Emotions as Original Existences: A Theory of Emotion, Motivation and the Self [1st ed.] 9783030546816, 9783030546823

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Emotions as Original Existences A Theory of Emotion, Motivation and the Self Demian Whiting

Emotions as Original Existences

Demian Whiting

Emotions as Original Existences A Theory of Emotion, Motivation and the Self

Demian Whiting Hull York Medical School University of Hull Hull, UK

ISBN 978-3-030-54681-6    ISBN 978-3-030-54682-3 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54682-3 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and ­transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: Drawing of Five Characters in a Comic Scene by Leonardo da Vinci (Photo by © Alinari Archives/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images) This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

For R, D, H, E, and S

Acknowledgments

This book has benefited greatly from conversations I have had with a number of people over the years. I would particularly like to thank Luke Brunning, Steven Burwood, Quassim Cassam, Roger Clarke, Adriana Clavel-Vazquez, Barry Dainton, Christopher Dowrick, Rachel Fredericks, Dimitris Gorgogiannis, Daniel Hill, Tom McClelland, Talia Morag, David Pugmire, Joanne Reeve, Catherine Robb, Tom Roberts, Stephen McLeod, Robert Stern, Dawn Wilson, Bill Wringe, and Nick Zangwill. I would also like to extend an especially warm thank you to an anonymous reviewer for Palgrave Macmillan for their detailed and helpful comments, and to Paul Gilbert who read through and provided very constructive feedback on an earlier draft of the book. Finally, I am very grateful to Lauriane Piette, Jasper Asir, Vanipriya Manohar, and the rest of the Palgrave Macmillan team for their professionalism and support in getting this book to publication—a big thank you to you all.

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Contents

1 Introduction  1 Reference   7 Part I On Emotion   9 2 Emotions as Conscious Mental States 11 Introduction  11 The Phenomenal Appearance of Emotion   13 Why Emotions are Their Phenomenal Appearances   16 Why Emotions are Always (Phenomenally) Conscious   24 Concluding Remarks  33 References  35 3 Emotions as Original Existences 37 Introduction  37 The Feeling Theory of Emotion   40 Objections to the Feeling Theory of Emotion, and Replies   54 Concluding Remarks  83 References  85

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Part II On Emotion and Motivation  89 4 Urges of the Heart 91 Introduction  91 Dispositions, Stimulus Events, and Categorical Bases   94 Human Behavior and a Role for Emotion   99 Dispositions to Mental Actions or Doings  118 Concluding Remarks  120 References 122 5 Emotion and Moral Thought125 Introduction 125 Emotion as the Categorical Basis for Moral Thought  129 A Distinctive Normative Role for Emotion with Respect to Moral Thought  140 Internalized Norms of Thought  144 Concluding Remarks  146 References 148 6 Emotion, Virtue, and Situationism153 Introduction 153 Emotions as Categorical Bases for Virtues and Vices  157 Implications for the Cultivation of Virtue and Elimination of Vice  159 Emotion and the Situationist Critique of Virtue Theory  161 Concluding Remarks  171 References 172 Part III Emotion and the Self 175 7 Our Emotional Cores177 Introduction 177 Why the Search for an Object’s Intrinsic Nature is an Important One  181 Five Criteria for Being an Intrinsic Property  183

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The Core Self  191 Concluding Remarks  200 References 201 8 Emotion and the Fractured Self203 Introduction 204 Emotion and Poor Mental Health  205 Implications for Treatment and Therapy  212 Concluding Remarks  225 References 227 Index229

1 Introduction

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them… A passion is an original existence, or, if you will, modification of existence, and contains not any representative quality, which renders it a copy of any other existence or modification. When I am angry, I am actually possest with the passion, and in that emotion have no more a reference to any other object, than when I am thirsty, or sick, or more than five foot high. —David Hume (1896, 415)

The eighteenth-century philosopher, David Hume, claimed that emotions are original existences, mental states with no representational properties of their own. While beliefs, perceptual experiences, and other like states represent the way the world is taken to be, emotions make no reference to the world at all. As Hume puts the point in the passage quoted above: “When I am angry…I have no more reference to any other object, than when I am thirsty, or sick, or more than five foot high” (1896, 415). Today few philosophers agree with Hume. The standard view nowadays is that emotions are very like beliefs or perceptual states in

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representing the world in certain ways. On some views, emotions just are types of thoughts or perceptual-like states. On other views, emotions are compound or hybrid mental states containing mental representations as constituents. But common to all such views is the idea that emotions have intentional or representational properties. For instance, when we are afraid we might represent an object (a fierce looking dog, for example) to be dangerous or threatening, and when we are angry we might represent something (how we have been treated by another person, for example) as being unjust or offensive. One principal reason for writing this book is to try to revive the Humean view and show why thinking of emotions as representational mental states is badly mistaken. Rather, in the tradition of writers such as Hume and William James, I defend the idea that emotions are nothing but types of bodily feelings that have no representational properties of their own. Part I of this book, then, is taken up with advancing and defending a feeling theory of emotion. In Chap. 2 I am concerned to argue that emotions are phenomenally conscious mental states, by which I mean that emotions comprise how they phenomenally appear or present themselves to us in our experience of them. Establishing that emotions are how they phenomenally appear to us doesn’t in itself show that emotions are feelings that lack representational properties. This is because it is an open question as to how emotions phenomenally present themselves to us, as to whether, for instance, emotions present themselves to us as possessing representational properties or not. However, showing that emotions are their phenomenal appearances does set up the justificatory basis for how I proceed in Chap. 3, where drawing on the phenomenology of emotion, I argue that emotions are non-representational feeling states, closely akin to though not identical with other kinds of bodily sensations, such as aches, pains, and itches. But defending a feeling theory of emotion is not all I want to do in this book. To be sure, a successful defence of a feeling theory of emotion would be a worthwhile task in itself, and one that holds interest independent of the implications the theory has for other areas in philosophy. One main reason for doing philosophy has always been to get clear on the nature of certain phenomena, including mental states such as emotions,

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regardless of the wider consequences such a project might have for other areas of enquiry. Nevertheless, I want to spell out what I take to be some of the broader implications of the theory of emotion I defend, because they also hold a great deal of significance and interest. Indeed, it seems to me that to conceive of emotions as types of feelings opens up a whole new way of thinking about the role and centrality of emotion in our lives, and especially the role emotion serves with respect to behavior, moral thought, virtue and vice. So here is the outline of another idea that I am going to advance and try to make good. In fact, making the idea good will occupy much of the second part of the book. A standard view in metaphysics has it that objects are disposed to behave in the ways they do in virtue of their intrinsic properties. A vase, for instance, is disposed to shatter in the event of being struck by a blunt instrument in virtue of the vase’s atomic or molecular structure. This intrinsic property of an object is commonly known as the categorical basis for the way an object is disposed to behave. Now, human beings too are disposed to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain, sometimes in beneficial and wonderful ways, other times in harmful and terrible ways. But if objects in general are disposed to behave in the ways they do in virtue of certain intrinsic properties of theirs, then the same must be true of human beings specifically. So the question arises: what in the case of ourselves might serve as a categorical basis for the different ways we are disposed to behave? Answering this question will be the task of Chap. 4. I will claim that unlike the case of ordinary physical objects, such as vases and rocks, the search for those properties that underlie the ways we are disposed to behave seems to be a search for some kind of psychological property. However, I will argue that neither desires nor beliefs can serve as categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions, desires because they are behavioral dispositions and therefore in need of categorical bases themselves, and beliefs because they serve as the stimulus or triggering conditions for the manifestations of our behavioral dispositions. Instead, my answer to the question posed above will be that dispositions to behavior are grounded in or realized by emotions. Moreover, I will argue that emotions discharge this role precisely because they are the sorts of mental states that I claim they are, namely non-representational

