mel said to Bo: As the functional physiology of the brain is described, the seat of emotions is in the "reptile brain," the older portions of the brain deeper within than the crenellated mass we are most fascinated with most of the time: cerebral cortex. Since the emotional center is deeper in the brain and part of an older structure we share with all mammals, there must be a functional reason for it. After all it did not suddenly evolve.
dmb quotes Pirsig: “For years we’ve read about how values are supposed to emanate from some location in the “lower” centers of the brain. This location has never been clearly identified. The mechanism for holding these values is completely unknown. No one has ever been able to add to a person’s values by inserting one at this location, or observed any significant changes at this location as a result of a change of values. No evidence has been presented that if this portion of the brain is anesthetized or even lobotomized the patient will make a better scientist as a result because all his decisions will then be “value-free.” Yet we’re told values must reside here, if they exist at all, because where else could they be?” This is tricky business and it's not exactly clear to me. I suppose the neurological explanations will tend to confuse the issue because they tend to smuggle SOM back into the equation and Pirsig's comment about emotions being a biological response is often understood that way. I've seen people interpret the hot stove example that way too, as a physiological response to the low quality of the situation. This tends to denigrate "value" as a low grade thing that needs to be overcome and adjusted by a more sophisticated understanding. And then beyond that, there's probably some confusion that involves the difference between value as a dynamic experience, as the immediately felt quality of the situation, and the static levels with which we can respond and which play a role in our subsequent explanations of the experience. I think it's interesting to notice that emotions are felt in the whole body. William James noticed that people blush before they even realize they're embarrassed. Ever notice how seeing a really hot babe will be immediately felt around the top of the belly and just below the heart. Bam! Like cupid's arrow, it seems to hit you as if from the outside. It doesn't seem to be located in the mind or the brain or even in the groin but rather the center of whole organism. Recently I read a little story in Frans de Waal's "Primates and Philosophers". There was a boy 10 or 12 years old who was rather cruel to his camel. For several days he'd been beating the poor thing with a stick in an effort, apparently, to get the camel to work much harder than it wanted to. The grown ups said, basically, hey you better take it easy on that camel or you'll be sorry. So he backed off a bit. But three days after a particularly brutal beating this camel found itself alone on a road with the boy, who'd dismounted and was walking around. The camel chose that moment, away from the eyes of any witnesses, to bite the boy's skull. Ripped his brian wide open and killed the boy in an apparent act of revenge. De Waal's point, I think, was to say that animals can hold a grudge. He studies primate behavior and his book is full of evidence for this capacity among our closest relatives. He shows how the higher animals exhibit all sorts of things that we usually think of as exclusively human capacities. They show an aversion to cruelty, a sense of fairness, a capacity for empathy, and even a capacity to enforce certain "rules", to teach the young one's how to behave. De Waal is making a case that the differences between them and us are so great as we tend to imagine and that we ought to be rethinking these things. And in my other class, psychology of religion, we were looking at Freud's ideas about the social repression of our instincts and she pointed out that we repress our pets to a certain extent. It's almost funny but it's true, ain't it? We can see a dog's guilt when its been naughtly. I swear my dog had a look the other day that said, hey I know it was wrong but I just couldn't help it so gimme a break. She was sick and pooped on the rug. Normally, she can wait for hours. Seems she can wait longer than I can, if fact. Ooops, I just pooped on my computer. Gotta go. dmb _________________________________________________________________ When your life is on the go—take your life with you. http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/115298558/direct/01/ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
