Aristotle has famously made the claim that having the right emotion at the right time is an essential part of moral virtue. Why might this be the case? I consider five possible relations between emotion and virtue and argue that an adequate answer to this question involves the epistemic status of emotion, that is, whether the perceptual awareness and hence the understanding of the object of emotion is like or unlike the perceptual awareness of an unemotional awareness of the same (...) object. If an emotional awareness does not have a unique character, then it is unlikely that emotions provide an understanding that is different from unemotional states of awareness: they are perhaps little more than “hot-blooded” instances of the same understanding. If, on the other hand, an emotional state involves a perceptual awareness that is unique to the emotion, then emotions are cognitively significant, providing an understanding of the object of the emotion that is absent in a similar but unemotional episode of awareness. I argue the latter and substantiate the claim that emotions are essential to moral virtue because they can be essential to a full understanding of the situations that they involve. In such cases, emotions are not merely a symptom of the possession of an adequate understanding, but are rather necessary for having an adequate understanding. (shrink)

Looking at a person’s expression is a good way of telling what she feels—what emotions she has. Why is that? Is it because we see her emotion, or is it because we infer her mental state from her expression? My claim is that there is a sense in which we do see the person’s emotion. I first argue that expressions are physical events that carry information about the emotions that produce them. I then examine evidence suggesting that specific brain areas (...) and structures are involved in the process that extracts such information and makes it available in the content of visual experience. I consider only what happens in early stages of visual processing and make no claim about the role of simulation and empathy. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the work of the unorthodox Stoic Posidonius - as reported to us by Galen - can be seen as making an interesting contribution to contemporary debates about the nature of emotion. Richard Sorabji has already argued that Posidonius' contribution highlights the weaknesses in some well-known contemporary forms of cognitivism. Here I argue that Posidonius might be seen as advocating a theory of the emotions which sees them as being, in at least some cases, two-level (...) intentional phenomena. One level involves judgments, just as the orthodox Stoic account does. But Posidonius thinks that emotions must also include an element sometimes translated as an "irrational tug". I suggest that we see the "irrational tug" as involving a second level of intentional, but non-conceptual representation. This view satisfies two desiderata: it is a view which would have been available to Posidonius and which is compatible with the views reported to us; and it is a view which is independently attractive. It also makes Posidonius' position less far removed from that of orthodox Stoics than it might otherwise do, while remaining genuinely innovative. (shrink)

Donald Gustafson has argued that grief centres on a combination of belief and desire:The belief that the subject has suffered an irreparable loss.The desire that this should not be the case.And yet, as Gustafson points out, if the belief is true, the desire cannot be satisfied. Gustafson takes this to show that grief inevitably implies an irrational conflict between belief and desire.I offer a partial defence of grief against Gustafson's charge of irrationality. My defence rests on two elements. First, I (...) offer an alternative model of emotion, which presents emotions as complex episodes, initiated by emotional appraisals. Secondly, I appeal to John Bowlby's account of grief to argue that grief involves two forms of sadness (anguish and desolation) which Gustafson's analysis runs together. I concede that anguish does characteristically involve an element of irrationality. But the irrationality of anguish does not arise from an apparently gratuitous clash between belief and desire, but from a conflict between emotion and belief—a form of irrationality that is both familiar and easily explained. Moreover, desolation need not involve any irrationality. (shrink)

A person raised in a religious family may have been taught that going to the theater is not allowed, and even if he has rejected this taboo years ago, he still feels guilty when attending theater. These kinds of cases may not be rare, but they are strange. Indeed, one may wonder how they are even possible. This is why an explanation is needed, and in my paper I aim to give such an explanation. In particular, I will first provide (...) a brief review of the explanations of irrational guilt that are compatible with the cognitive theories of emotions, that is, theories that presuppose that there is a causal or a constitutional connection between emotions and cognitive factors, such as judgments, beliefs or thoughts. Following many other reviewers, I found most of the explanations of irrational guilt unsatisfactory, although my reasons for critical conclusions will partly differ from the usual ones. After the review, I will defend a solution according to which it is possible to believe that an act does not have any moral costs and at the same time to have an impression that is has, which explains the guilty feelings. (shrink)

Recent work in the area of ethics and animals suggests that it is philosophically legitimate to ascribe emotions to nonhuman animals. Furthermore, it is sometimes argued that emotionality is a morally relevant psychological state shared by humans and nonhumans. What is missing from the philosophical literature that makes reference to emotions in nonhuman animals is an attempt to clarify and defend some particular account of the nature of emotion, and the role that emotions play in a characterization of human nature. (...) I argue in this paper that some analyses of emotion are more credible than others. Because this is so, the thesis that humans and nonhumans share emotions may well be a more difficult case to make than has been recognized thus far. (shrink)

