Shaya
New member
I've been wondering about what impact our emotions have on our logic for a while now. I haven't worked it all out and so far I haven't been able to find much in the way of scientific research on this. Those with a philosophy background may have more luck attacking this problem than those with a science background.
There's no doubt in my mind that emotions influence our logic. What I'm interested in is complicated and may take a few sentences to explain. Imagine a decision or a fact that you would under normal circumstances only partially agree with, but may become more agreeable to if you were under the influence of drugs or alcohol or just a strong emotional state. If you verbalise your agreement whilst in that state, do you then tend to agree with it more even when you're out of that emotional state?
Example 1:
Your partner wants you to see a movie they know you don't want to see. They get you a little tipsy (not too drunk), or they start showering you with affection, then playfully ask about it whilst engaging your sense of humour. You say no, they tease you a bit and you both share a laugh ending with you saying yes. When your mood returns to normal, you kindda think "It's not really my movie but..." and then agree to see it and walk into the theatre surprised you're not dragging your feet. What I'm trying to illustrate here is that you verbally agreed to something you may not usually have agreed to, but did it whilst in a heightened emotional state. When the heightened emotional state resolved, you felt compelled to keep your prior promise. Further examples push this analogy into more important topics.
Example 2:
You are in an argument and you say things you've always felt (emotionally) were true about your partner but say it in an exaggerated manner that is hurtful. You have never said or believed this exaggerated version but your emotional state is heightened and it falls out of your mouth without having been properly thought through by your brain. When your emotional state resolves, you feel that some of the extra oomph and exaggerations are not true and you apologise. However, I wonder if you now feel rationally more biased towards your exaggerated comments - not that you accept the exaggerated comments fully, but just whether you now think a little more about their exaggeratedness and whether there is more to the topic than you had previously thought whilst feeling emotionally normal. What I'm trying to illustrate is that a belief got verbalised in an exaggerated form whilst in a heightened emotional state, and when the emotional state resolved, some aspects of the exaggerated belief remain, even though emotions and logic have returned to normal.
Example 3:
Imagine you're high on drugs or alcohol. Sex feels fantastic. You're now no longer high or drunk. Your emotional memory remains and you feel that sex was fantastic and attribute it to the person you were sexing with.
Example 4:
Imagine someone presents a conspiracy theory to you and you laugh it off but don't think much about it. Months later, whilst drunk or high on drugs, a different friend presents the same theory to you with what you feel has more evidence. Your heightened emotional state make you agree emotionally at the time. When the drunkenness or drug-induced state wears off, you no longer really agree, but your interest is piqued. You enter another heightened emotional state and again the same conspiracy theory is presented, this time with google evidence (as an aside, google "first black president" and google's first hits will not be Barack Obama, and instead be a conspiracy theory - please don't derail my thread by commenting only on this). Over the course of a few months with these guys, you find yourself warming up to a theory you wouldn't usually consider, even whilst sober. What I'm trying to illustrate is that logic could be fickle when emotions are involved. If you emotionally agree with a topic and voice your agreement, then even when your emotional state has resolved, your logical brain remembers your verbal agreement and is now biased in its assessment despite the now-normal emotional state.
In summary, what impact do you feel decisions made whilst being emotional have after you have dropped from the emotional high (or recovered from the emotional low)? Equivalently, how often are our logical processes hijacked in this manner when we are emotionally sober, if the logical process was started whilst emotionally heightened?
The practical impact of this would be:
a) to be aware that such bias exists in our cognitive thinking and to consciously attempt to compensate for it.
b) avoid voicing things out loud during times of heightened emotions so as to avoid compounding the bias (ie avoid arguments when angry, avoid major decisions whilst in NRE, avoid voicing life-changing statements whilst very happy or very sad).
c) Deliberately use this to engage in positive communication when feeling happy so as to bias topics with happy emotions. That way, when emotions return to normal, bias remains, but the bias is a positive bias.
What do you guys think?
There's no doubt in my mind that emotions influence our logic. What I'm interested in is complicated and may take a few sentences to explain. Imagine a decision or a fact that you would under normal circumstances only partially agree with, but may become more agreeable to if you were under the influence of drugs or alcohol or just a strong emotional state. If you verbalise your agreement whilst in that state, do you then tend to agree with it more even when you're out of that emotional state?
Example 1:
Your partner wants you to see a movie they know you don't want to see. They get you a little tipsy (not too drunk), or they start showering you with affection, then playfully ask about it whilst engaging your sense of humour. You say no, they tease you a bit and you both share a laugh ending with you saying yes. When your mood returns to normal, you kindda think "It's not really my movie but..." and then agree to see it and walk into the theatre surprised you're not dragging your feet. What I'm trying to illustrate here is that you verbally agreed to something you may not usually have agreed to, but did it whilst in a heightened emotional state. When the heightened emotional state resolved, you felt compelled to keep your prior promise. Further examples push this analogy into more important topics.
Example 2:
You are in an argument and you say things you've always felt (emotionally) were true about your partner but say it in an exaggerated manner that is hurtful. You have never said or believed this exaggerated version but your emotional state is heightened and it falls out of your mouth without having been properly thought through by your brain. When your emotional state resolves, you feel that some of the extra oomph and exaggerations are not true and you apologise. However, I wonder if you now feel rationally more biased towards your exaggerated comments - not that you accept the exaggerated comments fully, but just whether you now think a little more about their exaggeratedness and whether there is more to the topic than you had previously thought whilst feeling emotionally normal. What I'm trying to illustrate is that a belief got verbalised in an exaggerated form whilst in a heightened emotional state, and when the emotional state resolved, some aspects of the exaggerated belief remain, even though emotions and logic have returned to normal.
Example 3:
Imagine you're high on drugs or alcohol. Sex feels fantastic. You're now no longer high or drunk. Your emotional memory remains and you feel that sex was fantastic and attribute it to the person you were sexing with.
Example 4:
Imagine someone presents a conspiracy theory to you and you laugh it off but don't think much about it. Months later, whilst drunk or high on drugs, a different friend presents the same theory to you with what you feel has more evidence. Your heightened emotional state make you agree emotionally at the time. When the drunkenness or drug-induced state wears off, you no longer really agree, but your interest is piqued. You enter another heightened emotional state and again the same conspiracy theory is presented, this time with google evidence (as an aside, google "first black president" and google's first hits will not be Barack Obama, and instead be a conspiracy theory - please don't derail my thread by commenting only on this). Over the course of a few months with these guys, you find yourself warming up to a theory you wouldn't usually consider, even whilst sober. What I'm trying to illustrate is that logic could be fickle when emotions are involved. If you emotionally agree with a topic and voice your agreement, then even when your emotional state has resolved, your logical brain remembers your verbal agreement and is now biased in its assessment despite the now-normal emotional state.
In summary, what impact do you feel decisions made whilst being emotional have after you have dropped from the emotional high (or recovered from the emotional low)? Equivalently, how often are our logical processes hijacked in this manner when we are emotionally sober, if the logical process was started whilst emotionally heightened?
The practical impact of this would be:
a) to be aware that such bias exists in our cognitive thinking and to consciously attempt to compensate for it.
b) avoid voicing things out loud during times of heightened emotions so as to avoid compounding the bias (ie avoid arguments when angry, avoid major decisions whilst in NRE, avoid voicing life-changing statements whilst very happy or very sad).
c) Deliberately use this to engage in positive communication when feeling happy so as to bias topics with happy emotions. That way, when emotions return to normal, bias remains, but the bias is a positive bias.
What do you guys think?