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feeling states. I will also give reason for thinking that the view I advance is true not only with regard to dispositions to overt physical behaviors or doings, but also dispositions to mental acts or doings, such as a disposition to attend to something in thought or a disposition to infer certain beliefs when presented with supporting evidence. Furthermore, suppose the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions is correct. In which case, that idea promises to provide us with a novel way of thinking about emotion’s role in the generation of moral thought, virtue and vice. For plausibly moral thought, virtue, and vice, each involve or comprise behavioral dispositions. Thus, in Chap. 5 I argue that if the view that is known as ‘motivational internalism’ provides us with a correct account of the nature of moral thought and moral judgments are intrinsically motivating mental states, then to form a moral judgment is to be disposed to behave in a certain way. But then it must follow that moral judgments are realized by or grounded in emotions if moral judgments are intrinsically motivating states. Similarly, virtues and vices are commonly taken to comprise behavioral dispositions. Honesty, for instance, involves the disposition to act in a truthful way, and dishonesty is the disposition to behave in ways that are false. But in which case, and as I argue in Chap. 6, emotions must again serve as those things that underlie or realize the behavioral dispositions associated with different virtues and vices. Part II of this book, then, is largely concerned to show that emotions as types of bodily feelings discharge an explanatory role by virtue of being those things that underlie or realize how we are disposed to behave. However, I will argue this is not the only role that emotions discharge. For I will also advance the view that emotions play a critical normative role, not in the sense of justifying our behavioral dispositions, but rather in the sense of regulating our behavioral dispositions, by ensuring that our behavioral dispositions are by and large the right ones for us to form in the circumstances in which we are placed. In the case of moral thought, this means that if motivational internalism is a correct account of the nature of moral thought, then emotions are those things that ensure we form the right moral judgments, that is to say, moral judgments that are sensitive to the right and wrong making features of our situations. I submit there is a clear parallel to be made here

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with another of Hume’s very well-known claims, namely that ‘reason is and ought only to be the slave of the passions’ (Hume 1896, 415). So we might say that reason is the slave of the passions because reason, comprising our moral judgments or internalized norms of action, has emotion underlying or realizing it, and reason ought to be the slave of the passions because emotions by and large ensure that our moral judgments are the right ones for us to form in the circumstances in which we are placed. And a similar claim can be made for emotion’s role with regard to the virtues. The point will be argued as way of responding to an objection that has been made to virtue theory in recent years, namely, the objection that virtue theory fails to recognize that how people behave is largely situation dependent. Thus, according to the critique of virtue theory in question there is no such thing as the person who is disposed to behave honestly in all situations (as virtue theory is often taken to hold) but only the person who tends to behave honestly in some situations and not in others. But if emotions serve a regulatory role by way of ensuring our behavioral dispositions are sensitive to the particularities of our situations, then virtue theory has a retort to the ‘situationist challenge’. The virtue theorist can hold that it is a good thing we are disposed to behave differently in different circumstances, as those are the behavioral dispositions that our emotions prescribe us to have. Regarding emotions as serving an important regulatory role with regard to our behavioral dispositions allows the virtue-theorist a way of replying to the situationist challenge, then, as it motivates the idea that virtues and vices are what are often known as local, not global, traits of character. Part III of this book addresses a number of issues relating to the self. In Chap. 7 I advance the idea that emotion lies at the core of self, by which I mean that emotions are those properties of ours that characterizes our intrinsic properties, or what we are like in and of ourselves, that is when considered apart from the different ways we are disposed to behave. This is an implication of the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions, taking as true the idea that intrinsic properties act as categorical bases. But it is also suggested by a number of other features that intrinsic properties are commonly thought to bear. For instance, that emotions identify our intrinsic properties is suggested by the idea that intrinsic properties are non-relational properties of

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ours, properties the nature of which do not relate us to anything separate from ourselves. Thus, it is my claim that emotions are feeling states that place us in no kind of relation to the world. Moreover, it is difficult to see what else can serve as a property of ours that would qualify as an intrinsic property. Desires and beliefs, for instance, are clearly relational in that they relate us to the things believed or desired. Relevant also, I argue, is what I call ‘the test of deep change’. If emotion is that thing that characterizes what we are like in and of ourselves, then we would expect any kind of emotional change we endure to be accompanied by a deep change in ourselves, a change to the core of our beings, so to speak. In Chap. 7 I give a number of examples from fiction and real-life that makes that idea a very credible one. In Part III of the book I am interested also in exploring various issues relating to what I call the fractured self, the self that suffers from symptoms of poor mental health, symptoms that plausibly often have their source in emotion. Here, then, I am particularly concerned to spell out the implications that claims advanced earlier in the book may have for our understanding of the role of emotion in explaining symptoms associated with various mental health conditions, including disorders of conduct and thought. To take an example, consider how emotion might be involved in the formation of aberrant beliefs, such as believing yourself to be the Emperor of Antarctica or believing that aliens want to harm you or steal your ideas. Now, suppose that emotions serve as categorical bases for our cognitive or intellectual dispositions, as I argue in Chap. 4. But if that is true for cognitive dispositions in general, then it must be true for the cognitive dispositions present in cases of aberrant or unusual or irrational belief formation. And, indeed, this is what I will argue in the final chapter of the book. There, I will advance the view that people come to form the unusual or aberrant beliefs they do due to possessing certain cognitive dispositions—for instance, those cognitive dispositions that seem to characterize certain kinds of reasoning biases—where these cognitive dispositions are themselves explained or realized by particular emotional states. In Chap. 8 I consider also the implications that some of the claims made earlier in the book have for issues pertaining to the treatment of

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distressing or maladaptive emotions, including and especially the theoretical underpinnings of cognitive therapy. To be sure, my critique of the cognitive model that underpins the philosophy and practice of cognitive therapy bears in no way on the question of whether cognitive therapy is actually effective or not, though if my critique is successful then that gives us positive reason to think that if cognitive therapy does work then this is unlikely to be explained by the cognitive model. Nevertheless, I will argue that my critique of the cognitive model justifies our trying to understand why cognitive therapy is effective when it is effective if not for the reasons suggested by the cognitive model, as well as creating space and a possible rationale for the development of alternative treatments for emotional disorder.

Reference Hume, D. (1896). A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume (L. A. Selby-­ Bigge, ed.), Reprinted from the Original Edition in Three Volumes and Edited, with an Analytical Index. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Part I On Emotion

2 Emotions as Conscious Mental States

If we fancy some strong emotion, and then try to abstract from our consciousness of it all the feelings of its characteristic bodily symptoms, we find that we have nothing left behind, no ‘mind-stuff’ out of which the emotion can be constituted… —William James (1884, 193)

Introduction In this chapter I argue that emotions are phenomenally conscious states, mental states that comprise the way they feel or phenomenally appear to us in our experience of them. I do this for two reasons. First, if emotions are their characteristic ways of appearing, then this tells us something important about what emotions are. For instance, it tells us that emotions are conscious through and through. I also explain why it tells us that emotions are always conscious and that it follows there is no such thing as the emotional unconscious. Second, if emotions are how they phenomenally appear to us, then this gives us a way of getting to know the kinds of phenomenal states that emotions are, as to whether, for instance, emotions are raw feelings, or © The Author(s) 2020 D. Whiting, Emotions as Original Existences, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54682-3_2

