RE: Justification for Foundational Belief
August 6, 2012 at 3:54 am
(This post was last modified: August 6, 2012 at 3:55 am by genkaus.)
(August 5, 2012 at 8:52 pm)mralstoner Wrote:(August 5, 2012 at 3:18 pm)genkaus Wrote: Our emotions and feelings are not tools of cognition. They do not provide us knowledge. Any beliefs gained by pursuing emotional goals would, by their nature, be unreliable...Yes, of course, but that's not what I said. You have confused beliefs and values.
Beliefs/truth/knowledge should not, as you mention, be swayed by emotion.
Values, on the other hand, are not questions of fact, but matters of desire/preference/want. And these are matters of feeling.
Reason informs, and emotion moves. Both are necessary and interdependent for human activity.
We should, as you say, pursue truth and thereby find reliable beliefs. But no beliefs are ever certain. That was my point.
If both are necessary and interdependent, then how do you classify one of them as foundational?
(August 5, 2012 at 9:09 pm)jonb Wrote:(August 5, 2012 at 8:52 pm)mralstoner Wrote: Yes, of course,
Do you honestly think the only understanding is academic, dispassionate, fitting things in boxes?
Why would emotions have evolved if they are not a useful means of making sense of what is around us. The eye can be fooled, but that is no reason to cut it out. Feynman was such a great scientist because it had an emotional charge for him, and we gained by him pursuing his emotional goals.
What is reliable? You are programmed to seek meaning.
Ready to hear a relevant argument anytime now....
