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Chris Anderson: So, Jon, this feels scary.

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Jonathan Haidt: Yeah.

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CA: It feels like the world is in a place

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that we haven't seen for a long time.

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People don't just disagree
in the way that we're familiar with,

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on the left-right political divide.

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There are much deeper differences afoot.

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What on earth is going on,
and how did we get here?

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JH: This is different.

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There's a much more
apocalyptic sort of feeling.

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Survey research by Pew Research shows

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that the degree to which we feel
that the other side is not just --

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we don't just dislike them;
we strongly dislike them,

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and we think that they are
a threat to the nation.

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Those numbers have been going up and up,

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and those are over 50 percent
now on both sides.

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People are scared,

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because it feels like this is different
than before; it's much more intense.

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Whenever I look
at any sort of social puzzle,

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I always apply the three basic
principles of moral psychology,

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and I think they'll help us here.

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So the first thing that you
have to always keep in mind

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when you're thinking about politics

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is that we're tribal.

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We evolved for tribalism.

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One of the simplest and greatest
insights into human social nature

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is the Bedouin proverb:

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"Me against my brother;

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me and my brother against our cousin;

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me and my brother and cousins
against the stranger."

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And that tribalism allowed us
to create large societies

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and to come together
in order to compete with others.

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That brought us out of the jungle
and out of small groups,

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but it means that we have
eternal conflict.

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The question you have to look at is:

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What aspects of our society
are making that more bitter,

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and what are calming them down?

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CA: That's a very dark proverb.

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You're saying that that's actually
baked into most people's mental wiring

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at some level?

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JH: Oh, absolutely. This is just
a basic aspect of human social cognition.

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But we can also live together
really peacefully,

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and we've invented all kinds
of fun ways of, like, playing war.

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I mean, sports, politics --

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these are all ways that we get
to exercise this tribal nature

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without actually hurting anyone.

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We're also really good at trade
and exploration and meeting new people.

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So you have to see our tribalism
as something that goes up or down --

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it's not like we're doomed
to always be fighting each other,

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but we'll never have world peace.

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CA: The size of that tribe
can shrink or expand.

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JH: Right.

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CA: The size of what we consider "us"

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and what we consider "other" or "them"

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can change.

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And some people believed that process
could continue indefinitely.

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JH: That's right.

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CA: And we were indeed expanding
the sense of tribe for a while.

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JH: So this is, I think,

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where we're getting at what's possibly
the new left-right distinction.

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I mean, the left-right
as we've all inherited it,

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comes out of the labor
versus capital distinction,

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and the working class, and Marx.

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But I think what we're seeing
now, increasingly,

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is a divide in all the Western democracies

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between the people
who want to stop at nation,

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the people who are more parochial --

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and I don't mean that in a bad way --

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people who have much more
of a sense of being rooted,

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they care about their town,
their community and their nation.

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And then those who are
anti-parochial and who --

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whenever I get confused, I just think
of the John Lennon song "Imagine."

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"Imagine there's no countries,
nothing to kill or die for."

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And so these are the people
who want more global governance,

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they don't like nation states,
they don't like borders.

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You see this all over Europe as well.

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There's a great metaphor guy --
actually, his name is Shakespeare --

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writing ten years ago in Britain.

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He had a metaphor:

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"Are we drawbridge-uppers
or drawbridge-downers?"

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And Britain is divided
52-48 on that point.

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And America is divided on that point, too.

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CA: And so, those of us
who grew up with The Beatles

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and that sort of hippie philosophy
of dreaming of a more connected world --

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it felt so idealistic and "how could
anyone think badly about that?"

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And what you're saying is that, actually,

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millions of people today
feel that that isn't just silly;

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it's actually dangerous and wrong,
and they're scared of it.

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JH: I think the big issue, especially
in Europe but also here,

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is the issue of immigration.

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And I think this is where
we have to look very carefully

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at the social science
about diversity and immigration.

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Once something becomes politicized,

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once it becomes something
that the left loves and the right --

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then even the social scientists
can't think straight about it.

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Now, diversity is good in a lot of ways.

