Emotion is an indispensable aspect of our lives, but its necessity in gaining knowledge is often disregarded by people, and therefore this essay will analyze, and justify why it is to a great extent that emotion is needful when obtaining knowledge. Emotion plays an enormous role in helping an individual obtain knowledge, as emotion can aid the person in making sense of knowledge, developing it, and it also has an immense effect on our thought process.
Even though some argue that emotion isn’t necessary in obtaining rational knowledge in areas of knowledge like physics and math, this is falsified by the fact that emotion assists us in enhancing our learning. Which is due to the presence of secondary emotions such as “passion”, and “determination”.
It is noticed that it is easier to obtain knowledge that has a connection with our lives or our feelings. This is a result of how emotion and memory are closely related and since we tend to recall knowledge kindred with our emotions. The knowledge newly obtained is retained more easily in our memories because it’s easier to develop knowledge that is emotionally arousing, than disinteresting knowledge. This was proven from the results of a psychology “emotional Stroop test”. The test required people to name the color each word was written in and the results showed that people were affected by the emotional content of each word even though it seemed that this was irrelevant to the color-naming task. (MacKay,
This is proven in Elliot’s case who lost the part of his brain responsible for emotion from a brain tumor, although he didn’t show a drop in his IQ, he was no longer able to make decisions, and therefore Elliot was fired from his job because of the way he seemed stupid as he was unable to develop knowledge because of his inability to take decisions (Baer, 2016).
Emotional experiences are vital as they provide us with knowledge that are hard to obtain through other ways of knowing. Studies have shown that people responded correctly, when tested on past mistakes due to the presence of emotional experience (Zolfagharifard, 2015). This is owing to negative emotions such as shame, guilt, or disappointment, which increase our ability to become aware of our mistakes and gain knowledge about moral
This essay concerns emotions and controversial arguments based on whether emotions are universal or a learned phenomenon. Most of the research in to cross cultural Psychology surround their attention on the biological aspect of emotions as being the primary source of the occurrence of emotions and has been the subject of numerous studies. However, culture is also known to affect and provoke emotional experiences. This essay will discuss the position of emotions from a Universalist view and from a cultural view. The following approach will focus on the universality of emotions.
What is an emotion? William James and Jean-Paul Sartre present two different arguments regarding what constitutes an emotion. This paper will explore William James' analysis of emotion as set out in his 1884 essay . It will attempt to discover the main points of his view, and then present Sartre's rebuttal of this view taken from his essay on emotions . Concluding with an explanation regarding why Sartre's account is flawed and James's argument is the stronger of the two, it will use outside examples to demonstrate the various weaknesses and strengths within the two perspectives.
"A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true" this quote was said by Socrates who was a Greek philosopher ,Basically, Socrates advocates the use of logic and sense over emotions concerning morality. That makes sense to me, but certainly emotions have their place as well; To leave emotions strictly out of every sort of moral decision, seems inhuman or sort of robotic. Humanity's ability to be emotional is one of our best, endearing qualities, allowing us to make informed decisions based on circumstantial evidence at times. In this essay I'm going to discuss the importance of both reason and emotions when it to comes to justifying moral actions, and I'm going to talk about the problems that arise from them and lastly give example of each and try to connect it to one the areas of knowledge.