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perceptual-like states, or judgments, or conative states, or, perhaps, compounds of several different types of mental states. If emotions comprise how they phenomenally appear to us, then we can get to know about the kinds of phenomenal states that emotions are simply by attending to how emotions phenomenally appear to us. This will be crucial to my argument in Chap. 3 where drawing on the phenomenology I argue that emotions are types of bodily feelings that lack intentional or representational properties of their own. The structure of this chapter is as follows. To begin with, I say something about what it means to talk about mental states in general, and emotions in particular, phenomenally appearing to us in certain ways. In the process, I spell out what I take to be a basic phenomenological truth, namely that emotions phenomenally present themselves to us in a bodily felt way. That being said, I leave unspecified the exact character of the bodily felt properties in question (as to whether, for instance, they have an intentional or representational character) until I take up that issue in Chap. 3. Next, I give one conceptual and one empirical consideration supporting the idea that emotions are how they phenomenally appear to us, though I explain why I think the empirical consideration bears most weight. Then in the remainder of the chapter, I take up the question of whether emotions are always conscious. I argue that if emotions are identical with how they phenomenally present themselves to us, then that implies that emotions are always conscious. I also consider a number of objections to the idea that emotions are always conscious but show why none of them succeed. Let me finish by saying something about how this chapter differs from the second chapter, where I argue that emotions are feeling states  that lack intentional or representational properties of their own. Now, on the face of it, the purpose of the two chapters might seem very similar. In this chapter I argue that emotions comprise the way they feel or phenomenally appear to us, and in the second chapter I argue that emotions are non-representational bodily feeling states. Doesn’t this amount to much the same thing? The answer is negative for the following reason. To say that an emotion is its phenomenal appearance is to say nothing about the specific character of the phenomenal appearance in question, as to whether, for instance, the appearance is a felt bodily one or a perceptual-­ like one or a thought-like appearance. It is merely to say that emotions

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are their phenomenal appearances, whatever the character of those appearances might be. Whereas, to say that emotions are non-­ representational or  non-intentional bodily feelings is to say something about the actual character of the phenomenal appearances that are emotions. It is saying that what is characteristic of conscious mental states that are emotions—as opposed, say, to conscious mental states that are thoughts or perceptions—is the possession of a bodily felt character that has no intentional or representational qualities of its own. The two chapters, then, really are doing something importantly different. But the above being said, the argument of the second chapter builds on the argument of the first chapter. My primary justification for the feeling theory of emotion that I defend is phenomenological, namely that I think emotions phenomenally present themselves to consciousness as the types of mental states that I think they are. However, someone might ask why we should think the appearance of emotion tells us anything important about emotion, about what an emotion intrinsically is, so to speak. If the arguments I advance in this chapter are right, the answer is simple. We should think the phenomenal appearance of emotion tells us important things about what emotions are because emotions just are their phenomenal appearances. Chapter 2, then, can be viewed as setting-up the justificatory basis for my strategy in Chap. 3, where drawing on the phenomenology of emotion I advance the theory of emotion that I do.

The Phenomenal Appearance of Emotion To speak about the way a mental state phenomenally appears to us is to speak about what it is like to be in that mental state from a first-person point of view (Nagel 1974), or, in other words, about what it feels like to undergo the mental state in question. Here the idea is that certain mental states—typically episodic or occurrent mental states—have a qualitative feel to them or present themselves to us in a particular way. For example, we might talk about the painful appearance or feel of pain, the itchiness of an itch, the visual appearance or look of a table, and the visual-like appearance of an after-image.

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Now, there is an ongoing debate regarding whether every occurrent mental state phenomenally appears to us in a certain way. For instance, while some philosophers claim that episodic thoughts have no characteristic phenomenology of their own (see e.g. Tye 1995; Carruthers 2005), others claim that thoughts possess a phenomenology that is characteristic of thoughts and thoughts alone (e.g. Strawson 1994; Horgan and Tienson 2002; Pitt 2004; Whiting 2016). While those in the first camp often agree that thoughts can be accompanied by perceptual or imagistic phenomenology, those in the second camp think that cognitive phenomenology is real and unlike that associated with any other kind of mental state. But regardless of one’s views on whether every occurrent mental state has a phenomenology, nearly everyone accepts there is something it is like to undergo an emotion. Even philosophers whose theories of emotion differ in other respects accept this point. I say this because I wish to emphasize that the claim that emotions possess a characteristic phenomenology or way of appearing need not in itself imply the view that emotions are merely raw feelings or sensations of bodily activity or change, mental states characterized entirely by their sensuous felt qualities. William James advances such a view when he writes: What kind of an emotion of fear would be left, if the feelings neither of quickened heart-beats nor of shallow breathing, neither of trembling lips nor of weakened limbs, neither of goose-flesh nor of visceral stirrings, were present, it is quite impossible to think. Can one fancy the state of rage and picture no ebullition of it in the chest, no flushing of the face, no dilatation of the nostrils, no clenching of the teeth, no impulse to vigorous action, but in their stead limp muscles, calm breathing, and a placid face? The present writer, for one, certainly cannot. (James 1884, 194)

According to James, what it is like to undergo an emotion is what it is like to undergo certain bodily changes—sensations of visceral stirrings, quickened heartbeats, and shallow breathing, for instance. Now, I think James is right to hold that emotions present themselves in a bodily felt way (though, as I explain in Chap. 3, my way of describing that bodily felt quality differs from the way James describes it). And for this reason I

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am going to make the following basic phenomenological claim, a claim that I will assume to be true throughout this chapter. At a minimum, what it is like to undergo an emotion is (or is closely akin to) what it is like to undergo certain kinds of bodily feelings or sensations. Thus, in the same way that pain has a painful appearance and one that is felt in different parts of the body, fear has an edgy appearance and one that often pervades the guts and limbs. Similarly, anger has an irritable feel and one that often pervades the cranial area (hence, such expressions as a ‘rush of blood to the head’ when describing anger), and sadness has a ‘dispirited’ felt quality and one often felt in the chest area (hence, such expressions as a ‘heavy heart’ when describing sadness). Again, I assume the phenomenological claim is true, as will be evident from the examples I give in the chapter, though I will leave it until the next chapter to spell out the claim in detail. But having now stated the basic phenomenological claim, I want to make two points. First, the basic phenomenological claim leaves unspecified the exact nature of the feelings associated with different emotions. The point is important because a number of emotion theorists agree with James that emotional phenomenology has a bodily felt character but believe that this bodily felt character can itself possess representational and/or conative properties. For instance, Michelle Maiese argues that emotions are forms of ‘conative affectivity’ or ‘embodied desires’ (see Maiese 2011; see also Deonna and Teroni 2012 who hold that emotions are ‘felt action-tendencies’), and a number of perceptual theorists seek to identify ‘emotional perceptions’ with types of bodily feelings or affective states (e.g. Prinz 2004; Döring 2007). Now, of course, it is an open question as to whether such theorists are entitled to think of emotional feelings in this way. So are emotions and their associated feelings—the edgy feeling in the case of fear, or the ‘down-hearted’ sensation in the case of sadness—really desire-like or perceptual-like in how they appear to us? Although I think the answer is negative, as I argue in Chap. 3, I will not pursue the question further at this stage. This leads me onto the second and more central point. In this chapter I am concerned mainly with showing that emotions are by nature conscious or phenomenally conscious mental states (from now on I will use the terms ‘conscious’ and ‘phenomenally conscious’ interchangeably). Consequently, I am not so concerned to answer the question of how

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emotions might phenomenally appear to us, and, therefore, the kinds of conscious mental states that emotions are. I have spelt out the basic phenomenological claim, namely, that emotions have a bodily felt quality, and have done so because some of the arguments I give in support of the idea that emotions are the way they phenomenally appear to us require that at least that much is established. However, the claim that emotions are how they phenomenally appear to us is distinct from any particular theory regarding how emotions might phenomenally appear to us. For this reason, it isn’t necessary in this chapter to get into the specifics regarding the character of the bodily feelings associated with different emotions. Indeed, different philosophers could adopt differing views regarding how emotions phenomenally appear to us but agree that regardless of how that issue is resolved emotions are their ways of appearing. One could even hold that emotional phenomenology is complex, comprising types of bodily feelings along with a distinct cognitive and/or conative phenomenology (see, for instance, Kriegel 2012), but still maintain that emotions are their ways of appearing. In fact, it is even open to someone to hold that emotion does not phenomenally manifest a felt bodily nature at all, but still maintain that emotion is its characteristic way of appearing, whatever that might be (perhaps a purely non-bodily cognitive or conative or perceptual way of appearing). That being said, such a view would violate the basic phenomenological claim spelt out above and which I along with a number of other emotion theorists accept to be true.

