Cultivating Compassion: The Science Behind Spiritually-Informed Techniques

SRI 21|Session 3

Cultivating Compassion: The Science Behind Spiritually-Informed Techniques

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Overview

Humans are capable of great cruelty, but also great compassion. Like many social species, our brains have been shaped by the evolutionary chisel according to the laws of adaptiveness, not virtue. Yet unlike many other species, we have the ability to move beyond those laws — to make choices that align with our chosen morality, not our innate one. But doing so requires effort. Practices are needed to re-align our mind’s predictions about and reactions toward other people in our present world, or even the world yet to come. For millennia, spiritual traditions have sought to offer practices meant to accomplish this goal — practices whose efficacy science is now validating. In this talk, David DeSteno offers a broad overview for how contemplative practices from different spiritual traditions can help foster compassion and empathy, and why they may be superior to strategies or interventions based on other techniques.

  • SRI 21
    11 sessions
  • June 4, 2024
    Garrison, New York
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Speakers

David DeSteno

David DeSteno is a professor of psychology at Northeastern University. At the broadest level, his work examines the mechanisms of the mind that shape vice and virtue. Studying honesty and compassion, altruism and punishment, cooperation and trust, his work continually reveals the forces that underlie moral behavior. David is a fellow of the Association for Psychological Science and the American Psychological Association, for which he served as editor-in-chief of the journal Emotion. His work has been repeatedly funded by the National Science Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation. He is the author of several books, including most recently “How God Works: The Science Behind the Benefits of Religion.” He frequently writes about his work for major publications including The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and Harvard Business Review. He also hosts the PRX podcast How God Works: The Science Behind Spirituality. David received his Ph.D. in psychology from Yale University.

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