In a role-playing game, we level up our character in order to become better at surviving the next challenge. We can see this process at work if we look to nature. Throughout the evolution of life on planet earth, many life forms popped in and out of existence. The ones that survived did so by successfully adapting to their environment. We are the descendants of a long relay race, with each of our ancestors having passed on the genetic baton to the next. As more complex multicellular life began to emerge around the globe such as animals, the development of a central nervous system became a significant advantage to their reproductive fitness. Starting with locomotion with the cerebellum, to emotions with the limbic system, all the way to the formation of complex notions with the frontal lobe. Along with this came an emergence of higher consciousness in which the richness of sensory experience expanded into a nearly infinite field of possibility. In the human animal, and likely many other animals, perhaps all things including electrons, this is known as the capacity to feel “what it is like”. A bat knows what it is like to be a bat — a dolphin, a dolphin — a cow, a cow — and you, yourself. In philosophy and psychology, the “what it is like” of subjective experience is referred to as qualia.
Qualia can be divided into varying degrees of “this mental state feels good” or “this mental state feels bad”. Positive mental states played key roles in motivating humans towards behavior that allowed them to successfully reproduce, that is, “nutritious food tastes good”, “social cooperation feels good”, and “sex feels good”. If we didn’t desire calorie dense foods like fatty meats and starches we would be too weak to perform the tasks necessary for daily survival. Without motivation to cooperate with one another, we wouldn’t be able to form larger cohesive social units. And if we weren’t motivated to have sex, you and I simply would not exist. Negative mental states played key roles in motivating humans to avoid things that were detrimental to reproduction, “this plant is bitter and smells bad, maybe it’s poison”, or “that person is ugly, maybe they are unhealthy”. Without the ability to detect off putting flavours and smells, there would be a lot of unnecessary deaths due to consumption of poisonous plants and fungi. A person’s attractiveness is a byproduct of healthy genes and access to adequate resources, and our desire to reproduce with the most attractive potential mate ensured that the highest quality genes were passed on successfully to the next generation. The evolving brain selected for states and behaviors that were beneficial for long term survival to feel good, and selected against states and behaviors that were detrimental for long term survival to feel bad.
Whether or not consciousness pervades all things, somewhere along the line, as evidenced above, evolution evolved in brains a sense of feeling in the dimension of what in psychology is called valence. Valence, otherwise known as hedonic tone, refers to the intrinsic attractiveness (positive valence) or aversiveness (negative valence) of a mental state — pleasure vs. pain respectively. Whether you are being chased by a lion, are having a migraine, or have been poisoned; these examples would generally refer to negative valence experiences in various degrees. And whether you are having an orgasm, have just eaten a good meal, or are experiencing a mystical state of ecstasy; these examples would generally refer to positive valence experiences in various degrees. In the past, before the internet, our desire to pursue pleasure would have been beneficial for survival. This is because our brains evolved valence to motivate us to either engage in behaviours that were conducive to reproduction or avoid behaviours that were not. It is this biological machinery that motivates us to continue playing the human game.
Our modern environment is radically different from the one we experienced as hunter gatherers hundreds of thousands of years ago. But we are more or less physically identical and thus the game itself has not changed, as we are still motivated by our desire to feel good. If there are optimal values, they are neatly situated within this context. Purely as a thought experiment, we can imagine that there are aliens out there in the universe with their own set of values. Perhaps these beings value ignorance, disease, and unhappiness. You may have experienced a gut feeling that these do not align with your values, and you are right. We have evolved to value their opposites — namely knowledge, health, and happiness. Our capacity for knowledge allowed us to survive and adapt to the often harsh and changing environments of the past. Being in good health was important in order for us to reach sexual maturity and pass on our knowledge to our children. And our desire to be in a positive mental state created the motivations to engage in the behaviours conducive to our survival. All complex organisms on earth increased the probability of passing on their genes by optimizing these values.
We can call this the value pyramid.
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