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It clearly creates more innovation.

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The American economy
has grown enormously from it.

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Diversity and immigration
do a lot of good things.

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But what the globalists,
I think, don't see,

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what they don't want to see,

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is that ethnic diversity
cuts social capital and trust.

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There's a very important
study by Robert Putnam,

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the author of "Bowling Alone,"

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looking at social capital databases.

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And basically, the more people
feel that they are the same,

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the more they trust each other,

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the more they can have
a redistributionist welfare state.

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Scandinavian countries are so wonderful

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because they have this legacy
of being small, homogenous countries.

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And that leads to
a progressive welfare state,

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a set of progressive
left-leaning values, which says,

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"Drawbridge down!
The world is a great place.

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People in Syria are suffering --
we must welcome them in."

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And it's a beautiful thing.

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But if, and I was in Sweden
this summer,

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if the discourse in Sweden
is fairly politically correct

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and they can't talk about the downsides,

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you end up bringing a lot of people in.

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That's going to cut social capital,

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it makes it hard to have a welfare state

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and they might end up,
as we have in America,

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with a racially divided, visibly
racially divided, society.

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So this is all very
uncomfortable to talk about.

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But I think this is the thing,
especially in Europe and for us, too,

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we need to be looking at.

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CA: You're saying that people of reason,

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people who would consider
themselves not racists,

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but moral, upstanding people,

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have a rationale that says
humans are just too different;

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that we're in danger of overloading
our sense of what humans are capable of,

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by mixing in people who are too different.

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JH: Yes, but I can make it
much more palatable

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by saying it's not necessarily about race.

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It's about culture.

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There's wonderful work by a political
scientist named Karen Stenner,

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who shows that when people have a sense

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that we are all united,
we're all the same,

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there are many people who have
a predisposition to authoritarianism.

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Those people aren't particularly racist

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when they feel as through
there's not a threat

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to our social and moral order.

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But if you prime them experimentally

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by thinking we're coming apart,
people are getting more different,

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then they get more racist, homophobic,
they want to kick out the deviants.

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So it's in part that you get
an authoritarian reaction.

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The left, following through
the Lennonist line --

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the John Lennon line --

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does things that create
an authoritarian reaction.

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We're certainly seeing that
in America with the alt-right.

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We saw it in Britain,
we've seen it all over Europe.

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But the more positive part of that

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is that I think the localists,
or the nationalists, are actually right --

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that, if you emphasize
our cultural similarity,

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then race doesn't actually
matter very much.

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So an assimilationist
approach to immigration

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removes a lot of these problems.

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And if you value having
a generous welfare state,

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you've got to emphasize
that we're all the same.

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CA: OK, so rising immigration
and fears about that

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are one of the causes
of the current divide.

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What are other causes?

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JH: The next principle of moral psychology

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is that intuitions come first,
strategic reasoning second.

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You've probably heard
the term "motivated reasoning"

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or "confirmation bias."

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There's some really interesting work

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on how our high intelligence
and our verbal abilities

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might have evolved
not to help us find out the truth,

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but to help us manipulate each other,
defend our reputation ...

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We're really, really good
at justifying ourselves.

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And when you bring
group interests into account,

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so it's not just me,
it's my team versus your team,

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whereas if you're evaluating evidence
that your side is wrong,

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we just can't accept that.

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So this is why you can't win
a political argument.

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If you're debating something,

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you can't persuade the person
with reasons and evidence,

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because that's not
the way reasoning works.

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So now, give us the internet,
give us Google:

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"I heard that Barack Obama
was born in Kenya.

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Let me Google that -- oh my God!
10 million hits! Look, he was!"

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CA: So this has come as an unpleasant
surprise to a lot of people.

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Social media has often been framed
by techno-optimists

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as this great connecting force
that would bring people together.

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And there have been some
unexpected counter-effects to that.

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JH: That's right.

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That's why I'm very enamored
of yin-yang views

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of human nature and left-right --

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that each side is right
about certain things,

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but then it goes blind to other things.

