Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

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Omniverse
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Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Omniverse »

Proof That Our Emotions Are The Perception Of Value: I talk about how our emotions allow us to perceive value. Many people would disagree with this idea because many people think that emotions are just simply emotions (i.e. how we feel about things) and nothing more. But I think this example I am going to give you might prove how our emotions really are the perception of value. When you, for example, feel fear from being in a dangerous situation, that feeling of fear is a chemical message to the brain which is telling your brain something.

It tells your brain "THREAT!!!" or "DANGER!!!" This would be no different than your brain getting the message "IT MATTERS!!!" When your brain gets that message of threat and danger, that allows you to perceive things and situations as being threatening and dangerous. When you perceive a situation as being threatening or dangerous, that is no different than perceiving that situation as something that matters to you because, if it's a threat or danger, then it matters.

Now, when something matters to you, this means it is something good or bad from your perspective. For example, if the loss of your loved one mattered to you or if getting a new movie is something that mattered to you, then this means those things had value from your perspective.

Therefore, when you feel fear, that is no different than your brain getting the message that this dangerous situation you felt fear from was something bad. So, I can honestly conclude that emotions are the message of value to our brains which means they really are the perception of value. But since people are in denial of this, then they are in denial of their own emotions.

That is why I do not trust humanity because people are often times in denial and delusional. Humanity currently believes in this idea that emotions being the source of value in our lives is for the weak-minded and that the real value comes about through our intellect, character, and morals. I think humanity is also in denial when it comes to their moral and intellectual based values because I don't think these are real values. In essence, my views oppose the vast majority of humanity.

I think the emotional values are the real values while the values founded upon morality, intellect, and character are the fake values. But humanity thinks the opposite. Humanity thinks I am the one who is delusional and in denial and I think it is humanity that is delusional and in denial. As I explain later on, I do not think both sets of values can be real. I don't think the emotional values and the intellectual and moral based ones can be real. One set is real and one set is fake.

It would be like having two boxes of money and figuring out which box consists of real money and which box consists of fake money. In a way, I consider myself to be a detective trying to figure this whole thing out. We should all be like detectives to try to figure this out. The idea that our emotions are the perception of value is supported by many skeptics, emotional theorists, and neuroscientists as pointed out later on. Some people reject that idea, but I support it based upon my own personal experience as well as my own arguments.

The very fact that there is this idea out there that our emotions are the perception of value should be our 1st clue to really consider the possibility that humanity is in denial and that it's our emotions that are the true source of value in our lives and not our character, morality, intellect, or obligations/responsibilities (or "just doing what you got to do in life" even if you feel miserable and hopeless).
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LuckyR
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by LuckyR »

Sorry to hear you are in denial of your emotions. You should work on that.
"As usual... it depends."
Speedyj1992
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Speedyj1992 »

I'll be honest, while it sounds like you're in a dark place, I also can't say that you're wrong, because we tend to deny our emotions a lot. I do this, sometimes, and it's not healthy. But as a Christian, I'm very grateful for God, who will expose things in us and work in our lives in ways that are really extraordinary. Here's a link that explains the importance of giving him your heart (as in the heart of your soul, not physical heart):

https://youtu.be/CVqNHiYQzW0
Eduk
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Eduk »

Humanity doesn't agree on anything. Least of all that emotions are of no real value. We aren't Vulcans.
Ethics, for example, are founded on the emotion of empathy. I don't see how it's possible to have a character without emotion. And intelligence is very hard to define, somewhat fuzzy, and certainly not something to denigrate.
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Judaka
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Judaka »

Emotions are unreliable, contradicting and often rather meaningless and illogical, they shouldn't be used as a message for anything and they certainly don't denote value. People cry from being yelled at, scream hysterically due to road rage, they get angry that their phone isn't working properly.. Slap someone and they'll get angry, try to kiss a stranger and they'll be disgusted and confused. Don't try to extract some kind of meaning out of this, emotions don't come from a singular cause, it isn't an attempt to communicate something and it's not indicative of anything meaningful.