 hy Emotions are Their W Phenomenal Appearances Although it is widely held that emotions have a distinctive phenomenology—where, again, in the case of emotion I am assuming the phenomenology in question has a bodily felt character—much less discussed is the question of the nature of the relationship between emotions and their characteristic ways of appearing. For observe that the claim that emotions appear to us in certain ways is consistent with the following ways of

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thinking about the relationship between an emotion and the way the emotion phenomenally appears to us. To begin with, that claim is consistent with the view that an emotion is distinct from the way it phenomenally appears to us. On this view, although emotions phenomenally appear a certain way to us, emotions do not comprise how they phenomenally appear to us even in part, in much the same way rocks and trees or freckles and scars are generally considered not to comprise even in part how they phenomenally appear to us in our experience of them. So perhaps emotions are states of bodily arousal that tend to feel a certain way when undergone, but, as with such things as freckles and scars, are to be characterized wholly independent of how they feel or phenomenally appear to us. Call this the ‘non-­ constitution view’. However, the claim that emotions have phenomenal properties is consistent also with the idea that emotions comprise their characteristic ways of appearing. This view—call it the ‘constitution view’—admits of a weaker and a stronger version. According to the weaker version, emotions are composite entities, consisting in part of how they phenomenally appear to us and in part of other things, whatever these might be. According to the stronger version of the constitution view, emotions consist entirely of their ways of appearing. That is to say, according to the stronger version no distinction exists between an emotion and its way of appearing; they are one and the same thing. For example, according to the stronger version fear is identical with the way fear feels or phenomenally appears to us, where if James is right how fear appears to us might involve such things as feelings of quickened heartbeats, visceral stirrings, and shallow breathing. Shortly, I will give one conceptual and one empirical consideration supporting the stronger version of the constitution view. But before doing that, I want to be clear on one thing. The weaker version of the constitution view is not to be confused with the view that emotions are their ways of appearing (as per the stronger version of the constitution view), but qua their ways of appearing are neural or bodily states. This latter view is one that a mind-brain (or mind-body) identity theorist might hold. But this view is not the weaker version of the constitution view. After all, the

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mind-brain identity theorist isn’t saying that emotions are neural states plus emotions’ ways of appearing. I make the point, first, to clarify the nature of the weaker version of the constitution view, which again takes emotions to be composite in nature, comprising their ways of appearing along with other things. It is this thesis I am contrasting with the stronger version of the constitution view, according to which emotions consist entirely of their ways of appearing. And, as I will make clear, the conceptual and empirical considerations I advance support the stronger, not weaker, version of the constitution view. Second, it follows that neither consideration I advance is an argument for rejecting a mind-brain or mind-body identity thesis.1 Even if my arguments succeed in showing that emotions are nothing but their ways of appearing, it will remain to be seen as to whether emotions qua their ways of appearing are neural or bodily states.2

Conceptual Consideration The conceptual consideration in favor of the view that emotions are their ways of appearing begins with the observation that although we say emotions are phenomenally conscious, we do not similarly say that such things as freckles and scars are phenomenally conscious, even though freckles and scars phenomenally appear to us in certain ways when we experience or observe them. For example, freckles and scars look a certain way to us when viewed in normal lighting conditions. Why, then, don’t we say freckles and scars are phenomenally conscious if freckles and scars phenomenally appear a certain way to us? The conceptual consideration has it that saying something is conscious is saying more than merely that thing phenomenally appears a certain way to us, namely it is saying that that thing comprises the way it phenomenally appears to us or has  Also, neither consideration should be taken to be a reason to reject a view according to which emotions may depend on the brain or body in some non-constitutive perhaps causal way. 2  This follows even if the fact of emotions being their ways of appearing serves as a premise in an argument showing that emotions are not neural or bodily states. It follows because the fact of emotions being there ways of appearing isn’t sufficient to reject the idea that emotions are neural or bodily states. To establish the falsity of that thesis, we would also need to show that neural or bodily states are not their ways of appearing (but for an argument to that effect, see Whiting 2016, 2018). 1

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phenomenal consciousness built into it, so to speak. Thus, we do not say freckles and scars are phenomenally conscious, despite their appearing or looking a certain way to us, because freckles and scars do not comprise how they phenomenally appear to us, whereas we do say that emotions are phenomenally conscious because emotions comprise how they phenomenally appear to us. Observe that the conceptual consideration supports the stronger, and not the weaker, version of the constitution view. It supports the stronger version, because although our idea of a conscious mental state seems to be that of something that comprises the way it appears to us, our idea of a conscious mental state doesn’t seem to be that of something that comprises more than how it phenomenally appears to us. Indeed, it would seem odd to say that our idea of a conscious mental state is that of something that is more than the way it appears to us, in much the same way it would seem odd to say our idea of a feeling is that of something comprising more than how it feels to us. Our idea of a feeling seems to be that of something that is exhausted by the way it feels, and similarly our idea of a conscious mental state seems to be that of a mental state that is exhausted by the way it phenomenally appears to us. Or, to put the point more figuratively, our idea of a conscious mental state seems to be that of a mental state that is shot through with consciousness. The conceptual consideration supports the stronger version of the constitution view even if it does not settle the matter. It might not settle the matter since our ideas about things can be mistaken. Thus, even if to call an emotion conscious is to attribute to that thing a phenomenal nature, perhaps we are mistaken to think emotions are conscious. If emotions are other than how they phenomenally appear to us, then perhaps we should not call emotions conscious. But the conceptual consideration bears some weight. First, it is plausible to suppose the way we think about things corresponds largely to the way things are, since it is plausible to suppose that how the world is shapes how we think about the world. Second, consider what is risked if we move too far from our concept or idea of something. For instance, suppose that to say an emotion is conscious is to say an emotion is identical with how it phenomenally appears to us, and suppose we reject the idea that emotions are identical with how they phenomenally appear to us. But then it would seem open to someone to

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complain that by saying emotions are not conscious we are revising our idea of an emotion to such an extent that it is no longer clear we are talking about emotion.

Empirical Consideration The conceptual consideration provides some support for the idea that emotions are their ways of appearing. Nevertheless, the point remains that there is reason to hold that we should not rely solely on our concepts regarding what emotions are, because our concepts might be incomplete or mistaken. In my view, a stronger argument for the idea that emotions are by nature phenomenally conscious mental states—and one that vindicates our concepts or ideas regarding what emotions are—appeals directly to our experience of emotion. Indeed, I believe the case for the stronger version of the constitution view becomes a very compelling one once we recognize that there are solid empirical reasons, reasons grounded in the experience of emotion, for thinking that is the right view to adopt. For although the experience doesn’t support the idea that freckles and scars are their appearances, how they look to us when we visually perceive them, for instance, the experience does strongly support the idea that emotions are nothing but their phenomenal appearances. That the experience does provide solid support for this idea can be seen by carrying out a simple experiment. When you next undergo an emotion—a pang of fear or anxiety, say—introspectively attend to the emotion and keep what you are attending to in mind. Once you have done that, attend to how the emotion feels or phenomenally appears to you in your experience of the emotion and keep what you are attending to in mind. Then, having done both of these things, reflect on whether you experienced your attention shifting when moving from the emotion to the phenomenal appearance of the emotion. Ask yourself whether you found yourself focusing on one thing when attending to the emotion and another thing when attending to how the emotion felt or phenomenally appeared to you. For instance, when moving attention from a pang of fear or anxiety you were undergoing to the way the fear or anxiety appeared to you, did you experience a shift in attention?

