Читать книгу Money Mammoth - Ted Klontz - Страница 13

In tribal life, ancestors' status within a tribe was a matter of life or death. One of the greatest threats to their survival was finding that they no longer belonged in the group and they no longer had a community to help keep them safe. Our ancestors left on their own would not live long enough to pass on their DNA. So, today, we are incredibly sensitive to whether we belong in a group or not. We are wired to be on constant lookout for cues that we might have lost our place.

In the past, it was critically important that our ancestors kept up on the latest gossip and rumors. Tribes typically consist of 100–150 individuals, so it was a daily task for our ancestors to see where they stood. It was important to know who was mad at whom, and who was in good favor with the leaders of the tribe. Given that our current society is so much larger, we rely on social media and the news to make sure we are not caught by surprise. Watching the news, whether accurate or not, triggers our pleasure centers and gives us hits of dopamine similar to those we get from food and sex. Our brain rewards us for keeping up with the Joneses. For our ancestors, keeping up with the news was a matter of life or death.