Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief

by Jordan B. Peterson

I learned that the meanings of the most profound sub strata of belief systems can be rendered explicitly comprehensible, even to the skeptical rational thinker--and that, so rendered, can be experienced as fascinating, profound and necessary. I learned why people wage war--why the desire to maintain, protect and expand the domain of belief motivates even the most incomprehensible acts of group-fostered oppression and cruelty-and what might be done to ameliorate this tendency, despite its universality. I learned, finally, that the terrible aspect oflife might actually be a necessary precondition for the existence oflife-and that it is possible to regard that precondition, in consequence, as comprehensible and acceptable.