Are the Introverts Winning? with Marie le Conte

Heron Books is delighted to support this event organised by the Bristol Humanists.

Full details and tickets: https://www.meetup.com/bristol-humanists/events/305649303/

In our post-pandemic online world are we becoming more and more socially isolated? If so, what does that mean for us humans, the most social of all animals? We have evolved and are genetically pre-disposed to live in large social groups. Social interaction and cooperation is key to our ‘success’ and flourishing as a species. In this talk, based on a recent article in New Humanist, Marie le Conte will make the case that the pandemic, and near universal access to the internet, has just speeded up a fundamental long-term shift in our social patterns, leading to reduced social interaction. This in turn reduces diversity, positive ‘friction’ and the myriad benefits of social contact. Did you know for example that social isolation leads to greater loneliness, and in turn is actually a bigger killer than smoking cigarettes. She will argue that the outside is where the unknowable can take place, that chance interactions are a precious thing, and that a life without serendipity is not really worth living. How can we recreate this vital social interaction that is so vital to our wellbeing and survival?

Marie Le Conte is a French-Moroccan freelance journalist based in London. She previously worked as media and politics correspondent for Buzzfeed and as political diarist for the New Statesman, as well as co-host of the Polling Politics podcast and presented a documentary for Radio 4 called Club 18-30. She also co-founded and organised two editions of the Words by Women awards. She writes features, profiles, essays, book reviews, newsletters and columns for a number of publications, often on politics but also about everything else! She has written 3 books, the most recent of which is ‘Escape – how a generation shaped, destroyed and survived the internet’