Jordan Peterson

Jordan B. Peterson (b. 1962[1]) is a tenured research and clinical PhD psychologist who currently teaches at the University of Toronto. His research interests include self-deception, mythology, religion, narrative, neuroscience, personality, deception, creativity, intelligence and motivation.[2]

Personal life

Jordan Peterson has a B.A. in Political Science and a B.A. in Psychology from the University of Alberta. He received his PhD in clinical psychology from McGill University. He taught at Harvard University as an Assistant and an Associate Professor before returning to Canada and taking a position at the University of Toronto. Peterson currently resides in Toronto.[3] He grew up in Fairview, Alberta, Canada, a small town of 3000 people 360 miles northwest of Edmonton, Alberta. He resided in Montreal from 1985–1993, where he studied under the supervision of Robert O. Pihl and Maurice Dongier. From 1993–1998 he lived in Arlington, Massachusetts, while teaching and conducting research at Harvard. He has resided in Toronto since 1998.

Media appearances

Peterson has appeared on TVO on shows such as Big Ideas[4][5][6][7] and The Agenda with Steve Paikin,[8] where he currently serves as a monthly essayist.[9][10][11]

Online projects

Peterson has produced a series of online writing exercises including: the Past Authoring Program, a guided autobiography; two Present Authoring Programs, which allow the user to analyze his or her personality faults and virtues in accordance with the Big Five personality model; and the Future Authoring program, which steps users through the process of envisioning and then planning their desired futures, three to five years down the road. The latter program was used with McGill University undergraduates on academic probation to improve their grades.[12]

The Self Authoring programs were developed in partial consequence of research conducted by James Pennebaker at the University of Texas and Gary Latham at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto. Pennebaker demonstrated that writing about traumatic or uncertain events and situations improved mental and physical health, while Latham has demonstrated that planning exercises that are personal help make people more productive.[13]

Works

Peterson is currently under contract with Penguin/Random House for his book Do not Bother Children while they are Skateboarding: 18 Rules for Life, slated for publication in January of 2017. It is an in-depth study of some of the suggestions for leading a good life posted on Quora several years ago, to answer the question "What are the most valuable things everyone should know?" Dr. Peterson is a Quora most viewed writer in Values and Principles, as well as Parenting and Education.

Peterson published Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief in 1999. The book describes a comprehensive rational theory for how we construct meaning, represented by the mythical process of the exploratory hero, and also provides a way of interpreting religious and mythical models of reality presented in a way that fits in with modern scientific understanding of how the brain works.[14] It synthesizes ideas drawn from narratives in mythology, religion, literature and philosophy, as well as research from modern neuropsychology.

Peterson’s primary goal was to figure out the reasons why individuals, not simply groups, engage in social conflict, and try to model the path individuals take that results in atrocities like the Holocaust or the Soviet Gulag.[15] Peterson considers himself a pragmatist, and uses science and neuropsychology to examine and learn from the belief systems of the past and vice versa, but his theory is primarily phenomenological.[16] Peterson explores the origins of evil, and also posits that an analysis of the world’s religious ideas might allow us to describe our essential morality and eventually develop a universal system of morality.[17]

Harvey Shepard, writing in the Religion column in the Montreal Gazette in 2003 states "To me, the book reflects its authors profound moral sense and vast erudition in areas ranging from clinical psychology to scripture and a good deal of personal soul searching..." He goes on to note that "Peterson's vision is both fully informed by current scientific and pragmatic methods, and in important ways deeply conservative and traditional."[18]

References

  1. ↑ @3:40, age 20 in 1982
  2. ↑ Jordan Peterson. . Accessed online May 19, 2015.
  3. ↑ Jordan Peterson. . Accessed online May 19, 2015.
  4. ↑ The Necessity of Virtue
  5. ↑ Reality and the Sacred
  6. ↑ Evil and Tragedy
  7. ↑ The Meaning of Music
  8. ↑ Trust and the Credit Crisis s
  9. ↑ Actions and Consequences
  10. ↑ Visceral Politics
  11. ↑ Bin Laden and Personal Responsibility
  12. ↑ Kamenetz, Anya (July 10, 2015). "The Writing Assignment That Changes Lives". NPR.
  13. ↑ Kamenetz, Anya (July 10, 2015). "The Writing Assignment That Changes Lives". NPR.
  14. ↑ Peterson, Jordan. "Maps of Meaning" Routledge, 1999, p. 12.
  15. ↑ Peterson, Jordan. "Maps of Meaning" Routledge, 1999, p. 12.
  16. ↑ Peterson, Jordan. "The Pragmatics of Meaning" Accessed online September 17, 2015.
  17. ↑ Peterson, Jordan. "Maps of Meaning" Routledge, 1999, p. 12.
  18. ↑ Shepherd, Harvey (November 11, 2003). "Meaning from Myths". Montreal Gazette.

External links

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