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A new edition of Wegner's classic and controversial work, arguing
that conscious will simply reminds of us the authorship of our
actions. Do we consciously cause our actions, or do they happen to
us? Philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, theologians, and
lawyers have long debated the existence of free will versus
determinism. With the publication of The Illusion of Conscious Will
in 2002, Daniel Wegner proposed an innovative and provocative
answer: the feeling of conscious will is created by the mind and
brain; it helps us to appreciate and remember our authorship of the
things our minds and bodies do. Yes, we feel that we consciously
will our actions, Wegner says, but at the same time, our actions
happen to us. Although conscious will is an illusion ("the most
compelling illusion"), it serves as a guide to understanding
ourselves and to developing a sense of responsibility and morality.
Wegner was unable to undertake a second edition of the book before
his death in 2013; this new edition adds a foreword by Wegner's
friend, the prominent psychologist Daniel Gilbert, and an
introduction by Wegner's colleague Thalia Wheatley. Approaching
conscious will as a topic of psychological study, Wegner examines
cases both when people feel that they are willing an act that they
are not doing and when they are not willing an act that they in
fact are doing in such phenomena as hypnosis, Ouija board spelling,
and dissociative identity disorder. Wegner's argument was
immediately controversial (called "unwarranted impertinence" by one
scholar) but also compelling. Engagingly written, with wit and
clarity, The Illusion of Conscious Will was, as Daniel Gilbert
writes in the foreword to this edition, Wegner's "magnum opus."
An overview of the latest interdisciplinary research on human
morality, capturing moral sensibility as a sophisticated
integration of cognitive, emotional, and motivational mechanisms.
Over the past decade, an explosion of empirical research in a
variety of fields has allowed us to understand human moral
sensibility as a sophisticated integration of cognitive, emotional,
and motivational mechanisms shaped through evolution, development,
and culture. Evolutionary biologists have shown that moral
cognition evolved to aid cooperation; developmental psychologists
have demonstrated that the elements that underpin morality are in
place much earlier than we thought; and social neuroscientists have
begun to map brain circuits implicated in moral decision making.
This volume offers an overview of current research on the moral
brain, examining the topic from disciplinary perspectives that
range from anthropology and neurophilosophy to justice and law. The
contributors address the evolution of morality, considering
precursors of human morality in other species as well as uniquely
human adaptations. They examine motivations for morality, exploring
the roles of passion, extreme sacrifice, and cooperation. They go
on to consider the development of morality, from infancy to
adolescence; findings on neurobiological mechanisms of moral
cognition; psychopathic immorality; and the implications for
justice and law of a more biological understanding of morality.
These new findings may challenge our intuitions about society and
justice, but they may also lead to more a humane and flexible legal
system. Contributors Scott Atran, Abigail A. Baird, Nicolas
Baumard, Sarah Brosnan, Jason M. Cowell, Molly J. Crockett, Ricardo
de Oliveira-Souza, Andrew W. Delton, Mark R. Dadds, Jean Decety,
Jeremy Ginges, Andrea L. Glenn, Joshua D. Greene, J. Kiley Hamlin,
David J. Hawes, Jillian Jordan, Max M. Krasnow, Ayelet Lahat, Jorge
Moll, Caroline Moul, Thomas Nadelhoffer, Alexander Peysakhovich,
Laurent Pretot, Jesse Prinz, David G. Rand, Rheanna J. Remmel, Emma
Roellke, Regina A. Rini, Joshua Rottman, Mark Sheskin, Thalia
Wheatley, Liane Young, Roland Zahn
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