Re: "Infinite Wants"

[Paul Henry Rosenberg <rad@xxxxxxx>]

S R Larsson wrote:
>
> Greg Nowell:
> >2.  One of the major themes in the General Theory is the
> >reverse of that thesis.  It is phrased thus: "the decreasing
> >marginal propensity to consume."  What that means is that
> >wants DO get fulfilled (for individuals) and that they
> >cut consumption accordingly (resulting in "savings").
>
> S R Larsson:
> This is true for single types of wants, such as the want for food. However,
> this is not true for human needs in total. Once we have satisfied the need
> for food (or cheese or beef, if we have that preference) we move on to the
> next unsatisfied need, such as the intellectual want for stimulus.

Well, believe it or don't, there is a psychological theory of human
motivation that's relevent here -- Maslow's theory of hierarchical
motivation.

He distinguishes between those basic needs, such as food, that are
deficiency needs (d-needs, for short) -- needs that biologically must be
fulfilled to avoid biologically destructive deficencies -- and those
higher needs, such as intellectual stiumulus, that he calls being needs
(b-needs) which are expressive of our basic nature, and are not
necessarily limited in their extent.

Of course, the b-needs have little or no inherint linkage to materialist
consumption.  Hermit monks can be very high on b-need "consumption", if
it can be called that.  In fact, b-needs have more to do with creation
-- and recreation -- than production or consumption.

So, we *can* construct a society around materializing such b-needs (SRI
did a study on this back in the 70s, a copy of which I've got lying
around somewhere), but there's no *necessary* connection -- it's a
purely contingent one, based on culture, not biology.

--
Paul Rosenberg
Reason and Democracy
rad@xxxxxxx

"Let's put the information BACK into the information age!"