Dr. Jamil Zaki

For instance, cynics, it turns out, score less well on cognitive tests than non-cynics, and they have a harder time spotting liars than non-cynics.

In fact, you can think about cynicism as apparent wisdom that actually, if you look more closely, is just a bunch of assumptions.

You know, you think of the opposite of a cynic as a naive, gullible person who blindly trusts people.

But cynics blindly mistrust people.

And because of that, they actually stop paying attention to evidence about who they can trust and who they can't.

And it turns out that a lot of cynical assumptions about people are really clearly wrong when you look again at the data.

So I would say to a cynic who argues that they're a realist,

that they should take a closer look at the people around them.

Yeah, I think that's a great question.

And again, I think if you ask a cynic what is the opposite of cynicism, they would tell you it's someone who's naive and unthinking.

But actually, as I've been mentioning, I think cynics and naive people have a lot in common in that each one of them has a conclusion already, and they just look for evidence that supports their conclusion.

Really trusting people will put faith in others even if they've been betrayed.

They're missing the evidence of who they can't trust.

Cynical people decide that nobody can be trusted and also don't look at the evidence.

In my opinion, the opposite of both of these folks is somebody who is skeptical.

So skepticism, unlike cynicism, is not a theory about people.

It's not a blanket assumption.

Skeptics think like scientists.

They focus on evidence and update their impressions, update their perspective based on what they learn.

So to me, that type of skepticism is much healthier and allows us not just to feel good, but to understand each other better.