Dan Ariely: Our Buggy Moral Code

Can we trust in our intuition? What are we influenced by and how can it affect our behaviors? Behavioral economist Dan Ariely studies the bugs in our moral code: the hidden reasons we think it's OK to cheat or steal.


Despite our best efforts, bad or inexplicable decisions are as inevitable as death and taxes. They're also just as predictable. Why, for instance, are we convinced that "sizing up" at our favorite burger joint is a good idea, even when we're not that hungry? Why are our phone lists cluttered with numbers we never call? 


Dan Ariely has long been fascinated with how emotional states, moral codes and peer pressure affect our ability to make rational and often extremely important decisions in our daily lives -- across a spectrum of our interests, from economic choices (how should I invest?) to personal (who should I marry?). A behavioral economist, Ariely has based his career on figuring out the answers to these questions, and in his bestselling book Predictably Irrational, he describes many unorthodox and often downright odd experiments used in the quest to answer this question.
We also recommend watching: "Barry Schwartz: The Paradox of Choice" and "Simon Sinek: How Great Leaders Inspire Action".

Dan Ariely: Our Buggy Moral Code

Dan Ariely is an Israeli American professor of psychology and behavioral economics. He teaches at Duke University and is the founder of The Center for Advanced Hindsight. Ariely's talks on TED have been watched 2.8 million times. He is the author of Predictably Irrational and The Upside of Irrationality, both of which became New York Times best sellers.