"Just one more!" comes from Being an Animal

"Evolutionarily valuable" is an interesting concept. To me, it means a behavior which, if followed, would help an organism chug along the evolutionary chain. (If you don't believe in evolution, well, this isn't your topic.) So I've been wondering about what everyday tendencies are evolutionarily valuable. I was rather shocked on day to realize it's evolutionarily valuable for an organism (like a person) to think satisfaction is just beyond its current state. Why? It is, by definition, evolutionarily valuable to achieve something that helps you survive. And we've certainly evolved to find things that help us survive (at least in moderation) to be satisfying or pleasurable--food, physical pleasure, shelter, etc. So no surprise. The organism--or person--is motivated to do things that help survival and evolution. That's half the story. The other half is people seem to have an inbred sense of what economists call a "discount rate." That is, any good thing now is worth more than the exact same good thing (in the same quantity) at some time in the future. And if it is indeed inbred, it is likely not specific to humans, but perhaps many organisms. Maybe even nonsentient ones. Who knows why this sense might develop, but it can be as simple as "enjoy it now because by next week you may be eaten by a cougar." The result is obvious: if you have a satisfying outcome in the future, you will be motivated. But if your brain breaks the outcome into tiny pieces and spreads these like tiny milestones with the same final endpoint, the sum total of motivation increases! Put these together and what do you get? You get an organism that will evolve to want "just one more." For people, that means believing that slightly more in many typical areas will finally make you satisfied. A bit more food, alcohol, money, career success, friendship, etc. will be "just what I need." The implications range from dieting to goal setting to career planning to family planning. The next time you want "just one more" of anything, at least question whether you only want it because your genes are telling you so.