‘Physical, biological urges rather than reason will always control desire’ Discuss

Whilst at first it may seem that desire can only be controlled by primitive biological instincts, we shall discover that it is possible for desire to be partly controlled by reason too. This will be shown by the Natural Law argument of John Finnis, and Plato’s concept of “upward motion”. Yet, it will become clear that desire can never entirley rid itself of its physical/biological roots, and therefore can never be a fully rational process. This is because, as Nietzsche states, a desire without emotion is void of any meaning, and would be a contradiciton. Therefore, desires are not fully controlled by either reason or urges, but are the result of an interaction between the two. —— First, It could incorreclty be argued that desires are controlled by physical impulses rather than reason. Augustine argued that sex, the major issue that humans must grapple with, is a manifestation of our fallen nature. This is because through one’s lack of control over sexual desire, one is subject to original sin. Concupiscence rules over one’s soul to the extent that it is unbalanced and governed mainly by lust, rather than by reason. This lack of balance in the soul partly explains the problem of akrasia, where one desires to do x but instead does y - a clear demonstration of the lack of control reason has over desire. This is further due to an imbalance in the amount of caritas and cupiditas present in desire - in a post-lapsarian world there is usually an excess of one over the other, and therefore this leads to a loss of rational control over desire. It may therefore seem that human nature is fundamentally rules by biological urges rather than reason. ——-However, this view is contrasted by John Finnis. He states that desire must in itself always be a product of a skill and never an end in itself. When desire is an end in itself, it looses its common good and the activities’ intrinsic good. For example, by pursing an activity such as marriage, one can actualise and experience the intelligible good of friendship and procreation. This is contrary to when one, for instance, pursues the activity of bestiality, which is void of any common good and only sought after for the external pleasure it provides. Therefore, by pursuing an intrinsic and common good, one is following, according to Natural Law, a rational act (for the telos of the action is the common good - such as procreation with sex). Therefore it cannot be stated that desire is only controlled by physical urges for it is also possible, as demonstrated here, for it to be controlled by reason. ———Furthermore, Plato again states that desire cannot be reduced to either physical urges or reason, but is a complicated amalgamation of the two. For if desire is rooted in eros, the driving force behind motion towards something, and if this eros makes an upward motion towards something that is ontologically greater than us, then it is healthy. Therefore, the purpose of sex is an upward motion which can aid in our own upward motion. This in turn, implies both a rational degree of choice over sexuality and desire (Whether we make an upward motion or not) and also a primitive impulse of repulsion and attraction. ———Overall,we can see that it would be wrong to claim that desire is just the product of bioligcal urges. However, it is equally wrong to state that desire is fully controlled by rationality. This is because desire is fundamentally not something which can be quantified or logically explained - in fact, a fundamental part of desire is a loss of control, as Aquinas stated, and to be able to control desire rationally voids it of any meaning. Nietzsche stated that desire is natural because it is a Dionysian value, it is chaotic, powerful, active and creative. A desire that is rational and passive would be Apollonian and anti-natural. Therefore, it is clear that desire is the result of both reason and bioloigcal urges acting together, rather than exclusively one or the other.