The complex
relationship between Systems 1 and 2 and construal level
The
distinction between pre-attentive and focal-attentive mental processes has permeated cognitive psychology for some
35 years. In the past half-decade has emerged another cognitive dichotomy specific to
social psychology: processes of abstract
construal (far cognition) versus concrete construal (near cognition). This essay will theorize about the relationship between these
dichotomies to clarify further how believing in the existence of free will and in
the objective existence of morality can thwart reason by causing you to choose
what you don’t want.
The state
of the art on pre-attentive and focal-attentive processes is Daniel Kahneman’s
book Thinking, Fast and Slow, where
he calls pre-attentive processes System 1
and focal-attentive processes System 2.
The reification of processes into fictional systems also resembles Freud’s
System Csc (Conscious) and System Pcs (Preconscious). I’ll adopt the language System 1 and System 2, but readers can apply their understanding of preconscious – conscious, pre-attentive – focal-attentive, or automatic processes – controlled processes
dichotomies. They name the same distinction, in which System 1 consists of
processes occurring quickly and effortlessly in parallel outside awareness;
System 2 consists of processes occurring slowly and effortfully in sequential awareness, which in this context refers
to the contents of working memory rather than raw
experience and accompanies System 2 activity.
To
integrate Systems 1 and 2 with construal-level theory, we note that System
2—the conscious part of our minds—can perform any of three routines in making a
decision about taking some action, such
as whether to vote in an election, a good example not just for timeliness
but also for linkages to our main concern with morality: voting is a clear example
of an action without tangible benefit. The
potential voter might:
Case 1. Make a conscious
decision to vote based on applying the principle that citizens owe a duty to
vote in elections.
Case 2. Decide to be open to
the candidates’ substantive positions and vote only if either candidate seems
worthy of support.
Case 3. Experience a change
of mind between 1 and 2.
The preceding were examples of the
three routines System 2 can perform:
Case 1. Make the choice.
Case 2. “Program” System 1 to
make the choice based on automatic criteria that don’t require sequential
thinking.
Case 3. Interrupt System 1 in
the face of anomalies.
When System
2 initiates action, whether it retains the power to decide or passes to System
1 is the difference between concrete and abstract construal. Case 2 is key to understanding how Systems 1 and 2 work to produce the effects
construal-level theory predicts. Keep in mind that the unconscious, automatic
System 1 includes not just hardwired patterns but also skilled habits. Meanwhile,
System 2 is notoriously “lazy,” unwilling to interrupt System 1, as in Case 3,
but despite the perennial biases that plague System 1, resulting from letting
it have its way, the highest levels of expertise also occur in System 1.
A delegate
System 1 operates with holistic patterns typifying far cognition. This mode is far because we offload distant matter to
System 1 but exercise sequential control under System 2 as immediacy looms—although there are
many exceptions. It is critical to distinguish far cognition from the lazy failure of System 2 to perform properly
in Case 3, as such failure isn’t specific to
mode. Far cognition, System 1 acting
as delegate for System 2, is a narrower concept than automatic cognition, but far cognition is automatic cognition. Near
cognition admits no easy cross-classification.
Belief in free will
and moral realism undermine our “fast and frugal heuristics”
The two
most important recent books on the cognitive psychology of decision and
judgment are Thinking, Fast and Slow by
Daniel Kahneman and Gut Reactions: The
Intelligence of the Unconscious by Gerd Gigerenzer, and both insist on the contrast between their positions, although
conflicts aren’t obvious. Kahneman explains System 1 biases as due to employing mechanisms outside their evolutionary range of usefulness; Gigerenzer
describes “fast and frugal heuristics” that sometimes misfire to produce
biases. Where these half-empty versus half-full positions on heuristics and
biases really differ is their overall appraisal of near and far processes,
as Gigerenzer is a far thinker and
Kahneman a near thinker, and they are
both naturally biased for their preferred modes. Far thought shows more confidence in fast-and-frugal heuristics,
since it offloads to System 1, whose province is to employ them.
The
fast-and-frugal-heuristics way of thinking helps in understanding
the effects of moral realism and free will: they cause System 2 to supplant System 1 in decision-making. When we apply principles of integrity to regulate
our conduct, sometimes we do better in far
mode, where System 2 offloads the task of determining compliance to System
1. Not if you have a principle of integrity that includes an absolute
obligation to vote; then you act as in Case 1: based on a conscious decision. But
principles of integrity do not really take this absolute form, an illusion
created by moral realism. A principle of integrity flexible enough for actual use
might favor voting (based, say, on a general principle embracing an obligation
to perform duties) but disfavor it for “lowering the bar” if there’s only a
choice between the lesser of evils. The art of objectively applying
this principle depends on your honest appraisal of the strength of your
commitment to each component virtue, a feat System 2 is incapable of performing; when it can be
accomplished, it’s due to System 1’s unconscious skills.
Principles of integrity are applied more accurately in far-mode than near-mode.
[Hat Tip to Overcoming Bias for
these convenient phrases.]
But beliefs
in moral realism and free will impel moral actors to apply their principles in near-mode because these beliefs hold that moral conduct results from freely willed acts.
I’m not going to thoroughly defend the premise here, but this thought
experiment might carry some persuasive weight. Read the following in near mode, and introspect your emotions:
Sexual predator Jerry Sandusky will serve his time in a minimal security prison, where he’s allowed groups of visitors five days a week.
Some readers
will experience a sense of outrage. Then remind yourself: There’s no free will. If you
believe the reminder, your outrage will subside; if you’ve long been a
convinced and consistent determinist, you might not need to remind yourself. Morality inculpates based on acts of free will: morality and free will are
inseparable.
A point I
must emphasize because of its novelty: it’s System 1 that ordinarily determines
what you want. System 2 doesn't ordinarily deliberate about the subject
directly; it deliberates about relevant facts, but in the end, you can only intuit your volition. What a
belief in moral realism and free will do is nothing less than change the
architecture of decision-making. When we practice principles of integrity and
internalize them, they and nonmoral considerations co-determine our System 1 judgments, whereas according to moral
realism and free will, moral good is the product of conscious free choice, so
System 2 contrasts its moral opinion
to System 1’s intuition, for which System 2 compensates—and usually
overcompensates. With the voter who had to weigh the imperatives of the duty to vote and
the duty to avoid “lowering the bar” when both candidates promote distasteful or vacuous programs, System 2 can prime and program System 1 by
studying the issues, but the multifaceted decision is itself best made by
System 1. What happens when System 2 tries to decide? System
2 makes the qualitative judgment that System 1 is biased one way or the other and
corrects System 1, implicating the overcompensation
bias, by which conscious attempts to counteract biases usually overcorrect. A
voter who thinks correction is needed for a bias toward shirking duty will vote
when not really wanting to, all things considered. A voter biased toward "lowering
the bar" will be excessively purist. Whatever
standard the voter uses will be taken too far.
Belief in moral
realism and free will biases practical reasoning
This essay has presented the third of three ways that belief in objective morality and free will causes people to do other than what they want:
- It retards people in adaptively changing their principles of integrity.
- It prevents people from questioning their so-called foundations.
- It systematically exaggerates the compellingness of moral claims.
