Mastery of the environment to achieve internal balance is our goal in life, but it is not without difficulty. When trying to effect control, either we succeed or we fail. Though success is the goal, failures are rampant, and they spur us toward greater caution and understanding of our environment.
Earlier, I sketched a number of dangers to systemic life, but I neglected to highlight the most persistent of all threats, entropy, the second law of thermodynamics, which not only encompasses all of the aforementioned dangers, but presents one more constant and subtle threat, dwindling resources, or energy starvation. The most fearsome predator of all is not a tiger or shark or allosaurous, but the ever-present force of entropy. (For those who fear that we are slowly moving toward "rocket science," let me assure you that our jaunt into thermodynamics will be little more than understanding boiling water over a fire - a thermodynamical event.)
ENERGY
Let me first lay a little groundwork about energy before jumping into
entropy. Most physicists believe that everthing is composed of energy.
Some may quibble about "energy versus matter", but the argument can
always be undermined by referencing the first law of thermodynamics,
called The Conservation of Energy, which states that everything is a
form of energy and that energy is neither created nor destroyed. Embodied
by Albert Einstein's famous equation, E=mc² or Energy=mass*(velocity of light)²,
it is NOT called the Conservation of Matter nor the Conservation of
Light Speed using an equation of M=e/c² or C²=e/m or some such relation.
Granted, the definitions are not crisp. Let's take a walk with Milton Rothman, formerly a research physicist at the Princeton University Plasma Physics Laboratory:
"We used to call a beam of light a 'form of energy,' but now the distinction between matter and energy has disappeared. ... An electron and a positron may combine to form two photons (units of radiation) ... this represents a case of 'matter' changing to 'energy.' ... But the fact that one can change into the other now leads us to think that matter and energy are two aspects of the same thing." (Rothman, 1963. pg. 27,43)Further, as "matter" has been split and reduced, every reduction appears to release energy and leave smaller and smaller particles which still seem dynamic in nature. To date, no one has been able to isolate "matter" from "energy", and chances of isolating pure matter are nil, at least on Earth which spins at about 1000 miles per hour near the equator and orbits the Sun at over 65,000 miles per hour. With the entire solar system racing around the center of our Milky Way which hurtles into deep space, no particle on this Earth can be devoid of energy. It is questionable if anything can exist without it. As a result, at the very roots, the extreme roots, everything is essentially made from one single commodity which, for convenience, will be termed energy.
From this perspective, our first deduction must be that happiness is a manifestation of energy. We deduce this for all other emotions and thoughts, too. If we have differing emotions and if our thoughts and emotions change, then our second deduction must be that some change in energy flow has occurred. Either the presence, direction, or magnitude of energy (the vector) has changed.
If we are to survive, then these changes must be managed. Fortunately, one bodily organ appears to perform this - the brain. The brain appears to manage overall energy distribution within the body and directs energy resouces wherever and whenever needed. Earlier, an optimum energy distribution, or balance, was stated as necessary for survival. Adding this, then for the brain to effectively manage energy for survival, it must attempt to maximize the optimized state of the system - the state of internal balance or well-being.
ENTROPY
The troublesome truth is
maintaining an optimum and balanced state is not a simple task.
One reason for difficulty, if not the primary one, is the
aforementioned and dreaded "entropy" which keeps getting in
the way. Not only is it a disrupting force, but it is a
draining one as well. To understand this better, we will
need to return to the boiling water ...
Heat and light are considered pure energy, and each can readily be used to explain the second law of thermodynamics, entropy. If you set a pot of water over a fire, eventually the water boils with steam rising out of the pot. Entropy demands that heat travel from hot things to cold things; thus, entropy transfers heat from the hot fire to the cooler pan and then into the cool water. This is a very good thing if you ever expect the water to boil. (If you do happen to find the water getting colder, please call your local physicist. You may have made either a great discovery or a great error.) Other examples of entropy include turning on an electric lamp at night in your home. The light fills the room because entropy is at work. Light and heat are both composed of "photons" (electromagnetic radiation), so the same rule applies. Restating entropy to accommodate light, energy travels from high energy sources to low ones, from energy rich sources to energy poor ones. This rephrasing would still apply to our boiling pot of water since the flame is a high energy source and the water is a relatively low one.
