ABSTRACT
In the previous chapter, the attempt was made to explain how the introduction of different, neuron-based, and successively more complex mechanisms gave rise to a remarkable increase in plasticity of the behavior of organisms in general and, in the more recent past, of man in particular. Due to learning, under given physical and social circumstances, the behavioral repertory became more and more diverse and, moreover, showed increasing differentiation with respect to the particulars of the environment. The basic question was: given a potential set of stimuli, how is an organism capable of forming responses that increase its fitness? However, this is only one aspect of what has to be understood if one is to explain why behavior indeed developed the way it did. The other essential part of the question is: why do organisms actually behave the way they do? What makes a behavioral potential become a reality? While Chapter 2 tried to answer the question how learning can give rise to solutions to given problems, this chapter will be devoted to the questions concerning the origin of the underlying problems. What makes up an individual’s motivation to learn, think, and act in the first place? Of course, the effect of a series of basic needs can easily be explained in terms of the organism’s survival and of the fitness of the respective behavioral constituent. However, this contribution to fitness is not always immediately evident. Moreover, none of the motivational forces is effective continuously but, instead, each of them follows its specific time course. Some of them show up occasionally and readily vanish after being satisfied. Others hardly undergo any satisfaction and use any opportunity to attract their holder’s attention. This already implies that not all motivations can work simultaneously: some show priority over competing forces while others constantly wait for their opportunity to come. This aspect is of particular importance for the explanation of moral behavior. Learning makes the interaction between different motivational forces even more complex because it affects each of them in a different way In a few animals, but particularly in man, it is this complexity of interaction that renders motivation, and thus behavior, so complex-too complex to be analyzed solely in terms of stimuli and responses with the acting organism represented by a black box. Therefore, a more differentiated analysis follows.
