Hostname: page-component-77f85d65b8-g98kq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-04-19T08:17:37.902Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Imagining our moral values in the present and future

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 November 2022

Jordan Wylie ,
Alix Alto  and
Ana Gantman Open the ORCID record for Ana Gantman [Opens in a new window]
Jordan Wylie
Affiliation:
Basic and Applied Psychology, The Graduate Center, City University of New York, New York, NY 10016, USA jwylie@gradcenter.cuny.edu; jordancwylie.com agetreu@gradcenter.cuny.edu; alixalto.com
Alix Alto
Affiliation:
Basic and Applied Psychology, The Graduate Center, City University of New York, New York, NY 10016, USA jwylie@gradcenter.cuny.edu; jordancwylie.com agetreu@gradcenter.cuny.edu; alixalto.com
Ana Gantman
Affiliation:
Basic and Applied Psychology, The Graduate Center, City University of New York, New York, NY 10016, USA jwylie@gradcenter.cuny.edu; jordancwylie.com agetreu@gradcenter.cuny.edu; alixalto.com Department of Psychology, Brooklyn College, Brooklyn, NY 11215, USA ana.gantman@brooklyn.cuny.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Imaginary worlds allow us to safely develop, crystallize, and criticize our moral values – at times even serving as catalysts for change in the real world. Fans of imaginary worlds sometimes form groups to advocate for social change in the real world, and it is part of Leftist ideology to imagine radically different, possible futures aligned around shared moral values.

Information

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 45 , 2022 , e308
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Black, J. E., & Barnes, J. L. (2017). Measuring the unimaginable: Imaginative resistance to fiction and related constructs. Personality and Individual Differences, 111, 71–79. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2017.01.055.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bötticher, A. (2017). Towards academic consensus definitions of radicalism and extremism. Perspectives on Terrorism, 11, 73–77.Google Scholar
Brough, M. M., & Shresthova, S. (2012). Fandom meets activism: Rethinking civic and political participation. Transformative Works and Cultures, 10. https://doi.org/10.3983/twc.2012.0303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carriere, K. R. (2018). “We are book eight”: Dialoging the collective imagination through literary fan activism. Culture & Psychology, 24, 529–544.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Curry, O. S., Mullins, D. A., & Whitehouse, H. (2019). Is it good to cooperate? Testing the theory of morality-as-cooperation in 60 societies. Current Anthropology, 60, 47–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eyal, T., Liberman, N., & Trope, Y. (2008). Judging near and distant virtue and vice. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 44, 1204–1209.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gendler, T. S. (2000). The puzzle of imaginative resistance. The Journal of Philosophy, 97, 55–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haiven, M., & Khasnabish, A. (2010). What is the radical imagination? A special issue. Affinities: A Journal of Radical Theory, Culture, and Action.Google Scholar
Jenkins, H., & Shresthova, S. (2012). Up up and away! The power and potential of fan activism. Transformative Works and Cultures 10, 1–13. doi:10.3983/twc.2012.0435CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelley, R. D. (2002). Freedom dreams: The black radical imagination. Beacon Press.Google Scholar
Khasnabish, D. A. (2008). Zapatismo beyond borders: New imaginations of political possibility. Buffalo; University of Toronto Press. doi:10.3138/9781442689695CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mar, R. A., & Oatley, K. (2008). The function of fiction is the abstraction and simulation of social experience. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 3, 173–192.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McHugh, C., McGann, M., Igou, E. R., & Kinsella, E. L. (2022). Moral judgment as categorization (MJAC). Perspectives on Psychological Science, 17(1), 131–152.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mentovich, A., Yudkin, D., Tyler, T., & Trope, Y. (2016). Justice without borders: The influence of psychological distance and construal level on moral exclusion. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 42, 1349–1363.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Meyer, M. L., Zhao, Z., & Tamir, D. I. (2019). Simulating other people changes the self. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 148, 1898.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Paulson, J. (2010). The uneven development of radical imagination. Affinities: A Journal of Radical Theory, Culture, and Action. https://ojs.library.queensu.ca/index.php/affinities/article/view/6134.Google Scholar
Petersen, M. B., & Aarøe, L. (2013). Politics in the mind's eye: Imagination as a link between social and political cognition. American Political Science Review, 107, 275–293. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055413000026.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pizarro, D. A., & Baumeister, R. (2013). Superhero comics as moral pornography. In Rosenberg, R. S. (Ed.), Our superheroes, ourselves (pp. 19–36). Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Reinsborough, P. (2010). Giant whispers: Narrative power, radical imagination and a future worth fighting for. Affinities: A Journal of Radical Theory, Culture, and Action. https://ojs.library.queensu.ca/index.php/affinities/article/view/6140.Google Scholar
Searle, J. R., & Willis, S. (1995). The construction of social reality. Simon and Schuster.Google Scholar
Tomasello, M. (2009). Why we cooperate. MIT press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yudkin, D. A., Gantman, A. P., Hofmann, W., & Quoidbach, J. (2021). Binding moral values gain importance in the presence of close others. Nature Communications, 12, 1–12.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed