My favorite part about Birkin bags is talking with women about how they can spot fakes, and the intense social sanction against those who might have fakes. They're a status signal for a specific group (unrecognisable to general population) and those within the group

PhDs in social sciences/business schools these days are a self handicapping status signal Waste a decade of your life making 0 money, learning no marketable skills, and contributing 0 to society (outside contributing to the educational ranking system), and leave with little

The other downside of China dominating scientific journals is that native Chinese speakers using english on average use a LOT more jargon

Kuwait abolished around same time. That means the upper echelon of people there (merchant & royal families) were all raised with slaves, which 'formally' left when they in grade school but in reality stayed on. The culture surrounding this is still there, and the entourage of

At just 5 days old, human newborns prefer watching helpful interactions to unhelpful ones. This suggests that prosociality may be part of our evolved nature. doi.org/10.1038/s41467…

Monaco takes the title for highest concentration of prostitutes per square foot. It's legal and many have nice jobs back in their home countries, etc. But the huge amounts of money & skewed gender ratio there bring in the supply... Dubai is second to Monaco... Both also have

At the highest levels, power doesn't want the status... why? Because it brings attention & scrutiny, and then you can't exercise your power. Those who are powerful and high in status don't enjoy the power. Those who are powerful but are unknown can do whatever they want.

"Evolution, like a business, operates on the basis of a strict bottom line." psyche.co/ideas/the-hidd…

"Tenure", or the length of time one has been in a system, is a base of status at least to some degree in many/most status hierarchies. In hierarchies where there are fewer ways to accurately differentiate members, tenure becomes a major way to differentiate the highs from the

High status draws people in to invade your space. Unlike power which pushes paper away, status lures them in closer, prompting approach and scrutiny. Here a celebrity has an entire instagram page devoted to people 'secretly' trying to film him. This is a common problem

Lawyers are expensive, but *looking* like you have a lawyer is free. Today, I'm happy to announce my latest project, Heavyweight! Heavyweight lets you take any complaint you have, and make it look like a scary legal document without ever actually claiming to be from a lawyer.

"elites who hold social status in society on the basis of...knowledge, skills, or institutional rank tend to be resentful and disdainful toward those who enjoy high social position primarily on the basis of their business success and accumulated wealth" press.princeton.edu/books/hardcove…

If I've put #humanpeacocking on a posts, its just to help index/search for it at later points, reference it in talks/classes, etc. Its not a critique of poster / their intentions, or a moral judgement. No need to message/send hate mail to complain!

Don't feel left out! You too can stalk celebrities on their boat vacations! boatinternational.com/yachts/news/ce… And then you can track their yachts at marinetraffic.com