After receiving this e-mail from Elijah, I searched the Internet and found a few free downloadable versions of my audiobook and a few scanned copies of the printed version (which, I have to admit, were high-quality scans, including the front and back covers, all the credits and references, and even the copyright notices, which I particularly appreciated).
No matter where you stand on the “information wants to be free” ideological spectrum, seeing your own work distributed for free without permission makes the whole issue of illegal downloads feel a bit more personal, less abstract, and more complex. On the one hand, I’m very happy that people are reading about my research and hopefully benefitting from it. The more the merrier—after all, that is why I write. On the other hand, I also understand the annoyance of those whose work is being illegally copied and sold. Thankfully I have a day job, but I am certain that if I were to rely on writing as my main source of income, illegal downloads would be less of an intellectual curiosity and much more difficult to swallow.
As for Elijah, I think we made a fair exchange. Sure, he illegally copied my audiobook (and made some money in the process), but I learned something interesting about loyalty and care for customers in the illegal industry and even got an idea for possible future research.
WITH ALL OF this in mind, how can we fight our own moral deterioration, the what-the-hell effect, and the potential of one transgressive act to result in long-term negative effects on our morality? Whether we deal with fashion or other domains of life, it should be clear that one immoral act can make another more likely and that immoral acts in one domain can influence our morality in other domains. That being the case, we should focus on early signs of dishonest behaviors and do our best to cut them down in their budding stages before they reach full bloom.
AND WHAT ABOUT the Prada bag that started this whole research project? I made the only possible rational decision: I gave it to my mother.
CHAPTER 6
Cheating Ourselves
Imagine yourself on a soft, sandy beach. The tide is rolling out, creating a wide swath of wet sand for you to wander along. You’re heading to the place where you go from time to time to check out girls. Oh, and you’re a feisty blue crab. And in reality, you’re going to spar with a few other male crabs to see who will win the favor of the females.
Ahead you see a pretty little thing with cute claws. At the same time, you notice that your competition is quickly closing in. You know that the ideal way to handle the situation is to scare off the other crabs. That way you don’t have to get into a fight and risk hurting yourself or, worse, lose your chance to mate. So you have to convince the other crabs that you’re bigger and stronger. As you inch closer to your competition, you know you need to emphasize your size. However, if you simply pretend to be larger by standing on your toes and halfheartedly waving your claws around, you will probably give yourself away. What to do?
What you need to do is give yourself a pep talk and start believing that you are, in fact, bigger and tougher than you really are. “Knowing” you’re the biggest crab on the beach, you stand as high as you can on your hind legs and spread your claws as far and high above you as possible (antlers, peacock tails, and general puffing up help other male creatures do the same thing). Believing in your own fabrication means that you will not flinch. And your (exaggerated) self-confidence might cow your opponents.
NOW BACK TO us. As humans, we have slightly more sophisticated means of puffing ourselves up than our animal counterparts. We have the ability to lie—not just to others but also to ourselves. Self- deception is a useful strategy for believing the stories we tell, and if we are successful, it becomes less likely that we will flinch and accidentally signal that we’re anything other than what we pretend to be. I’m hardly endorsing lying as a means of attaining a partner, a job, or anything else. But in this chapter, we’ll look at the ways we succeed in fooling ourselves as we try to fool others.
Of course, we can’t instantly believe every one of our lies. For instance, let’s say you’re a guy at a speed-dating event and you’re trying to impress an attractive woman. A wild idea enters your mind: you tell her that you have a pilot’s license. Even if you sold her this story, it’s unlikely you will convince yourself that you do, in fact, have such a license and start suggesting to the pilots on your next flight how to improve their landings. On the other hand, let’s say you go out running with your buddy and you get into a discussion about best running times. You tell your friend that you’ve run a mile in under seven minutes, when in reality your best time was a tiny bit over seven minutes. A few days later, you tell someone else the same thing. After repeating this slightly exaggerated claim over and over, you could eventually forget that you hadn’t actually broken the seven-minute mark. You may come to believe it to such a degree that you might even be willing to bet money on it.
ALLOW ME TO tell you a story of a time when I embraced my own deception. In the summer of 1989—about two years after I left the hospital—my friend Ken and I decided to fly from New York to London to see another friend. We bought the cheapest flight to London, which happened to be on Air India. When the taxi dropped us off at the airport, we were dismayed to see a line of people trailing all the way out of the terminal. Thinking fast, Ken came up with an idea: “Why don’t we put you in a wheelchair?” I thought about his suggestion. Not only would I be more comfortable, but we could also get through much faster. (Truthfully speaking,
