Pleasant vs useful. What is the difference between Homo sapiens and an animal?

Dmitry Luchikhin, philosopher

Here along the way, somehow unexpectedly, the question arose of distinguishing human motivations, the motivations of the mind, from its own organic ones. Animal human motivations.

So it’s not complicated, but now, I decided that it might be worth talking about. For the obvious today, that's it.

Nature took care to make the actions necessary for living beings attractive. Therefore, any motivated activity is accompanied by feelings of pleasure and "deep satisfaction".

It can even be said that it is precisely this that is the operating motive of any organic goal-setting. At the same time, the very actions leading to its achievement are fully verified by the result. They are recognized as correct and necessary if they lead to it. And erroneous, and unnecessary - if not.

Not so with the motivations of the mind. While many of them have an expectation of pleasurable outcomes, they have self-sufficient value, are motivated by their own necessity, and are not dependent on the achievement of the outcome that is pleasure.

So knowing the world or creating a cultural product, the individual, of course, counts on all sorts of pleasant consequences, but if they do not occur, he does not at all consider his activity to be erroneous and meaningless. If he approves a certain moral norm, achieves justice, he can at least count on gratitude in the depths of his soul. But if not, then no.

The deep reasons for this difference lie in the fact that the motivations of the mind are oriented not towards an objective result, but towards the result of self-change, self-manifestation, self-expression of the actor. Which are experienced as valuable in themselves, psychologically valuable in themselves, without an additional carrot from nature, in the form of pleasant sensations. Although often accompanied by them.