A New Theory of Morality: A Treaty on Human Nature and the Nature of Interhuman Divisions

The author takes Jonathan Haidt’s The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion as her departure point. She presents Haidt’s ideas and relates them to Polish social and political divisions and Polish “worldview wars.” In her opinion, Haidt’s book is a treatise on human nature and the nature of interhuman divisions. It is also the personal story of a researcher seeking answers to the question of whether moral thinking differs from other kinds of thought. Haidt reaches his conclusions by overcoming the cognitive boundaries resulting from the liberal worldview. In the end he states that worldview disputes and culture wars have not disappeared and will not disappear in systems of liberal democracy due to their moral foundations and lack of agreement as to what is and is not subject to moral judgment. The author of the review provides an optimistic conclusion though: understanding the mechanisms behind the culture wars provides an opportunity to understand the people who conduct those wars, including in Poland