You could make an argument for emotions being based on interpretations rather than value but seeing as drugs, biological factors and habits can play such huge roles in completely changing our emotions, it doesn't seem reasonable. Not to mention that for example, if I am tired or irritated - a whole range of things will now annoy me that I would otherwise completely ignore. Same for everyone. Not much else to say.
Eduk
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Eduk »

Why did you write that judaka?
Unknown means unknown.
Judaka
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Judaka »

OP didn't say that emotions are of real value, he said emotions are insights into what we truly value and I'm responding to that. I'm saying he's wrong. I just browse the forums for interesting topics and give my opinions when I think I have something worthwhile to say.
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Commonsense2
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Commonsense2 »

Judaka wrote: April 3rd, 2018, 8:35 am Emotions are unreliable, contradicting and often rather meaningless and illogical, they shouldn't be used as a message for anything and they certainly don't denote value. People cry from being yelled at, scream hysterically due to road rage, they get angry that their phone isn't working properly.. Slap someone and they'll get angry, try to kiss a stranger and they'll be disgusted and confused. Don't try to extract some kind of meaning out of this, emotions don't come from a singular cause, it isn't an attempt to communicate something and it's not indicative of anything meaningful.

You could make an argument for emotions being based on interpretations rather than value but seeing as drugs, biological factors and habits can play such huge roles in completely changing our emotions, it doesn't seem reasonable. Not to mention that for example, if I am tired or irritated - a whole range of things will now annoy me that I would otherwise completely ignore. Same for everyone. Not much else to say.
Judaka has hit the nail on the cranium. I would only quibble with the second paragraph.

Emotions are based on interpretations. Drugs, biological factors and habits can change our interpretations in ways that will change our emotions. Being tired is a physiological biological factor. Being irritated is a psychological biological factor.
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Karpel Tunnel »

Judaka wrote: April 3rd, 2018, 8:35 am Emotions are unreliable, contradicting and often rather meaningless and illogical, they shouldn't be used as a message for anything and they certainly don't denote value. People cry from being yelled at, scream hysterically due to road rage, they get angry that their phone isn't working properly.. Slap someone and they'll get angry, try to kiss a stranger and they'll be disgusted and confused. Don't try to extract some kind of meaning out of this, emotions don't come from a singular cause, it isn't an attempt to communicate something and it's not indicative of anything meaningful.
IN which of those incidents was the emotion not indicative of something meaningful. Yes, road rage, for example is often not helping the person, but this is likely because they either did not, or could not, process the irritation, fear and anger about a lot of things in their lives. Driving amongst poor drivers and/or heavy commuter traffic, heading to and from jobs that we have to do for money but are often not satisfying if not worse has everything to do with meaning. In fact you cannot have meaning with out emotions, you just have information. Unless we are taking meaning to mean a dictionary definition.
You could make an argument for emotions being based on interpretations rather than value but seeing as drugs, biological factors and habits can play such huge roles in completely changing our emotions, it doesn't seem reasonable. Not to mention that for example, if I am tired or irritated - a whole range of things will now annoy me that I would otherwise completely ignore.
It's likely that those things do irritate you, but you deny it, but when tired you are more senstive, find it less easy to suppress your reactions and be 'civilized' and 'rational'.
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Knowledge_seeker
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Knowledge_seeker »

I can't say that I have thought much about this in advance, or that I have a solid thesis on that but I like to play devil's adcovate . So here is a rushed counterargument i came up with, that possibly proves the contadiction of feelings evenfor a specific value :
A person is possible to feel sad when seeing people ridiculating an other person. This means they perceive humiliation as something bad. Although, when it comes to their relationships, the same person might feel pleased by doing that to e person they are jealous of, orhate for some reason. So, in this came they perceive humiliation as something good.
Judaka
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Judaka »

Emotions are based on interpretations. Drugs, biological factors and habits can change our interpretations in ways that will change our emotions. Being tired is a physiological biological factor. Being irritated is a psychological biological factor
There's a strong relationship between the two, emotions also influence interpretations heavily and someone who is generally happy is very unlikely to see things the same as someone who's generally unhappy. So I suppose it becomes a bit of a chicken and egg argument seeing as I think a drug/hormone which changes your emotions will change your interpretations but interpretations are intellectual, biological and philosophical, they aren't influenced by drugs.

