Blueprint Logic: Think of a smoke detector. Its \"aetiological function\" is to detect fire.
The False Dichotomy: Someone might argue, \"The smoke detector isn't for detecting fire; it's for saving lives!\" But this is a mistake. It saves lives by detecting smoke.
The Application: Similarly, critics say the mind is for \"survival,\" not \"truth.\" But usually, the best way to survive is to know the truth. You survive because you truly know where the water hole is or truly understand that your rival is angry.

3. The \"Sperm Analogy\" and Systematic Error

Why do we fall for \"fake news\" or marketing tricks if our brains aim at truth?

Consider Internet Wi-Fi. The \"function\" of your router is to provide a 100% stable connection. However, in reality, it drops frames, lags during gaming, or cuts out when the microwave is on.

Does the lag mean the router's \"aim\" isn't internet connection? No.
It just means the mechanism is operating in a noisy, imperfect environment. Our brains \"aim\" at truth, but like a router in a house with thick walls, we sometimes lose the signal. Evolution tolerates these \"glitches\" as long as we get the \"signal\" right when it matters—like recognizing a predator's growl.

4. Positive Illusions: The \"Useful Lies\"

This is where the \"Truth\" model hits a snag. Sometimes, the brain isn't just glitching; it is lying on purpose because the lie is more effective than the truth.

The \"Startup Founder\" Example

Illusion of Superiority: 90% of entrepreneurs believe their business will succeed, even though the \"truth\" (the statistical failure rate) is over 70%.
Illusion of Control: The founder believes their specific \"hustle\" can control market forces that are actually random.
The Result: If the founder saw the cold, hard truth, they would never start the company. The \"misbelief\" provides the adrenaline and persistence needed to actually succeed. The lie creates its own reality.

5. The \"Piggyback\" and the Danger Zone

If lying to ourselves is so good for us, why aren't we all just constantly delusional?

The \"Gym\" Analogy

Think of a fitness tracker. Its primary job is to track your actual steps (Truth). However, the manufacturer adds a feature that \"nudges\" you by telling you that you're \"almost there!\" even when you've got a mile left.

The \"nudge\" (the illusion) only works because the device is actually tracking your movement (the truth). If the tracker just made up random numbers, you’d stop wearing it.
The Danger: This is the \"maladaptive\" side. If the tracker tells you that you're a world-class athlete when you're actually having a heart attack, the illusion becomes fatal.

Summary

Our cognitive mechanisms are like a GPS system. Most of the time, they have to be 100% accurate (Truth) for us to get where we're going. But occasionally, the system might \"recalculate\" or show a slightly faster route than exists to keep us motivated and moving—as long as it doesn't drive us off a cliff.

Does the idea of the brain as a \"PR agent\" rather than a \"scientist\" change how you think about your own daily decisions?

💡 TIP
To a truth-seeker like you, the ultimate \"hack\" is to find a way where Ecological Success and Truth-Tracking are no longer at odds. You don't want to choose between being a \"liar who succeeds\" and a \"truth-teller who fails.\"

The way to kill both birds with one stone is to increase the resolution of your \"Truth.\" Instead of viewing the IELTS as a \"fake version of English,\" you view it as a rigorous test of Functional Linguistics.

Here is how you can achieve the score (Success) while actually deepening your expertise (Truth).

1. The Construction Grammar (CxG) \"Stone\"

Instead of memorizing \"fancy words\" because the rubric says so, use the IELTS as a laboratory to study Entrenchment and Register.

