You know, the Vulcans (fictional) weren't too far off - that whole emotion thingy

[Taverner]

Emotions make us do really stupid things. They make us get in fights for no logical reason, they make us marry people who want to destroy us, they make us vote on our feelings or "gut" rather than reason.

It seems to me humanity's core problem is our emotions. Sure we can build New York City, but Religion + Emotion makes us fly planes into the buildings there.

It would be good for our species to stop putting so much emphasis on our emotions. Our "gut feelings" are worthless without data, and when I hear about "intuition" I reach for my wallet because I know I'm being had.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

1. empathy is an emotion too.

[Taverner]

2. Yes it is, but you can get to the same conclusion via reason that you could empathy

Where as even empathy can lead to destructive things

[La Lioness Priyanka]

3. reason is not as stable as you credit it to be. nor is science.a good issue is gay rights

you could get via empathy to give people equal rights but not yet via science. there is not yet a proven gay gene etc. my point is no matter what the issue, you could still find a 100 excuses to be a bigot or an asshole, by supporting it with science in the same way you can with emotion/religion.

a lack of kindness and empathy can make you be just as much of a terror with religion as with science

[Deep13]

8. Our basic desire to avoid suffering in others...

...is the whole key morality and ethics. Irrational ideas pervert our basically good nature. There is no rational reason to oppose gay rights and our basic humanity makes them imperative. Without irrational ideas, there would not be any such thing as "gay rights" because no one would have any reason to discriminate in the first place.

[Taverner]

14. Exactly - the emotions that go with homophobia come from an artificial source (religion) anyway...

With true reason, you eliminate the problem (religion)

[Deep13]

15. Right. For example our compassion for each other...

...and evidence based thinking means I would never get on an airplane with a contagious disease.

[Taverner]

16. But if we took precatutions, being the spreader of those disesaes

Especially ones that have been known to WORK - then we are blameless

By the same laws

[Deep13]

18. You're in a packed, pressurized, recirculated tube.

A mask and Purell will be dodgy at best. Anyway, shouldn't the other passengers have a say in whether they will be forced to be exposed to it?

[Taverner]

19. It's all about contact

Are they in direct contact with the germs or not?

A mask and purell might or might not protect, but most infections take place when there is direct contact

There is no direct contact on a plane

[rcrush]

4. But Vulcans are fucking crazy

Whenever a Vulcan on Star Trek decides to express emotion its usually followed by crazed homicidal rage. They always end up trying to kill someone they work with. Always so angry very angry.


Vulcans are crazed psychopaths unless they repress their emotions. They learned thousands of years ago when Surak taught his people to repress emotions cause no one wanted to be around them they were so fucking crazy.

[Taverner]

5. so are humans tho...

[pscot]

27. Vulcans are just scientologists

with wrinkly foreheads. Who don't lock themselves in the closet.

[lukasahero]

6. Actually, that's the argument that has been used to keep women

out of politics and positions of leadership for eons. They're "too emotional".

"I, Robot" made the point well by suggesting, while robots had all "the facts", intuition and emotion play a substantive role in the humanity of individual decisions.

[Deep13]

7. Flying a plane into a building is a perfectly rational think to do IF...

...you believe that Islam is true and that Allah will lavishly reward you and your family for doing it. Likewise, oppressing women is perfectly rational if one believes that god made women to be subservient and that they are weak, sinful creatures. And if one believes the Biblical condemnation of homosexuality, the "queer-bashing" becomes a moral imperative. The problem is no feelings, sin most people's default position is to empathize with those you suffer, but irrational ideas that make suffering seem virtuous.

Emotions are a normal part of being human and if we could not feel, there would be little point in living. Evidence and my rationality tell me that two million years of human evolution means that instincts (intuition or gut reactions) are actually pretty valuable. Your primitive mind may be aware of things that your conscious, human mind is not. Obviously, there are real limits to the usefulness of instincts, but within those limits, they are pretty important.

[existentialist]

9. But what makes you think that New York is a good thing if

it isn't your emotions?

[EndersDame]

10. I think emotions are cool as long as you act honorably

[SteppingRazor]

11. Pure number-crunching reason without emotion can lead to atrocity as well. n/t

[Orsino]

12. Our emotions were needed to help us overrun the planet.

Unfortunately, we haven't been able to evolve dampers fast enough to compensate for overcrowding.

[Avalux]

13. Thats why only 6% of scientists are Republicans.

Seriously though; emotions are useful. But without facts; without knowledge, they can be dangerous.

[Rabrrrrrr]

17. But the Vulcan philosophy is built on the false assumption that there is an objective logic.

What they consider to be "logical" is still an emotional response. Filtered through hundreds of years of teaching and social conformity, but still an emotional response.

Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations - one has to make an emotional decision to choose that as better than no diversity, one combination; or infinite diversity in one combination.

The good of the many outweighs the good of the few or the one - that's an emotionally founded 'logic' as well.

[cynatnite]

20. The problem isn't emotions...it's allowing emotions to rule us. n/t

[Taverner]

21. True - if we just put them into perspective

They wouldn't be so harmful

[Odin2005]

22. Read "Descartes' Error" by Antonio Damasio.

Reason requires emotions to function, they put valuations on perceptions and memories and so make decision-making possible. A lot of the activities in the Pre-Frontal Cortex involve synthesizing together information and emotions and damage to the area impairs judgment ability.

[Jade Fox]

23. It's the repression of feelings that turn them into monsters....

that wreck our lives.

Intuition is usually some rattled up emotion from the past being projected onto the present.

Dr. Jade Fox ;)

[BuddhaGirl]

24. I don't think that humanity's core problem is emotions

rather it's a general lack of compassion. More compassion = a more peaceful world.

[pink-o]

25. In all seriousness, I believe humans are a work in progress.

And we're hopefully evolving away from the destructive "emotions"--that are really just manifested survival instincts. Think about it. Fear: we never would have made it out of the primordial ooze without fear to make us cautious, to hone our senses to drive us to fight for limited resources and food against others who were trying to take it from us. Xenophobia and racism are a throwback to the days when we needed to fear the foreigner, because he was a threat to us and our families. We don't live at the mercy of the elements anymore, but those instincts are still bred into us since they were so essential for human survival.

Love is another one. Primates with Big Brains need to nurture their offspring for a lot longer than, say, arachnid mothers, who kick out those baby spiders before they eat her for breakfast. So humans built family units around their children, with strong males who could fight off predators, and fertile females who were always either pregnant or nursing. If women had seven babies, the hope was at least one of them would live to breed and carry on our survival. So love is a manifestation of a necessary social structure as well.

Yeah, when I was younger, I might have argued the idea that emotions come from chemicals and not some divine and special force that only humans are endowed with. But after being a slave to my own menopausal hormones the last seven years, I'm a total convert to the science of it all!!!

[Ptah]

26. "Vulcans (fictional)"