Tag Archives: Emotion

The layers of emotional feelings

Posted on November 25, 2019 by

One of the ongoing debates in neuroscience is on the nature of emotions, where they originate, where they are felt, and how innate versus learned they are. One view, championed by the late Jaak Panksepp and his followers, see emotions … Continue reading →

Posted in Mind and AI | Tagged , , , , | 46 Comments

Joseph LeDoux’s theories on consciousness and emotions

Posted on September 5, 2019 by

In the last post, I mentioned that I was reading Joseph LeDoux’s new book, The Deep History of Ourselves: The Four-Billion-Year Story of How We Got Conscious Brains.  There’s a lot of interesting stuff in this book.  As its title … Continue reading →

Posted in Mind and AI | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 119 Comments

The reflex and the feeling

Posted on August 22, 2019 by

Stephen T. Asma and Rami Gabriel have an interesting article at Aeon on emotions.  Their main thesis is that many emotions are biological, universal, and rooted in evolution.  And that they arise through “the strata of consciousness”: the physiological, the … Continue reading →

Posted in Zeitgeist | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 17 Comments

The layers of emotion creation

Posted on August 12, 2017 by

What are emotions?  Where do they come from?  Are they something innate or something we learn?  The classic view is that they’re precognitive impulses that happen to us.  If so, this would imply that they have specific neural signatures. Early … Continue reading →

Posted in Mind and AI | Tagged , , , , , , , | 43 Comments

Fruit fly fear and AI sentience

Posted on May 19, 2015 by

I found this study interesting: Do flies have fear (or something like it)? — ScienceDaily. A fruit fly starts buzzing around food at a picnic, so you wave your hand over the insect and shoo it away. But when the insect … Continue reading →

Posted in Zeitgeist | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 45 Comments

Reason is a tool of emotion

Posted on January 28, 2014 by

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them. David Hume Reason, logic, is a tool.  It is a means to an end. … Continue reading →

Posted in Philosophy | Tagged , , , , , , | 60 Comments

The Dark Side of Emotional Intelligence – Adam Grant – The Atlantic

Posted on January 3, 2014 by

Emotional intelligence is important, but the unbridled enthusiasm has obscured a dark side. New evidence shows that when people hone their emotional skills, they become better at manipulating others. When you’re good at controlling your own emotions, you can disguise … Continue reading →

Posted in Zeitgeist | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Rationally Speaking: Rationally Speaking cartoon: Evidence & Reason

Posted on December 18, 2013 by

via Rationally Speaking: Rationally Speaking cartoon: Evidence & Reason. Click through to see a enlarged version. This succinctly mirrors my earlier comments on a post Massimo made a while back expressing frustration on a relative’s unwillingness to see logic.  Sometimes the … Continue reading →

Posted in Zeitgeist | Tagged , , , , , | 5 Comments

Countering emotion with logic is often not effective

Posted on November 19, 2013 by

Massimo Pigliucci posted yesterday: Rationally Speaking: Irrationality, a personal study, his personal frustration in a conversation with a relative who, despite being a fairly rational person, had an emotional aversion to gay marriage.  Massimo lamented the difficulty in convincing people to … Continue reading →

Posted in Philosophy | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments