Logic > Emotions?

[OpheliaGinger]

I know if some guy kicked down my door, I will be running at him with my butcher knife and yelling, "GET THE FUCK OFF MY PROPERTY!"

[Mongo]

I guess this is one of the parts of Christianity that screwed me up the most, even though it was one of the most subtle. Although my parents disagree slightly (my dad is more chauvinistic than my mom) the basic logic goes like this:

 

Logic and emotions are incompatible opposites.

Logic is how you see the world rightly; emotions lie ("the heart is deceitful...).

Women are more emotional than men.

 

Wow... what a load of shit! (Notice how I used emotional language?) (Notice how I'm aware of my emotions?) (BTW - I'm not gay!)

 

Logic and emotions are NOT, repeat NOT opposites. Think of them as processing information differently like eyes and ears. Are ears opposite to eyes?

 

Here is more shit...

 

Logic lies. To those who dispute this I say "Hello McFly! Have you talked to an apologist lately?"

Yes, logic, or at least what people present as logic fails people all the time. This is an X-C thread and xtians come here all the time and present their logic over and over and their logic repeatedly fails them.

 

And NO I'm not talking about those that make impassioned arguments... I'm talking about fundies who can't think straight because they don't have any ability to question the authority from which their assumptions draw. Hence they present faulty arguments in a sincerely non-emotional container of (flawed) logic.

 

And more shit...

The emotional part of our brain, aka the heart, is not so much deceitful but sometimes unreliable as our logical brain.

The emotional brain is more of an emergency response system when the logical brain does not have time to weigh and decide between several avenues. By your dad's logic, you would be run over by traffic if you suddenly got confused while crossing a road rather than doing what your emotional brain urgently says to you; "Move!!!".

 

Rather than lead us astray... the emotional brain may simply over react and send us into terror when we should be cautious or put us into rage when we should be offended. In other words the logic may be right but the response may be over or even under done.

 

One final note on Data, Spock and the absence of emotion. People who lack emotion (and yes they exist) are incapable of correctly judging the importance of something. I can remember reading where someone was saying that the best investor would be emotionless. What a crock of shit! When investing money, it kills me to take a loss on a trade. That said, each time a foul up I try to learn to make a different mistake the next time and hopefully a slightly longer interval until it happens again. But at the same time my emotions ensure that I dump a bad trade before it becomes a catastrophic trade. That said, I manage my emotions but I would never dispense of them; they are extremely valuable.

 

I highly highly highly recommend "The Gift of Fear by Gavin (????) Several local libraries here have it on audio CDs so I bet you can can find it too and listen to it while in transit from whatever to where ever. I've given it two listens so far in the last few years.

 

I'm currently listening to "Emotional Intellegence" (forgot authors name) and there is a segment on this topic. That is a very informative book as well but a little long winded. The Gift of Fear is a better read.

 

Mongo