To summarize pjeby’s essay as best I can, we generate propositions, which when we think about them activate concepts like “useful” or “truthy”, which are special cases of “good”, or else activate concepts like “convoluted” or “absurd”, which are special cases of “bad”, and whether good or bad markers are active determines whether we continue along the same line or purge it from our working memory.
Yes, and I’m further arguing that these markers are somatic—they exist to effect physical changes in the body.
pjeby treats the goodness or badness of a concept in memory as being emotion, but conventional use of the word emotion refers instead to an aspect of mental state that adjusts the perceived goodness and badness of things as they are retrieved from or recorded to memory.
I don’t even begin to understand this sentence, since in my view, the goodness or badness is represented by emotion—i.e. a somatic marker. And the markers are somatic because in an evolutionary context, goodness or badness had to do with moving towards or away from things: I can eat that, that will eat me, that’s a potential mate, etc.
In a sense, that’s more or less the “root” system from which all other markers derive, although it’s a mistake to treat it like some sort of logical hierarchy, when in fact it’s just a collection of kludges upon kludges (like most everything else that evolution does).
First I should clarify my rather ambiguous remark about mental states affecting perceived goodness and badness as things are retrieved or recorded from memory. What I mean is, the markers which we assign things depend partially on our state of mind. For example, we think of some things as dangerous (tigers, guns, ninjas), and some things as not-dangerous (puppies, phones, secretaries), but some things could go either way (spiders, bottles, policemen), depending on how they’re interpreted. If you’re feeling safe, then you’ll tend to label the border cases as safe; if you’re feeling frightened for unrelated reasons, the border cases will come up as dangerous. In other words, priming applies to somatic markers too, not just semantic ones. Or, as I put it in my previous post, emotional state adjusts the perceived goodness and badness of things as they are retrieved from memory.
If every time you think of something you feel frightened, then you will come to think of that thing as scary, even if the only reason you were frighted at the time was because of some irrelevant other thing. This is what I meant by saying that emotional state affects perceived goodness and badness as it’s recorded to memory.
Yes, and I’m further arguing that these markers are somatic—they exist to effect physical changes in the body.
I’m not so sure about this. They certainly effect behaviors, and those behaviors may have physiological ramifications, but many markers have no effect or only indirect effects. Or you could say that each mechanism in the mind exists to support the body, since they co-evolved, but that would be like saying that my liver exists to support my left thumb; all parts of the body are interdependent, the brain included.
Yes, and I’m further arguing that these markers are somatic—they exist to effect physical changes in the body.
I don’t even begin to understand this sentence, since in my view, the goodness or badness is represented by emotion—i.e. a somatic marker. And the markers are somatic because in an evolutionary context, goodness or badness had to do with moving towards or away from things: I can eat that, that will eat me, that’s a potential mate, etc.
In a sense, that’s more or less the “root” system from which all other markers derive, although it’s a mistake to treat it like some sort of logical hierarchy, when in fact it’s just a collection of kludges upon kludges (like most everything else that evolution does).
First I should clarify my rather ambiguous remark about mental states affecting perceived goodness and badness as things are retrieved or recorded from memory. What I mean is, the markers which we assign things depend partially on our state of mind. For example, we think of some things as dangerous (tigers, guns, ninjas), and some things as not-dangerous (puppies, phones, secretaries), but some things could go either way (spiders, bottles, policemen), depending on how they’re interpreted. If you’re feeling safe, then you’ll tend to label the border cases as safe; if you’re feeling frightened for unrelated reasons, the border cases will come up as dangerous. In other words, priming applies to somatic markers too, not just semantic ones. Or, as I put it in my previous post, emotional state adjusts the perceived goodness and badness of things as they are retrieved from memory.
If every time you think of something you feel frightened, then you will come to think of that thing as scary, even if the only reason you were frighted at the time was because of some irrelevant other thing. This is what I meant by saying that emotional state affects perceived goodness and badness as it’s recorded to memory.
I’m not so sure about this. They certainly effect behaviors, and those behaviors may have physiological ramifications, but many markers have no effect or only indirect effects. Or you could say that each mechanism in the mind exists to support the body, since they co-evolved, but that would be like saying that my liver exists to support my left thumb; all parts of the body are interdependent, the brain included.