Active Reaction of Thoughts

[DalTheJigsaw123]

My experience has been that emotions could be active reactions of thoughts. It is easy to fall into confusion, to understand when and why you might react to one thing, but not to the other, as the memories linger — episodes of statements, observations, declarations, and actions.

 

Personally, it stems mostly from experience and upbringing. If you were raised in an environment where verbal assaults and physical gestures were rampant, who is to say that you will not act the same way when raising your own child? Most of the time, human beings are easily led by their own experiences. While it is true that genetics affect human behavior, it is even more affected by how a child is raised; environment is the foundational need, which provides a blueprint to how a child should be raised. 

 

Read more here:

https://medium.com/@leonbasin/active-reactions-of-thoughts-beb11ad6a514#.tco2idtvs

[Karl]

My experience has been that emotions could be active reactions of thoughts. It is easy to fall into confusion, to understand when and why you might react to one thing, but not to the other, as the memories linger — episodes of statements, observations, declarations, and actions.

 

Personally, it stems mostly from experience and upbringing. If you were raised in an environment where verbal assaults and physical gestures were rampant, who is to say that you will not act the same way when raising your own child? Most of the time, human beings are easily led by their own experiences. While it is true that genetics affect human behavior, it is even more affected by how a child is raised; environment is the foundational need, which provides a blueprint to how a child should be raised. 

 

Read more here:

https://medium.com/@leonbasin/active-reactions-of-thoughts-beb11ad6a514#.tco2idtvs

 

They are.

 

You can name an emotion and that is a conceptual effort, otherwise it would be an unconnected sensation that at most would tell you hunger, mating, fight, fear, but not as specific concepts but as immediate instinctive reactions in the same way that switching a light switch illuminates a light-for an animal that's how it is.

 

For a human the sensation has become entwined with abstract concepts. An animal cannot feel love or hate, because these are abstract conceptions. To find the source of an emotion, as opposed to just a sensation, to discover the thought process that is behind it, is a proper tour de force of effort. Most people do not have the ability to do it, their minds will wander off like bored puppies. It requires a diligence and an immense effort and discipline. First the mind must be trained to do what most people believe they do naturally-to think. Most have never thought in that way, instead they are using gathered concepts and memory. The times when thought has been active is learning a new skill, but then, any lapse of concentration is impossible, as it is often dangerous, it is also a loci of focus. Pure thought has no loci. There is no focus point.

[Marblehead]

An animal cannot feel love or hate, because these are abstract conceptions.

Strange you made this statement as just last night I watched a documentary that totally contradicted this false assumption.

 

Jane Goodall was the driving force behind this new understanding.  Many other animals beside humans experience emotions.

[Karl]

Strange you made this statement as just last night I watched a documentary that totally contradicted this false assumption.

 

Jane Goodall was the driving force behind this new understanding.  Many other animals beside humans experience emotions.

 

Not conceptual emotion, they are instinctive automatic creatures. It is the humans that are misinterpreting the actions. That's the problem with perception going to conception. Use logic to see the reality. This is what we have been talking about. It is why I said you are not an objectivist.

 

An animal feels pleasure, pain etc, but it does not relate them to a conceptual awareness of an emotion because they are incapable of reason. It just does what feels good or moves away from what doesn't. It's why there cannot ever be animal rights, it's a contradiction.

 

If animals are capable of emotion then we have to reevaluate our entire understanding of animals as rational creatures. Yet, like you see the tree, you know that it is a tree.

[Marblehead]

You still don't believe me.  Oh well.  Most people wouldn't because we have placed the human at a much higher level than it deserves. 

 

I don't want to take this thread off topic so early in its life so I will stop with talking about emotions in other animals.

 

A fair question, I think, would be: Are emotions learned or are they genetic?

[Karl]

You still don't believe me.  Oh well.  Most people wouldn't because we have placed the human at a much higher level than it deserves. 