As a side note I believe Nietzsche goes through some of these topics in the gay science if anyone is interested.
IN which of those incidents was the emotion not indicative of something meaningful. Yes, road rage, for example is often not helping the person, but this is likely because they either did not, or could not, process the irritation, fear and anger about a lot of things in their lives. Driving amongst poor drivers and/or heavy commuter traffic, heading to and from jobs that we have to do for money but are often not satisfying if not worse has everything to do with meaning. In fact you cannot have meaning with out emotions, you just have information. Unless we are taking meaning to mean a dictionary definition.
You can interpret a meaning from performance of emotion, you can interpret a million meanings too. That's not what OP is talking about, he's talking about your emotional response demonstrating your values as opposed to other ways of communicating what you value, like stating it for example. So the two problems with this is that we need to interpret what an emotional response is demonstrating value for and that emotions are inconsistent, contradictory, unreliable and often illogical. They can be influenced by hormones, drugs, food, health among other things and so it's difficult to see them as being reliable and useful in showing what we value. Even that men and women, adult and child - experience emotion differently is a cause for concern.

Meaning comes from interpretation, not emotions. Even emotions get their meaning from interpretation.
Omniverse
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Omniverse »

Judaka wrote: April 3rd, 2018, 8:35 am Emotions are unreliable, contradicting and often rather meaningless and illogical, they shouldn't be used as a message for anything and they certainly don't denote value. People cry from being yelled at, scream hysterically due to road rage, they get angry that their phone isn't working properly.. Slap someone and they'll get angry, try to kiss a stranger and they'll be disgusted and confused. Don't try to extract some kind of meaning out of this, emotions don't come from a singular cause, it isn't an attempt to communicate something and it's not indicative of anything meaningful.

You could make an argument for emotions being based on interpretations rather than value but seeing as drugs, biological factors and habits can play such huge roles in completely changing our emotions, it doesn't seem reasonable. Not to mention that for example, if I am tired or irritated - a whole range of things will now annoy me that I would otherwise completely ignore. Same for everyone. Not much else to say.
Judaka wrote: April 6th, 2018, 10:10 pm
Emotions are based on interpretations. Drugs, biological factors and habits can change our interpretations in ways that will change our emotions. Being tired is a physiological biological factor. Being irritated is a psychological biological factor
There's a strong relationship between the two, emotions also influence interpretations heavily and someone who is generally happy is very unlikely to see things the same as someone who's generally unhappy. So I suppose it becomes a bit of a chicken and egg argument seeing as I think a drug/hormone which changes your emotions will change your interpretations but interpretations are intellectual, biological and philosophical, they aren't influenced by drugs.

As a side note I believe Nietzsche goes through some of these topics in the gay science if anyone is interested.
IN which of those incidents was the emotion not indicative of something meaningful. Yes, road rage, for example is often not helping the person, but this is likely because they either did not, or could not, process the irritation, fear and anger about a lot of things in their lives. Driving amongst poor drivers and/or heavy commuter traffic, heading to and from jobs that we have to do for money but are often not satisfying if not worse has everything to do with meaning. In fact you cannot have meaning with out emotions, you just have information. Unless we are taking meaning to mean a dictionary definition.
You can interpret a meaning from performance of emotion, you can interpret a million meanings too. That's not what OP is talking about, he's talking about your emotional response demonstrating your values as opposed to other ways of communicating what you value, like stating it for example. So the two problems with this is that we need to interpret what an emotional response is demonstrating value for and that emotions are inconsistent, contradictory, unreliable and often illogical. They can be influenced by hormones, drugs, food, health among other things and so it's difficult to see them as being reliable and useful in showing what we value. Even that men and women, adult and child - experience emotion differently is a cause for concern.

Meaning comes from interpretation, not emotions. Even emotions get their meaning from interpretation.
Yes, emotions are an unreliable source of value. But I think they are still the only way we can truly perceive value in our lives. Also, my worldview says that it is our positive (pleasant) emotions that allow us to perceive the good values in life. They allow us to perceive and experience joy, happiness, love, and beauty. Negative (unpleasant) emotions allow us to perceive the bad values in life. They allow us to perceive and experience horror, tragedy, misery, suffering, hate, rage, and sadness. Therefore, we need the positive emotions to make our lives good and we should avoid the negative ones. We should also avoid apathy since apathy is where our lives have no value at all. Emotions make things matter to us which is the reason why they make things of value to us in our lives. It makes no sense to me to say that something can have value if it doesn't matter. I will say one last thing here. My worldview is a religion. It is my own personal religion based upon my own personal experience which was something powerful and profound.

