Is it reason or emotion that guides?

It is a common belief that reason is far superior to emotion. But is it really true. To some extent, emotion does oppose reasoning in our response to many situations. Emotions have a reputation for "clouding" our reasoning, preventing us from clear thinking when they "flood" over us.
And in your life is it reason or emotion that guides?


Consider the following pair of cases:


Trolley:
There is a runaway trolley barreling down the railway tracks. Ahead,
on the tracks, there are five people. The trolley is headed straight for them.
You are standing some distance off in the train yard, next to a lever. If you
pull this lever, the trolley will switch to a different set of tracks. Unfortunately,
you notice that there is one person on the side track. You have two options:
(1) Do nothing, and the trolley kills the five people on the main track. (2) Pull
the lever, diverting the trolley onto the side track where it will kill one person.


Fat Man:
There is a runaway trolley headed toward five people again. Only,
this time, you are not in the train yard next to a lever. You are on a bridge,
watching the events from above the tracks. There is a very large man next to
you. You realize that, if you push him off the bridge and down onto the tracks
below, the trolley will hit and kill him, but his body is so large that it will stop
the trolley before it reaches the five endangered people. You have two
options: (1) Do nothing, and the trolley kills the five people. (2) Push the large
man off the bridge, so that he dies, but the five others are saved.


In both Trolley and Fat Man, one is harmed, and five are helped.
 However, nearly everyone says we should kill the one in the Trolley
case, but NOT in the Fat Man case. Where's the difference?


Philippa Foot (who authored the original Trolley case) suggests that 
the difference is that, in Fat Man, one intends to harm the fat man as 
a means to saving the others. Meanwhile, in Trolley, one does not 
intend the harm at all. Rather, one merely foresees it as an unfortunate, 
unintended side-effect.


(based on: http://rintintin.colorado.edu)


There are three main different theories connected with emotions, which I would like
 to explain shortly:

• James Lange theory 
  

The James-Lange theory of emotion proposes that emotions occur as a result of physiological reactions to events. According to this theory, you see an external stimulus that leads to a physiological reaction. Your emotional reaction is dependent upon how you interpret those physical reactions. For example, suppose you are walking in the woods and you see a grizzly bear. You begin to tremble and your heart begins to race. The James-Lange theory proposes that you will interpret your physical reactions and conclude that you are frightened ("I am trembling, therefore I am afraid").

•  Cannon-Bard theory
  

 Cannon-Bard theory states that we feel emotions and experience physiological reactions such as sweating, trembling and muscle tension simultaneously. More specifically, it is suggested that emotions result when the thalamus sends a message to the brain in response to a stimulus, resulting in a physiological reaction.
For example: I see a snake --> I am afraid --> I begin to tremble.
According to the Cannon-Bard theory of emotion, we react to a stimulus and experience the associated emotion at the same time.

•  Two factor theory
  

According to the two-factor theory, emotions have both a physiological and cognitive component. First we must experience physiological arousal, but then we must cognitively label that arousal.

So, imagine you are alone in a dark parking lot walking toward your car. A strange man suddenly emerges from a nearby row of trees and rapidly approaches. The sequence that follows, according to the two-factor theory, would be much like this:

1. I see a strange man walking toward me.

2. My heart is racing and I am trembling.

3. My rapid heart rate and trembling are caused by fear.

4. I am frightened!

The process begins with the stimulus (the strange man), which is followed by the physical arousal (rapid heartbeat and trembling). Added to this is the cognitive label (associating the physical reactions to fear), which is immediately followed by the conscious experience of the emotion (fear)

 (source: http://psychology.about.com)

Language as a way of knowing

"No matter when we go in the world, people posses the amazing ability to make noises to each other and convey this thing we call meaning. In many places, they also make marks on paper or other surfaces and expect others to be able to understand meaning form the marks. The capacity of language is human characteristic."
Yes, language is remarkably important and it's so much part of our everyday lives that we often give no thought to how language serves to give us knowledge and affects our understanding.

Every person on the world use a language slightly different than any other person. Of course it is the place of living that influences this fact most. As we have no way of separating language and culture, the cultural perspective can also have a significant impact on what and how we're saying. Quoting Umberto Eco:
"Translation is always a shift not between two languages but between two cultures"

The relationship between language and culture, and the influence of their combination on thought, creates a lot of important TOK questions. For example: To what extent do the cultural differences reflected and created by language influence our perspectives on the world?

Not only the language we speak can be a barrier in communication. Even when two people use the same language, still they look at the world from different perspectives and that also can cause some misunderstandings. Let's take a simple, everyday example of conversation between man and woman. Having a boyfriend, I know from my own experience that sometimes we may seem like people from two different planets. Languages of males and females have a lot of difference and I think we all know that. Let's look further in them:

• Say What?!

