The Source of Desires

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"I have an experience of making all these choices in life and thinking that my outcomes are affected by the choices I make," he says. "It might be okay to talk about desires that I have or wants or aspirations without necessarily connecting them to the idea that they reflect a true self underneath" But it's really, really hard and maybe impossible to truly identify some singular source of those things,. He adds: 'The question is just like, what's the source? Right?'

There is an image, especially in Western cultures, of the rugged, authentic, self-made individual choosing how to navigate the intricacies of the social world. But there is no mystical soul within us, manifesting as the immutable essence of self. What we think of as our "self" is shaped by our environment and our genes, and most of all by our interactions with other people. Psychologist Brian Lowery argues for a strong version of this thesis, positing that our sense of self is largely a social construct. We talk about the implications of this idea, and what it means for shifting notions of personal identity.

Post with transcript: https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2023/06/12/239-brian-lowery-on-the-social-self/

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Brian Lowery received his Ph.D. in psychology from the University of California Los Angeles. He is currently Walter Kenneth Kilpatrick Professor of Organizational Behavior at Stanford University Graduate School of Business. His new book is Selfless: The Social Creation of "You."

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