Active desire

ABSTRACT

Desire is commonly understood as a mental state in relation to which we are passive. Since it seems to arise in us spontaneously, without antecedent deliberation, it also seems to constitute a paradigmatic type of mental state which is not up to us. In this paper, I will contest this idea. I will defend a view according to which we can actively shape our desires by controlling the way in which we imagine their contents. This view is supported both by behavioral and neural data which indicate that imagining can either strengthen or weaken our existing desires. Arguably, this influence is made possible by our capacity to imaginatively elaborate on the content of our desires. This gives a reason to think that what we desire is partially under our control. It is under our control only partially because we can influence our desires insofar as their content appears appealing to us in imagination.

KEYWORDS:

• Desire
• agency
• imagination
• affect
• reasons

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Presumably, it is relatively uncontroversial that instrumental desires, as opposed to intrinsic ones, can be formed through reasoning and are therefore not passive. The focus of this paper is solely on intrinsic desires, where the controversy lies.

2. A possible way to indirectly generate an attitude is to behave as if you have that attitude (Bovens, 1995).

3. In this paper, I want to steer clear of the debate between compatibilists and incompatibilists about free will. The proposed model is meant to be neutral on the question of whether whatever agency we have over our desires is ultimately determined by antecedent causal processes.

4. One of the few authors who has defended voluntarism, at least to an extent, is Shemmer (2004).

5. I treat desire as a propositional attitude, where its propositional content describes its satisfaction condition. Hopefully, a proponent of a different view can still adjust what I say here to her conception of desire.

6. My notion of caring is simpler than some other accounts that take it to be a complex attitude which involves affective dispositions, deliberative dispositions and dispositions to believe (see Seidman, 2016; Helm, 2001).

7. Berridge himself puts wanting and liking in quotation marks in order to avoid too hastily identifying them with folk concepts.

8. I am here drawing from a variety of views which claim that when one has a desire, one evaluates its object as something worth pursuing (Stampe, 1987).

9. There is also room to argue that evidential considerations regarding p do not always determine whether to believe that p since an agent can exercise discretion over that by abstaining from belief even when evidence permits forming that belief (McHugh, 2015).

10. Alex Gregory has claimed that desires are, in fact, constituted by beliefs about reasons (Gregory, 2013). However, his arguments largely focus on demonstrating the advantage of his view over those according to which desire involves judgments about value. Even if this claim about the comparative advantage is correct, the considerations provided in this section and the next should suffice to cast doubt on his view.

11. This is further supported by observations of how we cannot reason our way out of erotic desires; this is vividly discussed by Neil Sinhababu, according to whom a desire remains even despite one thinking it would be better not to have it (Sinhababu, 2017, p. 40).

12. See Davis (1986), who draws a parallel distinction between appetitive and volitive desires. According to him, while “volitive desire” denotes a motivational state which is referred to in action explanations, appetitive desire involves “viewing its object with pleasure,” an expression which he takes to be idiomatic and unanalyzable.

13. I thank an anonymous reviewer for pointing out this possibility.

14. This case is inspired by Nomy Arpaly’s example of a person who believes in principles espoused in Atlas Shrugged but has altruistic motivation (Arpaly, 2003, p. 78). Arpaly herself uses this example to illustrate a different point, namely, that belief about what is the right thing to do is not necessary for morally praiseworthy action.

15. How I understand it, there are a variety of measures by which one can estimate the strength of desire, but the most relevant ones are phenomenological intensity and motivational power (Baker, 2017, p. 590). As argued by Baker, these two measures can sometimes pull one in different directions when estimating desire strength. However, both measures are clearly relevant.

16. 6 Not every kind of imagination is equally effective. It turns out that simulating the process of bringing about an outcome is more effective than simply imagining the outcome (Taylor et al., 1998, p. 432).

17. The relationship between imagination and food craving is actually more complicated. Repeated simulation of eating can induce habituation and a decrease in cravings (Morewedge, Huh, & Vosgerau, 2010). However, the amount of repetition has to be high for such habituation to occur (Haasova, Elekes, Missbach, & Florack, 2016). In any case, the possibility of habituation does not disprove the fact that imagining has an effect on desire-strength. It only makes the relationship between imagining and wanting more intricate.

18. Admittedly, Sulzer’s study relied on the neurofeedback methodology, the reliability of which is still under debate. (For a quite skeptical review of the neurofeedback method, see Thibault, Lifshitz, & Raz, 2016). That being said, coupled with the rest of the data about the relationship between imagination and desire, it is significant in the present context.

19. A reviewer asked if the study by Sulzer et al. (2013) might speak in favor of agents’ ability to make certain desires occurrent, instead of an ability to change their strength. However, since the results of this study indicate that imagining can increase or decrease the activity in VTA and SN in a continuous fashion, they probably cannot be interpreted in terms of imagining making some desires occurrent. The switch from a standing desire to an occurrent one should be a discrete transition.

20. EI uses the term ‘imagery,’ which suggests that the relevant kind of imagination is only sensory. By preferring the term “imagining,” I remain agnostic as to whether the relevant activity of imagination also involves cognitive imagination.

21. Elicitors of desire can also include physiological deficits (Nader et al., 1997).

22. EI is not only an abstract model of desire: It has found practical application in functional imagery training, which consists in inviting subjects to form imagistic goals in order to reduce their cravings. For instance, in the context of food cravings, distal goals concerning one’s health are deconstructed into proximal goals which can be associated with concrete and vivid imagery. This may include imagining a successful exercise of self-control and the pleasant feelings that result from it. Imagery-based interventions are effective in reducing cravings even if they last less than one hour (Andrade et al. 2016, p. 260).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Eesti Teadusagentuur [IUT20-5,PUTJD656];Sihtasutus Archimedes [TK145].

Notes on contributors

Uku Tooming

Uku Tooming is at University of Tartu, Department of Philosophy and Harvard University, Department of Philosophy.