Artificial Programming of Human Needs: A Path to Degradation or a New Impetus for Development?

The development of biological sciences in the twentieth century clearly demonstrated that the positive and negative sensations and emotions of living organisms can be controlled by influencing the material structure of the nervous system. Today it seems quite probable that in the foreseeable future humanity will learn to artificially, at the physiological level, associate pleasant and unpleasant sensations and emotions with any stimuli and life situations, thus gaining the ability to artificially program their needs. This work analyzes the prospects for creating and using such technologies, their possible limitations, and social consequences. It is shown that the factor of striving for individual survival will apparently allow people to avoid the most dystopian consequences and preserve the incentive for development under various social models — from completely liberal (even permitting simple artificial stimulation of pleasure centers) to totalitarian, based on the forced programming of needs.