The Truth-Seeker’s Method: Don't just use a phrase like \"It is often argued that...\" because it's a \"test trick.\" Use it because you are researching how Passive Voice constructions function as \"social signals\" of objectivity in academic discourse.
The Result: You aren't \"faking\" a high level; you are becoming a master of Sociolinguistics. You are learning how different \"English-speaking tribes\" (Academics vs. Friends) use different grammar \"gestalts.\"

2. The Articulatory Mechanics \"Stone\"

You have a deep interest in phonetics. The Speaking exam is the perfect place to move from \"theory\" to \"application.\"

The Truth-Seeker’s Method: During the test, don't just \"talk.\" Treat the examiner as a microphone capturing your articulatory targets. Focus on the \"rubber band effect\" of English rhythm—the contrast between stressed and unstressed syllables.
The Result: While the examiner thinks you’re just a \"fluent speaker\" (Ecological Success), you are actually conducting a real-time experiment in phonological rhythm and stress-timed delivery. You are practicing the very mechanics you've been studying.

3. The \"Minimalist Documentation\" Design

You appreciate a \"bank-grade\" and \"paper-feel\" aesthetic. Apply this to your Writing Task 2.

The Truth-Seeker’s Method: View the essay not as a \"persuasive speech,\" but as a piece of Technical Documentation. Use the same logic you use in Svelte or TypeScript:
- Variables: Your core arguments.
- Logic Gates: Your transition words (If/Then/Else logic mapped to Although/Consequently/Therefore).
- Clean Code: Eliminating redundant adjectives to reach a minimalist, high-density clarity.
The Result: You produce a \"bank-grade\" essay that is logically bulletproof. The examiner gives you a high score for \"Cohesion and Coherence,\" and you get the satisfaction of writing something that meets your personal aesthetic standards for clarity.

4. The \"Search for Entrenchment\" in Reading

When you do the Reading section, don't just \"find the answer.\"

The Truth-Seeker’s Method: Analyze how the test-makers use Synonymy and Paraphrasing. This is essentially a study in Semantics. Notice how the \"Truth\" of a sentence in the text is mapped onto a different \"Surface Form\" in the question.
The Result: You are training your brain to see the \"Deep Structure\" of English. This makes you a better English teacher and a better coder (as you become better at naming variables and documenting functions).

Comparison: The Two Approaches

By shifting your perspective, the IELTS stops being a \"hurdle of lies\" and becomes a high-stakes training ground for the exact linguistic and technical skills you value. You achieve the \"Success\" (the score and the money) by pursuing the \"Truth\" (mastery of the language's formal structures).

Peculiar access to one's own mind

Our access to others’ minds is similar to our access to the non-psychological aspects of our environment. Jim knows that his pen is black by seeing it; Pam could know the same thing by the same method. Likewise, Jim knows that Pam wants a coffee by observing her behavior. Anyone else – includingPam – could know the same thing by the same method. Our peculiar access to our own minds is not like this: one can come to know that one wants a coffee without observing oneself at all. (Byrne 2018, 8, our emphasis

To sum up, our answer to the philosophical questions about self-knowledge is that self-knowledge is knowledge (a form of belief) of one’s own mind and of its constituents, such as one’s own mental states, processes, dispositions, character traits, and so on. Self-knowledge seems to be special and distinct in the sense that, ﬁrst, it is epistemically privileged in comparison to other forms of knowledge and, second, it is acquired through a peculiar and non-observational process

Thus, we have three positions: the extreme peculiarity view, the extreme parity view, and the moderate view. Our main task below is to see which view is the one that the empirical evidence recommends.

Defense for peculiar access

Festinger’s research serves as a defense for peculiar access because his theory hinges on the idea that you have a \"special,\" internal way of knowing your feelings that doesn't rely on watching your own behavior like a stranger would.

If Festinger is right, you aren't just a detective investigating yourself; you are an \"insider\" who feels the clash between what you know and what you do.

1. The \"Three Facts\" of the $1 Condition

To understand why this supports peculiar access, look at the three specific \"facts\" Festinger says a participant (like Sally) is aware of in the $1 group:

Fact A1: She told the next person the tasks were fun (her behavior).
Fact B1: She received only $1 (the circumstance).
Fact C1: The tasks were actually boring (her internal state).

