The Moral Science Podcast

Dr. Michael McCullough is a professor of psychology at University of California, San Diego. There, he directs the Evolution and Human Behavior Laboratory, where his team studies the cognitive mechanisms that contribute to cooperation, altruism, and aggression. His work also addresses shortcomings in the measurement of forgiveness, empathy, and altruism. He has authored and co-authored five books on these topics, the most recent of which we discuss in this podcast. In The Kindness of Strangers, Mike traces the interaction of social challenges and reason throughout history. We discuss how these interactions have shaped what it means to be cooperative, and how cooperation may continue to morph in the face of ongoing challenges like poverty and climate change.

The Kindness of Strangers on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Kindness-Strangers-Selfish-Invented-Moral/dp/0465064744

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2021, March 30).  Evolved Reason and Shared Challenges Yield Cooperation with Michael McCullough [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep42-MikeMcCullough

Dr. Andrew Vonasch is a lecturer in psychology at the University of Canterbury where he researches moral rationality. His academic training in economics and psychology has informed his interest in agency and divergences from the rational actor model. Specifically, Andy is interested in how people will incur costs to demonstrate that they are moral, and to ensure that other people behave morally too. In this podcast we discuss his work regarding costly tradeoffs in reputation management and tendencies to project hidden motives, or so-called phantom costs, onto others.

Dr. Sarah Schnitker is a Professor of Psychology and Nueroscience at Baylor University, where she directs the science of virtues lab. She previously researched as an associate professor in the Thrive Center for Human Development at Fuller Theological Seminary. As a principle investigator, Sarah has secured more than $3.5 million in research funding through the John Templeton Foundation for a number of projects with various aims, including understanding gratitude towards God and fleshing out a foundation for the scientific study of patience. In this podcast, we discuss her work which focuses on the role of religiosity as a fertile context in which virtue and character develop in adolescents.

Transcript available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep40-SarahSchnitker

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, September 22).  Religion as a Context for Character Development with Sarah Schnitker [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep40-SarahSchnitker

Dr. Steven Pinker is a Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. He conducts research on a number of topics, including visual cognition, psycholinguistics, and social relations. His work has received a number of prestigious prizes, including the Troland Research Prize from the National Academy of Sciences. In addition to his impressive scholarly work, Dr. Pinker has also drawn attention as a public intellectual. He is a frequent contributor to the New York Times, and has written nine books, including the New York Time best sellers, The Better Angels of Our Nature and Enlightenment Now. In this podcast, we discuss humanism and his popular books, trends of declining violence, and the general state of moral psychology.

Leave a tip at: https://www.patreon.com/moralscience

Transcript available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep39-stevenpinker

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, September 8).  The Arrow of Moral Progress with Steven Pinker [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep39-StevenPinker

Dr. J Kiley Hamlin is an Associate Professor of Psychology and the Canadian Research Chair at the University of British Columbia. There she directs the Centre for Infant Cognition, where she examines the developmental origins of moral judgments in preverbal babies and young toddlers. She is the recipient of numerous awards and grants from the Association for Psychological Science, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and the John Templeton Foundation, among others. In this episode, we discuss her research which illuminates when and how babies express the earliest forms of a moral sense.

Paper referenced in this episode: Hamlin, J. K., & Van de Vondervoort, J. W. (2018). Infants’ and young children’s preferences for prosocial over antisocial others. Human Development, 61(4-5), 214-231. https://doi.org/10.1159/000492800

Transcript available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep38-KileyHamlin

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, August 25).  Babies are Judging You with Kiley Hamlin [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep38-KileyHamlin

Dr. Brad Owens is an Associate Professor in the Marriott School of Management at Brigham Young University. There his teaching and research focus on ethical leadership in business. His work examines the impact of humility on leader effectiveness, relational energy, and team functioning, and has received a number of awards and funding from The Academy of Management, as well as the Templeton Foundation. Brad’s work has received wide media coverage, including in the Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, and Harvard Business Review. In this podcast, Brad and I discuss the details of what humility is, how it is often mischaracterized, and its effects for business leaders.

Transcripts available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep37-BradOwens

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, August 11).  The Best Leaders are Humble with Bradley Owens [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep37-BradOwens

In this episode, five scholars of morality talk about their observations of ethics during the coronavirus pandemic. These scholars include Bengt Brülde, an Associate Professor of Practical Philosophy at the University of Gothenburg and University West in Sweden, where he studies well-being, bioethics, and business ethics; Bradford Cokelet, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Kansas where he researches comparative ethics, character, and agency; Debra Lieberman, Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Miami, where she uses principles of evolutionary biology to understand disgust and altruism; Richard Shweder, Cultural Anthropologist and Professor of Human Development at the University of Chicago, where he studies a variety of topics, including multicultural ethical exchanges; and Liane Young, Associate Professor of Psychology at Boston College, where she uses functional neuroimaging to understand moral judgment.

APA citation: APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, June 16).  Morality Amid COVID-19 with Bengt Brülde, Bradford Cokelet, Debra Lieberman, Richard Shweder, and Liane Young [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep36-covid19

NOTE: At 39 minutes into the episode, the 1 in 50,000 likelihood estimate is an excess death estimate, not an infection fatality rate.  It is the likelihood of a healthy person in that age category dying from a coronavirus infection over and above their likelihood of dying from all the other things that might kill them, given their age and prior health status. See https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-measure-of-new-yorks-coronavirus-devastation-11591140254?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=2

Ten leading causes of death by age category: https://freopp.org/estimating-the-risk-of-death-from-covid-19-vs-influenza-or-pneumonia-by-age-630aea3ae5a9

Dr. Peter DeScioli is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Stony Brook University, where he teaches courses on Moral Politics and Public Policy. His research concerns how people strategically form friendships, how people understand notions of property and ownership, and the role of moral condemnation in social functioning. Today, we discuss his research on moral condemnation—the function of moral impartiality, third party judgement and punishment. Specifically, we talk about his theory which construes moral judgement as playing a functional role in reducing the costliness of conflicts as they arise.

Transcript available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep35-PeterDeScioli

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, June 9). Moral Impartiality, Third Party Judgment, and George Floyd Riots with Peter DeScioli [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep35-PeterDeScioli

Dr. Joshua Greene is a Psychology Professor and a faculty member of the Center for Brain Science at Harvard University. His work focuses on the dual-process theory of emotions and reason as it relates to moral judgment. He is perhaps most known for his past neuropsychological work involving the trolley dilemma. Today, he continues his research into strategies for effective altruism and how to apply principles of what he calls “deep pragmatism,” for solving large-scale social challenges. We discuss the principles of deep pragmatism, as outlined in his book Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap between Us and Them, in today’s episode.

Transcript available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep34-JoshuaGreene

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, May 26). Deep Pragmatism with Joshua Greene [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep34-JoshuaGreene

Dr. Linda Skitka is a psychology professor and associate department head at the University of Illinois at Chicago, as well as a professor of political science by courtesy. She has been the president of the Midwestern Psychological Association and the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, and an associate editor of Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: Attitudes and Social Cognition, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, and Social Justice Research. She has received numerous awards for her service. Her research spans a broad range of topics, but she is perhaps best known for her work on justice, the precursors and outcomes of moral convictions, attitude moralization, and how each of these relate to political ideology.

Transcript available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep33-LindaSkitka

APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, March 31). The Stubbornness of Convictions with Linda Skitka [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep33-LindaSkitka