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“Lots of us are able to cheat a little bit and still think of ourselves as honest people.”
Dan Ariely is a professor of behavior economics at Duke University. His latest book, The (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty, explains how creativity makes us better liars—even to ourselves.
“Dishonesty is all about the small acts we can take and then think, no, this not real cheating. So if you think that the main mechanism is rationalization, then what you come up with, and that’s what we find, is that we’re basically trying to balance feeling good about ourselves. On the one hand we get some satisfaction, some utility from thinking of ourselves as honest, moral, wonderful people. On the other hand we try to benefit from cheating.
“So rationalization is what we allows you to live with some cheating and not pay a cost in terms of your own view of yourself.
“What kind of people would be able to rationalize better than other people? Better storytellers, right? Creative people, right? Because if you’re creative, you find more ways to cheat and still yourself a story about why this is okay.”
—Ingrid Wickelgren and Steve Mirsky
[The above text is a transcript of this podcast.]
[You can hear Ingrid Wickelgren's full interview of Dan Ariely on the December 25th edition of the Science Talk podcast. Just go to www.scientificamerican.com/podcast and click on Science Talk.]
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Add CommentAwhile back, I criticized someone being touted as an "artist" on Scientific American for her "technique" of taking already published "science" graphics, from maps to fossil outlines to drawings of plants to Feynmann diagrams and transferring them to small clay tablets and marketing them as jewelry. I srgued that this was mere reproduction and that terming it "art" was at least questionable. I was accused of attacking her and threatened with being banned from placing comments on Scientific American. And, yet, here is Dan Ariely, a "professor of behavior economics", saying that many have the ability to con themselves into thinking that copying others is actually creativity. Which only point up something else I have been saying, that, in the society the New World Order wants to fabricate, if you don't have popularity, position, a plurality if not the majority won't believe you if you tell them the sky is blue. But popularity, position, sttus, a byline grants individuals automatic credential and pedigree in the eyes of this plurality, or majority!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI can no longer download this podcast via iTunes or any of the other 60 second podcasts. Any idea what the problem is?
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