Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Guru Effect

  • Published:
Review of Philosophy and Psychology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Obscurity of expression is considered a flaw. Not so, however, in the speech or writing of intellectual gurus. All too often, what readers do is judge profound what they have failed to grasp. Here I try to explain this “guru effect” by looking at the psychology of trust and interpretation, at the role of authority and argumentation, and at the effects of these dispositions and processes when they operate at a population level where, I argue, a runaway phenomenon of overappreciation may take place.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. I am using here the English word “guru,” not the Sanskrit word from which it is derived.

  2. For the distinction between intuitive and reflective beliefs, see Sperber 1997.

  3. Wason 1960. See Mercier and Sperber 2009 for a new approach to the confirmation bias.

  4. This is a central claim of Relevance Theory (Sperber and Wilson 1995)

  5. See Sperber 2001

  6. For doubts that it is so, see Dennett 1989.

  7. See Sperber 1996

References

  • Dennett, Daniel (1989). Murmurs in the cathedral (review of R. Penrose, The Emperor’s New Mind). The times literary supplement, September 29–October 5, pp. 55–57.

  • Mercier, H., and Sperber, D. 2009. Intuitive and reflective inferences. In Evans, J. St. B. T. and Frankish, K. (Ed.) In two minds: Dual processes and beyond. Oxford University Press.

  • Penrose, R. 1989. The emperor’s new mind: Concerning computers, minds, and the laws of physics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sperber, D. 1996. Explaining culture: A naturalistic approach. Oxford: Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sperber, D. 1997. Intuitive and reflective beliefs. In Mind and Language 12(1): 67–83.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sperber, D. 2001. An evolutionary perspective on testimony and argumentation. Philosophical Topics 29: 401–413.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sperber, D., and D. Wilson. 1995. Relevance: Communication and cognition, 2nd ed. Oxford: Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wason, P.C. 1960. On the failure to eliminate hypotheses in a conceptual task. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 12: 129–140.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut Jean Nicod, EHESS-ENS-CNRS, 29, rue d’Ulm, 75005, Paris, France

    Dan Sperber

Authors
  1. Dan Sperber
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Dan Sperber.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Sperber, D. The Guru Effect. Rev.Phil.Psych. 1, 583–592 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13164-010-0025-0

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13164-010-0025-0

Keywords

Search

Navigation