This paper argues for an understanding of emotion based upon Merleau-Ponty's conceptions of embodiment and passivity. Through a critical assessment of cognitive theories of emotion, and in particular Solomon's theory, it argues (1) that there is a sense in which emotions may be judgments, so long as we understand such judgments as bodily enactments of meaning, but (2) that even understood in this way, the notion of judgment (or construal) can only account for a subset of emotions which I call (...) "emotional clichés," and not for authentic passions. In contrast with Solomon's account which conceives the subject as constituting, this account of emotion requires us to understand subjectivity as moved by meanings in the world, and as sometimes, in an authentic passion, dispossessed by those meanings. (shrink)

In ancient as well as in early modern theories of emotion, philosophy is often described as some kind of therapy. However, the assumption that philosophical reflection can influence our emotional life is only plausible, if the following requirements are met. First, one has to defend a realist account of self-knowledge. Second, one must allow for some kind of constructivism in regard to the description of one′s own experience. Finally, one has to maintain a strictly cognitivist conception of emotion. The article (...) discusses these three conditions and shows that, while the idea of a therapeutic influence of philosophical reflection is valid in principle, it is only of a restricted use. (shrink)

Religions don’t simply make claims about the world; they also offer existential resources, resources for dealing with basic human problems, such as the need for meaning, love, identity, and personal growth. For instance, a Buddhist’s resources for addressing these existential needs are different than a Christian’s. Now, imagine someone who is agnostic but who is deciding whether to put faith in religion A or religion B. Suppose she thinks A and B are evidentially on par, but she regards A as (...) offering much more by way of existential resources. Is it epistemically rational for her to put her faith in A rather than B on this basis? It is natural to answer No. After all, what do the existential resources of a religion have to do with its truth? However, I argue that this attitude is mistaken. My thesis is that the extent to which it is good for a certain religion to be true is relevant to the epistemic rationality of faith in that religion. This is plausible, I’ll argue, on the correct account of the nature of faith, including the ways that emotion and desire can figure into faith and contribute to its epistemic rationality. (shrink)

The traditional and prevailing definition of lying is that lying is some variation or combination of: “an untruth told with intent to deceive.” I establish that this is the case, and that, as a result, contradictions and injustices arise. An alternative definition is proposed which is shown to avoid these difficulties. It is also shown that and how on the new definition the alleged “Liar paradox” is easily dissolved.

William James’s account of emotions is frequently categorised as a feeling theory of emotions. Consideration of James’s views about sensations, however, reveals that this categorisation is untenable. Instead, many of James’s emotions are more appropriately categorised as instincts. The categorisation of emotions as instincts entails that emotions do have a function–contrary to a criticism often levied against James’s account.

Philosophical discussions regarding the status of emotion as a scientific domain usually get framed in terms of the question whether emotion is a natural kind. That approach to the issues is wrongheaded for two reasons. First, it has led to an intractable philosophical impasse that ultimately misconstrues the character of the relevant debate in emotion science. Second, and most important, it entirely ignores valence, a central feature of emotion experience, and probably the most promising criterion for demarcating emotion from cognition (...) and other related domains. An alternate philosophical hypothesis for addressing the issues is pro- posed. It is that emotion is a naturally occurring valenced phenomenon that is.. (shrink)

What does it mean to say that an emotional response fits the situation? This question cannot be answered simply by specifying the core relational theme (loss or risk, say) associated with each emotion: we must also explain what constitutes an emotionally significant loss or risk. It is sometimes suggested that emotionally significant situations are those that bear on the subject’s interests or concerns. I accept that this claim is plausible for some emotional responses, and I propose a particular way of (...) interpreting it. I suggest that, for many emotions, emotional significance is determined by the subject’s likes and dislikes – that is, settled dispositions to find a certain situation pleasant or distressing. I contrast this account with other preference-based accounts and with an account that appeals to the subject’s interests. I argue that we should prefer the likes-based account to these rival views. (shrink)

The philosophy of emotion has long been divided over the cognitive nature of emotion. In this paper I argue that this debate suffers from deep confusion over the meaning of “cognition” itself. This confusion has in turn obscured critical substantive agreement between the debate’s principal opponents. Capturing this agreement and remedying this confusion requires re-conceptualizing “the cognitive” as it functions in first-order theories of emotion. Correspondingly, a sketch for a new account of cognitivity is offered. However, I also argue that (...) this new account, despite tacit acceptance by all major theories of emotion, in fact rules out some of the most fundamental and controversial claims of one side of the nature-of-emotion debate, emotional cognitivism. (shrink)

In approaching the future, i.e. in planning projects and decision-making, the role of both affective and non-affective factors is considerable. But given that affectivity is not a homogeneous realm and that it is difficult, if not impossible, to isolate the affective and non-affective elements of a description, anticipation can be hardly described as purely affective, and, on the other, it is necessary to consider what kind or level of the hierarchical realm of affectivity is involved in the anticipation move. In (...) the paper several distinction are made in order to elucidate the role of affectivity in anticipating a person’s approach to the future. (shrink)