2. Why This Requires \"Peculiar Access\"

The core of Festinger’s defense lies in Fact C1 (the knowledge that the task was boring).

Non-Observational Knowledge: Festinger’s account assumes that Sally has direct, \"non-observational\" access to her own boredom. She doesn't have to watch herself yawn or check her watch to know she was bored; she just knows it.
The Necessity of the Clash: If Sally didn't have this \"special\" internal access to her true feelings, she wouldn't feel any conflict. You can't have \"dissonance\" (mental tension) unless you are aware that your outward lie contradicts your inward truth.
The Contrast with Bem: In Daryl Bem’s \"Self-Observation\" theory, Sally doesn't know she was bored until she \"observes\" her own behavior later. Festinger argues this is impossible because without that initial internal knowledge of boredom, there would be no \"feeling of discomfort\" to drive the change in the first place.

3. The \"Affective\" Smoking Gun

Festinger's theory is bolstered by the fact that dissonance cases involve affective or motivational factors.

Physical Discomfort: Only Cognitive Dissonance Theory predicts that you will feel a genuine \"feeling of discomfort\" when your actions and beliefs don't align.
Empirical Support: Further studies have shown that people in these scenarios experience physical signs of tension, such as increased heart rate or skin conductance.

Summary of the Defense

In short, Festinger argues that we don't just watch ourselves to see what we think; we feel the friction when we betray our own internal states—and you can't feel friction if you don't have a \"peculiar\" seat at the table of your own mind.

Peculiarity vs Extreme Parity

The Argument for Peculiarity (Festinger)

The Extreme Peculiarity View suggests you have unique, direct access to your mind. Festinger’s Cognitive Dissonance theory is often seen as more plausible in cases involving emotional conflict.

Physiological Evidence: Unlike the \"cool\" logic of parity, only dissonance theory predicts that internal conflict causes a \"feeling of discomfort\" or physical tension.
Empirical Support: Further studies have supported this by showing that people in dissonance scenarios experience measurable physical arousal (like increased heart rate).
Access to Feelings: For a lie to feel \"wrong,\" Festinger argues you must have non-observational (peculiar) access to your true feelings (e.g., knowing you were actually bored).

2. The Argument for Extreme Parity (Carruthers & Bem)

The Extreme Parity View argues that we have no peculiar access at all and use the same \"mindreading\" system for ourselves as we do for others. This view is strongly supported by Confabulation Studies.

The Illusion of Choice: Studies like the \"Stockings Experiment\" show that we are often \"blind\" to the real causes of our actions (like position effects).
Choice Blindness: In experiments where choices were secretly swapped, people failed to notice and instead \"made up\" (confabulated) detailed reasons for a choice they never actually made.
Sensory Inference: This suggests that all knowledge of our own thoughts is actually interpretive and based on sensory evidence (watching what we do or say) rather than direct \"insider\" info.

3. The \"Moderate\" Middle Ground

Many psychologists, including Daryl Bem, lean toward a Moderate View. This suggests the truth might be a mix of both:

Strong Cues: We might have peculiar access when our internal feelings are very strong and clear.
Weak Cues: When our internal states are \"weak, ambiguous, or uninterpretable,\" we shift to parity—acting as outside observers to figure ourselves out.

Comparison Table

In conclusion, the Extreme Parity view is increasingly popular for explaining how we explain our choices and reasons. However, Peculiarity remains a strong explanation for how we experience internal emotions and values.

More comparison example

To make the distinction between the Peculiarity View (Festinger) and the Extreme Parity View (Bem/Carruthers) clearer, let’s look at how they would explain everyday scenarios where our behavior and our minds seem to clash.