 

I don't want to take this thread off topic so early in its life so I will stop with talking about emotions in other animals.

 

A fair question, I think, would be: Are emotions learned or are they genetic?

 

You have to place yourself where you deserve. I don't place all humans anywhere particularly. That they are capable does not mean they will choose to. In that respect they can be as irrational and dangerous as jungle creatures and must be treated as such.

 

Emotions are learned, but sensations are part of the human faculty as is cognition. We are born having both faculties then we build a conceptual hierarchy. This is why we can choose to ignore our emotions. We can be frightened and still stand on the battlefield facing bullets and certain death. An animal cannot, the sensation danger is directly transferred into the instinct to fight or run, it cannot choose to die. Kant says this is a sense of duty in man.

 

You really should start listening to Peikoffs lectures whilst you are gardening, building stuff and driving that pick up about :-)

[Marblehead]

Emotions are learned, but sensations are part of the human faculty as is cognition. We are born having both faculties then we build a conceptual hierarchy. This is why we can choose to ignore our emotions. We can be frightened and still stand on the battlefield facing bullets and certain death. An animal cannot, the sensation danger is directly transferred into the instinct to fight or run, it cannot choose to die.

Yeah, this is my first response.  But then, I have seen so many contradictions, the differences between siblings, raised in the same manner but emotional opposites.

 

I agree with the flight or fight thing.  Well, kinda'.  Hehehe.  

 

Kant says this is a sense of duty in man.

I don't read Kant.

 

You really should start listening to Peikoffs lectures whilst you are gardening, building stuff and driving that pick up about :-)

Oh, No!  He's trying to get me edjumacated.

 

Too late for that.  I'm retired.

[Karl]

They aren't emotional opposites, they have just integrated in a very different way. Their experiences are also unique to them. Say that you were shown a spider by your mother and she let it run up and down her hand to show you it was nice and harmless, contrast that with the mother who runs shrieking and hysterically from the room leaving you alone with the spider. In the first case spiders are not to be feared, in the second they are the stuff of nightmares. I had the second experience :-)

 

 

No one reads Kant, they just say they have. When someone says they are reading Kant, I will always reply 'neither am I'.

 

I'm retired too-but early. Learned more in four years than my entire life and enjoyed every second of it. When I left work I applied to do a PPE degree (politics, philosophy and economics) which is the de rigeur qualification for political life. My wife pointed out my fundamental hatred of organised academic study, which I agreed with-she knows me very well. What's weird is that I then proceeded, completely unintentionally, to study all of those subjects.

Edited March 31, 2016 by Karl

[wilfred]

karma baby, energetic formations before any of that other stuff manifests. the correct mind training & purification necessary to perceive it.

 

penguin OUT.

[Marblehead]

They aren't emotional opposites, they have just integrated in a very different way. Their experiences are also unique to them. Say that you were shown a spider by your mother and she let it run up and down her hand to show you it was nice and harmless, contrast that with the mother who runs shrieking and hysterically from the room leaving you alone with the spider. In the first case spiders are not to be feared, in the second they are the stuff of nightmares. I had the second experience :-)

Good point and likely very supportable.

 

No one reads Kant, they just say they have. When someone says they are reading Kant, I will always reply 'neither am I'.

Hehehe.

 

I'm retired too-but early. Learned more in four years than my entire life and enjoyed every second of it. When I left work I applied to do a PPE degree (politics, philosophy and economics) which is the de rigeur qualification for political life. My wife pointed out my fundamental hatred of organised academic study, which I agreed with-she knows me very well. What's weird is that I then proceeded, completely unintentionally, to study all of those subjects.

I likely would have enjoyed going for a Master's in either philosophy or geography but life didn't take me in that direction.  I don't regret how things worked out though.

[Marblehead]

karma baby, energetic formations before any of that other stuff manifests. the correct mind training & purification necessary to perceive it.