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I submit that the answer to the question just posed will be negative. In other words, I submit that what you found yourself attending to when attending to your fear or anxiety was what you found yourself attending to when attending to the characteristic feel of your fear or anxiety. And if that is the case, then it constitutes a strong argument based on the experience of emotion for the view that emotions are their ways of appearing. We fix our attention onto an emotion and then onto that emotion’s way of phenomenally appearing to us in our experience of the emotion, and in the process come to discover that they are one and the same thing.3 We might usefully compare the case of emotion with non-mental phenomena, such as freckles and scars. What happens when we do the same experiment, but this time with something like a freckle or a scar? For my part, when I move my attention from a freckle or scar I am experiencing to the way the freckle or scar looks or phenomenally appears to me, there clearly is a shift in attention. I find myself going from attending to something occupying the physical or non-mental world (the freckle or scar) to something occupying my inner mental world, so to speak (the way the freckle or scar appears or looks to me). Or, again, I go from attending to something (the freckle or scar) which seems to possess a physical or non-­ mental nature, such as a determinate shape, size, and texture, to something (how the freckle or scar phenomenally appears or looks to me) which seems to me in my experience of it to possess a wholly mental nature or character.4  Is this true of so-called ‘higher cognitive’ emotions, such as guilt and pride, emotions that are widely held to involve cognitive elements in addition to purely bodily sensory ones? Does the experience demonstrate for us that these states are identical with their characteristic way of appearing? I think so. As I will argue at length in Chap. 3, plausibly such states are feelings that qualify as pride or guilt in virtue of being triggered by certain thoughts (thoughts of wrongdoing in the case of guilt and thoughts of personal achievement in the case of pride), where the feelings in question are how they phenomenally appear to us. But suppose the thoughts in question are held to be constituent parts of pride and guilt and not merely individuating causes. Even if that were the case, I think the experience would show us that pride and guilt are their ways of appearing, albeit ways of appearing that are complex in nature, comprising sensory and cognitive elements (again on this point, see Chap. 3). 4  A ‘mental nature or character’ in the sense that the way a rock or tree looks to us embodies a perspective or first-person point of view or has an ‘aspectual shape’ (Searle 1992)—again these being properties of the way a rock or tree looks to us but not of the rock or tree itself. I don’t accept the idea, then, that experience is transparent, that when we attend to the way something looks or appears to us we find ourselves attending directly to the thing that appears to us and its properties 3

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And there are two further things to note here. First, recognize that claiming the experience demonstrates that emotions are nothing but how they phenomenally appear to us is not question-begging, since it is no forgone conclusion that when we introspectively attend to an emotion we will find that thing to be its way of appearing. That is to say, it is an open question as to whether the experience will support the idea that emotions are indistinguishable from their characteristic phenomenology. This is because it is plausible to think there could be a shift in attention from the emotion we are undergoing (anger or fear, say) to how the emotion phenomenally appears to us. After all, this is what we discover when we investigate non-mental phenomena, such as freckles and scars, namely that the things we are observing are distinct from how they look or phenomenally appear in our experience of them. Second, note that the empirical consideration supports the stronger version of the constitution view, not the weaker version. This is because when we move our attention from an emotion we are undergoing to the emotion’s characteristic way of appearing, we find ourselves attending to one and the same thing. Consequently, the empirical consideration doesn’t support the weaker version of the constitution view, according to which emotions contain constituent parts in addition to their characteristic ways of appearing. Does the empirical-based argument I advanced for the stronger version of the constitution view succeed, then? I think so. To show otherwise, we would either need to show there is a shift in attention when moving from the emotion to how the emotion phenomenally appears to us, or we would need to show that our experience or introspective observation of emotion cannot be trusted to tell us about what emotion might be. Now, as regard the first option, I contended that consideration of our own case shows there is no shift in attention when moving from an (for a discussion of the relevant literature, see Kind 2003). Although I agree that when we attend to a rock (say) we attend directly to the rock and its properties, this is a different act of attention from that we engage in when we attend to how a rock looks or appears to us. Again, this is shown by the fact that when we engage in the latter act of attention, but not the former, we are presented with a perspective or first-person point of view (on this point, see also Kind 2003; Siewert 2004; Whiting 2016).

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emotion to the emotion’s way of appearing. I assume most people agree with me on this point and, therefore, the burden of proof seems to lie with anyone who disagrees, who thinks there is a shift in attention when moving from an emotion to how the emotion phenomenally appears to us. As regard the second option, certainly some philosophers have given examples suggesting introspection can be in error (see for instance, Churchland 1988). However, these tend to describe fairly exotic cases, where due to unusual cognitive pressures (involving expectation and memory, for instance) people are more prone to making errors. Or they describe cases involving mental states that are extremely brief or have rapidly changing natures and for that reason hard to fix attention on for the purpose of learning something about them. Such cases might be sufficient to refute the idea that introspection is infallible, that we cannot be mistaken about what we are introspecting. But I am not seeking to defend any sort of infallibility thesis. Moreover, the kinds of cases that motivate the claim that I am wanting to defend—namely, that our experience of emotion supports the idea that emotions are their ways of appearing— pertain to cases that involve mental states whose natures are sufficiently stable and long-lasting to be reasonably clear to us. They also pertain to cases where no unusual cognitive pressures exist that risk leading us into error. Of course, someone might still doubt whether we can ever be certain the experience doesn’t mislead. But then such a doubt can be had about the trustworthiness of our experience of anything, including ordinary physical items such as rocks and trees, and it is difficult to see what argumentative force such an extreme form of skepticism can bear. Indeed, it is widely held that barring reason to think our experience of the world does mislead (either generally or in particular cases), we are justified in believing what the experience tells us, and that seems as true for our experience of emotion as for anything else. The introspective method is not everyone’s preferred philosophical method, including those who think we can gain insights into the nature of reality by engaging in conceptual or a priori thinking alone. But unless we have some kind of ‘mind-to-world’ contact with whatever it is we are trying to understand, then we can never know whether our concepts or ideas are accurate or not. No-one would deny such a thing with respect

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to a scientific claim, such as the claim that water is H2O, which can only be established empirically. It is true that some philosophers take a dim view of the role of introspection in coming to understand the nature of conscious mental states (though such a view is hardly universal; many continental and analytical minded philosophers accept that phenomenology has a vital role to play in our attaining an understanding of the conscious mind). But, again, suppose you agree that ultimately we find out about the nature of something only by observing that thing. Then you will likely agree that to find out whether emotions are nothing but their ways of appearing we need to inspect our emotions. Indeed, what other empirical-based methodology can we use to test that hypothesis? We can talk to people about their emotions, but they are only going to report on their experiences of emotion. We can do brain scans and look at other measurable behavioral data, but what is that going to tell us about the relationship between emotions and their phenomenal appearances? So I think introspection is inescapable, that we have no choice but to resort to introspection when testing the claim that emotions are their phenomenal appearances. Now, this would be a major concern if we had no reason to trust introspection. In that case we would seem resigned to never knowing whether emotions are as they phenomenally appear to us, a bleak view were there good reason to believe it to be true. But I have given a number of reasons for thinking that introspection is reliable as well as being the only empirical-based methodology available to us, and therefore I believe we would be mistaken to hold that introspection cannot tell us important truths about the nature of emotion.

 hy Emotions are Always W (Phenomenally) Conscious Although there are some notable exceptions (for instance, Damasio 1999; Prinz 2005; Winkielman et al. 2005), the idea that emotions are always conscious is a view that has been held by a great many psychologists and philosophers of emotion (e.g. James 1884; Freud 1950; Clore 1994;

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Panksepp 2005; Hatzimoysis 2007; Maiese 2011; Whiting 2011; Deonna and Teroni 2012). But is the view that emotions are always conscious a correct one? If the considerations that I have advanced succeed in showing that emotions are their ways of appearing, then the answer to the question just posed is affirmative. This is because if emotions are the way they phenomenally appear to us, indistinguishable from the way they phenomenally appear to us, then we cannot undergo an emotion that does not phenomenally appear to us in some way. The reason given for holding that emotions are always conscious is likely to invite a number of objections, however. First, it might be objected that acceptance of the stronger version of the constitution view succeeds only in demonstrating that some emotions are always conscious, namely the conscious emotions. For even supposing we discover that some fear episodes (say) are the way they phenomenally appear to us, why should this mean that all fear episodes are the way they phenomenally appear to us? A particular sculpture is made of bronze, but it does not follow that every sculpture is made of bronze. At most, all we can conclude is that every bronze sculpture is made of bronze. Similarly, all we can conclude from the fact that conscious emotions comprise their phenomenology is that every conscious emotion comprises its phenomenology. But the objection fails because it equivocates between two different ways in which we might speak of something ‘comprising’ certain of its properties. On the one hand, we might be saying that the thing in question is identical with those properties. When we say water comprises H2O molecules, we are saying that water is identical with H2O molecules. On the other hand, we might be saying that the thing in question materially comprises the properties in question but is not identical with those properties. This is what is going on in the sculpture case; the sculpture materially comprises a lump of bronze but is not identical with it. The sculpture is not identical with the lump of bronze that materially constitutes it because the sculpture and the lump of bronze bear different properties. For instance, their persistence conditions differ; the lump of bronze but not the sculpture can survive certain misadventures, such as being melteddown and remolded.

