The Elephant in the Brain: Hidden Motives in Everyday Life

by Kevin Simler

When we suggest that our political behavior is driven largely by coalition loyalty, then, we’re not trying to single out political parties (Democrat, Republican) or political ideologies (liberal, conservative) as the fundamental focal points. The left–right split happens to be important in modern liberal democracies, especially the United States in recent, more-polarized decades, but changing circumstances can shift the focal points. When a nation goes to war, for example, intra-national political divisions often take a back seat to patriotism and national unity. In other words, context matters—a lot. Nevertheless, our hypothesis is that the political behavior of ordinary, individual citizens is often better explained as an attempt to signal loyalty to “our side” (whatever side that happens to be in a particular situation), rather than as a good-faith attempt to improve outcomes. In addition to the Do-Right’s motives, then, we also harbor the motives of the apparatchik: wanting to appear loyal to the groups around us.

contexts that reward loyalty are a breeding ground for self-deception and strategic irrationality. For our beliefs to function as loyalty signals, we can’t simply “follow the facts” and “listen to reason.” Instead, we have to believe things that are beyond reason, things that other, less-loyal people wouldn’t believe.45 This helps explain why voters feel little pressure to be informed. As long as we adopt the “right” beliefs—those of our main coalitions—we get full credit for loyalty. We don’t need to be well informed because the truth isn’t particularly relevant to our expressive agendas. The main actions we take based on our political beliefs are preaching and voting, neither of which has practical consequences for our lives (only social consequences). And on the rare occasions when our political beliefs do suggest concrete actions, we’re happy to ignore their suggestions and act as we would even if we believed the opposite. For example, we might think, “Everyone deserves access to the same opportunities” and yet fiercely compete to get our kids into the best schools. This kind of mild hypocrisy might bother us on occasion, but it probably won’t keep us up at night. We have to strike a balance, though, between critical thinking and mindless obedience. If we adopt beliefs that are too far-fetched, we risk looking foolish, thereby offsetting the benefit we get for showing loyalty. Thus the best apparatchiks are highly intelligent and even skeptical, as long as their skepti...

we use far-off national politics as a medium in which to jockey for local advantages.

Another promising strategy is to put ourselves in situations where our hidden motives better align with our ideal motives. For example, if we want to express sincere yet accurate beliefs, we might get into the habit of betting on our beliefs. Or, for charity, we might join the effective altruism movement, in order to surround ourselves with people who will judge our charitable giving more by its effects than by superficial appearances. Incentives are like the wind: we can choose to row or tack against it, but it’s better if we can arrange to have the wind at our backs (see Box 18.).

Beyond what we can do in our personal lives, however, is what we can do when we’re in positions to influence policy or help reform institutions. This is where an understanding of the elephant really starts to pay off. Maybe most laypeople don’t need to understand their hidden motives, but those who make policy probably should. A common problem plagues people who try to design institutions without accounting for hidden motives. First they identify the key goals that the institution “should” achieve. Then they search for a design that best achieves these goals, given all the constraints that the institution must deal with. This task can be challenging enough, but even when the designers apparently succeed, they’re frequently puzzled and frustrated when others show little interest in adopting their solution. Often this is because they mistook professed motives for real motives, and thus solved the wrong problems.

We may be competitive social animals, self-interested and self-deceived, but we cooperated our way to the god-damned moon.

21One might see our human capacity to give counterfeit reasons in order to deceive others as a perversion of our basically solid ability to reason privately, i.e., to decide what to believe by collecting reasons for and against such beliefs. But in fact, it has been plausibly argued that our uniquely human tendency to collect reasons is primarily designed for social effect. That is, humans developed an ability to collect reasons mainly for the purpose of persuading others to support predetermined conclusions. This can help explain common human tendencies toward overconfidence, confirmation bias, relying more on reasons for public (vs. private) decisions, and occasionally preferring worse outcomes when it’s easier to find supporting reasons (e.g., the sunk cost fallacy). See Mercier and Sperber 2011.

7Even as recently as 1989, Irenäus Eibl-Eibesfeldt, one of the leading scholars of animal behavior, suggested that laughter may be an ancient form of aggression. “The rhythmic sounds,” he writes, “are reminiscent of threat and mobbing sounds made by lower primates, and the baring of teeth may be derived from an intention to bite” (Eibl-Eibesfeldt 2009).

6Miller: “When healthy respect for an adaptation tips over into awe, it becomes impossible to make any progress in understanding the selection pressures that shaped the adaptation” (2000, 345).

30This random approach, marrying breadth and depth, is similar to the strategy used by the Israeli airport security to sniff out terrorists. If they simply asked visitors a predetermined set of basic questions—like “What’s the purpose of your visit?” or “Where are you staying?”—liars could easily prepare canned answers. Instead, security staff members are trained to interrogate their subjects randomly and deeply. “What did you do on Tuesday?” “How long was the line at the museum?” “Did the line snake back and forth, or was it straight?” By probing subjects in this way, it’s easier to tell who’s lying and who’s giving a real story.

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