According to my religion, positive emotions would be a divine state of consciousness. They are a divine mental state that I would describe as The Divine Perception. Our morality, character, and intellect alone cannot give us such a divine experience/perception. Our brains would be receivers that pick up on divine spiritual energy in this universe. This energy engulfs us and puts us into a divine state of mind known as a positive emotional state. When we, for example, feel profound beauty and joy from being out in nature or listening to a moving song, we transform into divine, magnificent beings and our lives become something beautiful, joyful, and amazing. Without this divine power/force/energy within us, then we either become empty vessels or beings of negativity and darkness through our negative emotions. Unfortunately, positive emotions are very fleeting things and there are mental illnesses as well as many factors that can take away our ability to feel positive emotions.
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Karpel Tunnel »

1) thoughts and statements and interpretations are affected by drugs, so if this makes emotions unreliable, it does the same to all cognitions
2) emotions are much better at seeing someones' values than their statements. If someone says they like X, value it, but everytime they come near X they are angry or disappointed, I would trust the emotional reaction is showing their values more than their statements. Besides, people often state things based on what they think they are supposed to value. And if I want to know my values, my emotions are the key. who do I worry about whne they suffer? What goal elicits my passion and what leaves me cool?
3) People express different thoughts, so that should concern us also.
4) If you do not know what you feel, you cannot know what you value. You just have words in the head. Maybe someone told you they were true. Maybe they said sex was evil and you have that thought,but your feelings, they will tell you more clearly.
5) Thoughts get contradictory. People, over time, will present a muddle of stated interpretations, even paradigms.
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Sy Borg
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Sy Borg »

Omniverse wrote: April 7th, 2018, 11:14 amYes, emotions are an unreliable source of value. But I think they are still the only way we can truly perceive value in our lives.
No emotion, no value, no motivation because there is no need to do anything. Animals that care whether they lived or not tended to survive better than more oblivious species, more able to avoid danger, more capable of making special efforts where needed. Emotionality requires some level of intelligence too - an organism needs to be able to recognise a threat before feeling fear.

To adapt an Einstein quote, "Intellect without emotion is lame, emotion without intellect is blind".
Omniverse
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Re: Humanity is in denial of their own emotions

Post by Omniverse »

Greta wrote: April 7th, 2018, 9:00 pm
Omniverse wrote: April 7th, 2018, 11:14 amYes, emotions are an unreliable source of value. But I think they are still the only way we can truly perceive value in our lives.
No emotion, no value, no motivation because there is no need to do anything. Animals that care whether they lived or not tended to survive better than more oblivious species, more able to avoid danger, more capable of making special efforts where needed. Emotionality requires some level of intelligence too - an organism needs to be able to recognise a threat before feeling fear.

To adapt an Einstein quote, "Intellect without emotion is lame, emotion without intellect is blind".
Intellect alone just gives us ideas of things such as the idea of threat, danger, or value. Sure, we can use these ideas to help and benefit us and others. But it can only be our emotions that allow us to actually perceive value. It would be no different than, for example, hunger and thirst. Intellect alone cannot give us hunger and thirst. It can only give us the idea of hunger and thirst. It is only once the thought of our favorite food or beverage sends the signal to the areas of our brain that make us feel hungry and thirsty that we then have actual hunger and thirst. Or, when we spontaneously feel hunger and thirsty when we need to eat or drink something, that is where we would have real hunger and thirst.

As you can see here, there is a big difference between what we think and what our actual mental state is. Just because you think and believe that your life is something good and beautiful without feeling any positive emotions does not mean that you are in the mental state that allows you to perceive beauty and good value (that mental state, again, being the positive emotions). It's no different than how thinking and believing you are hungry and thirsty is not the same thing as actually being hungry and thirsty.
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