I greatly admire Jonathan Haidt’s work on moral psychology, particularly his recent book, The Righteous Mind, on the differing moral intuitions of conservatives and liberals. So I was intrigued by a recent test Haidt published in Time—a series of questions that, Haidt says, predict where one falls on the political spectrum. The questions don’t relate to politics directly. They relate more to values (“Should kids be taught to respect authority?”; “Is self-control or self-expression more important?”) and lifestyle (“Do you like fusion cuisine?”)—what we might think of as culture. None of the questions relates to religion as such, though, to my mind, there are obvious overlaps. Also, none of the questions relates to economics; Haidt’s point, which seems right to me, is that politics remains largely a matter of moral intuition.
Anyway, I don’t want to say too much about the test and ruin it. Go ahead and answer the questions. For what it’s worth, they predicted my political leanings quite well. (H/T: Rod Dreher).