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Now, I take the claim that emotions are their distinctive ways of appearing to be an identity thesis and not a material constitution thesis. And certainly I think the two considerations I give in support of the strong version of the constitution thesis support the identity thesis. Understood as an identity thesis I think that thesis does entail that emotions are always conscious, in much the same way that the claim that water is H2O is sufficient (if it is true) to demonstrate that water is always H2O. And note that for this argument to go through it is sufficient that we discover one case only in which the identity thesis holds true. For instance, discovering that one sample of water is identical with H2O is sufficient to establish that every sample of water is H2O. Similarly, discovering that one episode of fear is its characteristic way of appearing is sufficient to establish that every episode of fear is its characteristic way of appearing. We can make a similar response to a related objection, which draws on the idea that emotion is whatever plays a certain causal or functional role. For instance, consider the claim that fear is whatever plays the fear role and anger is whatever plays the anger role (we can leave it open as to what these roles might be). Now, suppose that claim is true. Then it seems to follow that what counts as fear or anger in one case need not be what counts as fear or anger in another case. So long as some given state or entity discharges the role in question it will qualify as fear or anger. And in which case we might think that although in some cases fear and anger are their phenomenal appearances that need not be true in all cases. For we might imagine a case in which the thing that discharges the fear or anger role has a non-phenomenal nature. But we should disagree with the reasoning here. If fear and anger are their phenomenal appearances, then only mental states that are the phenomenal appearances in question can be fear and anger. If something is not the phenomenal appearance in question, then even if it discharges a role similar to that discharged by fear or anger it would not be fear or anger (in the same way that if something is not H2O, then even if it plays the same role that water plays it would not be water). So to put the point in another way, we cannot hold both the position that fear or anger is its way of appearing and the position that something that is not its way of appearing (or, in other words, is not fear or anger) is fear or anger if it

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discharges the fear or anger role. If a given thing is not its way of appearing and fear or anger is its way of appearing, then the thing in question cannot be fear or anger whatever functional or causal role that thing might be discharging.5 At this point we could try to move to a position that holds that fear and anger are identical with the functional or causal roles themselves (that is, as opposed to being identical with whatever it is that might contingently discharge those causal or functional roles). In actual fact, the claim that something is its phenomenal appearance need not rule out the idea that the thing in question is identical with a causal role it discharges if, as I think is the case with desires, for instance, functional or causal properties can be phenomenal in nature (see Chap. 4).6 But, if the position is supposed to be that fear and anger are identical with certain functional properties but not with the way they phenomenally appear to us, then that position is false. For I have gone lengths to argue that fear and anger are phenomenally conscious mental states by their very nature. The first two objections fail to show that emotions are not always conscious. Both fail to recognize the power of an identity thesis. If something is identical with certain of its properties (for instance, if fear is identical with its phenomenal appearance, and water is identical with its molecular constitution), then that holds true always, in all possible worlds, so to speak, and there can be no exceptions. If water is H2O then water is always H2O, and if emotions are identical with how they phenomenally appear to us then emotions are always identical with how they phenomenally appear to us.

 More precisely, the idea that if emotions are the way they feel, then emotions are always how they feel, serves as a reductio of the idea that emotions are whatever play a certain functional or causal role. In other words, emotions cannot be whatever play a certain functional or causal role, because that would have the absurd implication that emotions need not always be how they feel. The implication is absurd because if emotions are how they feel then necessarily emotions are always how they feel. Compare, water cannot be whatever substance it is that plays the water role, as that would imply that water need not always be H2O, where, again, the implication would be absurd because if water is H2O then necessarily water is always H2O. 6  Very briefly, I am strongly inclined to the view that desires are phenomenally conscious mental states that are behavioral dispositions, which in Chap. 4 I define as mental properties whose nature or essence is to cause us to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain. And if this is right then desires look to be phenomenal states that are identified in terms of their causal roles. 5

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The remaining objections to the thesis that emotions are always conscious proceed by way of counterexample. These counterexamples do not seek to reject the idea that if emotions are their phenomenal appearances, then emotions are always conscious. However, if these counterexamples are successful, they would potentially show something much more serious, namely that we should reject the idea that emotions are their phenomenal appearances. For if cases exist where emotions do not phenomenally appear any way to the possessors of the emotions, then we have good reason to think emotions cannot be their ways of appearing, since I have just argued that such cases could not exist if emotions are their phenomenal appearances. At stake here, then, is the credibility of the idea that emotions are always conscious as well as the credibility of the idea that emotions are their characteristic ways of appearing. To begin with, then, suppose Marcel is jealous of his neighbor’s possessions and Josiah has a fear of spiders. Now, it seems we can assign these emotions to Marcel and Josiah even when they are not undergoing occurrent or episodic emotions. For instance, we can say that Marcel is jealous of his neighbor’s possessions and Josiah fears spiders when Marcel and Josiah are dreamlessly sleeping. For this reason, it might be held that such emotions are dispositional in nature.7 So Marcel’s jealousy is a disposition to undergo occurrent states of negative affect when Marcel thinks about his neighbor’s possessions and Josiah’s fear of spiders is a disposition to undergo occurrent states of fear when Josiah perceives or thinks about spiders. Unlike occurrent emotions, which tend to be transitory mental states and have a distinctive phenomenology of their own, emotions such as jealousy of one’s neighbor’s possessions and fear of spiders might seem to be standing mental states that have no characteristic phenomenology of their own. For instance, there is nothing that it is like to be jealous of  Michael-John Turp seems to come close to expressing such a view when he writes: “Although it is true that human emotions normally involve bodily feelings, there are also quite ordinary cases in which emotions remain with us long after the violent neurological-hormonal-muscular sensations and concomitant desire to act die down. Emotions can come in short fiery bursts, but they can also be long-lived and mostly unconscious, such as the enduring love of a mother for her child. Of course, some characteristic activity of the nervous system remains, but the same is true of all mental states. A mother does not only love her child when she is conscious of the accompanying feelings. For this reason it is standard to draw a distinction between occurrent emotional episodes and emotional dispositions”. (Turp 2018). 7

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a neighbor’s possessions or frightened of spiders when dreamlessly sleeping. But in response, I think those who consider standing emotions to be counterexamples to the idea that emotions are always conscious infer an invalid conclusion. For according to them, when we say a person is afraid of spiders or jealous of a neighbor’s possessions we attribute to the person a disposition to certain episodic emotions. And from which it is inferred these standing mental states are dispositions to episodic emotions. However, the inference is invalid, because we are entitled only to infer that the possessing or having of these mental states is a matter of being disposed to certain emotions. Even if for someone to have a fear of spiders is for someone to be disposed to undergo fear in the perceived presence of spiders, this entitles us only to make an inference about what it is to have or possess a fear of spiders. It does not entitle us to make any inference regarding the nature of a fear of spiders, as to whether a fear of spiders is a disposition or not. With respect to standing emotions, then, I think we need to distinguish between an emotion and the having of an emotion, and maintain that in cases of standing emotions, it is the having of an emotion that has a dispositional nature and lacks a characteristic way of appearing, not the emotion itself.8 And here like examples are easy to find. For instance, consider how we might say of a javelin thrower who is asleep that they have an unusual throwing action, or of a watch hidden in a drawer that it looks a certain way. Plausibly, in both cases we are assigning dispositions to the things in question, namely the disposition to throw a javelin in a certain way and the disposition to look a certain way. But no one infers  Does talk of ‘having’ or ‘possessing’ a standing emotion pick out a genuine property exemplification relation? It is unclear that it does. On the face of it, such talk picks out only a disposition to exemplify a property. Thus, to say that someone has a standing fear of spiders is to say that that person is disposed to exemplify fear in the perceived presence of spiders. One might respond that we should instead think of there being two ways in which a property might be exemplified, namely that something can be exemplified in an occurrent way and something can be exemplified in a dispositional way. However, I’m not sure this is right. If to have a standing fear of spiders is to be disposed to exemplify fear in the perceived presence of spiders, then that implies that the occurrent sense of ‘exemplify’ is the only correct sense of ‘exemplify’, and that although talk of having or possessing a standing emotion may suggest there is a dispositional way an emotion can be exemplified, careful consideration of what it means to possess a standing emotion demonstrates we would be wrong to interpret such talk in this way. 8

