Sunday, June 3, 2012

Conscience, the App

Psychologist and behavioral economist Dan Ariely has a new app called Conscience+.  I knew that outsourcing our moral and willpower decisions was going to happen soon, I just didn't know it would happen this soon.  Here's what he writes about it:


I’m pleased to announce that I have a new app available at the App Store called Conscience+.

Conscience+ helps you reason through moral dilemmas by providing you with little “shoulder angels” that can help you argue either side of a decision. Simply flip the switch at the top of the app to move between good conscience and bad conscience. Whether you need the extra push to go through with a selfish deed or words of wisdom to resist a bad temptation, Conscience+ has you covered.

Get help with:
turning away the dessert menu
splurging on a new electronic gadget
staying faithful to your romantic partner
padding your expense report on your boss’s dime
lying on your college application
and much, much more!
Get Conscience+ free from the App Store here! Once you’ve played with the app yourself, let us know in the comments if you have any suggested excuses. If we like them, we’ll put them in the next update.

I guess like most apps, this app will get smarter and smarter the more people use it?  And pretty soon we'll be completely outsourcing our moral decisionmaking, the same way that no one really programs their own computers or drives a manual transmission anymore?

46 comments:

  1. Great now people have another thimg to blame if something goes wrong.

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  2. I don't think anyone actually has a conscience in the normal sense of that word. What they call conscience is just badly evolved survival strategy.

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    Replies
    1. You make no sense at all.

      Normal conscience is normal, in the normal sense of the word, otherwise it wouldn't be normal, or normal in the normal sense of the word, regardless of what whoever decides it's source or purpose is.

      Survival strategy: isn't that the point of everything humans do?

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  3. Good lard, modern life is pathetic.

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    1. For having O.C.D you make a lot of typing errors.
      *...rd. M...

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    2. Psychopathy/Sociopathy cannot coexist with OCD or OCDP.
      No super ego vs a very strong one.Paradox.

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    3. It's called wordplay, smartass.

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  4. I'm amused. Just another salve for all those people too unwilling or stupid to think for themselves.

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  5. i'm usualy the sholder devil (you know you want to)

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  6. ME was on aftermathradio16 April

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    Replies
    1. There is no April 16.

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    2. ME sounds exactly as I expected. And she's very convincing at faking her emotions.

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  7. http://aftermath-surviving-psychopathy.org/radio/index.php/2012/04/16/aftermath-radio-am-i-a-psychopath/

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    Replies
    1. this doesn't work?!?!?!

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    2. That was lame. That Tatiana chick has exactly the "girl on internet" voice.~

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    3. thats how I imagine demon, or any other "am I a sociopath" to sound. Young confused, and desperate to be the super hero ideal of a sociopath.
      'I don't fit any of the characteristics that define sociopathy, but when I make up my own definition I fit it perfectly! Amazing!"

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    4. That wasn't M.E. . M.E. was at coachella when that was recorded. That girl was retarded
      She actually is just like every wanna be psychopath that we fucl with on here.

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    5. No one tried to fuck with me yet :o

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    6. I couldn't get past the first five minutes of her speaking. All I could picture was a thiry-something obese girl with 50s hipster bangs and cat-eye glasses who probably talks a lot about going to mortuary school.

      That host was even a bigger douchebag. A whole lot of words but a whole lot of saying nothing.

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  8. I'm going to download 'lack of conscience+' which helps me choose the most morally questionable decisions on a daily basis.

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  9. The Bible says that man was born with a conscience but it can be seared and rendered non accessible.

    Actually, for more interest, Adam and Eve were NOT born with a conscience, as they did not need one.

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    Replies
    1. this is part of the existential philosophy?

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    2. No, who said anything about existential philosophy. We are talking about the conscience.

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    3. someone threw up a paper which described the difference between atheist and bible existentialists.

      Conscience moral decisions come easier with god and religion imo.

      The paper said both can be existentialists and describes both as naturalists. It equates existentialism with humanism.

      Do you feel like you have an existentialist philosophy?

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    4. Not sure.Can you explain more?

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    5. No not really anything I want to share. Thank you though.

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    6. I am happy to try to describe what I believe, but I have to understand the question lol

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  10. Bible Anon - is that you Jose;)?

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  11. Nope Bible Anon is his own man

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  12. I think conscience is a man made concept..I keep going back to a quote by Oscar Wilde "there is nothing either good or bad, only thinking makes it so". This idea upsets a great many people I wonder why? I guess in a dream world man is really moral and it's society and its values that damage and perhaps corrupt him..but what if the real truth is that man is more beast than human and only a tremendous amount of effort keeps the beast in check...I know myself there are urges and I am the "nice" girl..I am so "good" but it's not real..once in a while I have let my true nature show and it was not pretty as it is on the outside because on the inside I realize no matter how I may seem, how many men desire me, how many friends I have, how successful I am, or what a "good listener" "good student" "good lawyer" "good blah..blah..blah.." I am..I am something different. Something I need to disguise because the real me is aggressive, slightly sadistic, competitive, manipulative, mean, and very alienated. Sometimes the greatest thrill is pretending to be a sheep and being a wolf in its clothing while watching, observing, plotting, and of course laughing..on the inside while being so "serious" on the surface ;)

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    1. Must be pretty lonely, only being able to honestly laugh to yourself and not have any true connections with people.