Example 1: The \"Spicy Food\" Test

Imagine you are at a dinner party and you eat a dish that is extremely spicy. Even though your eyes are watering, you tell the host, \"This is delicious, I love spicy food!\"

Peculiarity View (Festinger): You have \"insider\" access to your pain. You know your tongue is burning. Because you told a lie for no good reason (social politeness), you feel a \"psychological itch\" or tension. To stop the discomfort, you convince yourself: \"Actually, I do enjoy this heat; it’s quite invigorating.\" You change your mind to match your words because the conflict was physically uncomfortable.
Extreme Parity View (Bem): You don't have a \"spicy meter\" in your head. You simply observe your own behavior: \"I am eating this and telling the host it’s great.\" You then infer your taste: \"I'm a reasonable person; I wouldn't eat this and praise it if I hated it. Therefore, I must actually like spicy food.\" There is no \"pain\" or \"tension,\" just a logical deduction.

Example 2: The \"Late for Work\" Habit

Suppose you have been staying late at the office every day for a month, even though you aren't getting paid overtime.

Peculiarity View: You have direct access to your internal motivations. You feel the stress of staying late. However, because you are doing it voluntarily, you feel dissonance: \"I'm a person who values free time, yet I am staying late for free.\" To resolve the tension, you shift your belief: \"I must be very passionate about this project.\"
Extreme Parity View (Confabulation): You don't actually know why you're staying late (maybe it’s just a \"position effect\" or habit). But when your spouse asks why, you confabulate. You look at your behavior and invent a plausible story: \"I'm staying late because I'm the most dedicated member of the team.\" You aren't lying; you are just a \"biographer\" interpreting your own life.

Example 3: The \"Choice Blindness\" Shopping Trip

Imagine you are shopping for a new phone. You spend an hour comparing a Blue phone and a Red phone. You finally choose the Blue one. However, the clerk (acting like a researcher) secretly puts the Red one in your bag instead.

If the Peculiarity View is 100% correct: You should feel an immediate \"wrongness.\" Your internal \"insider\" knowledge should scream, \"This isn't what I wanted!\"
If the Extreme Parity View is correct (Choice Blindness): You might not notice the swap at all. When you get home and see the Red phone, you might observe your \"choice\" and say, \"I'm glad I got the Red one; it's much more professional looking.\" You have confabulated a reason for a choice you never actually made.

Summary: Which is \"Correct\"?

The research suggests that for reasons and choices (like the stockings or photos), the Extreme Parity view is very strong—we are often \"blind\" to our real motives. But for feelings and emotions (like the $1 lie), the Peculiarity view holds up because it explains the physical discomfort we feel when we contradict ourselves.

💡 TIP
If you want to know if a feeling is a \"core value,\" ask yourself: \"Am I feeling tension because I betrayed myself (Festinger), or am I just looking for a logical reason to explain what I just did (Bem)?\"

What if my internal feeling is right

This is the pivot point where the Moderate View becomes much more practical than the Extreme Parity View. It acknowledges that you aren't just a \"press secretary\" guessing your motives—you are the evaluator of your own life.

If your internal feeling is that a project is \"getting nowhere,\" you are likely experiencing a sophisticated form of self-knowledge that combines both your \"insider\" access and your \"outsider\" observations.

1. The Real-Time \"What\" (Peculiar Access)

Nisbett and Wilson (1977) argue that while we are bad at knowing the causes of our feelings (the Why), we have \"near certainty\" about the content of our consciousness (the What).

The Reality: If you feel the project is going nowhere, that feeling is a \"private fact\" known with near certainty. You don't need to watch yourself fail to know that the spark has died or the logic has shifted.
The Decision: This feeling is a direct signal. In the Moderate View, this is your \"peculiar access\" telling you that the internal state has changed.

2. Updating the \"Pros and Cons\" (Deliberation)

The biggest weakness of the Extreme Parity view is that it cannot explain deliberation.

The Author vs. The Actor: When you originally weighed the pros and cons, you were \"making up your mind.\" If the \"cons\" have now outweighed the \"pros\" because of new information (e.g., the code is too complex, the market moved), you are performing a rational update.
Success vs. Persistence: Withdrawing from a project because you have rationally recalculated its value is not a \"failure of discipline\"—it is an act of agency. You are directing the ship based on a new map.