In Daniel Goleman’s “Emotional Intelligence,” he dives into the science behind the brain and how emotions can affect a person’s decision making process. The human brain consists of two main parts: the neocortex, or the thinking brain, and the amygdala, the emotional brain. The neocortex is the part of the brain that is responsible for rational thoughts. “It contains the centers that put together and comprehend what the senses perceive” (Goleman 11). Contrasting the neocortex is the amygdala, which “acts as a storehouse of emotional memory; life without the amygdala is a life stripped of personal meanings” (Goleman 15). According to Goleman, one man, whose amygdala was surgically removed, became completely uninterested in people, preferring to sit in isolation with no human contact. “Without an amygdala he seemed to have lost all recognition of feeling, as well as any feeling about feelings” (Goleman 15). The amygdala has its own circuitry attaching it to the pre-frontal cortex, which is the center for the brain for working memory. If this circuitry was cut, a person’s decision making process would be greatly affected. However, if this connection was broken, a person’s score on an IQ test would not be affected at all. This is true because the emotional aspect of the brain, which is used in making decisions, would be affected but the rational thinking portion would not be affected. The amygdala
Sight cues came as no surprise to me, as I had assumed since the start that those would be the most prevalent. What was surprising to me was that I had a memory cued by a memory. Although I did not think it impossible, I had assumed that such a cue would not happen to me. I also noted the pattern of influence on my emotional state. Five memories influenced me positively, one negatively, and six did not influence me at all. The emotional content of the memories lined up about the same as the influence it had on my emotional state. The only part that came as a surprise to me was that some of my memories had no emotional content. I had assumed that all of the memories I would write down would have emotion to them and influence my emotion in some way. All of the memories I recorded were dealing with unusual events in my life, which suggests there is no correlation between my emotion and the unusualness of the memory. I found this interesting, as I thought the purpose of most of my involuntary memories would be of things I do often and that is why they would be remembered out of the blue. Based on what I recorded, the purpose of my involuntary memories seems to be to make sure I remember things I do not think about that
Holt, Michael. “Guilt, Its Effects and How to Overcome Regretful Feelings”. Yahoo, 30 April 2007. Web. 16 February 2014.
Hamilton, L.W. (2012). The Brain and Our Emotional Future: Foundations of Emotions [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from Soul Beliefs: Causes and Consequences Online Course site: rutgersonline.net.
Storbeck, J., & Clore, G. L. (2005). With sadness comes accuracy; with happiness, false memory. Psychological Science, 16(10), 785-791.
It is a well-known fact that different factors affect on human behavior as well as various aspects of people’s life. Among them the emotions detect a powerful force on humans. Strong emotions may cause people to take actions they might not perform as usual, or obviate situations that they generally enjoy. Psychologists, researchers, and philosophers have proposed a set of different theories that explain how and why people experience the emotions. I have chosen two theories of emotion that I am interested in such as: the James-Lange Theory of Emotion and the Cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion. This paper describes those theories by comparing and contrasting them;
fact how we behave and what we feel is only the tip of the iceberg. I
All my life I have been taught to think before I act, in order to prevent myself from making a mistake. Yet, I have learned through my many errors in life not to duplicate my unfortunate actions. Many times I have been told to consider the consequences of my actions prior to acting. I have found, though, that this may not always be the best approach. I would not argue this to be true in every situation, however. What is to be said, for example, of those who have acted on their emotions, only to find themselves in prison? One must be able to know instinctively which situations are appropriate to be dealt with solely on emotions, and which are to require a certain amount of development. Nevertheless, as von Kleist states, in “On Thinking Things Over: A Paradox”, the proper time to reflect on an action is after the act has occurred.
Emotions play a role in everyday life in all things big or small, but particularly in making decisions. When an individual is deciding on what to do, they take into account what their expected emotions would be, but the determining factor is the immediate emotions they feel while making the decision. With expected emotions, an individual will think about how happy or upset they may feel for instance if they win a monetary cash prize, or gamble too much and walk away with nothing. Often ...
The distance learning environment creates a multitude of challenges that students or instructors do not have to deal with in a brick and mortar classroom. One controversial topic may be that people cannot express their emotions effectively online. Online environments are also complicated to have interactions and establish a presence. Is this really the case though? Is it challenging to show emotion online or have a presence; however, it is not impossible. These topics will be discussed in the following.
From the moment they wake up, people experience events that trigger certain emotions. How people react to these events may depend on that person feels during that event. In terms of whether our emotions control us or we control our emotions, I believe that to some extent emotions control us. Because we cannot change how we feel in response to certain stimulus, emotions control us. However, people have some control over whether or not they act on their emotions. Emotions at that given moment can influence our actions. If people can control their reactions, then to some degree we are controlling our emotions. However, the prompts raises several important questions. How can one’s emotions alter other ways of knowing such as perception or reason?
Have you ever wondered why people have certain reactions? I chose chapter eight on emotions for my reflection paper because emotions are something that everyone has and feels, yet cannot always explain or react to in the way you would expect. Personally, I have never been great at responding to emotions in a way that I would not regret in the future. Thus, naturally being drawn to this chapter as a way to expand my knowledge on how to react to things more positively. I also wanted to learn why I feel a certain way after events that would not affect most people and be reassured about my feelings. Opposite to that, it is nice to see that, while not always productive, others have the same reaction habits. Overall, emotions are a complicated