Drives, Values, and Goals as Domain Translations of Behavioral Control

Behavioral control requires translation between different representations. Drives translate physiological state into motivational intensity. Values translate competing drives and context into an ordered ranking. Goals translate current values into temporally extended plans. Each translation is a protocol that transforms the representation of one domain into the representation of another domain. I argue that drives, values, and goals form a protocol stack of the kind found in many robust layered systems in engineering and biology. Each protocol occurs at a translation interface between domains. At the interface, heterogeneous upstream inputs compress into compact signals that downstream systems use to guide action. Interfaces tend to be evolutionarily conserved because change breaks communication between the two sides. Fragility concentrates at the interface. The framework predicts a gradient of model-dependence in the architecture of translation interfaces. Drives translate physiology into motivation through concentrated, identifiable interface circuits. Values combine concentrated components for direct translations and distributed components for model-based predictions. Goals primarily output model-based plans about extended futures, implemented in distributed circuits. Many observations match the framework's combination of translation, compression, conservation, and fragility. Examples from mammals include concentrated hypothalamic drive circuits, value interfaces combining concentrated midbrain dopaminergic and ventral striatal components with distributed orbitofrontal and ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and distributed goal circuits across prefrontal cortex and its recurrent loops with mediodorsal thalamus.