The nature of human desire is memetic, meaning imitative. humans rely on models outside of themselves to determine the objects of desire that they pursue. So if you put two pieces of meat in front of me and i don't need a model to help me decide which one of those pieces of meat to eat - my body will send a pretty strong signal as soon as my nose gets a whiff of that rancid piece that i'm eating the other one.
In this episode of Infinite Loops we spoke with Luke Burgis, author of the book 'Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life'. We talk about:
- Needs vs. Desire
- The current state of social media
- 'Celebristan' and 'Freshmanistan'
- How to identify fake "experts"
- Scapegoating and Mimetic Violence
- And a LOT more!
Follow Luke on Twitter at
https://twitter.com/lukeburgis and get his newly-released book 'Wanting' from:
https://lukeburgis.com/wanting/