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Beliefism: how to stop hating the people we disagree with

Hosted by the Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science

In-person and online public event (Old Theatre, Old Building)

Speaker

Professor Paul Dolan

Join us for this talk by LSE's Paul Dolan in which he will talk about his new book, Beliefism.

Do you avoid people who are strongly against immigration? Or strongly for trans rights? Against abortion? For drug legalisation? We might like to think that we're tolerant, but many of us struggle to engage with people whose opinions differ strongly from our own-even if they might have something useful to contribute to the debate. That means we're falling victim to what behavioural scientist Paul Dolan defines as Beliefism: discrimination against those with different beliefs to us. Drawing on the evidence from across the social sciences, Dolan shows how easy it is for us to divide ourselves into opposing camps - and how harmful that can be.

Using the central metaphor of the duck-rabbit illusion - where the same image can be viewed as one animal or the other-the book shows that looking at an issue from only one perspective can lead to bad decisions and unnecessary conflict. The world would be a better place if there was less beliefism and Dolan shows how more tolerance is only possible "by design". We need to embed less beliefism into our organisations and lives and he provides a checklist called EMBRACE to help us do that.

Meet our speaker and chair

Paul Dolan (@profpauldolan) is Professor of Behavioural Science in the Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science at LSE, and Director of the Executive MSc in Behavioural Science. Three decades of research have focused on developing ways to better measure and value the richness of the human experience. He is the author of Happiness by Design, and Happy Ever After and the creator and presenter of the podcasts Breaking Beliefism, Duck - Rabbit and Get Happier. 

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From the world to the lab and back again. The Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science (@LSE_PBS) is a growing community of researchers, intellectuals, and students who investigate the human mind and behaviour in a societal context. Our department conducts cutting-edge psychological and behavioural research that is both based in and applied to the real world.

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This public event is free and open to all. This event will be a hybrid event, with an in-person audience and an online audience.

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For the online event: Registration for this event via LSE Live will open in mid April.

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