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    2. She didn't say that. Where do you get that from, BE?

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    3. lonely - It is..I am...but I don't know how to connect I never have. No matter how many people I may surround myself with, no matter how much my family loves me, no matter how full filling I may find my career....it's this dark pit where I know I am truly alone. Anytime I've really been me.. people have been horrified. I create a persona, a fantasy actually...for everyone parents, colleagues, friends, boyfriends, they think I'm "perfect" i can maintain for a while sometimes they can see certain things..cracks..things that don't add up....like when they tell me "oh don't you see how naive you are" and I explain what they are thinking but times 10. They don't get it they observe me and say but you think xyz and i say silly you it was just an act.. They are shocked by my "low" opinion of other people, that I hate those same people that I am friendly with who think they have my number and will take advantage but don't realize that I realize what they think they will do. They are shocked when they hear my opinions on the men I dated and what really shocks is that nothing shocks me at all..I've seen the worst of human nature..I invited it in.

      Sometimes my mother looks at me in cold awareness (she is a sociopath if one has ever exited) and she says wow i am a snake but you are so much worse..she says it with a real sense of admiration. She is one of the two people I have ever really understood.

      I am attracted to the dark part of human nature.. anyone who is different because at least they are not boring they feel "something". I feel nothing....I am numb. the only way I can combat it is to be constantly stimulated through outside forces that are extreme..I need a stressful job, an extreme workout, a starvation diet, a sadistic boyfriend, a hyper crticial parent..otherwise I have nothing that makes me feel..I am literally cold with no feeling at all.

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    4. Did you have bad abuse?

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    5. Did I have bad abuse? No..none that I didn't enjoy lol...just kidding. I had a perfectionist mother who always wanted more, ballet teachers who were tough, and a father who is a narcissist (a doctor obsessed with dieting). I was pushed a lot to be better than I thought I could be and then I would do it and the goal would be set higher..eventually i was obsessed with perfection..in everything and at times I think I came close to pleasing myself...but with a price of course. I was 103 pounds 5'9 it was thin..even my ballet teacher said to stop. Anyway I always feel like I am floating on air when I have no sustenance, when someone is emotionally unavailable, being drilled at work by a partner whom I impress, I feel strong for staring them dead in the eyes and not caring, when someone is trying to manipulate me and thinks me a fool, I participate in their game with glee until I don't and they see me they "really" see me..I guess I feel cold, I feel strong with certain challenges, I've conquered many demons, but i don't feel happy, I don't know the meaning of the word. My world is GREY..what is it called when you get what you want but it means nothing..?

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    6. I totally understand especially about the grey.

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    7. Anon 7:09
      I was thinking about you, last night. My background was similar. `I had to be a high achiever to have any value. However, what I achieved just made the bar go higher.
      I have stopped talking to my family for 7 months. In that time, I have gotten some clarity. A little clarity is a lot when one is under water in this way, as I was/am and sounds like you are.

      SW has helped me,immensely. You wrote your experience and you did not get a lot of do-gooder woman jump you and stuff fluff in your mouth, as you would in most places. This place is very honest. Health is Truth. Sickness is Lies. Have you ever read "People of the Lie" by Scott Peck.

      One thing I can see with a little distance from my mother is how black and white she is. No child could win that game. If you had any flaw, you were thrown away. If I got all A's, she would say that some people were so smart, they could get all A's without being a greasy grind lol

      It sounds funny when I write it, but my whole life was like that.
      She would tell me to fix myself up, so I looked better. When I did, she called me vain.



      She would tell me to care more about my house, material things etc. When I did, she called me materialistic.

      I was in an untenable position, as it sounds like you were, too.

      Stick around SW and you will get hope,strength and even joy, as this place is nuts.

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  13. The Bible says that what "The Fall" was, was man's disobedience to God. This ushered in ALL the pain, inside and out, that we all experience. Prior to Adam's disobedience i.e. The Fall, man had no consciousness of his being a separate creature from God. It was a perfect symbiosis. Man did not know he was a separate creature from God. That is why man was naked and did not know it.

    That ended with The Fall. When, that happened, man lost his innocence. As a result man's spirit changed. This was the beginning of the knowledge of good and evil i.e the conscience.

    Every man is tempted by evil thoughts and desires and will be until the day he dies.

    What Anon talks about is the natural condition of all men.

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  14. C M (as in committee member)June 7, 2012 at 9:03 AM

    I wish soulful was here to help me out with this one. I'd appreciate it if some of you could try.

    I am in a bind. I am a member of a committee, and the chair of the committee is someone I can't stand her face. She is quite sociopathic, and I played the heroine empath in the past (as in don't press her in front of others even when she dissed me in front of them) but got the picture eventually and started exposing her in competence related issues and she she is truly worried that I'll keep doing this while she also tries to take a stab occasionally.

    Now there will be only four meetings this committee has to go through. I could resign and avoid all that garbage (there is no good that I need from any of these people or the organization). But, I don't want to leave in a weak position so I should learn to go with a happy face and just be, conclude my term, say some nice things (as Americans are so good at this sort of bs) and call it yet another chapter of live and learn.

    Should I drink something before going into these meetings? What should be my mantra? Would you resign or would you go?

    ReplyDelete

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