The Rules of the Game

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Childhodd is a book that selects 75 % of the arguments children have after about 18 months, are over. The author says there's a deeper, older, more universal to all human a set of rules of the hunter gatherer rule set. And then on top of that are the er sharpening and flattening, shaping, an uniqueness of cultural convention. In east asia they're much more communitarian than we are over here in t the individualist west.

In this episode we welcome back author Will Storr whose new book, The Status Game, feels like required reading for anyone confused, curious, or worried about how politics, cults, conspiracy theories communities, social media, religious fundamentalism, polarization, and extremism are affecting us - everywhere, on and offline, across cultures, and across the world.

What is The Status Game? It’s our primate propensity to perpetually pursue points that will provide a higher level of regard among the people who can (if we provoked such a response) take those points away. And deeper still, it’s the propensity to, once we find a group of people who regularly give us those points, care about what they think more than just about anything else.

In the interview, we discuss our inescapable obsession with reputation and why we are deeply motivated to avoid losing this game through the fear of shame, ostracism, embarrassment, and humiliation while also deeply motivated to win this game by earning what will provide pride, fame, adoration, respect, and status.