then why do most people believe that reason and emotions are separate ?

People entertain all sorts of wrong ideas, like the mind and body being two separate things. Blame Descartes for that.

Many people 'privilege' rational thought and denigrate emotion, overlooking the fact that fast emotional responses are a critical part of human survival. Fear get's you moving fast on short notice. Lust keeps the world populated and most of us find it quite fun. Etc.

Thinking is critical too, of course, and one of the things that encourages thinking is the pleasure we experience when we solve a problem.

It SEEMS like our hearts and heads (so to speak) are opposed to each other. But generally our hearts and heads are on the same page.

It's folk wisdom (more like folk bullshit) that mind and emotion are separate.

:lol: Sounds to me that you are both quite emotional creatures. Perhaps, with little ability to be otherwise.

Plato placed emotion as the intermediary between contrary forces, the body and the mind. Sometimes emotion takes direction from the mind, like when the law is being enforced, and sometimes it takes direction from the body, like when the law is being broken. Sometimes it might even be left directionless, when a person is lost and confused.

I don't take kindly to your mocking insult. Ad hominins are a last resort of someone losing a debate.

I have very little interest or concern regarding what you find to be a mocking insult.
I have even less interest in your lack of ability to assess who won or didn't win a debate.
I consider our boring exchange over.
I suggest we ignore each others posts in the future. I prefer to debate with grown ups.

I don't take kindly to your mocking insult. — Massimo

He always insults and disrespects other users who don't think like him. Trust me when I say that he will destroy your energy and waste your time as well. My advice is to ignore him. Something difficult because he is always around posting hate and vacuous messages. What I don't understand is why moderators keep him here...

Massimo, you have posted very interesting comments here, and I wish you a good experience here. Welcome. :smile:

I am indeed a creature of emotion, I also know what it's like to be near void of emotion in a state of catatonia, but what I am not, is a creature of resentment, "who, deprived as they are of the proper outlet of action, are forced to find their compensation in an imaginary revenge. While every aristocratic morality springs from a triumphant affirmation of its own demands, the slave morality says "no" from the very outset to what is "outside itself," "different from itself," and "not itself": and this "no" is its creative deed. This volte-face of the valuing standpoint—this inevitable gravitation to the objective instead of back to the subjective—is typical of "resentment": the slave-morality requires as the condition of its existence an external and objective world, to employ physiological terminology, it requires objective stimuli to be capable of action at all—its action is fundamentally a reaction." -- Nietzsche's On the Genealogy of Asshats.

Careful of those compulsive reactions you're apparently privy to. Cheers!

Well root my toot! who knew it was as simple as that! :cool:

*pets universeness* Good lad.

LuckyR who is attacking me and why ? Seriously what are you talking about are people looking to eat me if I show to little or to much emotion

I stipulated "in competitive environments". That's the arena I'm speaking about. If you don't compete against others, then my commentary doesn't apply.

I think that a general approach to one’s life that is accepting and tolerant of human nature is a good start, at the very least.

We can never really get rid of basic aspects of our existence, like emotions and feelings, we can only repress the feelings in the effort to eliminate them.
It is a truism that repressed feelings are more harmful to one’s peace of mind (sanity) than those that are not repressed.

But of course, we don’t want to be servants to the whims of our capricious emotions.
Stoicism and Eastern systems encourage an awareness of everything, with calmness and equanimity as a goal.
It represents the golden mean of being aware of feelings, while having the ability to decide the best way to express or communicate them… or to ‘keep it to ourselves’.


I have the idea (or personal conspiracy theory lol) that most of the desires we have to change our very natures, or to ‘rise above our animal origins’ or such, have been implanted in us by cultural forces that are acting in their best interests, not ours. (If one could personify such things).