An earlier post noted the difference between accomplishing and experiencing. It was noted there that a significant trend in modern society is to replace actual accomplishment with experiences that may or may not accomplish anything, and which may detract from more productive activities. This distinction may have more to tell us regarding why people are motivated to pursue certain ideological objectives, and why affluence and relative safety tend to skew preferences.
To begin, we may start with two common scenarios. Imagine first a television game show, or a college football game. Some desirable event occurs, and satisfaction is registered by the reactions of the participants, or their supporters. Observe the reactions that are associated with winning, or events that increase the chance of winning. This is the first type of scenario.
Next, imagine a park frequented by drug addicts and alcoholics. Observe their reactions to getting a fix, or consuming alcohol. This is the second type of scenario.
What the two scenarios have in common is that the activities described produce psychological perception of satisfaction. At a neurochemical level, a neurotransmitter in some brain structure is released, providing a reinforcing sense of satisfaction, or pleasure. In the first type of scenario, this occurs indirectly by awareness that a desirable event has occurred, satisfying some personal interest. In the second type of scenario, the sense of satisfaction or pleasure results directly from the effect of chemicals that produce the response.
Experience demonstrates that the second type of satisfaction and pleasure is associated with accumulating episodes of misery and misfortune. Addiction tends toward tragedy and seldom if ever produces any type of beneficial side-effect. It predisposes to overdose, crime, poverty, homelessness, violence and depression. Forcing ones brain to release chemicals that produce a sense of pleasure or satisfaction is easy, and almost uniformly destructive. This is one of the perils of psychoactive substances: reinforcing destructive behavior.
The other type of reinforcement, i.e. the indirect type in which satisfaction derives from the perception of some desirable event, is dependent on two separate factors, both of which must be present. The event triggering the pleasurable or satisfying response must be perceived, and it must correspond to some interest of the person who experiences the response. The significance of this type of response lies in the source of interests that a person has. To the extent that human actions influence the occurrence of events, humans have an incentive to try and influence those events.
Schopenhauer observed that a person cannot choose what he or she desires. These desires are generally the result of complex interactions between socializing instincts, personality traits and experience. From these human beings develop the desires that influence their political views and influence their behavior. Some people who have no experience of hardship or poverty adopt ideological perspectives that incline toward assuming that affluence is the natural state of humans, and any deviation is the result of malign characters. They achieve a sense of satisfaction from events that appear to chastise those perceived as responsible for the observation that not everyone enjoys affluence. Other psychological wants, such as the desire for social approval or power or revenge, lead people to ideological interests that are satisfied by events that are congenial to those interests.
As in the case of experiences of pleasure or satisfaction that result directly from manipulations of brain chemistry, those same experiences that result indirectly from the perception of desirable events are reinforcing, and potentially destructive as well. The key point is that the perception of pleasure or satisfaction is independent of reason. In the case of cocaine or methamphetamine, the result depends only on biochemistry; in the case of political machination, the result depends only on the perceived state of ones interest at the time, regardless of whether this represents anything more than a transient fancy.
No comments:
Post a Comment