Emotional triggers

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

From the little I've read of this forum, I've gathered that emotions are looked down upon as weakness and folly and contemptible and even 'feminine'. Are emotions not to be trusted? does one of superior intellect always rely on cold logic, do they ever succumb to emotions?

I know the averrage mind can be driven by emotions that cloud their judgment (e.g. one could kill when in the heat of passion, or one could form a strong attachment to something ridiculous and nonsensical) so is emotion a flaw, would a genius be impervious to emotion, even the subtlest emotion?

One can mock the mass of humanity and those fanatics, those who have fixed ideas and irrational hatreds and such defects of reason but if they could detach from their emotions would they be closer to sanity?

Say you could list 10 absolute prerequisites for genius, 10 axioms of mind that result in clear thinking, what would they be? is this a quixotic endevour?

Say when approaching information, how does the genius react, (my definition of genius: one who has refined his mind to the highest perception of reality)

Axioms of Genius:
1. objectivity devoid of emotion ?
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

Thank you for listening to me ramble. Now I hope someone will either, obliterate, fortify or correct my idea.

[Dan Rowden]

From the little I've read of this forum, I've gathered that emotions are looked down upon as weakness and folly and contemptible and even 'feminine'.

Your characterisation of the perspective some of us have on emotions is quite wide of the mark. Naturally emotions can be characterised this way when they are highly distorting of the mind, but generally the issue with them is that they arise out of delusions regarding the nature of the self. In short, emotions are essentially delusional and spring from errors of mind. That's the quintessential problem for those seeking to enlighten their minds, not that they're a weakness and nasty and so forth (even though at times this can be so)..

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

Yes I am realizing more about emotions. I think i should really read more of this site. I know the drawback of emotional states, but i never thought of eliminating emotions, overcoming them, subjugating them.

[Dan Rowden]

It's more about transcending delusions in general. Because emotions spring from that particular well, when the specific delusions relating to emotions are transcended, such emotions simply cease to arise. It's funny, if a person expressed anger at simply being being hungry, we'd think that person to be very weird. But all anger and other such emotions are equally silly when seen from the perspective of the place from which they arise.

I recommend perusing our Newsletter, which is built from dialogues over the years: http://geniusrealms.com/geniusnews/. You should find some specific discussions of interest from the menus.

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

But what if that person was being held hostage and was being starved deliberately, would not they have justification for feeling anger. Emotions seem to me an integral part of the human organism. A survival mechanism. Something that has survived down the ages. I suspect it must have some value. So doing away with the emotions is hard for me to contemplate as a course of action. I am aware that observing emotions when they occur can be beneficial to ones understanding, and is certainly superior to mindless emotional reactions to things, but at the end of the day i'm not sure emotions are somethings we can just discard.

But then there is the psychopathic mind, who is said to be free of all emotions, biologically unable to feel. What separates the psychopath from the enlightened ? One can't feel, one chooses not to feel? both types must rely on logic and reason as their primary interpretation of reality. But it seems the enlightened mind and the psychopath mind have very different goals, even if they might operate along similar lines. By removing emotion, is one unconsciously imitating the psychopathic mind and how does this relate to enlightenment?

[Dan Rowden]

In your hostage scenario the anger would indeed be directed at something other than the simple fact of hunger. Forgetting for a moment the question of the legitimacy of that anger, let me ask how you would think of a person who was is in fact angry at the simple fact of being hungry. How would you think of that person. Would you think their anger justified or sane? If not, why not?

Oh, and psychopaths are not without emotions. Their emotions are said to be shallower than that of an average person but they aren't without emotions altogether.

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

If a person is hungry, and they experience anger, that is their body sending them signals to do something. No one is ever removed from life and in a vacuum. As living creatures we have first to survive. Eating being essential, the body will use everything it can to spur one on to rectifying the deficiency it detects. If one is in distress, hungry and starts feeling angry, then that might be beneficial in that it leads to the body acquiring food, quenching their hunger, keeping the body alive and dissipating their angry feelings. So in a way one could justify it if it is helpful in the business of survival. But if one say, got so angry they decided to kill themselves, rather than be poor and starving all the time, then that's where emotions would be detrimental. But then i would put that on the weakness of the logical and rationalizing consciousness of the specific individual not being sufficient to overcome the situation. The emotions being the thing that tipped them over the edge. Wether my sentences have any relation to the true workings of the human body, i cannot say for sure, but i cannot say that emotions are wholly bad or wholly good until i understand more. But as far as human evolution goes, if emotions in mammals had not been more beneficial than detrimental, (say the emotion of love in nurturing offspring) then why are we by and large an emotional species? why after countless eons are why still more emotional than logical? are we in the process of a change away from emotions? if so, are psychopaths a step in that direction? I guess i have too many question, too many doubts, i do not pretend to be enlightened on this issue, emotions to me are something inescapable from the human condition.

[Dan Rowden]

If a person is hungry, and they experience anger, that is their body sending them signals to do something.

