Reason vs Emotion

[aball1035]

My professor told us today that Western society has taught us that for humans, reason is above emotion, and that emotion must be controlled. However, new “evidence” has now taught us that people are mostly emotional beings, and have acquired reason through the centuries. In other words, which is “higher” for humans?

Is this simply a veiled creation/evolution debate? What do you all think?

 

[1AugustSon7]

My professor told us today that Western society has taught us that for humans, reason is above emotion, and that emotion must be controlled. However, new “evidence” has now taught us that people are mostly emotional beings, and have acquired reason through the centuries. In other words, which is “higher” for humans?

Is this simply a veiled creation/evolution debate? What do you all think?

Reason is above emotion or the passions. Faith is above reason. Emotion is not, however, evil. Emotion can be good. For example, when we are angry at seeing an injustice. Emotion in conjunction with reason can be a powerful source for justice. Emotion without reason can be destructive. It is good to recall that all that is natural is good, but the consequences of sin vitiate (destroy) nature and create, shall we say, problems - very serious problems. Sin is always vicious, especially to nature.

The sense of touch is, for example, a good; however, it can be a cause of temptation at times. Reason tells us not to give in to sensual temptation, and to therefore avoid touching things that might perturb or worse overthrow the healthy order that exists within us, i.e. that reason command the body and not the other way around, reducing us to irrational beasts.

This does work to disprove evolution; in fact, all true logic will.

I hope this helps.

 

[hazmat]

it depends on what youre trying to accomplish. reason is good for tasks that require it; emotion has its uses. its kind of apples to oranges. i dont know where you get creation vs evolution from what you wrote.

 

[1AugustSon7]

it depends on what youre trying to accomplish. reason is good for tasks that require it; emotion has its uses. its kind of apples to oranges. i dont know where you get creation vs evolution from what you wrote.

The implicatioin made by the professor is that reason was an evolutionary development. It’s absurd because a man is not a man if the faculty of reason is not proper to him. Without reason we would be beasts, and the human constitution is not at all suited to such a state, especially since we are born completely ignorant and haven’t the same powerful instincts that are so absolutely vital and necessary in the purely animal world.

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

My professor told us today that Western society has taught us that for humans, reason is above emotion, and that emotion must be controlled. However, new “evidence” has now taught us that people are mostly emotional beings, and have acquired reason through the centuries. In other words, which is “higher” for humans?

Is this simply a veiled creation/evolution debate? What do you all think?

Congratulations. You arrive to one of the biggest questions that Western Society has dealt with since before Christ. It is one of my favorites.

It is a pleasure to see some thinkers go one way: Aristotle, Descartes, Kant and others other way: Plato, St. Augustin, Hegel.

Do you love because you know or do you know because you love? This is one of my favorite questions.

Classicism (centuries 16,17,18) gave reason the leading role. After 1789, the French Revolution, Romanticism took the lead: sentiment and feelings are all that matters (remember “feelings, nothing more than feelings!”). What your teacher said is the divide made by the French Revolution.

The recent book of the great neurologist Antonio Damasio: “The error of Descartes” put the Amygdala in the center of personality. That is to say there is what today is called the Emotional Intelligence ( I do not know how to say in English).

No, it is not evolution/creation debate. It is a fascinating topic, that I can talk for hours about.

 

[hazmat]

The implicatioin made by the professor is that reason was an evolutionary development. It’s absurd because a man is not a man if the faculty of reason is not proper to him. Without reason we would be beasts, and the human constitution is not at all suited to such a state, especially since we are born completely ignorant and haven’t the same powerful instincts that are so absolutely vital and necessary in the purely animal world.

well, emotion would also fall under evolutionary development. animals can reason too. unless hes actually saying something about creationism, i wouldnt assume hes trying to have you debate it.

 

[1AugustSon7]

Do you love because you know or do you know because you love?

We love because we know. Only rational beings are capable of authentic love.

Q: Why are you here?
A: To know, love and serve God Who made me, that I might be reasonably happy in this life, and perfectly happy forever with Him in the next.

Notice the progression: To i) know God results in my ii) loving God, which results in my desiring freely to iii) serve God.

Saint Augustine himself said, ‘How can a man believe if he does not know what to believe?’ Or, as the Apostle put it,

How then shall they call on him, in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they believe him, of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear, without a preacher?

 

[1AugustSon7]

well, emotion would also fall under evolutionary development. animals can reason too. unless hes actually saying something about creationism, i wouldnt assume hes trying to have you debate it.

The animals cannot reason because they are not endowed with rational and therefore spiritual and immortal souls. Otherwise killing them would, I think, constitute murder.