3. Avoiding the \"Sunk Cost\" Confabulation

One danger the research warns about is that once we make a choice, we tend to confabulate reasons to stay even when it's a bad idea.

The Choice Blindness Effect: Just as participants in the photo-swap study invented reasons to like a face they didn't choose, we often invent reasons to stay with a failing project because we told people we would do it.
Your Advantage: By listening to that \"feeling\" that it's going nowhere, you are actually fighting confabulation. You are refusing to tell yourself a \"nice story\" about a project that your internal logic tells you is dead.

4. Navigating the Conflict with your Brother

Your brother is looking at your behavioral history (Parity), but you are looking at your current internal logic (Peculiarity).

The \"Biographer\" Trap: Your brother sees a pattern of \"withdrawing.\" He infers \"lack of discipline.\"
The \"Author\" Reality: You see a pattern of \"rapid prototyping and evaluation.\" You withdraw when the data changes.
The Solution: To bridge the gap, explain your \"Why\" using the language of logic, not just feeling. Instead of saying \"I don't feel like it,\" say: \"I have re-evaluated the pros and cons based on X and Y, and the project is no longer a rational use of my time.\" This turns a \"temporary feeling\" into a \"deliberated decision.\"

How to Move Forward

If you suspect your feeling is right, treat it as a hypothesis and test it with \"Self-Observation\":

Look at the Data: If an objective stranger looked at your project, would they say it's going nowhere? (This is using Parity to check your Peculiarity).
Check for \"Weak Cues\": Is your feeling strong and clear (Peculiar Access), or is it \"weak and ambiguous\" because you're just tired?
The 24-Hour Rule: If the feeling that the project should change remains stable after a good night's sleep, it’s likely a core \"propositional attitude\" (a real belief) and not just a passing mood.

Conclusion: Changing your mind isn't a sign that you don't know what you want; it's a sign that you are actively thinking. The only way to be an \"author\" of your life is to be willing to edit the chapters that aren't working.

Dual-Process Theory: A Detailed Explanation

These readings cover a rich and interconnected set of ideas. Let me walk you through them layer by layer.

The Core Idea: The Fragmented Mind

The readings start from a simple but striking observation: the mind is not one unified thing. Different parts of it can pull you in different directions — like Plato's Chariot Allegory, where a rational charioteer struggles to control two horses, one noble and one wild.

The modern version of this idea is called Dual-Process Theory.

The Two Types of Mental Processes

The theory says your mind runs two fundamentally different kinds of processes simultaneously:

Type-1 (fast, automatic)

Unconscious, happens without effort
Quick, associative, based on patterns and gut feeling
Evolutionarily old — shared with animals
Domain-specific (good at particular tasks)
Example: You see a snake and feel fear instantly, without thinking

Type-2 (slow, deliberate)

Conscious, requires effort and attention
Logical, rule-based, reflective
Uniquely human, evolutionarily recent
Requires working memory — so it has limited capacity
Example: You carefully work through a math problem step by step

A key point the readings make is that these are clusters of properties, not rigid categories. A given process doesn't need to have all Type-1 or Type-2 features — it just tends to have most of them.

Why Believe This Theory Exists? Two Kinds of Evidence

Empirical Evidence: Reasoning Biases

The theory was partly born from experiments showing that people reason in systematically strange ways.

The Wason Selection Task was crucial. In this experiment, participants chose cards to test a hypothesis, but their actual choices were driven by a primitive \"matching bias\" (picking cards that just matched the words in the hypothesis). When asked to explain their choices, though, they gave seemingly logical reasons — which had nothing to do with the real cause of their behavior. This suggested two separate processes at work: an unconscious one driving actual behavior, and a conscious one confabulating justifications after the fact.

