Conspirituality - Bonus Sample: The Role of Intuition
Aired: 2021-03-29
Duration: 03:41


=== Incest Taboos Explained (03:38) ===

[00:00:02]  Hello, Matthew here from the Conspirituality Podcast Team.
[00:00:06]  The following is a sample of the bonus episode we produce every week for our Patreon subscribers.
[00:00:12]  You can support our work and have full access to bonus episodes and other premium content by subscribing for as little as $5 a month at patreon.com slash conspirituality.
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[00:00:32]  In 2001, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt put forward an interesting question to try to better understand moral intuition.
[00:00:42]  This is from an article he wrote.
[00:00:44]  Quote, Julie and Mark are brother and sister.
[00:00:48]  They are traveling together in France on summer vacation from college.
[00:00:52]  One night, they are staying alone in a cabin near the beach.
[00:00:56]  They decide that it would be interesting and fun if they tried making love.
[00:01:01]  At the very least, it would be a new experience for each of them.
[00:01:05]  Julie was already taking birth control pills, but Mark uses a condom, too, just to be safe.
[00:01:11]  They both enjoy making love, but they decide never to do it again.
[00:01:15]  They keep that night as a special secret, which makes them feel even closer to each other.
[00:01:21]  What do you think about that?
[00:01:23]  Was it okay for them to make love?
[00:01:25]  End quote.
[00:01:28]  Hate bet that you would react with immediate disgust.
[00:01:32]  Logic doesn't really play a role given that you can't argue about the genetic dangers of a baby born through incest.
[00:01:39]  Hate made that an impossibility with two layers of sexual protection.
[00:01:44]  Their enjoyment might have raised a further red flag, but in the end, they never repeat the incident.
[00:01:51]  So then what, really, is the objection?
[00:01:53]  This is between two consenting adults.
[00:01:57]  No harm will ever come from it, especially to the siblings as they agreed upon it and even enjoyed it.
[00:02:03]  Hate notes that most people still respond, I don't know, I can't explain it, I just know it's wrong.
[00:02:12]  So the question, is this a rational argument or an intuitive one?
[00:02:17]  And if so, how does intuition play a role?
[00:02:21]  And what is intuition, again?
[00:02:25]  Evolutionary psychologist Deborah Lieberman followed up on Haidt's work.
[00:02:29]  She wanted to understand how a personal incest taboo—I would never have sex with my sister—turned into the notion that incest is wrong for everyone.
[00:02:41]  Most cultures have incest taboos, often as part of their theology.
[00:02:45]  So in one sense, we can understand cultures that believe their way is the only way tend to universalize.
[00:02:53]  Still, Lieberman found that the longer siblings lived together under one roof, the more their rejection of a sexual relationship increased.
[00:03:03]  Interestingly, it was not taught by their parents, nor did the degree of their relationship matter, such as being a brother, half-brother, or step-brother.
[00:03:14]  Incest taboos seem to be an innate trait across cultures.
[00:03:18]  In his 2013 book, The Righteous Mind, Haidt looked even more deeply at our moral intuitions, which he believes are in some ways tribal.
[00:03:28]  He writes that our moral thinking is much more like a politician searching for votes than a scientist searching for truth.
[00:03:37]  Intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.