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Essays, Opinion, & Commentary |
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Volition - An Outline-Summary Besides sense-perception, sensuous appetency, and intellection, we all experience a phenomena called volition, the activity of the will, as a phase of our mental life. A. The Concept of the Will Our everyday life manifests many attitudes and acts which reveal the activity of the will. The will is conceived and defined as rational appetency or the power to strive for an intellectually perceived good and to shun an intellectually perceived evil. B. The Object of the Will We strive for material and spiritual things which seem good to us. From the individual things where are good the intellect abstracts the universal concept of the "good in general." "Goodness" is the suitability of a thing to a natural tendency or appetency. The adequate object of the human will is everything that is good. The formal object of the human will is the good as good, provided it be suitable to the willing subject. Whatever is an object of the will, is striven for under the aspect of a "good." C. Types of the Good We distinguish between the ontological, the physical, and the moral good; between the absolute and the relative good; between the objective and the subjective good; between the real and the apparent good; between the disinterested, the delectable, and the useful good. Every good is a "value," recognized and appreciated as something perfect or perfective. Definitions: Ontological good: when a thing is a good in its very entity or reality. Every being, since it possesses a certain amount of entity or reality, is an ontological good, because its entity or reality is suitable for the tendency of its own nature to be what it is and to perfect itself and to retain its perfection. Physical good: when a thing satisfies the demand of the nature of a being. Each being has its own specific and individual nature, and as such it has a very definite end and purpose. For us, for instance, as human beings, sight, hearing, well-functioning of our physical organs, are physical goods. Moral good: when a thing has everything demanded of it by the moral law. An action, for example, may be physically perfect, but it may contravene the moral law; in that case, it would be physically good but morally evil. Absolute good: anything suitable to a being itself, irrespective of other beings. Any reality which a being possesses, whether substantial or accidental, is an absolute good for that being. For us, for instance, all bodily structures, organs, powers, and functions are absolute goods. Relative good: anything which is suitable to another being; food, drink, clothes, shelter, and so forth, are relative goods for us. Objective good: anything that is good in itself. Any absolute or relative good is an objective good in this sense. Subjective good: the actual possession of an objective good. An artistic painting, for example, is an objective good in itself; it becomes a subjective good for me, if I acquire it as my own. Real good: a good that is judged to be good for a being, and it actually is good for that particular being. The nature, bodily limbs, senses, intellect, will, and so forth, are real goods for us as human beings. Apparent good: a good that is judged to be good for a being, but it is actually not good for it. For example, a certain kind of food may seem a real good for a critically ill patient, but it may be very harmful; under the circumstances it is an apparent good, even though it is something which, in itself and for itself, is ontologically good. Disinterested good: any good considered merely as giving perfection, irrespectively of any pleasure derived though its acquisition or from its possession. Health, knowledge, and virtue are such goods. Delectable good: a relative good which gives pleasure or enjoyment. Food, drink, companionship, sex, belong to this class of goods. Useful good: a relative good which desired as a means to acquire perfection or pleasure. There is always an ulterior end in view when a good of this kind is desired. A game of golf, for example, is a useful good, desired as a means to promote one's health, to gain fame, to obtain the pleasure of companionship, and so forth. D. Evil and the Will Evil is the privation of a required good. By the fact that the will is necessitated by its very nature to strive for the good it is also necessitated to shun evil. When people desire things that are physically harmful or morally evil, they do so because they consider such things to be a "good" for them. E. Motive and Motivation A motive is an appreciated value realizable through an act of volition. A double factor is involved in a motive: the objective factor of the goodness of the object of experience; and the subjective factor of the intellectual knowledge of this goodness on the part of the willing subject. Motives may be of a physical, intellectual, or moral character; there are also inner and outer motives. By motivation is meant the arousal of the will from a state of inaction into a state of action. Motives reside in the intellect; the intellect makes the practical judgment that this or that thing is desirable and thereby elicits the act of the will. F. Natural and Deliberate Volition Since the good is the formal object of the will, and since happiness is the fullness of good, the will, by its very nature, must strive for happiness; this kind of striving is natural volition. Volition is said to be deliberate when, after a consideration of the respective merits of particular values, a preferential choice is made. G. Voluntary Control By voluntary control we understand the control which the will exercises over the powers and actions of the human organism. Experience proves that we exercise voluntary control, though this control is neither universal nor uniform. We have no control over the functions of the cells. The functions of the vegetative organs and of the external senses are subject to indirect control. We have direct control in some measure over bodily movements, over the activities of the internal senses, and over the intellect. Voluntary movements have a tendency to become gradually "mechanized." Some kinetic units are hereditary; most of them, however, are acquired by direct volition through repetition of acts. Movements may be actually, virtually, or habitually voluntary. Determining tendencies resemble virtual or habitual voluntary actions. H. The Existence of Volition That volition, as a distinct type of mental experience, actually exists, is proved from the facts of attention, from resolving on a task, from reaction-time experiments, from the control of emotions, from the inhibition of impulses and desires, and from readjustments of the mode of life. Experiments on volition reveal the Ego-in-action in every deliberate decision as the originator of the act of willing, so that the active interposition of the Ego manifests the act of the will as an experience distinct from all other conscious processes. The act of willing, therefore, demands, a specific power, the will. |
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