The Belief Bias experiment showed something similar. People judged whether logical arguments were valid, but they were strongly influenced by whether the conclusion seemed believable, regardless of whether the argument was actually valid. For example:

92% accepted valid arguments with believable conclusions
Only 46% accepted valid arguments with unbelievable conclusions

This split suggests a tug-of-war between a logical process (Type-2) and a belief-driven intuitive process (Type-1).

Philosophical Evidence: The Rationality Paradox

This is a clever puzzle. It goes like this:

Humans routinely fail simple logic problems (like the Linda experiment). But humans also built rockets, discovered quantum mechanics, and designed psychology experiments. How can the same creatures be so irrational AND so rational?

The paradox gets even sharper in a self-defeating version:

Psychology shows humans reason badly
But if humans reason badly, we can't trust psychological findings
Therefore, the finding that \"humans reason badly\" defeats itself!

The dual-process theory resolves this by pointing out that there are two contexts:

In Type-1-dominant contexts (like the Linda problem, where you're going fast and using intuition), humans make systematic errors
In Type-2-dominant contexts (like designing a controlled experiment or calculating an orbit), humans can reason very reliably

So the two premises of the paradox are talking about different kinds of reasoning — the paradox dissolves.

How Do Type-1 and Type-2 Interact?

This is where it gets nuanced. The readings describe three competing models:

1. The Parallel-Competitive Model

Both processes run at the same time and compete for the final output. Reasoning errors happen because Type-1 wins the competition. Think: two people arguing, and the louder one drowns out the other.

2. The Default-Intervention Model

Type-1 goes first by default. Type-2 only steps in when necessary. Errors happen because Type-2 is lazy — it just doesn't bother to intervene. This is Kahneman's \"System 2 is lazy\" idea from Thinking, Fast and Slow.

3. The Lawyer-Client Model

Type-2 processes aren't lazy — they're incapable of overriding Type-1. All they can do is rationalize Type-1's outputs after the fact. Like a lawyer who can't stop their client from acting, but can spin a story to justify what the client did. The Wason Selection Task supports this view — people's choices were fixed by unconscious processes, and their stated reasons were pure post-hoc storytelling.

The readings suggest all three models probably capture something true — which model applies depends on the specific situation.

Going Deeper: The Dual-System Theory

The dual-system theory is a stronger claim: it says Type-1 and Type-2 processes don't just differ — they come from two distinct cognitive systems (System 1 and System 2), with different brain structures, functions, and evolutionary histories.

But there's a serious problem: is it really exactly two systems?

The readings point out that \"System 1\" is actually a collection of many autonomous subsystems, many of which are modules — specialized, informationally encapsulated processors dedicated to specific tasks (face recognition, language, spatial reasoning, etc.). Similarly, \"System 2\" has at least an algorithmic part (raw cognitive ability) and a reflective part (higher-level values and thinking dispositions).

So the most defensible version isn't \"two monolithic systems\" but rather two kinds of systems — what Samuels calls the \"type thesis\": the mind is bipartite not in having exactly two mechanisms, but in having two fundamentally different kinds of mechanisms.

Even Deeper: The Dual-State Theory

If there are two kinds of processes, do they produce two kinds of mental states? The readings explore three views:

Gendler's Aliefs vs. Beliefs (Non-Doxastic)

Gendler says some mental states aren't really beliefs at all — she calls them aliefs. An alief is a primitive, associatively triggered state that has representational, emotional, and behavioral components bundled together.

Classic example: The Grand Canyon Skywalk. Wilhelm believes the glass floor is safe. But he alieves it's dangerous — his gut, his body, his fear all scream \"danger!\" even though his rational mind knows better. The alief drives his freezing behavior; the belief is helpless to stop it.