 

penguin OUT.

 

Yeah, if one holds to the concept of karma then your suggestion would be valid.

[Karl]

Good point and likely very supportable.

 

 

Hehehe.

 

 

I likely would have enjoyed going for a Master's in either philosophy or geography but life didn't take me in that direction.  I don't regret how things worked out though.

 

There isn't much point in the piece of paper they give you, or having to turn out a dissertation unless that floats your boat, but you shouldn't ever stop active learning....in my opinion of course ;-)

[Marblehead]

There isn't much point in the piece of paper they give you, or having to turn out a dissertation unless that floats your boat, but you shouldn't ever stop active learning....in my opinion of course ;-)

I just had a 'round-about with my cable service.  They jacked up my subscription cost too much so I had to make changes.  After seeing the changes they made, took away most of the educational channels and gave me about 45 sports channels (I don't watch sports) I fused with them until they agreed to give me back the educational channels.

 

But no, the diploma wouldn't have meant much to me.  I would have done it only for the enjoyment of learning in one or the other of those fields of study.

[Karl]

They always try and sell the sport. The salesman cant quite get it when I say I dont watch any.

 

"yes but you get to see the big footy matches"

"I dont watch Sport"

"we cover the wimbledon matches"

"I dont watch sport"

"the boxing"

"I"

"The Ashes"

"dont"

"Most of the olympics with special previews"

"watch"

"and all of the darts and snooker"

"sports"

"You get all of that at a vey low special price"

"fuck off"

[DalTheJigsaw123]

Thanks everyone for reading! I really appreciating you reading and commenting!

[Stosh]

Of Course advanced animals think and have emotions ! 

Simple Proof of thinking, a horse lifts its legs to a height above an object its jumping. It has to have an idea of itself , and the object , and the relative sizes of things , and where its going to be when it comes down, , and that it will be up. Otherwise it would spring like a flea , with no idea where , or how high or what will happen. Ping! 

Proof That it has emotions ,is ,, some days it may not feel like jumping , or it can be scared to jump , or it may jump around just having a good time. 

The drivers, for at least mammals, differ from those of humans , in scope , and level of abstraction, but even ducks have an idea of how many chicks they have , lizards can return to a hole from a route other than the one they set off in , parrots can mourn, and play,, and even turtles can solve some puzzles. No they probably cant solve complicated algebra ,, but neither did a lot of kids I knew in school. 

[Karl]

Of Course advanced animals think and have emotions ! 

Simple Proof of thinking, a horse lifts its legs to a height above an object its jumping. It has to have an idea of itself , and the object , and the relative sizes of things , and where its going to be when it comes down, , and that it will be up. Otherwise it would spring like a flea , with no idea where , or how high or what will happen. Ping! 

Proof That it has emotions ,is ,, some days it may not feel like jumping , or it can be scared to jump , or it may jump around just having a good time. 

The drivers, for at least mammals, differ from those of humans , in scope , and level of abstraction, but even ducks have an idea of how many chicks they have , lizards can return to a hole from a route other than the one they set off in , parrots can mourn, and play,, and even turtles can solve some puzzles. No they probably cant solve complicated algebra ,, but neither did a lot of kids I knew in school. 

 

I didn't say they were unable to think or that they didn't have sensations. I said they didn't have emotions and were incapable of conceptual thought which requires to faculty of reason. Emotion is a abstract concept which you can choose to act on, an animal doesn't have that abstraction it translates the sensation into action. Some animals are capable of high levels of intelligence, but they cannot conceptualise. They are forever stuck with precepts on which they must immediately act.

 

This is why I said that mans first value is his life, which he must choose as a value. An animal doesn't do that. It cannot and has not the capacity to choose in abstraction. It simply does whatever it must according to instinct and environment. Humans aren't born with the automatic knowledge of how to survive, we must plan ahead all the time. We can choose many multiples of options and juggle them about, but an animal does not plan long term, when it's hungry it hunts, when it's tired and cannot hunt then it sleeps. If it is attacked it must run or defend itself. It's instantaneous instinctive and automatic action.

