RE: Emotions are intrinsically good and bad
October 31, 2017 at 12:32 am
(This post was last modified: October 31, 2017 at 12:41 am by Transcended Dimensions.)
(October 31, 2017 at 12:00 am)bennyboy Wrote:(October 30, 2017 at 11:48 pm)Transcended Dimensions Wrote: I said earlier that emotions themselves are also value judgments which means we have the rational value judgments and then we have the emotional value judgments which are the emotions themselves. You are talking about the rational value judgments here. But this is all still analogous with sight and hearing since the rational value judgments are not any real value judgments just as how the thought of hearing a certain sound or seeing colors is not any real heard sound or visualized colors in your life either. It's also no different than needing light to see gold in a pitch black cave. The light is our positive emotions and it is they that allow us to see (judge) the gold (good value).
Nope. The values you are talking about aren't made available to us by our positive emotions: they are words ABOUT positive emotions. I taste cake. I feel pleasure. I say, "Mmmmmmm, good cake." My Korean friend eats squid jerky, which I find horrible, feels pleasure and says, "Mmmmmmmm, good cake."
There's really nothing magi-special here. In the context you are talking about, one definition of good is "things that make me feel good." It isn't really much of a discover to say that this kind of goodness wouldn't exist for you if you lacked the capacity to feel good. Value, under that definition, would be meaningless.
But this isn't a statement about reality. It's just one of the ways we use the word good. It's also a particularly weak and useless method of evaluation. "Mmmmm, good cake" almost never leads to lasting satisfaction, nor does "That ho gave great blowjobs" or "the way that girl's eyes bugged out when I strangled her reminded me of my childhood doll when it got run over by my drunken daddy."
Your view would be like saying that if a table lacked the quality of table-ness, we would never have a table, and then marveling at the existence of tables. That should be both immediately obvious and immediately uninteresting.
Now, emotional value judgments are real value judgments as pointed out by that neuroscientist/skeptic. The emotional value judgments are value judgments that go beyond words. The rational value judgments are the words while the emotional ones are beyond words (the emotions themselves). Having real value in our lives is something profound and powerful and, thus, it would have to be something that goes beyond words. Sure, I have used words in saying all of this. But those words alone are, again, just thoughts of our emotions being the source of judging our lives as being good and bad while the rational value judgments themselves would still be no real value judgments. Thinking of value is not the same thing as judging (seeing) value. Lastly, here is the quote by that neuroscientist/skeptic who explains emotional value judgments:
Quote:Emotions are value judgments too. If they weren't, humanity would not be distinct from other mammals; we would be biological machines with no autonomy, acting purely on instinct. For example, if you are physically hurt, and the doctor treating you causes you pain during treatment, do you become angry and bite him? No, because you are able to override your instinctive anger and fear at someone causing you pain with your ability to reason that the treatment is necessary and the pain is temporary. But a dog can't reason, and will bite to stop the person causing the pain. Both the instinctive emotions AND the reasoned thoughts are value judgments.