  Many arguments between couples stem from simple misunderstandings based on different communication styles. Therefore, better understanding how men and women think and speak can help us have better-functioning relationships. Here are some of the most common misunderstandings and what we really hear when the opposite sex talks.

• Hint, Hint

  Men are socialized to make direct requests, while women are socialized to put others’ needs above their own. How does this play out in relationships? Women often expect men to read their minds and know what they want without actually telling them. If women can ease into asking for what they want instead of leaving their guy to guess, they’ll get much more of it with no mind-reading necessary.

• Women Love Details

  When she says, “Do you remember that sweater I wore on our second date?” he hears her say, “If you cared, you’d remember!” Women have an amazing memory for details, and they’re more sentimental than men. However, men don’t remember details as well because of differences in how they process information, not because they don’t care

• Listen vs. Solve

  When a woman has a problem, a man offers solutions, but she’s looking for understanding and validation. And a woman tends to give a man what she’d want: a shoulder to cry on, which is often the last thing he wants. As a rule of thumb, men should offer women compassion first and then help, and women should offer men help first and then compassion.

• The Great Divide

  Men compartmentalize, mentally and emotionally separating work, relationships, etc. Women think “big picture,” connecting all aspects of their lives. For women, when he seamlessly switches gears from your serious conversation to the game, it’s not that he doesn’t care about the conversation. For men, remember that her brooding over things doesn’t mean she’s trying to nag. It’s just how her mind works.

• Too Much/Too Little

  When a woman feels stressed, she often will verbally recall every single horrific detail about her overwhelming schedule, her family, etc. Once she feels her emotions have been heard and understood, then she immediately starts to feel better. However, when a man is feeling stressed, he often stops talking altogether for a period of time. Give him space to relax on his own

• Men Have Feelings

  Most men are very sensitive and have deep emotions; they are just not always comfortable showing them. A woman should never assume that her man doesn’t feel things like hurt or rejection. But she shouldn’t assume she knows how he feels. The best practice is to ask. However, avoid phrases like, “Did that hurt your feelings?” Instead try, “Did it bother you when that happened?”

• Remind Me

  He thinks, “I’m committed to her; she knows I love her.” She thinks, “What has he done to show me he loves me today?” It’s not necessary to reassure her that he loves her every hour, but he shouldn’t assume that a gesture of love last month is fresh in her mind today.

• Miss Independent

  She says, “I’m capable of doing that myself.” He hears, “She doesn’t want my help.” This can be confusing, but most women, no matter how strong and capable, still love to be “taken care of” by their men in one way or another. Guys, tell your partner that you know she can do it herself but that you love to do things for her so she can take it easy.

• Can You Hear Me?

  She says, “You never listen to me.” He thinks, “She talks all the time, and all I do is listen.” All he really has to do is give some verbal cues to indicate he is paying attention or ask questions about the content of what she is saying to let her know he is listening. When he’s focused on something else, he can say something like, “Honey, I really want to hear what you are saying, so can this wait until I finish this?”

from: http://glo.msn.com/relationships/man-speak-vs-woman-speak

form: www.bubblews.com

Defining emotion

"Our emotions accompany us throughout our lives so thoroughly and profoundly that we can scarcely consider any of the other ways of knowing without their interwoven emotions. Certainly our sense perceptions, imagination and memories are affected, surely our faith, and definitely the shadings of our language."


The word emotion has originates from Latin movere meaning "to move". Our emotions can be caused by some external factors (being cased by a snarling dog causes fear; first prize in important competition causes pride and happiness, break up with a boyfriend - despair and sorrow) or internal factors (sometimes we wake up feeling sad in the morning but not know why... but be careful, sometimes it is just because of perspective of another day at school, so an external factor ;))
There are six universal emotions that each and every person can recognise:

• anger

 

• happiness

 

• sadness

 

• surprise

 

• fear

 

• disgust

 
The same situation in different people can cause completely different reactions, which leads also different emotions, for example having Chinese food for diner for one person may be the cause to be extremely happy ("Oh, I LOVE Chinese food"), for other - rather disgust ("Oh, I HATE Chinese food"). It can cause surprise ("Chinese food? Wow, you've never before prepared something like that") or anger ("Again Chinese food, you knew very well that I wanted to have pancakes today, but no, again this stuff. You never think about MY needs...")

Of course there are much more than those basic six emotions. A lot of them are strongly connected to each other, like that:


The graph quite clearly shows how complicated the net of emotions is, how one of them connects of others and how many levels of every emotion can we recognize.
“The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart”
― Helen Keller

Is it emotion a complete opposition to reason? And which of those is the one we should listen in our life?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5-4H1ljH2I

I leave it to you to think about it :)