 

When you have a feeling then you have thoughts that underpin that sensation. You can abstract 'this is love' you begin with the first word 'I' which is an abstract concept-an animal cannot comprehend 'I' in that sense. It simply is and then it does. Humans create art and music because of these abstractions. The best an animal like a chimp can do is to doodle with paint in the same manner as it would play with a tyre.

 

Humans have rights. Rights are abstractions. The animals have no kind of thing, they live by the law of the jungle. It is eat or be eaten. Animals require no rights because they cannot have the abstraction of values, ethics or morals. Go swimming with crocodiles and they bite your leg off. They can't be prosecuted, they don't respect your life, property, space, they just munch on you as they would a fish. They don't feel the emotion 'well maybe I shouldn't have eaten Stosh I feel a bit guilty about that'. Nature wants to eat us, feed on us and the only thing stopping it doing so is the big grey lump in our heads. The only reason some animals won't attack you is domestication, size, or food preference.

 

None of this says an animal cannot hunt you, lie in wait, wear you down by attrition or roll about merrily enjoying the sensation of your rotted carcass. An animal will scratch an itch, it will play, sleep, whine, lick or scratch you, but it is not considering its long term future or reasoning out if it should play or paint the shed. It's just doing what comes natural. A full belly makes it sleepy an empty belly makes it whine.

[Stosh]

I'm not sure us humans act out of abstractions as much as we like to think. But I do think my cat understands that her claws can hurt, and can have expectations that I may react poorly , I can fake her out ,and I could make my dog feel guilty.

I don't mess with the cats mind much , she's too honest, but the dog was fair game.

[Karl]

I'm not sure us humans act out of abstractions as much as we like to think. But I do think my cat understands that her claws can hurt, and can have expectations that I may react poorly , I can fake her out ,and I could make my dog feel guilty.

I don't mess with the cats mind much , she's too honest, but the dog was fair game.

 

We act out of abstractions always you just don't always see the wiring and so it seems like instinct.

 

All cats are interested in is shelter, warmth and a belly full of food. Don't kid yourself. The moment you withdraw that food bowl they will develop a wander lust and find another sucker :-) I know cats very well as we used to have a pair of the little gits. I loved them really.

[Stosh]

We act out of abstractions always you just don't always see the wiring and so it seems like instinct. All cats are interested in is shelter, warmth and a belly full of food. Don't kid yourself. The moment you withdraw that food bowl they will develop a wander lust and find another sucker :-) I know cats very well as we used to have a pair of the little gits. I loved them really.

Ya gotta accept them for what they are, they just arent humans , and I find em terriffic anyway. ( cats) Sophie does have to look after her own welfare, and their bonds do get severed easily ,, but that can be said for people as well, just as much ,, but at least she's an honest little 'ho'. with realistic needs and desires. 

That wasnt my point though , what I was getting at , is that she makes a distinction  between playing around , and being serious. The only difference in THAT is intent. Therefore , she has intents -unlike umm bugs and plants-. Which is really a pretty abstract thing IMO. 

 

PS, I dont think we have any actual instincts -hardly at all.

Edited April 1, 2016 by Stosh

[Karl]

Ya gotta accept them for what they are, they just arent humans , and I find em terriffic anyway. ( cats) Sophie does have to look after her own welfare, and their bonds do get severed easily ,, but that can be said for people as well, just as much ,, but at least she's an honest little 'ho'. with realistic needs and desires. 

That wasnt my point though , what I was getting at , is that she makes a distinction  between playing around , and being serious. The only difference in THAT is intent. Therefore , she has intents -unlike umm bugs and plants-. Which is really a pretty abstract thing IMO. 

 

PS, I dont think we have any actual instincts -hardly at all.

