[ExI] reason an emotion

[Ben Zaiboc]

Aargh! Did it again!
I keep forgetting to change the Subject.


-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: 	Re: extropy-chat Digest, Vol 266, Issue 1
Date: 	Sat, 1 Nov 2025 21:48:57 +0000
From: 	Ben Zaiboc <ben at zaiboc.net>
To: 	extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org



On 01/11/2025 13:32, bill w wrote:
> Here is an extremely interesting study on those two.
> A man somehow had a brain injury that severed the connection between 
> his amygdala and his forebrain.  This cuts off emotions from the 
> decision-making process.
> Result:  decisions are made without emotion.  His IQ and overall 
> intelligence levels were unchanged.  Thus he had only reason from the 
> forebrain to run his life.
> He could not make the slightest decision.  He was given intellectual 
> work but when he finished he could not move to the next problem. He 
> could not decide if he wanted a cup of coffee.   His decision-making 
> process was frozen.
> So this is what happens when we have only reason to make decisions.
> So our conclusion has to be that emotions are involved in every 
> decision we make, no matter how trivial.

I don't think you can make that conclusion from this story (you didn't 
give a link to the study).

It's not as simple as 'he only had reason to run his life'.

If that was the case, I'd think he'd be able to use reason to conclude 
that in the absence of a feeling towards making one decision or another, 
a random choice would work. And that making decisions was essential for 
survival. He'd be able to think that a "coffee makes sense, given that I 
haven't had anything to drink for three hours, and dehydration is bad", etc.

I think what's going on there is that as well as cutting off emotional 
connection to the forebrain, the mechanisms for directing attention and 
resolving competing tasks were also cut off.

As I said earlier, the whole concept of 'emotion vs. reason' is not very 
useful. People like simple scenarios. Natural vs. Artificial. Nature vs. 
Nature. Black vs. White. Things are almost never that simple.

In fact, I suspect that the whole concept of 'emotion' as a single thing 
is counter-productive when thinking about these things.

-- 
Ben

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