This may all seem simple enough and cause many to yawn, but entropy has other interesting facets which are not so obvious yet they manifest themselves throughout our lives. Back to the pot, most cooks would only be interested in the boiling water, but to understand the second property of entropy, we need to look at the steam. Have you ever tried to track steam to see where it goes after leaving the pot? An absurd idea, isn't it. Even if you tried, it would be nearly impossible, because steam quickly scatters everywhere. While sitting in the pot, all of the water molecules are co-located in a uniform group. Once energized with heat, the molecules fly out of the pot and are scattered throughout the rest of the room - into curtains, cabinets, and out through door cracks to the outside where they are blown everywhere "by the four winds." Thus, while in the pot, the molecules are reasonably organized or "ordered." After boiling, they become very disorganized and fly helter-skelter everywhere. This is the second principle of entropy: with increased energy, things tend to go from order to disorder. As physicist and Nobel Laureate, Erwin Schrödinger, put it:
"An isolated system or a system in a uniform environment ... increases its entropy and more or less rapidly approaches the inert state of maximum entropy. We now recognize this fundamental law of physics to be just the natural tendency of things to approach the chaotic state ..." - from Schrödinger's What is Life? (Schrödinger, 1944. pg. 78)
This still may not surprise some folks, but entropy has one more "trick up its sleeve". Not only do things tend to go from order to disorder, but information inherent within a system tends to be lost. Let's look at the fire under the pot for a moment. Suppose that four cedar logs are burning and each log has two knots. We could even have the knots in specific orientations - on opposite sides or one below the other. Also, as with all logs, tree rings which identify growth can be seen. Now, as fire consumes the logs, the knots and the tree rings disappear. The number and placement of knots, as well as the number of tree rings indicating the tree's age is suddenly lost forever. Eventually, even the fact that four logs have been consumed is gone. From the residue ash, you may be able to determine that cedar wood was burned, but how many logs and how many knots existed on each log as well as what pattern of tree rings existed would be totally obliterated. This highlights the 3rd facet of entropy: with increased entropy, information is lost.
"In a closed system, there is a tendency for organization to change into disorganization, or for the amount of information available about the system to become smaller as time goes on." (Rothman, 1963. pg. 144)
This third aspect, lost information, can also be viewed as a reduction to a simpler state. As information is lost, complexity is lost since complexity is a measure of information type and quantity. With the above example of the logs, we had logs, knots, rings, and a bunch of elements in complex molecular form. Even if some of the complex molecules survive the inferno, the logs, knots, and rings do not. The intricate details, or higher order features, are lost in the fire. Complexity is dramatically reduced. Therefore, to paraphrase Rothman, as entropy increases, a system tends to become less complex as time goes on.
Thus, entropy steals our precious energy, scatters and disorganizes everything about us, and destroys valuable information. It is forever active and exists everywhere at once - all around and inside each of us. If left to its own devices, entropy would literally rob us to death by stealing vital energy and disrupting the systematic forces holding each of us together. Our only defense is to go in the opposite direction and seek order. This was the great realization of Erwin Schrödinger:
"How would we express in terms of the statistical theory the marvellous faculty of a living organism, by which it delays the decay into thermodynamical equilibrium (death)? We said before: 'It feeds upon negative entropy' ... entropy, taken with the negative sign, is itself a measure of order. Thus the device by which an organism maintains itself stationary at a fairly high level of orderliness (= fairly low level of entropy) really consists in continually sucking orderliness from its environment." (Schrödinger, 1944. pg. 79)In order to survive, a living organism must climb toward negative entropy, toward order, toward information, toward complexity.