 

All living things as opposed to inanimate objects are goal directed. It is only conscious entities that have a purposeful existence; some lower species respond to stimuli and their guide to life is the pleasure pain principle, the higher species including man also experience pleasure and pain, the higher animals only in the context of perception. So cats grasp and deal with a world of entities and form automatic perceptual associations. There range of actions is far wider, they must learn skills which would be unnecessary and impossible for a lower sensory species.

 

Man is a conceptual animal. Unlike a cat, he cannot rely on perception, his sensations are not infallible or automatic. Compared with a cat, the number of skills a man must acquire to survive a vast. It makes a man far more adaptable. He isn't limited by his environment and can work to change it. A conceptual being cannot initiate action unless he knows the purpose and nature of his action.

[Stosh]

I dont know yet if I agree or dont ,to that. I hitch up at the word purpose. Which to me is different than having intent. Do animals know the purpose of sex? as you are using the word purpose? Or are you thinking that there is a purpose held by something else ? that say, a coral, is knowingly trying to fulfill...or even that the thing has goals,,,or that pleasure is required to make them spray into the water.

Edited April 1, 2016 by Stosh

[Karl]

I dont know yet if I agree or dont ,to that. I hitch up at the word purpose. Which to me is different than having intent. Do animals know the purpose of sex? as you are using the word purpose? Or are you thinking that there is a purpose held by something else ? that say, a coral, is knowingly trying to fulfill...or even that the thing has goals,,,or that pleasure is required to make them spray into the water.

 

Purpose, in context. Animals act purposefully, but only perceptually. Animals take pleasure from having sex, but it is perceptual pleasure.

A coral will also have purpose if it has any form of sensation and sensory system, then it also acts on the pleasure pain principle and again it will be perceptual. if it is more rudimentary then it will act only in accordance with sensory signals and will feel nothing at all. It's goal will also be survival as with all living things regardless of them being conscious or cognisant. A tree needs air, water, nutrition and It is entirely automatic and unconscious. It feels no sensation, pleasure or pain, there is no perception, but it still does react to stimuli. It is not an innanimate object like a rock which needs do nothing at all to survive, every living thing regardless of capacity is goal oriented- and that goal is survival even if it percieves nothing at all.

 

[Stosh]

Ah , I wouldnt consider something that has no consciousness to have goals,, they would incur consequences. But ok. Perceptual pleasure, umm can one have pleasure that was not perceived?

 

I agree though that a coral reacts to things, but so do plants, and chemicals. Its self fulfilling that procreating systems can persist by procreation, but I , Personally dont consider that to be goals without having awareness intent and understanding.

 

Ill try to remember what youre meaning ,going forward.

[Karl]

Ah , I wouldnt consider something that has no consciousness to have goals,, they would incur consequences. But ok. Perceptual pleasure, umm can one have pleasure that was not perceived?

 

I agree though that a coral reacts to things, but so do plants, and chemicals. Its self fulfilling that procreating systems can persist by procreation, but I , Personally dont consider that to be goals without having awareness intent and understanding.

 

Ill try to remember what youre meaning ,going forward.

 

Goal oriented. Keep it contextual, it's not a human conceptual kind of goal. For instance a planet orbits the Sun, but it has no intent or goal. It's simply reacting to forces. A living creature, by its nature of living has to sustain itself or perish. A plant, unlike a human, cannot choose. An animal cannot choose. A plant does not percieve because it lacks a consciousness, it isn't aware, it just reacts to impulses without pleasure or pain. Water bonds to molecules and cell roots divide in that direction, sunlight bonds with other molecules and the leaves turn towards the sunlight.

 

No, you cannot have unpercieved pleasure.

 

I don't really know a coral, I'm not a biologist so I can't really fit it into a particular category.

 

All this is background for the main event which is of course human perception, consciousness and conception. The latter being what makes us unique in the animal kingdom- so far.