For example one will desire a cup of coffee after a class, therefore this will motivate them to get this cup of coffee making it an effective 1st order desire. When looking at the alternative there are the non effective 1st order desires which are ones that are such, where one does not follow this motivation, personally "I would like to stay in bed all day " but in turn I do not making this 1st order desire the un-effective. Frankfurt claims that our effective first order desires are essentially "The Will,"" meaning, "Your Will"." .
Frankfurt describes this as such "To identify agent's will is either to identify the desire (or desires)by which he is motivated in some action he performs or to identify the desire (or desires)by which he will or would be motivated when or if he acts" (Frankfurt, 8). Frankfurt now begins to discuss the nature of a second order desire in its two forms. First is the desire for a first order desire, this is shown as before in "A wants X" this is simple and has no true levels, the fact that A wants X is innate and there is no true thought to it. The second form is the desire for a first order desire to be effective which in turn show us an account of second order volition. To better explain this we are given the Psychotherapist example. In this example a psychotherapist treats heroin addicts. He believes that he can better help his patients if he knows what it is like to want to take heroin. But, there is a strong will present to not take the heroin, therefore he strongly desires to not take the heroin. These are the therapists' desires. He has the first order desire to not take the heroin, the 2nd order desire to desire to take heroin. On the alternative he has No 1st order desire to take the heroin and no 2nd order volition in regards to the desire to take the heroin. .
Since this can be confusing as it was to me we can take another step to understanding desires.