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And so the left generally believes
that human nature is good:

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bring people together, knock down
the walls and all will be well.

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The right -- social conservatives,
not libertarians --

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social conservatives generally
believe people can be greedy

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and sexual and selfish,

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and we need regulation,
and we need restrictions.

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So, yeah, if you knock down all the walls,

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allow people to communicate
all over the world,

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you get a lot of porn and a lot of racism.

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CA: So help us understand.

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These principles of human nature
have been with us forever.

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What's changed that's deepened
this feeling of division?

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JH: You have to see six to ten
different threads all coming together.

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I'll just list a couple of them.

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So in America, one of the big --
actually, America and Europe --

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one of the biggest ones is World War II.

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There's interesting research
from Joe Henrich and others

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that says if your country was at war,

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especially when you were young,

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then we test you 30 years later
in a commons dilemma

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or a prisoner's dilemma,

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you're more cooperative.

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Because of our tribal nature, if you're --

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my parents were teenagers
during World War II,

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and they would go out
looking for scraps of aluminum

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to help the war effort.

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I mean, everybody pulled together.

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And so then these people go on,

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they rise up through business
and government,

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they take leadership positions.

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They're really good
at compromise and cooperation.

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They all retire by the '90s.

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So we're left with baby boomers
by the end of the '90s.

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And their youth was spent fighting
each other within each country,

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in 1968 and afterwards.

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The loss of the World War II generation,
"The Greatest Generation,"

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is huge.

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So that's one.

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Another, in America,
is the purification of the two parties.

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There used to be liberal Republicans
and conservative Democrats.

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So America had a mid-20th century
that was really bipartisan.

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But because of a variety of factors
that started things moving,

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by the 90's, we had a purified
liberal party and conservative party.

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So now, the people in either party
really are different,

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and we really don't want
our children to marry them,

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which, in the '60s,
didn't matter very much.

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So, the purification of the parties.

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Third is the internet and, as I said,

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it's just the most amazing stimulant
for post-hoc reasoning and demonization.

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00:10:52,316 --> 00:10:57,108
CA: The tone of what's happening
on the internet now is quite troubling.

242
00:10:57,132 --> 00:10:59,979
I just did a quick search
on Twitter about the election

243
00:11:00,003 --> 00:11:02,923
and saw two tweets next to each other.

244
00:11:03,335 --> 00:11:07,547
One, against a picture of racist graffiti:

245
00:11:08,007 --> 00:11:09,640
"This is disgusting!

246
00:11:09,664 --> 00:11:12,834
Ugliness in this country,
brought to us by #Trump."

247
00:11:13,424 --> 00:11:14,806
And then the next one is:

248
00:11:15,339 --> 00:11:18,642
"Crooked Hillary
dedication page. Disgusting!"

249
00:11:19,176 --> 00:11:23,383
So this idea of "disgust"
is troubling to me.

250
00:11:23,407 --> 00:11:26,642
Because you can have an argument
or a disagreement about something,

251
00:11:26,666 --> 00:11:28,227
you can get angry at someone.

252
00:11:29,094 --> 00:11:32,687
Disgust, I've heard you say,
takes things to a much deeper level.

253
00:11:32,711 --> 00:11:34,598
JH: That's right. Disgust is different.

254
00:11:34,622 --> 00:11:36,585
Anger -- you know, I have kids.

255
00:11:36,609 --> 00:11:38,359
They fight 10 times a day,

256
00:11:38,383 --> 00:11:40,350
and they love each other 30 times a day.

257
00:11:40,374 --> 00:11:43,284
You just go back and forth:
you get angry, you're not angry;

258
00:11:43,308 --> 00:11:44,831
you're angry, you're not angry.

259
00:11:44,855 --> 00:11:46,165
But disgust is different.

260
00:11:46,189 --> 00:11:50,662
Disgust paints the person
as subhuman, monstrous,

261
00:11:50,686 --> 00:11:52,495
deformed, morally deformed.

262
00:11:52,519 --> 00:11:54,943
Disgust is like indelible ink.

263
00:11:55,768 --> 00:11:59,283
There's research from John Gottman
on marital therapy.