This approach has been revitalized recently with Stuart Kauffman's theory of Autonomous Agents and Adjacent Possible:
"... an Autonomous Agent ... is able (to) act on its own behalf. ... In order to be an Autonomous Agent, a system must carry out work cycles by virtue of which it maintains and amplifies itself. ... At exact equilibrium no workcycles can be carried out. Hence no Agency exists." (Kauffman, 1996. pg. 5, 6)Since entropy reduces bodies of different temperature to a common one (equilibrium or "heat death"), any living entity or autonomous agent must move away from equilibrium toward negative entropy in order to survive:
"The fact that Autonomous Agents are necessarily displaced from equilibrium and perform work cycles means that agents can, and do 'ratchet' themselves further from equilibrium." (Kauffman, 1996. pg. 4)Kauffman notes that the ratcheting goes until the Autonomous agents are in the "... Ordered Regime near the Edge of Chaos." To go beyond would cause the system to disintegrate if prolonged. In order to "fine tune" its position along the order/chaos axis, living organisms tend to become more complex and move into what Kauffman terms the "adjacent possible":
"If building order requires degradation of free energy, then autonomous agents ratchetting themselves far from equilibrium, thereby storing energy and 'recorded embodied know how' in structure and flow to control their own constrained release of energy, construction of themselves, and exploration of the adjacent possible, appear the paramount way to build up complexity." (Kauffman, 1996. pg. 5, 6)
Bringing this closer to home, one way of climbing toward negative entropy or "ratcheting away from equilibrium," is simply eating food. The complex molecular proteins and starches in meats and vegetables are our fuel source, and by breaking down these foods, we free energy for use in our own bodies:
"While animals can and do derive energy from fats and proteins, they are first converted to carbohydrate, or an intermediate in carbohydrate metabolism, before the energy is made available. Energy for the maintenance of life is obtained by the degradation of compounds of relatively high potential energy into products of low potential energy ..." (Turner, 1966. pg. 276)By degrading "compounds of relatively high potential energy", we are effectively "sucking orderliness" (as Schrödinger put it) from our environment or "ratcheting away from equilibrium" (using Kauffman's terms).
EFFICIENCY
Consuming food is just
one of a myriad of ways that we climb toward negative entropy,
and we will delve into others later. But for now, one other
crucial implication of living with entropy exists, and it creates
the cornerstone for this theoretical approach. If entropy requires
us to find, consume, and metabolize food to replenish spent energy,
then one way to minimize the effects of entropy is to use energy
efficiently. The more efficient our energy use, the less often
we must seek food, the less food we must consume, and the less
food we must carry in our bodies.
This need for energy efficiency forms the basis of my maxim: emotive energy rises to success and falls from failure. If energy is a crucial and relatively scarce resource, then it must be used efficiently - sparingly and effectively. And to be effective, energy should only be used on successful behaviors and quickly withdrawn from failed behaviors. This is essentially the underpinnings of the Gregg Henriques' Behavioral Shutdown Model (BSM) and his Behavioral Investment Theory (BIT):
"In accordance with the second law of thermodynamics, animals are viewed as behavioral investors that must work to maintain animal-environment relationships conducive to survival and reproductive success." (Henriques, 2001 (b).)
"... behavior can be thought of as the process of expending energy or working in order to control and structure the environment in a way that allows for survival ... (this) gives rise to a cost benefit ratio of behavioral investment, a ratio much like that in economics." (Henriques, 2001 (a). pg. 152-165)
"Two systems are directly consistent with the BIT's neuro-economic conception of the selection of behavioral investments. ... the bevavioral activation system is involved in spending behavioral energy to acquire reward ... and the behavioral inhibition system is involved in spending behavioral energy to avoid punishment." (Henriques, 2001 (b).)Put simply, the guiding principle of survival is: feed success and starve failure. We put our resources into whatever maintains or improves our lives while withholding or shunting our resources away from whatever we deem detrimental. Energy rises to success and falls from failure. Ultimately, this creates efficiency for an organism. Creatures which exhibit this trait are emotive systems, and their energy is emotive energy.
NOTE: Emotive energy is NOT a new form of energy. It is strictly a quick term to facilitate communication such as "centrifugal force" is. Just as centrifugal force is really a convenient term to denote a variety of other complex energy interactions, emotive energy is a convenient term to account for the complexities of Kauffman's and Henriques' ideas based upon negative entropy and cost efficiency. Again, emotive energy is NOT some new and exotic form of energy - just a qualification of the old, "tried and true" kinetic and potential flavors of energy acting within the special case of "life."
Perhaps when living in a "land of plenty," the idea of scarcity may seem "a bit hard to swallow." Nevertheless, humans deal with scarcity everyday, and pressure to be efficient can be easily seen everywhere across the world. Here, at the dawn of the twenty-first century, scarcity of fossil fuels immediately comes to mind. Poverty and famine also exist as numerous countries struggle with burgeoning populations and limited food resources. Without a doubt, whether it be fossil fuels, arable land, precious minerals, available food, or any other "sought after" commodity, the supply is limited and, thus, must be managed and consumed sparingly and effectively - efficiently - in order to optimize its usage for as long as possible.
AUTONOMIC NERVOUS SYSTEM
If living organisms are driven to use resources of the environment efficiently and direct them into successful behaviors, then given a critical hazard, a destructive threat, it should be imperative that all necessary resources be directed to overcoming or evading the threat. What is more, if the extent of the threat is unknown, then additional resources should be conserved in case of a long, enduring struggle. Organisms should focus their energy usage upon any behaviors which may free them from stress and danger. Energy for other non-critical behaviors (non-critical in that they are not used in "fight or flight" situations) should be rationed or shut off.