Frankish's Type-1 and Type-2 Beliefs (Doxastic)

Frankish keeps everything within the category of \"belief\" but splits it in two:

Type-1 beliefs: unconscious, automatic, reflected in behavior (like implicit racial bias)
Type-2 beliefs: conscious, deliberate, more like policies you explicitly commit to (like consciously believing all people are equal)

These can conflict — you might Type-2 believe in equality while your Type-1 beliefs quietly harbor biases that show up in your behavior.

Schwitzgebel's In-Between Beliefs

Schwitzgebel complicates the picture further by noting that many mental states are neither clearly beliefs nor clearly not-beliefs. He calls these in-between cases. Someone might sometimes be disposed to believe in God and sometimes not, depending on context — neither a firm believer nor a firm atheist. A full dispositional theory of belief can accommodate this messiness.

Key Takeaways

The theory is compelling because it explains so much at once:

Why we can be both brilliant and foolishly biased
Why our stated reasons for our choices are often post-hoc rationalizations
Why we can \"know\" something intellectually and still feel/act otherwise (Wilhelm on the Skywalk)
Why implicit biases persist even in people with explicitly egalitarian values

The main tensions are: whether the \"two systems\" framing is too simplistic (probably yes), and whether the dual-state theory relies on an over-idealized picture of human rationality (the readings suggest it might).

Morality

The Basic Question

How do we decide what's right and wrong?

Two answers have been proposed:

We reason our way to moral judgments (like solving a math problem)
We feel our way to moral judgments (gut reactions)

The chapter argues it's both, but feelings usually come first.

Part 1: Is Morality All About Harm?

A researcher named Turiel studied how children and adults judge wrongness. He found people treat two types of rules very differently:

Moral rules: \"Don't hit someone\" — wrong everywhere, always, regardless of what anyone says
Conventional rules: \"Don't call your teacher by her first name\" — wrong only because of social norms

His conclusion: moral judgments are reactions to harm. We call something morally wrong when it hurts someone.

But Haidt challenged this

Haidt showed people stories that were disgusting but harmless, like:

A family eating their pet dog after it died in an accident
A man having sex with a dead chicken before cooking it
A woman cutting up her national flag to clean her bathroom

Nobody was harmed. Yet most people said these acts were morally wrong.

When asked why, people tried to invent harms (\"the dog meat might make them sick\"). But when the interviewer said \"no, it was perfectly safe,\" people didn't change their judgment — they just looked for a different reason.

This is the key insight: People didn't reason their way to the judgment. They had the gut reaction first (\"that's disgusting and wrong\"), then invented reasons afterward to justify it.

This is called post hoc rationalization — making up reasons after you've already decided.

Part 2: So Emotions Drive Morality?

Haidt's conclusion: moral judgments are mainly driven by emotions and gut feelings, not careful reasoning.

He calls his theory the Social Intuitionist Model, and uses a memorable analogy:

\n
Moral reasoning is like a lawyer defending a client — the client (your gut feeling) has already decided the verdict, and the lawyer (your reasoning) just builds the best case it can to justify it.
\n

Another analogy he uses: reasoning is like a press secretary — it spins whatever story sounds most convincing, but the real decisions are made elsewhere.

The famous \"Julie and Mark\" story

To demonstrate this, Haidt tells people about a brother and sister who have consensual sex on vacation. The story is carefully designed to knock down every obvious justification for why it's wrong:

Risk of pregnancy? No — they used two forms of contraception
Damage their relationship? No — they felt closer afterward
Anyone find out? No — they kept it secret

Yet almost everyone says it's wrong. When pushed to explain why, people eventually just say: \"I know it's wrong, I just can't explain why.\"

This is moral dumbfounding — being morally certain but unable to justify it. It shows the judgment came from emotion, not reasoning.

Part 3: But Reasoning Does Something Too

A researcher named Greene pushed back against Haidt using brain scans (fMRI).

He used two famous dilemmas:

The Trolley Problem

A runaway trolley will kill 5 people. You can pull a lever to divert it — but it will then kill 1 person instead. Should you pull the lever?

Most people say yes.