264
00:11:59,307 --> 00:12:04,432
If you look at the faces -- if one
of the couple shows disgust or contempt,

265
00:12:04,456 --> 00:12:07,552
that's a predictor that they're going
to get divorced soon,

266
00:12:07,576 --> 00:12:10,475
whereas if they show anger,
that doesn't predict anything,

267
00:12:10,499 --> 00:12:13,208
because if you deal with anger well,
it actually is good.

268
00:12:13,232 --> 00:12:14,684
So this election is different.

269
00:12:14,708 --> 00:12:18,362
Donald Trump personally
uses the word "disgust" a lot.

270
00:12:18,386 --> 00:12:21,243
He's very germ-sensitive,
so disgust does matter a lot --

271
00:12:21,267 --> 00:12:25,177
more for him, that's something
unique to him --

272
00:12:25,201 --> 00:12:28,104
but as we demonize each other more,

273
00:12:28,128 --> 00:12:31,537
and again, through
the Manichaean worldview,

274
00:12:31,561 --> 00:12:34,291
the idea that the world
is a battle between good and evil

275
00:12:34,315 --> 00:12:35,662
as this has been ramping up,

276
00:12:35,686 --> 00:12:39,012
we're more likely not just to say
they're wrong or I don't like them,

277
00:12:39,036 --> 00:12:41,572
but we say they're evil, they're satanic,

278
00:12:41,596 --> 00:12:43,517
they're disgusting, they're revolting.

279
00:12:43,541 --> 00:12:46,407
And then we want nothing to do with them.

280
00:12:46,806 --> 00:12:50,293
And that's why I think we're seeing it,
for example, on campus now.

281
00:12:50,317 --> 00:12:52,957
We're seeing more the urge
to keep people off campus,

282
00:12:52,981 --> 00:12:54,926
silence them, keep them away.

283
00:12:54,950 --> 00:12:57,545
I'm afraid that this whole
generation of young people,

284
00:12:57,569 --> 00:13:01,362
if their introduction to politics
involves a lot of disgust,

285
00:13:01,386 --> 00:13:05,091
they're not going to want to be involved
in politics as they get older.

286
00:13:05,506 --> 00:13:07,346
CA: So how do we deal with that?

287
00:13:07,370 --> 00:13:11,850
Disgust. How do you defuse disgust?

288
00:13:12,874 --> 00:13:14,822
JH: You can't do it with reasons.

289
00:13:15,312 --> 00:13:16,503
I think ...

290
00:13:18,257 --> 00:13:21,474
I studied disgust for many years,
and I think about emotions a lot.

291
00:13:21,498 --> 00:13:25,023
And I think that the opposite
of disgust is actually love.

292
00:13:25,764 --> 00:13:28,855
Love is all about, like ...

293
00:13:29,239 --> 00:13:31,810
Disgust is closing off, borders.

294
00:13:31,834 --> 00:13:34,379
Love is about dissolving walls.

295
00:13:35,074 --> 00:13:37,554
So personal relationships, I think,

296
00:13:37,578 --> 00:13:40,337
are probably the most
powerful means we have.

297
00:13:41,291 --> 00:13:43,988
You can be disgusted by a group of people,

298
00:13:44,012 --> 00:13:45,930
but then you meet a particular person

299
00:13:45,954 --> 00:13:48,730
and you genuinely discover
that they're lovely.

300
00:13:48,754 --> 00:13:53,050
And then gradually that chips away
or changes your category as well.

301
00:13:54,016 --> 00:13:59,993
The tragedy is, Americans used to be
much more mixed up in the their towns

302
00:14:00,017 --> 00:14:02,151
by left-right or politics.

303
00:14:02,175 --> 00:14:04,506
And now that it's become
this great moral divide,

304
00:14:04,530 --> 00:14:07,673
there's a lot of evidence
that we're moving to be near people

305
00:14:07,697 --> 00:14:09,209
who are like us politically.

306
00:14:09,233 --> 00:14:11,763
It's harder to find somebody
who's on the other side.

