Cass R. Sunstein Quotes & Sayings

Or consider the fact that after people buy a new car, they often love to read advertisements that speak enthusiastically about the same car that they have just obtained. Those advertisements tend to be comforting because they confirm the wisdom of the decision to purchase that particular car. If you are a member of a particular political party or have strong convictions, you might want support, reinforcement, and ammunition, not criticism. — Cass R. Sunstein

Those who emphasize animal rights have a more complicated task. They tend to urge that animals should be given rights to the extent that their capacities are akin to those of human beings. The usual emphasis here is on cognitive capacities. The line would be drawn between animals with advanced capacities, such as chimpanzees and dolphins, and those that lack such capacities. Undoubtedly a great deal of work needs to be done on this topic. But at least an emphasis on the capacity to think, and to form plans, seems to provide a foundation for appropriate line drawing by those who believe in animal rights in a strong sense. — Cass R. Sunstein

It might also count as an insult to dignity, and a form of infantilization, if the government constantly reminds people of things that they already know. — Cass R. Sunstein

By itself, partyism is not the most serious threat to democratic self-government. But if it decreases government's ability to solve serious problems, then it has concrete and potentially catastrophic consequences for people's lives. I — Cass R. Sunstein

People are more likely to object to nudges that appeal to unconscious or subconscious processes. — Cass R. Sunstein

If manipulation really does increase welfare, then it would seem to be justified and even mandatory on ethical grounds. — Cass R. Sunstein

We are blind to the fact that what we do to them deprives them of their rights; we do not want to see this because we profit from it, and so we make use of what are really morally irrelevant differences between them and ourselves to justify the difference in treatment. — Cass R. Sunstein

Covertly influencing decision processes such as that the resulting decision is aligned with higher-order desires may actually enhance autonomy. — Cass R. Sunstein

Do musical preferences predict political inclinations? Not long ago, an official with Pandora said that its predictions about those inclinations, based on zip code as well as musical choices, are between 75 and 80 percent accurate. And with that level of accuracy, it developed an advertising service "that would enable candidates and political organizations to target the majority of its 73 million active monthly Pandora listeners based on its sense of their political leanings. — Cass R. Sunstein

Without shared experiences, a heterogeneous society will have a much more difficult time addressing social problems. People may even find it hard to understand one another. Common experiences, emphatically including the common experiences made possible by social media, provide a form of social glue. A national holiday is a shared experience. So is a major sports event (the Olympics or the World Cup), or a movie that transcends individual and group differences (Star Wars is a candidate). So — Cass R. Sunstein

There is another problem. Echo chambers can lead people to believe in falsehoods, and it may be difficult or impossible to correct them. Falsehoods take a toll. One illustration is the belief that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States. As falsehoods go, this one is not the most damaging, but it both reflected and contributed to a politics of suspicion, distrust, and sometimes hatred. A — Cass R. Sunstein

If government is to respect people's autonomy, or to treat them with dignity, it should not deprive them of freedom. It should treat them as adults, rather than children or infants. — Cass R. Sunstein

They suggest that with respect to facts, partisan differences are much less sharp than they seem - and that political polarization is often an artifact of the survey setting. — Cass R. Sunstein

In 1960, just 5 percent of Republicans and 4 percent of Democrats said that they would feel "displeased" if their child married outside their political party.5 By 2010, those numbers had reached 49 and 33 percent, respectively - far higher than the percentage of people who would be "displeased" if their child married someone with a different skin color. — Cass R. Sunstein

There is widespread support for nudges that are taken to have legitimate ends and to be consistent with the interests and the values of most choosers. — Cass R. Sunstein

Emotions can get in the way of truth-seeking. People do not process information in a neutral way. — Cass R. Sunstein

The multiple failures of top-down design, and the omnipresence of unintended consequences, can be attributed in large part, to the absence of relevant information. — Cass R. Sunstein

Do not be misled by expert bravado or by an expert's own sense of how he or she is doing. Evidence is a much better guide than an impressive self-presentation. — Cass R. Sunstein

We can believe in hierarchy. We can believe the universe was made just for us. Hierarchy and a major sense of entitlement are not insurmountable problems. The problem occurs when we treat those whom we believe lie beneath us as slaves. Religion once sustained human slavery. It was wrong then. When it blindly sanctions the slavery of every nonhuman animal, it is wrong now. — Cass R. Sunstein

If we understand "rights" to be legal protection against harm, then many animals already do have rights, and the idea of animal rights is not terribly controversial. — Cass R. Sunstein

Janis believed that groups are especially likely to suffer from groupthink if they are cohesive, have highly directive leadership, and are insulated from experts. — Cass R. Sunstein

Partyism certainly isn't as horrible as racism; no one is enslaved or turned into a lower caste. But according to some measures, partyism now exceeds racism. In — Cass R. Sunstein

How about 4, 5, 1, 2, 3, 6, 7? Think about it for a minute. That approach has the advantage of giving you "I am your father," and of starting with the mysteries of the two best, while treating the prequels as kind of a flashback (as you're also focused on the cliffhanger ending of 5). Then you get to wrap everything up with the real finale, and the best, before the third trilogy starts. Not a bad idea at all. A — Cass R. Sunstein

Star Wars and Star Trek are good in different ways, and in fairness, you can't really rank them. But Star Wars is better. "YOUR — Cass R. Sunstein

It seems reasonable to say that people make good choices in contexts in which they have experience, god information, and prompt feedback - say, choosing among ice cream flavors. People know whether they like chocolate, vanilla, coffee, licorice, or something else. They do less well in contexts in which they are inexperienced and poorly informed, and in which feedback is slow or infrequent - say, in choosing between fruit and ice cream (where the long-term effects are slow and feedback is poor) or in choosing among medical treatments or investment options. If you are given fifty prescription drug plans, with multiple and varying features, you might benefit from a little help. So long as people are not choosing perfectly, some changes in the choice architecture could make their lives go better (as judged by their own preferences, not those of some bureaucrat). — Cass R. Sunstein

People are moderately more likely to favor approaches that involve reflection and deliberation. — Cass R. Sunstein

Social scientists emphasize that people use the "availability heuristic," which means that we assess risks by asking whether a bad (or good) event is cognitively "available." It — Cass R. Sunstein

Economists suggest that we should assess the value of decisions in terms of two considerations: the costs of decisions and the costs of errors. — Cass R. Sunstein

To become an extremist, hang around with people you agree with. — Cass R. Sunstein