Emotions

Emotions provide the fastest and most efficient way to process information. Using emotions our neurons can organize both individually and collectively by merely searching for what's missing from this picture and comparing elaborate patterns they generate collectively. Brain waves are much faster than synaptic responses and by taking their differentials and comparing patterns for what's missing our neurons can organize and respond to anything as rapidly as possible. For example, the visual centers of the brain are organized around looking for what's missing and by doing so our neurons can shift their focus, attention, and responses more rapidly than we can do consciously.

A shadow, for example, is the fastest, most efficient, and most reliable way for them to tell if another animal is moving and, while our neurons are not that bright in and of themselves, they can easily decide to prompt us to run for our lives. In fact, the a tiny electrical current across the heart is enough to inspire fear and you could say emotions are the language of our cells.

Reply to MonfortS26 The emotion of love has to develop first on the basis of frequent contact with the object of one's love. Expressions of love do have some attractive force, true enough, but generally a profession of love without prior preparation will not get one very far. You can tell people you are sad, but that doesn't mean they will cheer you up. They might unload on you their own sadness.

Mostly, though, our emotions are vitally important parts of our private discourse among sensory input, memory, thought, and emotion. Further, emotions have been at the center of mental activity in our evolutionary predecessors for a very long time.

Wuliheron's point about speed is important. Our animal sense of smell needs no mediation -- it's plugged directly into the emotional switchboard. That's why smell evokes such strong emotions, and in animals that have really sharp senses of smell (more sensitive than ours) it's a vital early warning system (or an effective mating app).

Quoting wuliheron

Emotions provide the fastest and most efficient way to process information.

Is it the most accurate way of processing information though?

Quoting Bitter Crank

Mostly, though, our emotions are vitally important parts of our private discourse among sensory input, memory, thought, and emotion. Further, emotions have been at the center of mental activity in our evolutionary predecessors for a very long time.

So you believe that emotions are the driving force of humans?

Quoting MonfortS26

Is it the most accurate way of processing information though?

Differentials provide greater precision rather than accuracy. Accuracy is hitting closer to the bull's eye, while precision is hitting the same area more consistently. By combining both our brain can first try to hit the general area and then take its time improving on accuracy. Someone may startle us while relaxing on the couch with our emotional response of fear being our first response that could save our life if its a burglar, while our more abstract intellectual recognition that its a friend would allow us to improve the accuracy of our response.

Reply to wuliheron So it sounds like the key to an accurate intuition is exposure? What do you mean by differentials?

Quoting MonfortS26

So it sounds like the key to an accurate intuition is exposure? What do you mean by differentials?

Differentials compare differences, integrals compare similarities. Its easier to observe something like an engine misfiring by comparing differences in how it sounds over time, while its often easier to tell if two objects are the same thing by comparing their similarities.

Our emotions change over time. A small child might think their favorite toy is the most wonderful thing in the world only to grow up and embrace bigger and better things. They might be frightened by dogs, only to learn to love them over time. etc. The same with our intellect because nothing ever stays the same forever and our thoughts and feelings don't even come close by our standards.

Reply to wuliheron So are you saying that emotion responses are differential and logical responses are integral?

Quoting MonfortS26

So are you saying that emotion responses are differential and logical responses are integral?

The two overlap, but for the most part that's true. A small child's attachment to their toy will become more abstract and intellectual over time and, sometimes, our abstract thoughts become more emotional. Thoughts without emotions and vice versa are simply a contradiction in terms like having a body with no cells or a mind without a brain.

Reply to wuliheron That makes a lot of sense

Emotions are intuitive, automatic, non-reflective value judgments that something is good or bad for us. Because they are non-conscious heuristics, though--fast and efficient, as wuliheron points out--they sometimes just plain get it wrong, and in many situations are insufficient, not accounting for relevant info that can be provided only via the slower, deliberative processes of rational cognition.

Reply to Brainglitch Reply to wuliheron If intelligence were to evolve to be more efficient than emotions, would emotions still have any evolutionary purpose?

Quoting MonfortS26

If intelligence were to evolve to be more efficient than emotions, would emotions still have any evolutionary purpose?

A bacteria or virus or slime mold can be described as efficient, but they are evolutionary dead ends unless they evolve into something more complex. The purpose of both emotions and intellect is for us to become more creative and evolve greater complexity and not simply efficiency.

Reply to wuliheron So are logic and emotion simply separate tools for the self to use?

Quoting MonfortS26

So are logic and emotion simply separate tools for the self to use?

They are indivisible complimentary-opposites, or yin and yang, that constantly transform into one another in extreme contexts. A small child attached to their favorite toy is a good example of how synergy becomes self-limiting in extreme contexts and how logic and emotions can exchange identities. No matter how hard the child may attempt to nurture and retain their love for their toy, their attachment will inevitably fade and become lost like a drop of water in the ocean as they steadily acquire new thoughts and feelings all synergistically vying for their attention. To some degree, the process works in reverse as well which is why older adults commonly nurture their childhood feelings in order to recapture them. They are context dependent explaining how what we consider humorous in one context becomes abstract logic in another.