307
00:14:11,787 --> 00:14:14,077
So they're over there, they're far away.

308
00:14:14,101 --> 00:14:15,671
It's harder to get to know them.

309
00:14:15,695 --> 00:14:19,919
CA: What would you say to someone
or say to Americans,

310
00:14:19,943 --> 00:14:21,101
people generally,

311
00:14:21,125 --> 00:14:23,734
about what we should understand
about each other

312
00:14:23,758 --> 00:14:27,233
that might help us rethink for a minute

313
00:14:27,257 --> 00:14:29,460
this "disgust" instinct?

314
00:14:30,086 --> 00:14:31,238
JH: Yes.

315
00:14:31,262 --> 00:14:33,415
A really important
thing to keep in mind --

316
00:14:33,439 --> 00:14:38,155
there's research by political
scientist Alan Abramowitz,

317
00:14:38,179 --> 00:14:42,172
showing that American democracy
is increasingly governed

318
00:14:42,196 --> 00:14:44,439
by what's called "negative partisanship."

319
00:14:44,875 --> 00:14:47,986
That means you think,
OK there's a candidate,

320
00:14:48,010 --> 00:14:50,416
you like the candidate,
you vote for the candidate.

321
00:14:50,440 --> 00:14:52,499
But with the rise of negative advertising

322
00:14:52,523 --> 00:14:54,747
and social media
and all sorts of other trends,

323
00:14:54,771 --> 00:14:56,812
increasingly, the way elections are done

324
00:14:56,836 --> 00:15:00,817
is that each side tries to make
the other side so horrible, so awful,

325
00:15:00,841 --> 00:15:02,882
that you'll vote for my guy by default.

326
00:15:03,319 --> 00:15:06,289
And so as we more and more vote
against the other side

327
00:15:06,313 --> 00:15:07,644
and not for our side,

328
00:15:07,668 --> 00:15:13,175
you have to keep in mind
that if people are on the left,

329
00:15:13,199 --> 00:15:16,109
they think, "Well, I used to think
that Republicans were bad,

330
00:15:16,133 --> 00:15:17,616
but now Donald Trump proves it.

331
00:15:17,640 --> 00:15:20,491
And now every Republican,
I can paint with all the things

332
00:15:20,515 --> 00:15:21,897
that I think about Trump."

333
00:15:21,921 --> 00:15:23,514
And that's not necessarily true.

334
00:15:23,538 --> 00:15:26,230
They're generally not very happy
with their candidate.

335
00:15:26,254 --> 00:15:30,970
This is the most negative partisanship
election in American history.

336
00:15:31,860 --> 00:15:35,223
So you have to first separate
your feelings about the candidate

337
00:15:35,247 --> 00:15:38,184
from your feelings about the people
who are given a choice.

338
00:15:38,208 --> 00:15:40,691
And then you have to realize that,

339
00:15:41,246 --> 00:15:43,666
because we all live
in a separate moral world --

340
00:15:43,690 --> 00:15:47,141
the metaphor I use in the book
is that we're all trapped in "The Matrix,"

341
00:15:47,165 --> 00:15:50,689
or each moral community is a matrix,
a consensual hallucination.

342
00:15:50,713 --> 00:15:52,956
And so if you're within the blue matrix,

343
00:15:52,980 --> 00:15:56,174
everything's completely compelling
that the other side --

344
00:15:56,198 --> 00:15:59,829
they're troglodytes, they're racists,
they're the worst people in the world,

345
00:15:59,853 --> 00:16:01,957
and you have all the facts
to back that up.

346
00:16:01,981 --> 00:16:04,256
But somebody in the next house from yours

347
00:16:04,280 --> 00:16:06,313
is living in a different moral matrix.

348
00:16:06,337 --> 00:16:08,284
They live in a different video game,

349
00:16:08,308 --> 00:16:10,686
and they see a completely
different set of facts.

350
00:16:10,710 --> 00:16:13,386
And each one sees
different threats to the country.

