Abstract

What do human beings desire? Desire is diverse, multi-layered, often contradictory, directed to the most various goals: from the satisfaction of the simplest, biologically-related needs, such as hunger, thirst, or sexuality, to elaborate forms of desire for self-realization, social recognition or religious experience. But what is the ultimate goal of desire? Is there such a goal? The book examines desire as a phenomenon in the intersection area of anthropological and psychological philosophy. It deals with the anthropological principle, indicated in Plato and formulated by Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, according to which all desire is ultimately directed to a Supreme Good or God. It critically reconsiders this principle by taking into account current phenomenology, empirical psychology and neuroscience.