For instance, if a gazelle runs to escape a hungry, charging lion, both animals consume energy at a blistering pace, and the survival of each relies upon the outcome of the chase. If the maximum speeds of the two animals are comparable, then the decisive factor is likely to be minor. Certainly, if either animal is sick or injured, immature, or old and weakened, then the balance will be tipped in favor of the other animal. However, if these factors are not involved, then sheer endurance becomes a crucial factor. Whichever animal can outlast the other will likely determine the outcome.
If the energy utilized by either the lion or the gazelle serves multiple purposes, then available energy will be consumed at a faster rate than if conserved and focused for just the task at hand, either hunting for the lion or fleeing for the gazelle. Bodily subsystems such as the digestive tract certainly consume energy, as in the processing of foodstuffs, yet such actions are slow and of little or no use in immediate and impending doom. The immune subsystems which fight disease are also of little assistance. Who cares if you "catch a cold" while escaping a lion? Worse, these bodily subsystems suck valuable energy from the body when it is of critical need elsewhere. Even though minor, such siphoning may be the crucial difference, as in my example, whether or not the lion snags the gazelle or the gazelle escapes leaving the lion panting in the dust.
If the difference between capture or escape is so slim, then diverting even a slight amount of energy away from hunting or fleeing behaviors could undermine the survival of the animal. The only way to ensure maximum resources for hunt/flee behaviors is to restrict energy usage by other behaviors. The greater the restriction, the greater availability for hunting or fleeing. With this redistribution of energy resources, an imbalance will exist. But the imbalance of internal energy is necessary to maximize survival potential, so it should warrant being naturally selected as long as it is a temporary and recoverable condition. Once the hunt is over, energy can be redistributed in a more balanced manner, and energy for the digestive and immune systems can recommence. With balance, the feeling of well-being and happiness should return.
If entropy has placed a severe energy demand upon living creatures such that they must go into an imbalanced (stressful) state during "fight or flight" situations, then a general subsystem should have evolved to handle both the stressful "fight or flight" situations as well as the normal, stress free (balanced) state. Further, since the "fight or flight" subsystem focuses on external hazards and issues, the opposing subsystem should focus on internal ones. Where the external subsystem attempts to maintain effectiveness in the outside world, the internal subsystem should try to maintain harmony within the inside world (the body). Functionally, I would call these subsystems the external control system and the internal control system. As it turns out, these two major subsystems do exist under a larger system known as the Autonomic Nervous System. The two subsystems are known as the Sympathetic and Parasympathetic Nervous Systems.
Rather than offer my descriptions of these systems, I will let the specialists do the talking:
"The autonomic nervous system is made up of two systems: the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic system comes into play following a fright or an emergency, preparing the body to defend itself by aggression or flight. ... Blood is diverted from the vessels surrounding the stomach and intestines to those serving the muscles. At the same time, the rates of working of the heart and lungs speed up ... After the emergency is over, the nerves of the parasympathetic system 'switch off' these changes and the person relaxes." (Miller, et al., 1970. pg. 343)Please note that blood is diverted from the stomach and intestines which are not essential to fight or flight. Blood is, thus, the scarce resource which needs to be rationed and directed to critical functions such as the muscles.
"The sympathetic system evokes responses characteristic of the 'fight or flight' response: pupils dilate, muscle vasculature dilates, the heart rate increases, and the digestive system is put on hold. The parasympathetic system has many specific functions, including slowing the heart, constricting the pupils, stimulating the gut and salivary glands, and other responses that are not a priority when being 'chased by a tiger'." (Molavi, et al., 1997. pg. 5)Again, the digestive system "takes a back seat" during fight or flight but is reinvigorated afterwards when the parasympathetic system takes hold.
If happiness is an optimum systematic state, a balanced state, where all subsystems of a living creature are being adequately nourished, then energy resources are split across multiple functions, and maximum energy resources cannot be directed toward escape behaviors (or as Walter Cannon called them, "fight or flight"). If an organism must make a fateful decision about how to direct its resources when facing imminent destruction, then I believe those organisms which split their resources to retain a balanced internal state will succumb to the culling of natural selection. These creatures will be eaten (literally or figuratively). Only creatures which sacrifice their balanced state in order to direct maximum energies toward "fight or flight" behaviors will survive. Yet, with the sacrifice of the balanced state comes the loss of the feeling born of a balanced state - the feeling of well-being, the feeling of happiness. Essentially, in the face of danger, an animal sacrifices its balance state, it's happiness, and enters into a stress state in order to direct maximum energy resources toward survival.