351
00:16:13,410 --> 00:16:15,500
And what I've found
from being in the middle

352
00:16:15,524 --> 00:16:18,451
and trying to understand both sides
is: both sides are right.

353
00:16:18,475 --> 00:16:20,595
There are a lot of threats
to this country,

354
00:16:20,619 --> 00:16:24,104
and each side is constitutionally
incapable of seeing them all.

355
00:16:24,963 --> 00:16:31,482
CA: So, are you saying
that we almost need a new type of empathy?

356
00:16:31,506 --> 00:16:33,676
Empathy is traditionally framed as:

357
00:16:33,700 --> 00:16:36,391
"Oh, I feel your pain.
I can put myself in your shoes."

358
00:16:36,415 --> 00:16:39,344
And we apply it to the poor,
the needy, the suffering.

359
00:16:40,023 --> 00:16:43,846
We don't usually apply it
to people who we feel as other,

360
00:16:43,870 --> 00:16:45,335
or we're disgusted by.

361
00:16:45,359 --> 00:16:46,510
JH: No. That's right.

362
00:16:46,534 --> 00:16:51,364
CA: What would it look like
to build that type of empathy?

363
00:16:52,268 --> 00:16:53,506
JH: Actually, I think ...

364
00:16:54,145 --> 00:16:56,450
Empathy is a very, very
hot topic in psychology,

365
00:16:56,474 --> 00:16:59,132
and it's a very popular word
on the left in particular.

366
00:16:59,156 --> 00:17:03,156
Empathy is a good thing, and empathy
for the preferred classes of victims.

367
00:17:03,180 --> 00:17:04,633
So it's important to empathize

368
00:17:04,657 --> 00:17:07,481
with the groups that we on the left
think are so important.

369
00:17:07,505 --> 00:17:10,036
That's easy to do,
because you get points for that.

370
00:17:10,442 --> 00:17:14,091
But empathy really should get you points
if you do it when it's hard to do.

371
00:17:14,513 --> 00:17:16,267
And, I think ...

372
00:17:16,291 --> 00:17:21,379
You know, we had a long 50-year period
of dealing with our race problems

373
00:17:21,403 --> 00:17:23,658
and legal discrimination,

374
00:17:23,682 --> 00:17:25,869
and that was our top priority
for a long time

375
00:17:25,893 --> 00:17:27,143
and it still is important.

376
00:17:27,167 --> 00:17:28,696
But I think this year,

377
00:17:28,720 --> 00:17:31,124
I'm hoping it will make people see

378
00:17:31,148 --> 00:17:33,943
that we have an existential
threat on our hands.

379
00:17:33,967 --> 00:17:36,634
Our left-right divide, I believe,

380
00:17:36,658 --> 00:17:38,818
is by far the most important
divide we face.

381
00:17:38,842 --> 00:17:41,873
We still have issues about race
and gender and LGBT,

382
00:17:41,897 --> 00:17:45,268
but this is the urgent need
of the next 50 years,

383
00:17:45,292 --> 00:17:48,153
and things aren't going
to get better on their own.

384
00:17:49,021 --> 00:17:51,856
So we're going to need to do
a lot of institutional reforms,

385
00:17:51,880 --> 00:17:53,289
and we could talk about that,

386
00:17:53,313 --> 00:17:55,643
but that's like a whole long,
wonky conversation.

387
00:17:55,667 --> 00:17:59,513
But I think it starts with people
realizing that this is a turning point.

388
00:17:59,537 --> 00:18:02,346
And yes, we need a new kind of empathy.

389
00:18:02,370 --> 00:18:03,875
We need to realize:

390
00:18:03,899 --> 00:18:05,441
this is what our country needs,

391
00:18:05,465 --> 00:18:07,819
and this is what you need
if you don't want to --

392
00:18:07,843 --> 00:18:10,538
Raise your hand if you want
to spend the next four years

393
00:18:10,562 --> 00:18:14,048
as angry and worried as you've been
for the last year -- raise your hand.

394
00:18:14,072 --> 00:18:15,777
So if you want to escape from this,

395
00:18:15,801 --> 00:18:17,952
read Buddha, read Jesus,
read Marcus Aurelius.

