Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!rochester!pt.cs.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!ap1i+
From: ap1i+@andrew.cmu.edu (Andrew C. Plotkin)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Feeling and thought: which comes first?
Message-ID: 
Date: 8 Dec 88 16:54:46 GMT
References: <17770@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <5626@sdcsvax.UCSD.EDU>,
	<2609@datapg.MN.ORG>
Organization: Carnegie Mellon
Lines: 37
In-Reply-To: <2609@datapg.MN.ORG>

/ Emotions and feelings are a "natural byproduct of" how our Terran bodies
/ and minds function.  Smell and internal chemicals (ie, "hormones")
/ trigger neuronal activity which humans interpret as emotions.  The
/ limbic system seems to report many things which we interpret as
/ "emotional feelings".
/ Some "feelings" are also triggered by instinct or feedback.  The
/ "fingernails on blackboard" sound appears to be a primate warning cry which
/ instinctively causes uncomfortable feelings in many humans.

I beg to differ (actually, I've already differed once, but I might as well
multiply differentiate)

I make a distinction between the feelings resulting from an emotion (which are
certainly related to internal biochemistry) and the emotions themselves.
Excitement produces a variety of sensations resulting from fast heartbeat, etc.
However, there must have been something to the "excitement" before those
sensations; something must have caused the physiological changes. There must be
something in common between failing a test, losing a possession, becoming
alienated from a friend, since they all cause similar feelings of depression.
But that common factor can only be in the mind, since there's no physical
similarity between the cases.
    Fingernails on a blackboard cause an uncomfortable sensation, but it's not
an emotion.

/ Feedback
/ can cause feelings either due to memories triggering neuronal activity
/ which are a "memory" of past feelings, or due to thoughts causing
/ limbic-detected chemicals ("hormones") to be produced.

I would say that those thoughts are the emotion. (All right -- I would -define-
the emotion as those thoughts.)
    This all sounds somewhat testable. Does anyone know of any cases where a
human's adrenal glands or whatever were removed? If so, did the person continue
to feel excited about exciting things, regardless of lack of physiological
symptoms?

--Z