One other crucial point about these two systems is that they should have the capability of being active together. For instance, would a lion nearby always start us running for cover? Perhaps, if it was chasing us and was only a few steps away. But what if the lion was a mile away? Would we still be just as anxious? What if we only had to jump into the cab of a truck or step into a building to be safe? Would we still be as fearful? Probably not. Depending upon the circumstances, our anxiety level would vary. Consequently, the two nervous systems should ebb and flow at varying strengths. At times, the sympathetic system should crank up a notch or two while the parasympathetic system backs off a couple of notches. At other times, the roles should reverse with the sympathetic system backing off and the parasympathetic system stepping up. Thus, these two powerful systems should work together passing their power back and forth in varying degrees as needs dictate.
"It is very easy to get the impression that the autonomic nervous system is composed of two subsystems that interact only to the extent of being an on-off switch ... In fact, this is only true in the extreme scenario of full 'fight or flight' response. ... every day life is far more complex: to varying degrees, the sympathetic and parasympathetic divisions (or some part of each) are on simultaneously. ... the brain is capable of selectively activating specific parts of either the parasympathetic or sympathetic systems." (UHS, 2001.)
Since earlier the hypothalamus was declared the center for homeostasis (balance), it should be the structure which manages the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems. And sure enough, it does:
"(Through) the outstanding work of Swiss neurophysiologist W. R. Hess ... the hypothalamus was shown to contain a variety of control centers for basic bodily functions and for certain drives. ... The efferent nerves of these centers, which turn on and off the appropriate machinery to accomplish control, operate the sympathetic and parasympathetic branches of the autonomic nervous system. The hypothalamus is thus the point of origin for the systems that maintain the constancy of the internal environment." (Wilson, et al., 1978. pg 424, 426.)
With the hypothalamus guiding the workings of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems, the ability to remain balanced and in a state of well-being depends upon the various environmental threats we face. As threats occur, the sympathetic nervous system gets activated, and we become stressed. Stress, then, kills happiness (the balanced state). Once stress is alleviated, happiness returns. Whatever the threat may have been, when we have successfully escaped or overcome it, we feel relieved or overjoyed. If we fail and suffer from the encounter, then our systems remain stressed. In the worst case of hopelessness and helplessness, our systems go into extreme energy conservation and we become lethargic as in depression (consistent with Gregg Henriques' Behavioral Shutdown Model). This biological routine has become so familiar that we now associate happiness with success and stress with danger or failure. We are pleased when we succeed, but we are disheartened by failure. With success, we allow ourselves to be bathed internally with energy. Failure, on the other hand, causes us to become conservative and to ration our internal energy - even to the point of placing some internal subsystems into dangerous stress.
With these internal systems reacting to success and failure, we now have a biological basis and biological systems for reflecting success and failure, "goodness" and "badness." As these biological systems prepare us for either a benefit or a danger, corresponding feelings are evoked. These sensations directly result and correspond to the biologic preparations occurring. From these basic sensations grow all of our feelings and emotions.
TIME, EFFORT, and MONEY
To further illustrate the need for rationing resources, let me suggest some
more common terms for human energy: Time, Effort, and Money.
Though the relationship between either time or effort
and expending human energy can easily be seen in any chore around
the house or workplace, relating money to human energy may not
be as readily clear. Nonetheless, money is effectively human
energy. Money has no intrinsic biological value in itself, as
can be seen by placing gold coins at the feet of just about any
creature other than humans. No other living organism, that I
am aware of, would find any use for gold coins. Gold and other
"valuable" commodities only hold value in the amount of human
time and effort that can be "bartered" for them. When you need
the services of a doctor, an architect, a police officer, or a
plumber, you pay money (either directly or indirectly) in
return for the time and effort these professionals provide
as a service to you. (This is true for all services.) If
you have a $1,000,000 painting, of what use is its value if
not in exchange for someone else's goods or services? How
about land? Again, its value is only in exchange for money
or in exploitation by farming with one's own time and physical
effort. And the above exchanges are only good with other
humans. You can't pay a cow to give milk. You can't pay a fox
to stay out of your henhouse. You can't pay a forest fire to
not burn down your house. You can't pay corn to grow. You
can't pay a marlin to jump into your fishing boat. You can't
pay an airplane to fly you to Tokyo. You can't pay a paint
pallet to paint a Renoir for you. Ultimately, money is
strictly a human convention used in exchange for the
expenditure of another person's time and effort. Money
is meaningless without people!
