So, yeah, I’m finally reading this book. Liking it quite a bit so far. And the kind of descriptive social and psychological work explained in this book is pretty relevant to developing a broadly Humean (desire-based and functionalist) metaphysics and epistemology of moral reasons (and normative reasons generally). It occurs to me that reading (or re-reading) Haidt might fit in with the research agendas of either or both of the two Davids. So, would either of you, or anyone else here, be interested in reading through the book together, emailing about it a bit in a somewhat-organized way, and then maybe posting something here (or perhaps just doing the whole thing here on the blog, in a slightly more-organized and accessible-to-all kind of way)?
-
Follow
Following
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
Policy of Truth 
Yes, I would like to have an impetus to read it, and an opportunity to combine reading with discussion would seem just the thing. I was eager to read it last year, but then I got involved in these writing projects—especially the research reported in “Morals and the Free Society”—and never got to it. Since that research has proved to be ongoing, TRM is now buried pretty far down the push-down stack. So I’d be glad of some occasion for rescuing it.
I don’t know as to format—online or offline or what. Would be open to suggestions, and let’s see who else is interested.
LikeLike
Sounds good, David. It is near the top of my to-do list to give you some more feedback on your M&FS essay. So that is coming soon. But yes let’s wait a bit and see who else is interested in reading/discussing TRM.
LikeLike
Still up for doing the Haidt, David (David P.)? I’m thinking that doing it on the blog might work if we can keep things clear and non-technical. If we do two chapters each week, we would get done in six weeks. We could alternate you and I doing summary/commentary within, say, a 2000-word limit. What do you think?
LikeLike
Yes, I don’t know where I’ll find the time, but I want to do it. I read The Happiness Hypothesis in December of 2014 and was thrilled because it was such a good book. Haidt has his finger on all the important things, in my view. I immediately put The Righteous Mind in my reading queue, where it has languished ever since. Other things keep getting inserted ahead of it. Time to put a stop to that!
I invited a friend to join us, by the way. I don’t think he will participate, but maybe he will lurk a bit.
Your suggested structure sounds fine. Shall we start next week? And would you mind doing the first installment, inasmuch as you’ve already done the reading?
LikeLike
Sounds great! I’m glad you are up for it – especially as it seems right up your alley so I’ll likely learn a lot from you. Yeah, I’ll get some selective summary and comments up on the first two chapters soon.
LikeLike
Okay, so I’ll give it a couple of days, but consider this the final call for reading through and discussing Haidt’s THE RIGHTEOUS MIND together.
LikeLike
I somehow managed to read your post the first time without registering that it was asking me a question (must have been distracted by computationalism, I guess). I’d like to read the book, but I’m afraid I can’t commit to doing it just now. In accordance with the laws of academia, now that we’re on summer break I have more to do than ever, and I frankly shouldn’t even be taking time to write blog posts about computationalism or the Jews in Greek literature. Somehow it is already June 11th, and that is a bad, bad thing.
LikeLike
As you’ve probably surmised, I’m overbooked right now. Also underbooked, in the sense that I don’t have access to books. An old high school friend (whom I hadn’t spoken to in years) raised her eyebrow at me the other day on Facebook, asking why I on earth I lug all these books around, and don’t have a Kindle. Obviously, lots of catching up to do.
LikeLike