Jul 02
Brilliant and very interesting talk about moral code and cheating
- By Scott Johnson on July 2nd, 2009
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This was an important message. Thank you so much for this. It all completely made sense, I have nothing else to say.
Very thoughtful and interesting speech.
I even thought that the Rolex advert at the end was interesting.
There are some really great ideas that are presented at TED. I really like the concept that a simple reminder can help us adhere to moralistic values. Thank you, Scott, for posting this one.
I thought that was a great speech, Dan Ariely is a great economist. If anyone is interested Dan has several short video podcasts about other interesting topics like procrastination up on the itunes store for free.
It seems like such a simple, no brainer, conclusion but the evidence he presents is striking. I really recommend watching with subtitles as you don’t want to miss a word and his accent is a tad bit thick.
Ok, another interesting thing I learn from here and from TED. Thanks!
you always post the best TED talks…
To expand on the whole risk thing:
People tend to cheat more with a mask of anonymity either from a vague presence or false identity (such as on the Internet or when voting) or from the ability to hide within a crowd of activity. (After all, a stuck pixel is difficult to see when one is viewing static.)
…
People tend to cheat more if their egoism is very high or very low. The ones on the high end tend to feel untouchable for some reasons (and sometimes do not bother to hide or justify their mistakes, typically with no apologies). On the low end, they feel their actions per se do little harm (or benefit) in the grand scheme of things compared to other things going on in the world. (The concept of “death by a thousand pricks” [pun] does not seem to get through to those types.)
I wish these Ted talks were longer. I could listen to that man for hours.
Nice find, Scott. Thanks!
@Moobie
Found this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZv–sm9XXU&feature=PlayList&p=4FD7331D5B390C35&index=0
Nearly an hour of him talking, unfortunately he starts by talking about the burns :p
This is his book,
http://www.amazon.com/Predictably-Irrational-Hidden-Forces-Decisions/dp/006135323X
Very interesting read and definitely recommended to anyone who is going to try and market something. Even if its just trying to increase the amount of people who are interested in a certain podcast!
Brilliant.
Absolutely fascinating. I’m always interested in psychological studies, and even the Rolex ad held me captivated as I watched a Rolex movement being built. This is why I check out your blog, Scott.
While I wasn’t particularly moved by the thesis, nor the evidence, I was taken with the irony between the “in-”group having disproportionate influence on cheating, and the overwhelming amusement that greeted the professor’s revelation that MIT has no honour code. It is obvious that the professor’s in-group status, coupled with his humourous irreverence, provides subtle yet effective cues to the audience to see irony itself as the core lesson.
The comments here seem to offer either blanket approval or personal accounts of irony as identification with the professor’s narrative; we all want to be “in” too.
I argue that the professor employs his wit and status together as a mechanism that allows him to “cheat”. His review of his experiments seems peurile, but it is taken as sufficient evidence that economists never admit or contend with the impossibility of grafting pure economic logic onto irrational human beings. This is treated as a revelation.
Other “cheats” in the speech are the suggestions that the latter-day economic tokens (i.e. CDOs, derivatives, etc…) are themselves instruments of corruption. If the professor was brave enough, he might also contend that money itself is an (if not “the”) instrument of corruption; you can not eat or shelter yourself with money.
I’m struck that this is yet another pithy talk aimed to influence the audience to accept irony in garden variety token-based economics (and with good humour), but to beware the excesses of such tokens, and the suggestions of the powerful… professors’ excepted I suppose.
Nothing to see here, move along.
@ Buzzkill: You’re trying too hard.
@ Eric: Yes and no. While he doesn’t deny that the chance to get caught is a factor in willingness to cheat, his point is that the correlation between the two is not absolute. Allowing yourself to cheat is also strongly driven by your perception of yourself, from which the anonymity of the internet cannot shield you. I think in your example you should think of internet message boards as full of cheaters wearing Carnegie Mellon sweatshirts.
@ All: Another good listen regarding the psychology of moral choice: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/analysis/8120646.stm