Watch: The great problem of our time
The Big Think Interview with philosopher and neuroscientist Sam Harris.
Our culture has atomized: We’re all on our own with our phones, laptops, and digital media experiences. No one knows what everyone else is seeing. In some ways, these technologies have caused a shattering of culture, and we can’t seem to agree about our perceptions of the world, says philosopher and neuroscientist Sam Harris.
To combat this, we need to secure some semblance of human wellbeing. What makes that an increasing challenge is the political fragmentation and extremism born from our engagement with new technologies.
We’re witnessing a zero-sum contest between those of us who want to maintain open societies and those who increasingly want to build closed, belligerent ones that make it impossible to share space. We have to become more intelligent to deal with these threats without losing the values we seek to defend. That’s why dogmatism is an intellectual sin, and overcoming it is key to building a better future for us all, says Harris.
I tried previously to make a comment on another post but was shooed off as an unpaid vagrant. I was browsing when I came across this one with the word "Sanity" staring at me. Yes, the word has been very much on my mind these days. I also did not know that you were a neuroscientist, a subject which I find appealing. You are right, technology has disrupted our lifestyle, and I don't know about others, but it is driving me crazy. In fact, Richard Dawkins did comment that we had all gone crazy. So it is particularly comforting to know that others also see to what extent technology has affected our lives. From my perspective, humans now act, think and feel like robots. Interaction, empathy and communication are therefore ever so precious and important.
Sam, your observations about our fragmented culture, the difficulties in maintaining shared facts, and the importance of open-ended conversation resonate strongly with the Dynamic Relational Model of Consciousness (DRMC) that my thesis proposes.. It’s not just about who’s lying; it’s about how each of us forms our worldview through layered influences: cultural narratives, linguistic frames, economic pressures, political interests, historical contexts, and even biological factors. We’re not merely watching different channels; we’re effectively living in different conceptual worlds shaped by these overlapping domains.
Consider a dynamic, relational perspective on how consciousness and identity develop. Instead of insisting that the world’s disagreements stem merely from ignorance or bad faith, we look at how each person’s worldview is formed by a web of influences: cultural norms, linguistic frames, socioeconomic conditions, historical legacies, political structures, and personal psychological experiences. In the United States, for example, psychological analyses often reduce social problems to matters of individual character, overlooking sociological or historical factors. Meanwhile, sensationalist pundits exploit these blind spots for political gain, turning complexity into tribal outrage rather than insight. The end result is a population easily herded into echo chambers, where genuine dialogue gives way to cynicism and distrust.
This challenge isn’t new. Historically, societies have confronted similar complexities. Think back to the debates of Adam Smith’s era, where the Scottish school of common sense philosophers wrestled with how to balance individual freedoms, moral duties, and collective well-being. They faced an evolving world, grappling with the integration of reason, empathy, and social trust. Technocrats of their day tried to impose order through rational design, while others insisted on the importance of communal values and shared ethical foundations. Their struggle reminds us that cultural fragmentation and ideological friction have long been part of human history, only the medium and scale have changed.
What’s different now is how pervasive and personalized these media ecosystems have become. While the technologies that shatter our consensus also intensify tribal loyalties and simplify complex issues into emotional soundbites, the irony is that these same tools could be repurposed to deepen understanding. Instead of tailoring feeds to reinforce biases, we could design platforms that encourage users to reflect on why they hold certain values or trust specific sources. We could highlight historical precedents and cultural variations in belief systems, showing that what we think of as “common sense” has always been negotiated territory.
In America, much of the discourse tends to frame social conflict in psychological terms, who is unstable, who is triggered, who can’t handle certain truths, overlooking the broader sociological, historical, and scientific dimensions that shape opinions. By restricting the lens to personal pathology or “craziness,” we dismiss the fact that today’s clashes are products of massive cultural, economic, and political dynamics. If we adopt a more integrative approach, acknowledging that beliefs arise from relational networks of meaning rather than isolated acts of individual cognition, we might find better strategies for communication and consensus-building.
Your emphasis on dogmatism as an intellectual sin is crucial. Overcoming it means recognizing that no single discipline or perspective provides all the answers. It also means admitting that every supposedly “obvious” fact might need revisiting as we learn more about the conditions under which people develop their views. This kind of humility allows us to engage more authentically with those who see the world differently, without dismissing them as irredeemably wrong from the start.
Ultimately, we need more than fact-checking or instructing people to be rational. We need to understand and address the underlying structures, economic inequalities, cultural histories, linguistic barriers, and religious frameworks, that influence what people consider rational or moral. If we can harness the same digital platforms that spread misinformation to instead prompt reflection on shared values, we might begin to restore some coherence. By acknowledging complexity and learning from historical attempts to reconcile diverse interests, we set the stage for a healthier public conversation, one that can handle complexity without devolving into mutual distrust and hostility.
Your point stands: human well-being and the values we cherish hinge on our ability to speak openly and thoughtfully with one another. Embracing complexity and turning our tools from weapons of division into instruments of reflection might not produce overnight harmony, but it could at least steer us toward a world where reasoning together remains possible.