The implication of the professor is that emotion, being in appearance similar to that of instinct in the animals, developed in man as it did in animals, and that later reason further developed in man. It is of course nonsense. Man would have been helpless without reason. Everything we know, we learn, and we are hardly able to think without a developed language. Human emotion, when it is properly ordered, does not have a resemblance to animal instinct. For example, animals cannot become duly irate as a man can nor selflessly sacrifice themselves for some greater good. What the animals do they do by instinct.

 

[hazmat]

animals can reason; they just dont do it as well as we do. and it doesnt make it murder to kill them either way. animals are able to act selflessly. im still not seeing how creation comes into this. so far, it seems what the professor is saying just happens to conflict with stuff you believe, and so youre jumping to conclusions regarding his intentions.

 

[1AugustSon7]

animals can reason; they just dont do it as well as we do. and it doesnt make it murder to kill them either way. animals are able to act selflessly. im still not seeing how creation comes into this. so far, it seems what the professor is saying just happens to conflict with stuff you believe, and so youre jumping to conclusions regarding his intentions.

I must insist that animals do not have a rational soul. They do have a created nature that is good because God made it good and, therefore, we often see things that are, for example, noble. But the animal does not make a conscious decision. The animal does not have free will.

It is an alarming sign when men begin to think that animals are rational. What it really means is that men are becoming less rational and so identifying more with the animal instinct, mistaking it for what appears to be reason. Exactly because we have free will, we can forego the right use of reason. Now right reason is in harmony with nature but the difference is that we also have an intellect capable of abstract thought that can draw universals. We also have free will such that we can forego the use of reason and subsequently abandon even nature as is obvious today. The animal cannot abandon its nature. It cannot exercise a choice whether rational or irrational such as man can.

 

[hazmat]

im not talking about souls. youve got some strong views, and thats not necessarily bad, but it wont really help you learn anything new…

 

[someperson555]

well, emotion came before reason since we were animals before we evolved into humans, and animals are pure passion with zero reason. but when we evolved into humans God gave us an immortal spirit which also allowed us to reason, therefore reasoning is a step higher on the evolutionary process. just because something was around longer doesnt make it better. for example, single celled organisms were around before multi-celled organisms, yet we know that multi-celled organisms are superior. so in conclusion, yes, emotions were around longer, but reasoning is superior. emotions are just chemical reactions in the brain, but reasoning is a function of the spirit.

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

We love because we know. Only rational beings are capable of authentic love.

Q: Why are you here?
A: To know, love and serve God Who made me, that I might be reasonably happy in this life, and perfectly happy forever with Him in the next.

Notice the progression: To i) know God results in my ii) loving God, which results in my desiring freely to iii) serve God.

Saint Augustine himself said, ‘How can a man believe if he does not know what to believe?’ Or, as the Apostle put it,

How then shall they call on him, in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they believe him, of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear, without a preacher?

But, and there come a big but, you must love to know. There are millions of things to know. There are millions of people to meet. Why do you want to know this instead of that. That person instead of this one.

Because you love. You study what you love, You try to know better the person you love. You investigate the cultures and peoples you love. You go to University to the course you love (unless you go for money or other reasons, financial or otherwise).

And you want to know MORE and More about God and not about witches, because you love God above all.

So, it seems that you know because you love …

 

[tonyrey]

My professor told us today that Western society has taught us that for humans, reason is above emotion, and that emotion must be controlled. However, new “evidence” has now taught us that people are mostly emotional beings, and have acquired reason through the centuries. In other words, which is “higher” for humans?

If emotion controls reason the conclusion that emotion controls reason may well be the product of emotion and is therefore suspect!

 

[Curious_Seed]

My professor told us today that Western society has taught us that for humans, reason is above emotion, and that emotion must be controlled. However, new “evidence” has now taught us that people are mostly emotional beings, and have acquired reason through the centuries. In other words, which is “higher” for humans?

Is this simply a veiled creation/evolution debate? What do you all think?

And who would hold any tenet he believes is without reason?

The choice is fatuous.

Nothing veiled here; but, if so, best left so.

 

[tonyrey]

If emotion controls reason the conclusion that emotion controls reason may well be the product of emotion and is therefore suspect!

Yet Pascal wrote:

"The heart has its reasons, which Reason does not know. We feel it in a thousand things. It is the heart which feels God, and not Reason. This, then, is perfect faith: God felt in the heart."

He also said:

“…there are two kinds of people one can call reasonable; those who serve God with all their heart because they know Him, and those who seek Him with all their heart because they do not know Him.” !

en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Blaise_Pascal

 

[grannymh]

My professor told us today that Western society has taught us that for humans, reason is above emotion, and that emotion must be controlled. However, new “evidence” has now taught us that people are mostly emotional beings, and have acquired reason through the centuries. In other words, which is “higher” for humans?

Is this simply a veiled creation/evolution debate? What do you all think?

It can also be a possible debate of objective reasoning versus subjective reasoning or a possible debate as to how one can use both objective reasoning *and *subjective reasoning together.