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that a throwing action is the disposition to throw a certain way and the look of a thing is a disposition to look a certain way. Or to take another example, observe that many birds have alarm calls that they sound in situations of danger. Observe also that birds have alarm calls when they are sleeping and not sounding those alarms. Are we to infer that birds’ alarm calls are the dispositions to sound certain calls? Clearly not. Although for a bird to have or possess an alarm call when asleep might be for a bird to be disposed to sound certain calls in the event of being awake and perceptually encountering things that might threaten harm, the alarm calls themselves are discrete episodes of sound and not the dispositions to emit such sounds.9 Similarly, we can agree that what it is for Josiah to have a fear of spiders when asleep is for Josiah to be such as to undergo episodic fear when awake and in the perceived presence of spiders. And we can agree that what it is for Marcel to be jealous of his neighbor’s possessions when asleep is for Marcel to be such as to undergo displeasure when awake and thinking about what his neighbor has. Thus, if Josiah fails to be such as to undergo fear when awake and in the presence of spiders, then Josiah cannot be described as having a fear of spiders when asleep. And if Marcel fails to be such as to feel displeasure when awake and thinking about what his neighbor has, then Marcel cannot be said to be jealous of what his neighbor has when asleep. However, that is not to say a fear of spiders and jealousy of what a neighbor has are dispositions to emotion. Indeed, according to this way of treating standing emotions, the mental states in question are discrete mental episodes that someone is disposed to undergo when certain circumstances obtain.10 Thus, we might  One might query whether possessing an alarm call is better thought of as a capacity, rather than a disposition. But in reply, even accepting that capacities are distinct from dispositions (see Chap. 4), the point about birds possessing alarm calls is intended only to demonstrate that from facts about what it is to have a certain property (an alarm call or an emotion, say), we cannot derive facts about the nature of the property itself. 10  Or, at least, emotions that someone tends to replicate or imitate when certain circumstances obtain. I will remain neutral regarding whether one and the same mental state can be occupied on more than one occasion. If mental states are temporally located entities—in the way that events are often considered to be temporally-located entities—then no mental state can be undergone on more than one occasion. But even if that is the case, certainly one and the same mental state can be imitated or replicated on more than one occasion. 9

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say that Marcel’s jealousy comprises the feelings of negative affect he is disposed to undergo when thinking about his neighbor’s possessions, and Josiah’s fear of spiders is the feeling of fear that he is disposed to undergo in the perceived presence of spiders. And importantly for present purposes, note that this way of treating standing emotions is entirely consistent with supposing that the mental episodes in question and which identify the standing emotions are phenomenally conscious mental states. Standing or dispositional emotions pose no threat to the idea that emotions are always conscious. However, there are also cases involving emotions of an indisputably occurrent or episodic kind that might seem to challenge the idea that emotions are always conscious. Consider, for instance, the case of a bereaved husband who originally thinks that he is feeling angry with what he perceived to be the unfairness of life, but comes to realize (after seeing a therapist, perhaps) that he is really feeling angry with his spouse for dying (Smith and Lane 2016). Or consider someone who is under the impression that the feelings they are undergoing are ones of excitement (knots in the stomach, flittering butterflies), when the person is actually feeling anxious. Or to take an often-discussed example from experimental psychology, consider a study in which participants were asked to rate the pleasantness of a fruit beverage after being shown subliminal images of happy, angry, or neutral, faces (Winkielman et al. 2005). Study participants who had been shown happy faces were found to rate the pleasantness of the beverage higher than those shown angry or neutral faces. They were also more likely to consume larger amounts of the beverage than participants shown angry or neutral faces. Now it is plausible to suppose that differences in behavior were due to differences in emotion. Study participants shown happy faces rated the beverage more highly because positive emotion had been induced in them. And yet when asked, study participants were able to report no differences in how they felt. It seems emotions were present but went undetected by study participants. Do the sorts of cases just described show that emotions can be unconscious? The answer is negative if by calling an emotion ‘unconscious’ we mean to say it is an emotion that fails to have a characteristic feel or phenomenology. For none of the cases just discussed entail there was nothing it was like for the subjects of the emotions in question to undergo those emotions. Although the bereaved husband failed to identify correctly the

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object or source of his anger, there is no suggestion his anger failed to feel any way to him. An act of misidentification is evident also in the case of the person who believes erroneously they are excited, though in this case it is the emotion type that is misidentified (excitement rather than anxiety). But again, there is no suggestion the person undergoes an emotion that fails to feel any way to them. Indeed, the allusion to ‘butterflies’ and ‘knots in the stomach’ clearly evidences the presence of emotional phenomenology. The Winkielman and colleagues study might seem more challenging to the idea that emotions are always conscious, since that study involved participants who avowed to possess wholesale unawareness of emotion. But even if the Winkielman and colleagues study shows that people can fail to consciously reflect on or have knowledge of their emotions, this wouldn’t be enough to demonstrate that people can undergo emotions that fail to feel or phenomenally appear a certain way to them. This is because claiming that emotions have a characteristic feel or phenomenology is not to rule out the idea that people can sometimes fail to consciously reflect on or have knowledge of their emotions (cp. Lambie and Marcel 2002). The point I am making is that we need to distinguish between two different ways in which we might talk about our being consciously aware of our emotions. According to the first, to be consciously aware of an emotion just is to feel or experience the emotion. This is the sense of conscious awareness that is at play when we speak about an emotion having a characteristic phenomenology or way of appearing, the idea being that an emotion has a characteristic way of appearing only in virtue of being experienced by us. Whereas according to the second way in which we might talk about our being consciously aware of our emotions, to be consciously aware of an emotion is just a matter of our reflecting on the emotion we are undergoing or having knowledge of our undergoing an emotion of a certain type. And the worry is that Winkielman and colleagues give us no reason why we shouldn’t interpret their study findings to show only that people can fail to have conscious awareness in the sense of not reflecting on their emotions or having knowledge of the emotions they are undergoing. After all, a number of reasons exist as to why study participants may have

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failed to reflect on or have knowledge of changes in emotions undergone or experienced. In particular, it seems sensible to suppose that the emotions elicited might have been too transient and faintly felt to be consciously registered by study participants. Note, this is consistent with supposing the emotions undergone still had the power to influence study participants’ behaviors in ways described by the study authors. Therefore, unless a compelling case can be given for thinking the study findings support better the idea that emotions were not felt or experienced, we cannot take those findings to be showing that emotions need not always be phenomenally conscious.

