There are plausible reasons for humans to have evolved this trait. One of the most complicated tasks a human has to do is predict the actions of other humans.
The Machiavellian intelligence hypothesis suggests that this is entirely the reason for our species’ level of intelligence. Hence chemistry professors using expressions like “electrons want to get to a lower energy state”, as if electrons have desires of their own. That sentence makes a lot more intuitive sense to a human brain than “electrons just sort of always do this. Because of math.”
The Machiavellian intelligence hypothesis suggests that this is entirely the reason for our species’ level of intelligence. Hence chemistry professors using expressions like “electrons want to get to a lower energy state”, as if electrons have desires of their own. That sentence makes a lot more intuitive sense to a human brain than “electrons just sort of always do this. Because of math.”