Talking to Our Selves

Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency

John M. Doris

A provocative challenge to our everyday understanding of human behavior
Reveals our lack of reflection and self-awareness
Offers a new way to make sense of ourselves as moral
Richly informed by psychological research
Lively and witty--a pleasure to read

Talking to Our Selves

Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency

John M. Doris

Description

The unconscious, according to contemporary psychology, determines much of our lives: very often, we don't know why we do what we do, or even exactly what we are doing. This realization undermines the philosophical-and common sense-picture of human beings as rational, responsible, agents whose behavior is ordered by their deliberations and decisions. Drawing on the latest scientific psychology and philosophical ethics, Talking to Our Selves develops a philosophically viable theory of agency and moral responsibility that fully accounts for the unsettling challenges posed by the sciences of mind.

Talking to Our Selves

Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency

John M. Doris

Talking to Our Selves

Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency

John M. Doris

Author Information

John M. Doris, Washington University in St. Louis

John M. Doris is Professor in the Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology Program and Philosophy Department, Washington University in St. Louis. He works at the intersection of cognitive science, moral psychology, and philosophical ethics, and has published in many leading journals. Doris has been awarded fellowships from Michigan's Institute for the Humanities, Princeton's University Center for Human Values, the National Humanities Center, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, the National Endowment for the Humanities (three times), and is a winner of the Society for Philosophy and Psychology's Stanton Prize. He authored Lack of Character: Personality and Moral Behavior (Cambridge, 2002) and, with his colleagues in the Moral Psychology Research Group, edited The Moral Psychology Handbook (Oxford, 2010). Doris' teaching has been recognized with an Outstanding Mentor Award from Washington University's Graduate Student Senate.

Talking to Our Selves

Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency

John M. Doris

Reviews and Awards

"[This] is an important contribution" -- John M. Doris, Australasian Journal of Philosophy

"Talking to Our Selves should appeal to all kinds of readers, philosophers and psychologists, students and the general public. For those who are aware of the current state of affairs, Doris is careful to situate his views with respect to other researchers and positions. It's an excellent model for those pursuing work at the intersection of philosophy and social science. But even for those who have not been following contemporary philosophy in this area, by focusing on the bigger picture, Doris has written an accessible and engaging book and one which gives the reader a sense of where empirical philosophy is headed." -- Emily Esch, Metapsychology Online Reviews

"This is a valuable book. It reminds us, with striking real-life evidence, just how hidden we often are from ourselves. Whether this evidence is compatible with our being morally responsible agents is the next important conversation agency theorists ought to have, and we should be grateful to Doris for sparking it in such a bold, original, and colorful way." -- Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews Online

"Talking to Our Selves is well-written and well-argued. And the wide-ranging evidence he considers makes for a very interesting and stimulating read. Moreover, its topic, the nature of human agency and moral responsibility, connects directly to the important question of what it means to be human...the theory deserves to be taken seriously, to be engaged and further developed, and to become an important part of our ongoing project of understanding ourselves." -- Metapsychology Online Reviews

"An informative and much-needed perspective on the hard questions of agency, responsibility, and conscious action.... This is an excellent book and would make an excellent text for a course or course segment on the nature of moral responsibility." --PsycCRITIQUES

"I found Doris's idea that agency can be exercised in ways beyond reflection compelling. A pluralistic approach to agency (and responsibility) is attractive if people's actions and judgments are not always based in reflective thought. In addition, the examples from psychological research he presents make reading his book a pleasure." -- Philosophical Psychology

Talking to Our Selves

Reflection, Ignorance, and Agency

John M. Doris

From Our Blog

Moral responsibility and the 'honor box' system

If you've worked in an office, you're probably familiar with 'honor box' coffee service. Everyone helps themselves to stewed coffee, adds to the lounge's growing filth, and deposits a nominal sum in the honor box, with the accumulated proceeds being used to replenish supplies. Notoriously, this system often devolves into a tragedy of the commons, where too many people drink without paying.

Posted on August 22, 2015

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