The Hierarchy of Needs and the Search for Value

 by Natalie Moras

Necessity. That state of dependence. Where we will pertain from function when lacking the correct inputs. If I do not eat I will perish. If I do not have clothing I will feel bare and diminished. Therefore I need food and I need clothes. Need is the requirement for achievement, which most simply put will always be life and raising its quality. 

Without food I will perish no matter my garments’ status, after being in the jungle for 3 days. Meanwhile, in this same landscape with food in my stomach I will be able to live beyond those 3 days, without a leaf to cover myself. Subsequently, the definition of need has expanded over time, as the recreational has been formulated and popularised. Perhaps a sacrificial exchange for pleasure. Where if I want to lose weight, in accordance with societal standards, I might have to eat less or commit to strenuous exercise but if I do not eat at all or overexercise I will collapse physically, dismissing any importance to the uprising of self-value. The whole process is rendered useless. Likewise, if a person hears voices they might take suppressants to numb them but the drugs could cause a lethal overdose if not consumed at the correct capacities, no matter the amplified numbing effect. What I am conveying in these analogies is that there are physical limiters to the appeasement of the mind, prioritising the well-being of the body over the consciousness. Yet if I can perfectly maintain my body whilst feeling no purpose in life, I might kill myself. Honestly, I might kill myself. I might kill myself and in fact, so might you if substituted into that situation.

So this equates to each human need having a place, in comparative ranking, whilst still holding some form of essentiality. Thus, there is a hierarchy of needs, where some will hold higher dictatorship than others in human life. At the highest point of influence are physiological needs whilst at the least is self-actualisation needs. Only if we are able to preserve the conscious sector of our being, would we shift our hierarchical priority over to that of sacrificing the physiological body. Would rearranging the hierarchy of needs occur if bodily transcendence permitted it?

The initial ‘Hierarchy of Needs’ was introduced by Abraham Maslow in his 1943 paper ‘A Theory of Human Motivation’ where the following classification of needs were ranked accordingly in descending relevance in sustaining human existence: physiological (involving shelter, food, water and rest); safety (concerning security from predators and environmental occurrences that act predatorily like lightning); love and belonging (maintaining positive relationships with other humans in friendship, romances and other representations of intimacy); esteem (regarding the ego determined by factors such as recognition and respect) and finally self-actualisation (where one’s life feels fulfilled and is often described as a state of mental-nirvana and the pursuit of stimulating the ideal of perfection). As the needs are chronologically fulfilled, life is ensured and its quality is increased. 

Although this theory was published seventy-eight years ago, it holds to be generally accepted to this day. This is because there is no facility to disprove it, maybe confirming its truth. Therefore the debate of this potential rearrangement of need classification is merely theoretical. 

In aspects of the media we have seen the utility in virtual reality and how people often prefer the representation of themselves in it than in reality. For example in the ‘Matrix’, a cinematic, simulated, virtual reality, humans no longer have the problem of bodily fatigue and act solely with their minds, therefore existing beyond the physical body. Although owning an actual body, the consciousness to this is nil. However, those who have managed to flee the Matrix suffer mentally within the real world when holding the knowledge of an easier existence and even sacrifice knowledge of the real world and their true bodies for the virtual kingdom of numbed ignorance to the dissipating world. Cypher betrayed his team and previous commitments to reinsert himself into the Matrix portraying his desire for a luxurious illusion rather than his monotonous reality, saying: "I'm tired, Trinity. I'm tired of this world. I'm tired of fighting, tired of this ship, being cold and eating the same goddam groop every day." They preferred to please their mind rather than their body. Of course, people did really die and could not live further in the Matrix when their bodies had perished as to that of non-fictional life. Back in our real world, many find life in virtual reality is easier by the burdensome human needs of the safety and physiological tiers being temporarily dismissed. If given the facility to live in these simulated realities on a long-term basis, many would take the opportunity to, so that in this way they live transcendent of pain, ageing and other wearing effects of mortality. This is because of its satisfying and self-positive nature. In this way, with the induction of a permanent virtual reality, it can be believed that the hierarchy of needs would shift, in that self-actualization and esteem would be highly prioritised in life rather than safety or the physiological needs.

Contrastingly, it can be argued that this shift would never happen and that the current hierarchy of needs is forever fixed. In Darwin’s ‘Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection’ it is made apparent that all organisms will fight for immediate survival to avoid death and will only evolve if there is demand for adaptation. 

Despite indulging ourselves comparatively more as a species than others, humans still are primarily concerned on physical survival which is dependent on fulfilling the hierarchy of needs in its current state. If death pertains to exist, this survival instinct will coexist because of it. If immortality was achievable, then humans would no longer be classified as humans rather another form of being altogether. Therefore in the question of human needs, the hierarchy would stand as is until human existence, as we know it, evolves and is eradicated.

Additionally, esteem is often fed by authenticity, and transcendence of human, negative consequence would seem unethical and unauthentic, therefore damaging esteem. This change is also capable of inducing the neglect of love and belonging needs in a person with detached, less developed relationships with the people around them, eliminating ‘bridges built on troubled waters’. Previously, physiological and safety have been mentioned as deflated needs too by this change, so the only beneficial factor is self-actualization, which perspectively, now does not seem a worthy gamble. Therefore to evoke the change in hierarchy, there must be an incredibly high level of demand for self-actualization which does not seem to expand at faster rates than the other needs in order to overtake them in importance: especially with the prevalent existence of poverty and war today.

Necessity. Where we will pertain from function when lacking the correct inputs.  I believe in what Maslow himself once said, "What is necessary to change a person is to change his awareness of himself." Whether or not that awareness is strong enough to enforce a change in need is what I think defines the hierarchy. I find that so long as people care first about their survival and least about their pleasure that the hierarchy will remain stationary in its ranking. However, if humans commit to raising the value of self-actualization, with the development of mental health and the like, the hierarchy could shift. Therefore, the rearrangement of the ‘Hierarchy of Needs’ is possible but will only occur with strong, active pursuit of it. This will not happen any time soon due to the diversity of ethics and judgemental patterns, but perhaps one day there will be a motivational occurrence to push this on. 

Each one of you has your basic needs (physiological and safety needs) fulfilled and so if you can fulfill your psychological needs (love-and-belonging and esteem needs) then in your life you are fully able to achieve living your life to its highest quality. Only you can ensure your own life-fulfillment needs are catered for, after the psychological, and prioritize it because of the other areas of success being built up to this climax. This may bring a satisfaction of all life’s needs. Befitting of the quote, "We may define therapy as a search for value."