396
00:18:17,976 --> 00:18:23,038
They have all kinds of great advice
for how to drop the fear,

397
00:18:23,062 --> 00:18:24,240
reframe things,

398
00:18:24,264 --> 00:18:26,347
stop seeing other people as your enemy.

399
00:18:26,371 --> 00:18:29,678
There's a lot of guidance in ancient
wisdom for this kind of empathy.

400
00:18:29,702 --> 00:18:31,079
CA: Here's my last question:

401
00:18:31,103 --> 00:18:35,438
Personally, what can
people do to help heal?

402
00:18:35,462 --> 00:18:39,545
JH: Yeah, it's very hard to just decide
to overcome your deepest prejudices.

403
00:18:39,569 --> 00:18:41,030
And there's research showing

404
00:18:41,054 --> 00:18:45,403
that political prejudices are deeper
and stronger than race prejudices

405
00:18:45,427 --> 00:18:46,687
in the country now.

406
00:18:47,395 --> 00:18:50,827
So I think you have to make an effort --
that's the main thing.

407
00:18:50,851 --> 00:18:52,855
Make an effort to actually meet somebody.

408
00:18:52,879 --> 00:18:55,089
Everybody has a cousin, a brother-in-law,

409
00:18:55,113 --> 00:18:56,982
somebody who's on the other side.

410
00:18:57,006 --> 00:18:58,822
So, after this election --

411
00:18:59,252 --> 00:19:00,603
wait a week or two,

412
00:19:00,627 --> 00:19:03,463
because it's probably going to feel
awful for one of you --

413
00:19:03,487 --> 00:19:07,639
but wait a couple weeks, and then
reach out and say you want to talk.

414
00:19:07,663 --> 00:19:09,087
And before you do it,

415
00:19:09,111 --> 00:19:12,256
read Dale Carnegie, "How to Win
Friends and Influence People" --

416
00:19:12,280 --> 00:19:13,319
(Laughter)

417
00:19:13,343 --> 00:19:14,510
I'm totally serious.

418
00:19:14,534 --> 00:19:17,124
You'll learn techniques
if you start by acknowledging,

419
00:19:17,148 --> 00:19:18,309
if you start by saying,

420
00:19:18,333 --> 00:19:20,003
"You know, we don't agree on a lot,

421
00:19:20,027 --> 00:19:22,565
but one thing I really respect
about you, Uncle Bob,"

422
00:19:22,589 --> 00:19:24,648
or "... about you conservatives, is ... "

423
00:19:24,672 --> 00:19:26,006
And you can find something.

424
00:19:26,030 --> 00:19:28,793
If you start with some
appreciation, it's like magic.

425
00:19:28,817 --> 00:19:30,931
This is one of the main
things I've learned

426
00:19:30,955 --> 00:19:32,868
that I take into my human relationships.

427
00:19:32,892 --> 00:19:34,812
I still make lots of stupid mistakes,

428
00:19:34,836 --> 00:19:36,852
but I'm incredibly good
at apologizing now,

429
00:19:36,876 --> 00:19:39,293
and at acknowledging what
somebody was right about.

430
00:19:39,317 --> 00:19:40,471
And if you do that,

431
00:19:40,495 --> 00:19:43,989
then the conversation goes really well,
and it's actually really fun.

432
00:19:44,717 --> 00:19:47,362
CA: Jon, it's absolutely fascinating
speaking with you.

433
00:19:47,386 --> 00:19:51,144
It's really does feel like
the ground that we're on

434
00:19:51,168 --> 00:19:56,035
is a ground populated by deep questions
of morality and human nature.

435
00:19:56,366 --> 00:19:58,790
Your wisdom couldn't be more relevant.

436
00:19:58,814 --> 00:20:01,109
Thank you so much for sharing
this time with us.

437
00:20:01,133 --> 00:20:02,285
JH: Thanks, Chris.

438
00:20:02,309 --> 00:20:03,470
JH: Thanks, everyone.

439
00:20:03,494 --> 00:20:05,494
(Applause)