Moral Acrobatics : How We Avoid Ethical Ambiguity by Thinking in Black and White

Human beings are full of moral inconsistencies. We wear multiple moral hats on one head, and juggle double standards. But how do we manage being the moral acrobats that we are? Moral Acrobatics addresses this question by trying to shed honesty on who we are as moral agents and the limits of what we consider "moral". Philippe Rochat reveals our deep inclination to hold double standards and manage contradictory values, and our universal tendency to cluster our existence depending on context and situations, whether we deal with close kin, colleagues, strangers, lovers, or enemies. Ultimately, Moral Acrobatics explains our inclination to see the world in black and white.

Although it is difficult for us to fathom, pure monsters do not exist. Terrorists and other serial killers massacre innocent people, yet are perfectly capable of loving their own parents, neighbors, and children. Hitler, sending millions to their death, was contemptuous of meat eaters and a strong advocate of animal welfare. How do we reconcile such moral ambiguities? Do they capture something deep about how we build values? As a developmental scientist, Philippe Rochat explores this possibility, proposing that as members of a uniquely symbolic and self-conscious species aware of its own mortality, we develop uncanny abilities toward lying and self-deception. We are deeply categorical and compartmentalized in our views of the world. We imagine essence where there is none. We juggle double standards and manage contradictory values, clustering our existence depending on context and situations, whether we deal in relation to close kin, colleagues, strangers, lovers, or enemies. We live within multiple, interchangeable moral spheres. This social-contextual determination of the moral domain is the source of moral ambiguities and blatant contradictions we all need to own up to.