I freely admit that I may just not have been paying attention since I was a little kid and that somebody already updated the list, but when I was in grade school I was told that there were three basic needs for human beings: Food, Clothing, and Shelter. Somewhere along the way, I heard of a longer list that may have gone by the name Basic Needs (or the like).
Given that food and drink might be all that were needed to keep you alive for an extended period in climates where clothing and shelter could be postponed more or less indefinitely, and that as one moves into less favorable conditions the other basic needs of Clothing and Shelter become more obvious, what other things need to be added to that Basic Needs list now that we are so accustomed to Transportation and Communications being downright necessities?
Mascara would be pretty high on my list. But for items that I would physically die without, I’d have to say The Sun. All else would cease to exist without it.
I have to have books. I’d be utterly miserable without anything to read-- to the point where if I knew I’d never have books again, life simply wouldn’t be worth living.
Old joke: The hypothalamus is responsible for the four Fs necessary for survival: fighting, fleeing, feeding and mating.
I think that’s probably the essentials. (Not that you can’t live a long life without sex, but some type of sexual release [and I would argue sexual stimuli] is needed.)
There’s also the Maslow Hierarchy of Needs.
