The world would be a much simpler place if we all took a deep breath and admitted to ourselves and others that we are not purely rational beings, never were, never will be, aren’t meant to be.
“Logic and Reason” are useful tools, but treating them as the end-all-be-all of everything is foolhardy at best.
Plus, the more “rational” you claim to be (aka, the more you reject your own emotions and refuse to accept and understand them because you think emotions are for others), the more likely you are to make decisions that are, in fact, not rational at all but that you’ve convinced yourself are the logical thing. Our rational brains are incredibly good at coming up with reasonings for our emotional responses that make sense to us but wouldn’t actually hold up to scrutiny.
Philosopher Solomon pointed out that emotions follow reasoning hand-in-hand, quite reliably.
If you think someone’s stolen from you, you feel angry. If you find out they didn’t steal from you, you stop being angry at them. Perhaps you become angry at yourself for losing the item, but again -that’s reasoning coming into play.
Emotions seem part of a judgement at every point. When your friend starts talking about how great someone is, you might conclude they’re having romantic feelings, because part of loving someone is thinking they’re great (if things are going well).
Even when someone’s feeling ‘just generally irritated’, this usually translates to persitently judging things to be bad - thinking their government, or the kids’ music, and the latest TV shows are bad.
Judgement can be irrational, and the emotions will follow suit, but to feel happy that you’re going to see an old friend doesn’t seem at all irrational.
I think D. Kahneman answered that pretty well with his Type-1/2 thinking. To conclude his point, emotions can be rational but can be irrational as well.
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No, because they make sense to YOU when you get them.
The world would be a much simpler place if we all took a deep breath and admitted to ourselves and others that we are not purely rational beings, never were, never will be, aren’t meant to be.
“Logic and Reason” are useful tools, but treating them as the end-all-be-all of everything is foolhardy at best.
Plus, the more “rational” you claim to be (aka, the more you reject your own emotions and refuse to accept and understand them because you think emotions are for others), the more likely you are to make decisions that are, in fact, not rational at all but that you’ve convinced yourself are the logical thing. Our rational brains are incredibly good at coming up with reasonings for our emotional responses that make sense to us but wouldn’t actually hold up to scrutiny.
Philosopher Solomon pointed out that emotions follow reasoning hand-in-hand, quite reliably.
If you think someone’s stolen from you, you feel angry. If you find out they didn’t steal from you, you stop being angry at them. Perhaps you become angry at yourself for losing the item, but again -that’s reasoning coming into play.
Emotions seem part of a judgement at every point. When your friend starts talking about how great someone is, you might conclude they’re having romantic feelings, because part of loving someone is thinking they’re great (if things are going well).
Even when someone’s feeling ‘just generally irritated’, this usually translates to persitently judging things to be bad - thinking their government, or the kids’ music, and the latest TV shows are bad.
Judgement can be irrational, and the emotions will follow suit, but to feel happy that you’re going to see an old friend doesn’t seem at all irrational.
I think D. Kahneman answered that pretty well with his Type-1/2 thinking. To conclude his point, emotions can be rational but can be irrational as well.
No need to paint it black or white.
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/rational
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/emotion
Just looking at the definitions I would say that emotions mostly are irrational. Right?