2013/2014 RELATIONS OF CHAPTER “EMOTIONS” (In the Book of Robert Nozick “Examined Life”) Lezione 22 31/3/14 by Gabriele Buratti & Maria Teresa Carini

Index 1. Introduction. 2. Structure of emotions and their cognitive character. 3. The “Problem Spock”. 4. The relationship between emotions and values. 5. Emotions as a model of the analog value.

First part Introduction “A large part of how we feel about life is shaped by the emotions we have had and expect to have, and feeling too (probably) is an emotion or a combination of them.” (pag. 87) The question: What emotions should we desire, indeed, why should we desire any, and how should we think about the emotions we do have?

Second part Structure of emotions Emotions have a common structure of three components: a belief, an evaluation and a feeling. Example of a particular emotion: pride What it means to be proud of something? “To be proud of something, you have to think or believe it is the case (well, not exactly, as a general point about emotions, for you might think of a possibility in fantasy and have an emotion about it, without believing it to be the case). [..] To be proud that something is so is to believe it is so and also to positively evaluate it as somehow valuable or good or admirable.” (pag. 88) So what that makes it a emotion of pride is connection of feeling with belief and evaluation.

More complex situation A more complex situation is where the feeling arises for some other reason and the person attributes it to that belief and evalution. In fact one can cause a feeling electrochemically. “ If while you’re simply thinking positively of having read the three books I electrochemically stimulate you, producing a sensation in your chest, you may identify that as pride.” (pag. 88)

“Cognitive emotions” But the emotion is constituted not just by the feeling BUT also by its attendant belief and evaluation: different belief or evaluation, a different emotion. However, sometimes we may discover our implicit beliefs and evaluations by pondering the emotions we are aware of feeling. What does it means? “ Emotion, therefore, is much more “cognitive” than one might think, and thus it can be judged in certain respects”. (pag. 89)

Can emotion to be defective? An emotion can be defective in three ways: the belief can be false; the evaluation can be false or wrong: or the feeling can be disproportionate to the evaluation. “ Let us say that an emotion fits when it has the above threefold structure of belief, evaluation, and feeling, and moreover when the belief is true, the evaluation is correct, and the feeling is proportionate to the evaluation.” (pag. 89)

“Intense emotions ” Nozick, in this chapter, held that there are “intense emotions”. What are intense emotions? “Intense emotions are the ones with evaluations that are very positive (or very negative) and also with proportionalety great attendant feelings.” (pag. 90) Happiness is only one of these intense emotions.

Third part “The Problem Spock”

The problem Spock is following: “ Why are emotions important, above and beyond correct evaluations?” (pag. 90) Another question: “ Is it that an emotionless life lacks the feelings that go along with correct evaluations and so is less pleasurable?” (pag. 91) For example the character Spock in the television program Star trek held correct beliefs, made correct evaluations, and acted on these, yet his life lacked emotion and inner feeling. Therefore his life, without emotions, would be poorer?

Fourth part The relationship between emotions and values For Nozick “the emotions can link us closely to external value. In fact when we positively evaluate a situation or fact, an emotional response links us more closely to the value we perceive than an unemotional evaluative judgment would”. (pag. 91) What does Nozick mean by value? “By value I do not mean our own subjective experience or liking of something; I mean the quality something has in virtue of which it is valuable”. (pag. 91)

The value judgments are not all subjective. They can be right or wrong, correct or incorrect, true or false, well- founded or not. Important question: When a thing has value? Nozick responds that: “ something is valuable insofar as it has a high degree of ‘organic unity’, unifying and integrating disparate material. “ (pag. 92)

The emotions as response to value In this chapter Nozick suggests the theory, according to which, emotions are a response to value. In fact for Nozick “When we respond emotionally to value, rather than merely judging or evaluating it mentally, we respond more fully because our feelings and our physiology are involved. Emotions are a fitting and appropriate response to value.” (pag. 92) Emotions are to value as beliefs are to facts.

Some questions What must value be like if emotions are the appropriate response to it? What is the difference between value and facts if emotions stand to value as beliefs do to facts? Our appropriate response to facts is to believe them and know that they hold. Beliefs are our appropriate response to nonevaluative facts.

Fifth part Emotions as an analog model of value Emotions provide a kind of picture of value. What does this mean? It means that “they are our internal psychophysiological response to the external value, a response that is specially close by being not only due to that value but an analog representation of it.” (pag. 93) Briefly: emotions provide a psychophysical replica of value.

What is an emotion? Something’s being valuable involves its having a certain mode of structural organization to a certain degree for example a degree of organic unity. So the responding emotion “ would be a psychophysical entity with a similar or parallel mode of organization.” (pag. 93) Briefly: the emotion is a map of the value or of the thing’s being valuable.

Why emotion is an analog model of value? To answer the question Nozick offers an example. He says this: “For suppose some extraterrestrials could dance expressively and represent external value though analog movement yet not have any elaborate feelings or emotions themselves. [..] If writers sometimes can write expressively without there being any emotions they have that they are expressing, or rather if the writing itself is the place where they have emotions, not in any inner psychological happenings but right there on the page, then perhaps the Martians can have them too in their dance motions.” (pag. 93)

Therefore emotions then might involve not necessarily inner feeling but rather analog representations through any sufficiently rich personal medium. Feelings would be only one way to constitute emotions. Now, another question arises: Is it good for us to be beings with an emotional life?

Answer to the question Nozick suggests that: “emotions make many things more valuable, more intense, and more vivid than otherwise”. (pag. 95) This statement is a response, although brief, to the “problem Spock”. The importance Nozick gives emotions emerges when he states that: “they constitute a force we can utilize and in important way, I think, they provide us with substance”. (pag. 95) In conclusion, emotions do not simply feel good but intense and fitting emotions make us more.