Sara Pascoe on the Necessity of Our Bastard Forebears

Sara Pascoe: The Modern Monkey, Series 1, Episode 4 - Charity

Episode 1 - Murder    • Sara Pascoe Solves Murder and the Wag...  
Episode 2 - Jealousy    • Sara Pascoe: Why Women Are More Vocal...  
Episode 3 - Territory    • Sara Pascoe Gets Molested in Morocco ...  

Sara will be exploring our modern social world, though theories of Evolutionary Psychology and more. How does our monkey past influence our modern lives, and how come we can still get emotionally hijacked by our primitive emotions?

The final episode of the series explores the concept of Charity. We've looked at some the less pleasant aspects of humans in previous episodes, but this show is all about the positive. There are lots of examples of altruistic behaviour and feats of generosity - the social traits of our species are at the root of why we're so successful. But it's complicated. Can we find compassion for each other, when we're doing the wrong things for the right reasons?