George Church
Professor of Genetics, Harvard Medical School; One of Time’s 100 Most Influential People
Author of the Selfie: How the West Became Self-Obsessed, a book The Sunday Times defined as ‘approaching genius’. Speaker Will Storr is the creator of a one-of-a-kind storytelling programme that relies on neuroscience and psychology and shows how storytelling can change everything we do for the better. Organizations book Will Storr to learn about the science of storytelling, how we use social positioning, and how the West has become obsessed with selfies.
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Bestselling author speaker Will Storr is a bestselling author and an award-winning journalist. He currently works at Section4, a platform that delivers high quality business education. Esquire, The New Yorker, The Guardian, The Sunday Times and several other publications have featured Will’s work. In addition, speaker Will Storr is a ghostwriter who has written several successful books.
In the past, Will travelled to Guatemala, South Sudan, and the remote Aboriginal communities of Australia to be a reporter during the respective civil wars. Thanks to his work as a reporter, The Independent considers Will a versatile and committed journalist who is also a skilled writer.
Speaker Will Storr is the creator of a one-of-a-kind storytelling programme. The Science of Storytelling relies on neuroscience and psychology. Also, it shows how storytelling can change everything we do for the better. Will is a firm believer that storytelling can help everyone, no matter where they live, both in improving their professional and personal lives. For this reason, Will has travelled around the globe to entertain his audience with his amazing storytelling skills.
Will helps branding specialists and marketers looking to learn persuasion. He also assists educators, leaders, and teachers who want to inspire, educate, or improve their skills. His book Selfie: How the West Became Self-Obsessed was highly praised by The Financial Times. The Sunday Times also defined the book as ‘approaching genius’.
In 2021, Will Storr released his book The Status Game: On Social Position and How We Use It.
Stories are a vital part of human life, influencing our character, beliefs, and cultural identity. They can inspire us to pursue our goals and shape our relationships, as well as play a role in legal proceedings and media interpretation. While many have attempted to analyze what makes a good story, few have taken a scientific approach. Will Storr's talk, based on his bestselling book with the same title, examines how the human brain, as the ultimate storyteller, can be used to understand and improve storytelling techniques through the use of psychological research and neuroscience. This speech also explores how these tools can be applied to various forms of storytelling, such as mythology, literature, and television, to better understand and make sense of the world around us.
Our society places a high value on individual success and the pursuit of perfection in terms of personal traits such as attractiveness, wealth, and happiness. This pressure to conform to an impossible ideal can be harmful and contribute to feelings of inadequacy for many people. In his speech based on his bestselling book, "Selfie," journalist Will Storr traces the history of this obsession with the perfect self, examining its roots and considering possible ways to resist its influence. Drawing on a variety of fields including history, psychology, economics, and neuroscience, this session explores the evolution of the idea of the perfect self from Ancient Greece to the present day, and how it has shaped our modern society's focus on individualism.
In this talk based on his bestselling book "The Status Game," Will Storr argues that it is our desire for status that shapes our behavior and defines who we are. This need for status has been present throughout human history, from hunter-gatherer societies to the modern globalized economy and online worlds. Research shows that the amount of status we have significantly impacts our happiness, wellbeing, and even physical health. Our pursuit of status drives both positive and negative actions, including innovation, art, and civilization, as well as violence, wars, and genocides. This session explores the reasons for our insatiable desire for status, the consequences of losing it, and how it relates to phenomena such as cults, moral panics, conspiracy theories, and social media. "The Status Game" offers a new perspective on human psychology and its role in shaping society.