The hunger is their body telling them there's a need to fill. The anger is entirely subsequent to that. Personally, if a person expressed anger at the simple fact of feeling hungry, I would immediately think them batshit crazy. If you think it would be somehow normal then I guess I better choose a different example to make my point. God knows what that will be however ;)

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

But hunger and anger are just feelings in the body. How is one permitted, one forbidden, one judged delusional, the other judged right and proper?

What about Joy? can one distinguish between negative and positive emotions. Because I can acknowledge that negative emotions when they arise should be overridden. But Joy?

[mental vagrant]

It's important to define what one believes emotions to be, and then in my opinion disect them empircally to comprehend sets of realistic survival behaviours which we can attribute to said emotions then form a construct model with interchangable intermediary value potentials that draw an overall state. Then, think idealistically, look at how certain thought systems and chemicles might be 'useful' for a scenario. Most people here won't be interested in such an idea as it is logically impractical in a big way.

Really, Cory Duchense is the person with whom you should have this discussion, it's a central interest of his. Not that there is anything wrong with Dan.

[Dan Rowden]

But hunger and anger are just feelings in the body. How is one permitted, one forbidden, one judged delusional, the other judged right and proper?

So, by this criterion there's no issue for you with hated of black people or the beating of a wife because she doesn't obey you and a million other similar examples. They'll all just feelings in the body, after all.

What about Joy? can one distinguish between negative and positive emotions. Because I can acknowledge that negative emotions when they arise should be overridden. But Joy?

We judge the validity and efficacy of emotions by their context. Arsonists feel joy watching a house they lit burn down. I can't think of a single emotion that can't easily be placed in a context where it is detrimental to all concerned.

Feeling Joy is fine so long as she's not your wife's sister ;)

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

I would define an Emotion as a bodily reaction to an object or situation.

If you're a cheating, wife beating, pyromaniac, white supremacist, I would say you've let your emotions get the best of you.

Emotions to me are 'good' or bad' depending on the results they obtain. One mother may nurture her baby because of "Love" = Good. Another mother kills her baby because of "Anger" = Bad. I guess Emotions are unreliable. But as long as a person has sufficient intelligence to keep their emotions in check. Everything should be fine.

[mental vagrant]

I would define an Emotion as a bodily reaction to an object or situation.

If you're a cheating, wife beating, pyromaniac, white supremacist, I would say you've let your emotions get the best of you.

Emotions to me are 'good' or bad' depending on the results they obtain. One mother may nurture her baby because of "Love" = Good. Another mother kills her baby because of "Anger" = Bad. I guess Emotions are unreliable. But as long as a person has sufficient intelligence to keep their emotions in check. Everything should be fine.

The system is feeding it's self presumably and consequently stopping you knowing anything about it. Decide what they are with an exoteric definition preferably. That might be my next move.

[Russell Parr]

I would define an Emotion as a bodily reaction to an object or situation.

If you're a cheating, wife beating, pyromaniac, white supremacist, I would say you've let your emotions get the best of you.

Emotions to me are 'good' or bad' depending on the results they obtain. One mother may nurture her baby because of "Love" = Good. Another mother kills her baby because of "Anger" = Bad. I guess Emotions are unreliable. But as long as a person has sufficient intelligence to keep their emotions in check. Everything should be fine.

The difference between the body reactions of emotion and something like hunger is that emotions have much more of a psychological aspect to them. There is, at many times, an illogical process within them, that occur even if unconsciously. Since we can decipher them as thought processes, we can (and should) characterize them as good or bad in regards to consciousness. This isn't necessary with hunger. Hunger is a much more physical experience, there's nothing to be done about that (at least for the now, barring some unforeseen discovery to end hunger, of course).

But emotions are well within the grasp of consciousness and abstract thought, since they operate primarily in direct relation to thought processes (or lack thereof). Unfortunately, most people are content being slaves to the pleasures of emotions and never even conceive of transcending them mentally.

Furthermore, this is really all about the ego. The ego longs for presence and existence, and will toss your body about, up and down, through various chemical states (realms of consciousness), in order establish itself and convince you that it's real. It's greatest weapon of deception is none other than emotion.

The goal of enlightenment, I believe, is the transcendence of the ego, not strictly emotions. However, transcending the illusionary trance that emotions induce upon the mind would be a by product of transcending the ego.

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

Transcending the ego, that's no easy task. Is this what Nietzsche talked about with his "down-going", killing the ego (the self) then overcoming it to create something stronger. But then again on my understanding of Nietzsche he seemed to be against focusing on backworlds and otherworlds, which negate the earth.

[Russell Parr]

I haven't read hardly any of Nietzsche yet. I'm not too much unlike you, I'm just a bit over 25 with a few years of experience of spare time philosophy.

But yes, trying to kill the ego and create something "better" is an act of the ego. The phoenix may rise from the ashes but it eventually burns itself out again. Instead, start seeing things as they are without emotional attachments and suddenly you won't need to change anything.

[SuperMegaUltraGenius]

Out of all the philosophers, I find Nietzsche the most fascinating and insightful and entertaining. But that is just my impression. There are so many books and so little time, one can't read them all, one has to be selective.