Are you looking for things that cannot be used for signaling, or things that have primary motivations other than signaling, or something else? A theory of partial motivations seems doomed, unless you’ve first solved the problem of scalar (as opposed to ordinal) choices.
I don’t think there’s ANYTHING which qualifies as action and has no signaling component. Any biological function carries a bit of data about health, and any mental function says something about motivation or ability.
Even things normally done in private (shitting, inner dialog) are signals. The fact that we keep them private is an indication of following social norms.
If we’re just trying to ignore signaling as a motivation, and look for activities which we’re motivated to do in addition to their signaling value, I’d propose looking at things with immediate survival value, and things that don’t involve cognitive choice. “Removing your hand from a hot stove” is something I don’t think is primarily done for signaling.
Are you looking for things that cannot be used for signaling, or things that have primary motivations other than signaling, or something else? A theory of partial motivations seems doomed, unless you’ve first solved the problem of scalar (as opposed to ordinal) choices.
I don’t think there’s ANYTHING which qualifies as action and has no signaling component. Any biological function carries a bit of data about health, and any mental function says something about motivation or ability.
Even things normally done in private (shitting, inner dialog) are signals. The fact that we keep them private is an indication of following social norms.
If we’re just trying to ignore signaling as a motivation, and look for activities which we’re motivated to do in addition to their signaling value, I’d propose looking at things with immediate survival value, and things that don’t involve cognitive choice. “Removing your hand from a hot stove” is something I don’t think is primarily done for signaling.