Daily: Chasing Status – Are we hard-wired to fight for glory?

The Bunker – News without the nonsense

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News, Government, Politics, Society & Culture

4.6 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 23 September 2021

⏱️ 26 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Are humans really driven by desire for power, money, sex and comfort – or is something even deeper at play? Beneath greed, acquisitiveness, and even altruism and self-sacrifice is an even more fundamental motivation, says science writer Will Storr: the scramble for status. He tells Andrew Harrison about his new book The Status Game: On Social Position And How We Use It, and the hidden social systems that program us to perform acts of great benefit to our fellows, deeds of heroism… and some of the most infamous crimes in human history. “We're a tribal animal. And once we’ve connected with our tribe, the jostling for position begins.” “The brain’s basic rule is ‘connect with people and go for status’.” “Morality is just a way we play for status.” “Humans are at their worst when they’re deprived of status.” “Even people who complain about virtue signalling are virtue signalling themselves.” https://www.patreon.com/bunkercast https://www.hive.co.uk/Product/Will-Storr/The-Status-Game--On-Social-Position-and-How-We-Use-it/25325652 Presented and produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	My name is Stan. I'm at. Nice to meet you. So you took up photography where? I've always loved
0:05.5	photography but I turn it into earning a living at 60. I enrolled on a day course.
0:11.8	Well college. I loved going to college. It's good you can retry. I'm enrolled on the day course. But college?
0:13.0	I loved going to college.
0:14.0	It's good you can retrain and do something.
0:16.0	Yeah, yeah.
0:17.0	Let's talk about working, learning, saving and making the most of living longer.
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0:32.0	From those happy greetings at the door to the warm cuddles on the sofa
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0:55.3	look after theirs with dental life. Pick Why do we do the things that we do? Beyond survival
1:14.7	and subsistence what motivates us to get up in the morning and pursue causes of
1:18.6	action that may or may not be exactly sensible? What makes us believe what we believe, join the groups we
1:23.9	join, follow the rules we follow and fight the fights we fight. For explanations of
1:28.0	this you can take your pick from Marx, Freud, Young, En-Rand, Nietzsche or Bobby
1:32.0	Don't Worry Be Happy Happy McPheron.
1:34.0	Or you could read the new book The Status Game by investigative science writer Will Staw.
1:38.6	Subtitled On Societal Position and How We Use It, the book looks at millennia of human developments to argue that it's not
1:44.4	sex money or power that drive us, it's the status that sex, money, power and other less concrete goals
1:49.3	can fare upon us. It takes in everything from radicalization into religious cults or
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