34 Quotes by Cass R. Sunstein

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

Terrible events produce outrage, and when people are outraged, they are all the more likely to accept rumors that justify their emotional states, and also to attribute those events to intentional action.

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.

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.

People are more likely to object to nudges that appeal to unconscious or subconscious processes.

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.

...when like-minded people get together, they often end up thinking a more extreme version of what they thought before they started to talk to one another.

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

Some rumors simultaneously relieve "a primary emotional urge" and offer an explanation, to those who accept them, of why they feel as they do; the rumor "rationalizes while it relieves.