Are Emotions A Hinderence To The Human Race?

I have to admit, the question in your thread title is one I've never thought about, but that fact probably isn't too surprising.

I find I'm actually getting more patient as I get older. Maybe I'm doing something wrong.

One minor observation about emoticons . . . they may be the most intelligent form of expression some people can muster on some topics.

Edited to add: The trouble with having your eyes get funky as you age is that you can misread things and come across like an idiot because of it. I just now noticed, about two hours after I posted the original message, that the thread title said "emotions" and not "emoticons."

Apparently I was right that emoticons may be the most intelligent form of expression some people can muster . . . and apparently I'm one of them!

Void of any emotion can be a scary thing that leads to dangerous/deadly outcomes.

The above statement is a LIE! If it were true, we would have over 50% of the worlds population locked up in jails, or executed. Inefficiency, ignorance and stupidity is growing SO fast that we almost EXPECT it, and have laws and laxed enforcement to tolerate it MORE!

Steve

For the record, Vulcans do have emotions.
They are taught how to control them.

Without emotions, we aren't human.

Hmmm... if people weren't incumbered with emotional responses, like maybe fight-or-flight?

I'm thinking that the DNA of the last human would be found in a prehistoric tiger-turd somewhere in East Africa.

Just seems logical to me.

Joe Mobley

Carl Jung refers to ridding of emotions as carefully amputating the shadow of human nature which is your invisible human animal tail.

You can't become emotionless though you'll end up in prison.

I don't know for sure. (There. Now I can say anything I like, and I have an "Out")

There is a difference between drives and emotions. The brain stem and "reptile brain" give us our drives, fight, flight, sex, hunger, territory, social hierarchy, the need for games, war, and the urge to dominate others.

I'm assuming by "emotions", you mean love, anger, desire to help others, sense of community, parental love, that sort of thing.

I know something about this. I process my emotions (such as they are) through a different part of the brain. Most people process their emotions through the medial cortex. I process them through the cerebral cortex. (at least a PET scan told my doctor this).

So I either have more insight into this...or less. Not sure.

See, you can take care of your children, provide them with everything they need to succeed, but not love them. Not all parents love their children. Plenty of marriages are successful, and they don't love each other. (although I can't see where that would be a fun way to live)

In a large enough society, you may not need emotions to live successfully. But I don't know if a society would form in the first place, without the emotional bonds that cause us to group.

Have you ever cried because something was so beautiful? a song, sunset, piece of art?
Is that emotional? or is it just a deep appreciation for the complexity of what you experience. I don't know.


You cannot purge emotions, because you cannot will yourself to stop using a third of your brain. But I think, as you get wiser, you stop relying on them so much to make decisions. It isn't a question I've studied. A subject I've studied is what emotions are.....because I was trying to determine if my responses were emotional...or intellectual. For example, I love my wife dearly. But I don't know if it's the same thing as other people mean, when they say they love someone. After serious study, I suspect not.
I cry during tender scenes in movies....but I'm not sure if I know why. And I get angry, but it isn't precisely like what others feel. At least it isn't what others say they feel.
So, am I feeling emotion? Maybe. Or maybe it's just the image of an emotion.

Is ambition an emotion, or a base drive?
How about altruism? Is a drive a feeling you have all the time, and an emotion, something you experience more selectively?

I know that emotional displays (arguments, anger, crying) are almost universally unattractive to me. Employees very quickly learned that I wasn't a shoulder to cry on. But that doesn't mean they aren't useful.

I used to be married to a very highly emotional woman, who wasn't stupid, but not very educated. It was seven years of hell, for both of us. To her, I was a very cold calculating business person that never responded to her emotional displays. To me, she was insane.
But she wasn't clinically insane. It was just that the emotional difference between us was far too great to sustain a relationship.

I think emotions can cloud judgement. But I think emotion is also why we do many good and bad things that we do.

Anyway, I don't know if any of that is useful.

Interesting yeah, vulcans are VERY emotional! They almost destroyed their entire society! Every 7 years, IIRC, they MUST have some sexual relations. They are obviously given to many things. They are specist, for example. Typically, they consider almost all beneath them. They are driven by their society to view needless emotions as an inferior trait. Those considering themselves the BEST are to consider acheivement of Kolinahr to be PARAMOUNT!

As for human emotions, it is interesting that at least one above listed some "emotions" I NEVER had! I would NEVER want! THEY are the kinds of things that nearly destroyed vulcan, and threaten THIS planet EVERY DAY! Just TODAY, in the news, an EGYPTIAN court BANNED a group that wants such a thing EVEN as a similar group, in PAKISTAN is fighting to gain a foothold.

As for what ***I*** would consider emotions and whether they are good or bad? Even LOVE has been both the BEST and the WORST emotion. It has helped and hurt good and bad. And HATE can be a good emotion in the same way. Jealousy, properly applied, is a GOOD emotion. If you see a trait or achievement that another has had, it may move you to strive to similar or greater peeks, and that may be a good thing. It is ONLY bad if it leads to hatred of them, or causes you to do them ill.

So YEAH, emotions have helped and hurt. FEAR has built heroes and caused cowardly turncoats.

Steve

Emotion has created amazing works of art and pieces of literature. A world without any emotion, I would think would be like living in a black and white film. You would watch life go by but without taste or color or passion.

On the other hand, I see great merit in learning how to control your emotions - focus them. If you can channel your passions in a specific direction, the possibilities are endless.

How would you feel about the topic if emotions didn't exist?


It takes extension of an emotion, from yourself to get the feedback....

There's little love given in response to a cold kipper.

See this post.

"Mork's Mixed Emotions" fits here too.


Terra

Since emotion is actually a department of the mind and emotions are linked to data from all other departments - it's a moot point what we'd be like without them. Nature seemed to think we needed them for survival.

What I think you are asking is if we need empathy - and yes we do. We can see globally what terrorists who have had their empathy systems suppressed are doing - torturing and slaughtering every living thing that gets in their path. When empathy is lost, society will feed on itself and fall.

While most of society still has a little bit of empathy - when it comes to not standing for animal or human abuse and murder, there is a lack of empathy becoming very rampant at levels of blaming people for being in terrible living conditions.........and very little rankor against those who have made it possible to crush them.