Book Bites: Outraged

Outraged: Why We Fight About Morality and Politics and How to Find Common Ground by Kurt Gray
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Outraged is the rare, shining example of a pop-psychology book worth reading. Many in the genre fall into the tropes of overextrapolation and padding out word counts on what are essentially blog posts.

This is not that.

In Outraged, Kurt Gray lays out a simple hypothesis, backed by mountains of science: all morality stems from a fear of harm. Humans are more prey than predators, our brains evolved to detect harm before it can harm us, meaning our ideologies are far more alike than they are different. Knowing this, Gray provides simple, actionable and proven steps on how we can bridge seemingly impossible gaps and foster understanding. (Bonus points for repeated, gentle dunking on Jonathan Haidt).
One of the few pop-psychology books actually worth your time and effort. Highly recommend.


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