With acceptance of Time, Effort, and Money as surrogate terms for the underlying common denominator of human energy, we can now look more easily and clearly at scarcity in our own lives. If you are like most people, you want someplace to live. Do you work at a job to earn money to pay for a home? If so, then you are expending your time and effort in exchange for money to be used in exchange for a home. All home furnishings and appliances follow similar logic: we work for money which we use to buy chairs, tables, stoves, beds, utensils, etc. What is obvious to those of us paying the bills is that the available money for these items is limited. Most of us do not have the money to buy two or three homes; we feel fortunate to even buy one. Most of us cannot afford utensils made of pure gold. Just as with homes and land, gold is a very limited commodity and in high demand, thus anything made of it is very expensive.
A further test of the scarcity of money is in how we use it. When you buy anything, do you pay twice the asking price? If you buy a bottle of milk marked at $2, do you pay $4 instead? Do you buy bread and pay 100 times the posted price?? If anything, we look for bargains or the "best value." If we can get a dealer to knock off another $100 from a sticker price, we do it. We try to save that extra few bucks because money is scarce, and we need to use it efficiently. We spend only as much as necessary to get what we want.
Commodities, though, are easy to relate to "supply and demand" logic. How about volumteer activities? If you believe in saving the environment, don't you work to preserve it with your time, money, and effort? You may actively clean trash and other pollutants from a river. You may just simply recycle aluminum cans and newspapers. If you belong to a church, then you likely contribute your time, money, and effort supporting it. You may personally spread the gospel or organize fundraisers. Yet, even for these volunteer activities, do you have unlimited resources? We know that money is limited. How about time and effort? With only 24 hours in a day, it is impossible to spend more than that time, so time is limited, and thus, scarce. We all have physical limits, too. Only so many pounds can be lifted by any individual during a day before collapsing in exhaustion. Our desire to save our personal time and effort shows up within a typical, modern home. Microwave ovens and dishwashers free people of time and effort spent in the kitchen. A vacuum cleaner speeds and eases the cleaning of carpets. Power drills, blow dryers, computers, clothes washers and dryers, these and a myriad of other human tools and machines are designed toward freeing humans of daily drudgrey - tasks around the home which are time consuming and require physical exertion (effort).
Our available resources, time, effort, and money are limited - scarce. If we are to succeed in life, we must manage these resources and use them efficiently. We need to decide when and where to use our resources - detemine what is the best use of them. Even though scarcity may not "jump out at us" when we first think about it, after looking closely at our lives, we can keenly acknowledge the scarcity of our resources and what a constant and huge affect it has upon our personal and our business decisions. Throughout society, we try to get what we want at the lowest price in terms of our triad of human energy resources - time, effort, and money (TEM). Out of our need for efficiency comes all sorts of aphorisms. "Time is money." "Don't throw good money after bad." "Work smart, not hard." "Use your time wisely." "Don't throw money down the drain." "Be dollar conscious." "Don't waste your time." "Get the most for your money." "Get a good deal." Seeking the lowest price or the least amount of time and effort is efficiency. We seek efficiency. We abide by it. When we must expend our resources, we expend them only as necessary.
Efficiency, though, is not merely a human phenomenon. All living creatures are pressured by limited resources. A bird can only carry a limited amount of weight and still fly. Plants in arid climates must efficiently utilize limited rainfall in order to survive. A gazelle must utilize its speed efficiently to escape a hungry lion. The lion, in turn, must utilize its speed and cunning efficiently to capture the fleeing gazelle. And so it is with all plants and creatures. If fauna and flora seem sleek and well adapted, it is not without reason. These various forms of life expend precious energy only upon that which begets life. Energy usage which does not contribute to life is culled. Nature demands that energy be fed into successful behaviors and withdrawn from unsuccessful ones: Emotive Energy rises to success and falls from failure. Efficiency is the scalpel of natural selection and the guiding principle of the theory of emotive energy. All other concepts and predictions regarding the brain, thoughts, decisions, and emotions are driven by this principle.
To keep in harmony with the theme of "happiness", let's continue by delving into the impact of entropy and efficiency upon happiness ...
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