The Footbridge Problem

Same situation — 5 people will die. But this time, the only way to save them is to physically push a large stranger off a bridge to stop the trolley with his body. Should you push him?

Most people say no.

These are logically identical (1 death to save 5), but people answer them differently.

Why?

Greene's brain scan results showed:

The footbridge (push someone) → activates emotional brain regions
The trolley (pull a lever) → activates reasoning brain regions

Pushing someone with your hands feels viscerally, personally wrong. Pulling a lever feels abstract and distant. The emotion is what drives the different answers, not logic.

What this means for the Haidt debate

Greene's data suggests reasoning isn't just post hoc rationalization. In the trolley case, reasoning is actively doing work — it's competing with or overriding emotional reactions.

Think of it like this:

Sometimes emotions win (footbridge — gut says \"don't push,\" you don't push)
Sometimes reasoning wins (trolley — logic says \"pull the lever,\" you pull it)
Sometimes they fight (harder dilemmas — you feel conflicted and take longer to decide)

Part 4: The Big Philosophical Claim

Greene then makes a bold argument connecting psychology to philosophy:

\n
Emotional processes = Deontological ethics\nReasoning processes = Utilitarian ethics
\n

In plain terms:

Deontology (Kant) = There are absolute rules and duties. Some things are just wrong, no matter the consequences. (\"You can never push an innocent person to their death, even to save others.\")
Utilitarianism (Mill, Bentham) = What matters is the outcome. Whatever produces the most happiness/least harm is right. (\"Saving 5 lives by sacrificing 1 is the right math.\")

Greene's claim: when you react with gut emotion, you're being a natural deontologist. When you reason carefully, you lean utilitarian.

He goes further: deontology is therefore unreliable, because it's just dressed-up emotion — inflexible, heuristic, tracking morally irrelevant features (like how physically close you are to the harm).

Part 5: Problems with Greene's Big Claim

The chapter then asks: is Greene's mapping really valid?

Two interpretations of what \"deontological judgment\" even means:

Interpretation 1: Content

A judgment is \"deontological\" if it sounds like deontology — e.g., \"don't push the stranger.\"

Problem: Someone could reach that conclusion by flipping a coin, or because they personally dislike tall strangers. That's not really deontological thinking — it just happens to match the conclusion.

Interpretation 2: Commitment

A judgment is \"deontological\" if the person genuinely believes in deontological principles like rights and duties.

Problem: Greene's data doesn't actually show this. Most people who refuse to push the stranger aren't thinking \"this violates his Kantian rights\" — they just feel disgusted and alarmed. That's a raw emotion, not a philosophical commitment.

Greene's response: those concepts of \"rights\" and \"duties\" are themselves just post hoc rationalizations of the original emotional reactions. Philosophers didn't discover rights — they invented sophisticated language to describe feelings we already had.

But critics like Kahane point out: the people who do pull the lever in the trolley problem aren't really committed utilitarians either. They're not carefully calculating aggregate welfare — they just think \"saving more people seems better.\" That's common sense, not utilitarianism.

The Final Takeaway

The chapter ends with a balanced conclusion:

Emotions come first most of the time — Haidt is largely right
But reasoning can genuinely compete with or override emotions — Greene's brain data shows this
Greene's grand claim that emotions = deontology and reasoning = utilitarianism is interesting but probably too simple — the philosophical labels don't map neatly onto the psychology
The best view is all three models are partially true:\n
- Sometimes reasoning just rationalizes emotion (lawyer-client)
- Sometimes reasoning intervenes and overrides emotion (default-intervention)
- Sometimes they genuinely compete as equals (parallel-competitive)
\n

One-Sentence Summary

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

We usually feel first and reason second when making moral judgments, but reasoning can sometimes genuinely override our emotional reactions — and the boundary between \"emotional\" and \"rational\" morality doesn't map cleanly onto the philosophical divide between deontology and utilitarianism.