Desire machine - by Siddharth - cybermonk

The two questions that seem to anchor all of life, that I’ve been forced to face over and over again, are: What should I do next? Why do people act in the ways that they do? On the second question—the usual explanation is that everyone has these things called desires, or needs. Each person has preferred material and psychological conditions, and the mind is a machine that invents strategies to attain and maintain those conditions. This seems superficially correct; if I miss a meal I often find myself walking to the grocery store for a particular brand of semi-sweet chocolate chunk cookies. In college I naturally preferred activities with even gender ratios (sorry, Pokémon club), except when I wasn’t single (although I still skipped Pokémon club). Then, the obvious follow-ups: if people are desire-fulfilling robots, seeking love, resources, and homeostasis, why are we so bad at it? Why does attaining a goal often feel empty? Why do mostly-happy relationships end? Why the trope of mid- (

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• Andrew Tam