Concluding Remarks I have argued that emotions are phenomenally conscious mental states, mental states that are nothing but their phenomenal appearances. I outlined a number of conceptual and empirical considerations in defense of that position, though I explained why the empirical considerations bear the most weight. I also argued at length that if emotions are their phenomenal appearances, then necessarily emotions are always conscious, the reason being that emotions cannot be how they phenomenally appear to us if emotions can fail to phenomenally appear any way to us. In arguing for that view, I considered a number of objections to the idea that emotions are always conscious but explained why none of them succeed in overturning that idea. I would like to flag up a couple of things as way of concluding the chapter. First, although my focus has been on emotion, we might well ask whether the considerations I advanced in support of the view that emotions are constituted by their phenomenology depend on features that are special to emotion or are shared by other mental states. After all, it is widely accepted that many mental states have a phenomenology of their own, that there is something it is like to visually experience a sunset, for instance, or to desire to eat chocolate, or to think a thought. And if that is so, then it is sensible to wonder whether such mental states might also be identical with how they phenomenally appear to us. In fact, we might think it odd if such mental states do not comprise the way they

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phenomenally appear to us. For why should this feature of emotion be peculiar to emotion? Surely, if emotions are constituted by their ways of appearing, then we would expect other conscious mental states to be constituted by their ways of appearing as well. Second, returning to the main objective of Part I of the book, namely a defence of a feeling theory of emotion, I have explained already why establishing that emotions are how they phenomenally appear to us serves an important purpose in our coming to know about the specific character of our emotions. Again, if emotions are how they phenomenally appear to us, then we will get to know whether, for instance, emotions are thought-like states or perceptual-like states or conative-like states or feeling states that bear no intentional relation to anything, only by attending to the way emotions phenomenally appear to us. Indeed, if emotions are their ways of appearing, then attending to the phenomenology seems inescapable. For in that case attending to other observable data, such as brain scans and observable bodily changes, will tell us little about the specific character of emotion. Of limited value also will be the language we use when speaking about emotion. If we get to know about the nature of emotion by attending to what it is like to undergo emotion, then we will have reason to accept everyday talk about emotion only if such talk is vindicated by the experience of emotion. As way of illustrating the point just made, notice that we commonly talk about emotions being about or of things. For instance, I might say that I am frightened of a dog or frustrated about the weather. Everyday talk suggests that emotions are object-directed mental states, in the same way that thoughts, desires and perceptual states are commonly taken to be object-directed mental states. But is such talk borne-out by the phenomenology of emotion? I will leave this question unanswered until the next chapter. For now, the point is simply this: we cannot answer such a question solely by appealing to our language about emotion. For again if emotions are their characteristic ways of appearing, then we will have reason to accept the way that we talk about emotion only if such talk is borne out by how emotions phenomenally appear to us. Now, I spelt out earlier what I called the basic phenomenological claim, namely the idea that at a minimum, what it is like to undergo an emotion is (or is closely akin to) what it is like to undergo certain kinds

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of bodily feelings or sensations. The basic phenomenological claim was needed to motivate some of the arguments that I later outlined in support of the thesis that emotions are as they phenomenally appear to us. However, I also explained that the basic phenomenological claim tells us nothing about the specific nature of the bodily feelings associated with different emotions, as to whether, for instance, they have representational properties or not. And so it is to this issue of the nature of the bodily felt qualities with which emotions are identical that I turn in Chap. 3. There I will argue for the distinctive view that emotions are feeling states that lack intentional or representational properties of their own.

References Carruthers, P. (2005). Conscious Experience Versus Conscious Thoughts. In Consciousness: Essays from a Higher-Order Perspective (pp. 134–156). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Churchland, P. (1988). Matter and Consciousness. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Clore, G. (1994). Why Emotions are Never Unconscious. In P.  Ekman & R.  Davidson (Eds.), The Nature of Emotion: Fundamental Questions (pp. 285–290). New York: Oxford University Press. Damasio, A. (1999). The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness. New York: Harcourt Brace. Deonna, J., & Teroni, F. (2012). The Emotions. A Philosophical Introduction. Oxon: Routledge. Döring, S. (2007). Seeing What to Do: Affective Perception and Rational Motivation. Dialectica, 61, 363–394. Freud, S. (1950). Collected Papers (J. Riviere, Trans., vol. 4). London: Hogarth Press and The Institute of Psychoanalysis. Hatzimoysis, A. (2007). The Case Against Unconscious Emotions. Analysis, 67, 292–299. Horgan, T., & Tienson, J. (2002). The Intentionality of Phenomenology and the Phenomenology of Intentionality. In D.  Chalmers (Ed.), Philosophy of Mind: Classical and Contemporary Readings (pp. 520–533). Oxford: Oxford University Press. James, W. (1884). What is an Emotion? Mind, 9, 188–205.

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Kind, A. (2003). What’s so Transparent About Transparency? Philosophical Studies, 115, 225–244. Kriegel, U. (2012). Towards a New Feeling Theory of Emotion. European Journal of Philosophy, 3, 420–442. Lambie, J., & Marcel, A. (2002). Consciousness and the Varieties of Emotion Experience: A Theoretical Framework. Psychological Review, 109, 219–259. Maiese, M. (2011). Embodiment, Emotion, and Cognition. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Nagel, T. (1974). What is it Like to be a Bat? Philosophical Review, 83, 435–450. Panksepp, J. (2005). Affective Consciousness: Core Emotional Feelings in Animals and Humans. Consciousness and Cognition, 14, 30–80. Pitt, D. (2004). The Phenomenology of Cognition or What is it Like to Think that p? Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 69, 1–36. Prinz, J. (2004). Gut Reactions. A Perceptual Theory of Emotion. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Prinz, J. (2005). Are Emotions Feelings? Journal of Consciousness Studies, 12, 9–25. Searle, J. (1992). The Rediscovery of Mind. Cambridge: MIT Press. Siewert, C. (2004). Is Experience Transparent? Philosophical Studies, 117, 15–41. Smith, S., & Lane, R. (2016). Unconscious Emotion: A Cognitive Neuroscientific Perspective. Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 69, 216–238. Strawson, G. (1994). Mental Reality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Turp, M.-J. (2018). Normativity, Realism, and Emotional Experience. Philosophia. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-018-9984-7. Tye, M. (1995). Ten Problems of Consciousness. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Whiting, D. (2011). The Feeling Theory of Emotion and the Object-Directed Emotions. European Journal of Philosophy, 19, 281–301. Whiting, D. (2016). On the Appearance and Reality of Mind. Journal of Mind and Behavior, 37, 47–70. Whiting, D. (2018). Consciousness and Emotion. In R.  Gennaro (Ed.), Routledge Handbook of Consciousness. New York: Routledge. Winkielman, P., Berridge, K., & Wilbarger, J. (2005). Emotion, Behavior, and Conscious Experience: Once More Without Feeling. In L.  Barrett, P.  Niedenthal, & P.  Winkielman (Eds.), Emotion and Consciousness (pp. 335–362). London: Guildford Press.

3 Emotions as Original Existences

A passion is an original existence, or, if you will, modification of existence, and contains not any representative quality, which renders it a copy of any other existence or modification. When I am angry, I am actually possest with the passion, and in that emotion have no more a reference to any other object, than when I am thirsty, or sick, or more than five foot high. It is impossible, therefore, that this passion can be opposed by, or be contradictory to truth and reason; since this contradiction consists in the disagreement of ideas, considered as copies, with those objects, which they represent. —David Hume (1896, 415)

Introduction It is probably right to say there is no psychological kind whose nature is more contested than emotion. Indeed, a quick survey of the literature finds emotions being associated with a whole range of things. In some cases, one type of thing is considered primary to an understanding of emotion, say, an evaluative judgment (Solomon 1993; Nussbaum 2001), or a perceptual-like state (Prinz 2004; Döring 2007; Tappolet 2016), or a desire or action tendency (Frijda 1986; Maiese 2011; Deonna and © The Author(s) 2020 D. Whiting, Emotions as Original Existences, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54682-3_3

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Teroni 2012; Scarantino 2014), or a raw feeling (Hume 1896; James 1884; Whiting 2011). In other cases, a number of mental (and sometimes bodily) properties are considered key to a proper understanding of emotion (see, for instance, Scherer 1984; Green 1992; Barlassina and Newen 2013). Given there are so many theories of emotion to choose from, there seems little point in evaluating each theory in turn. My strategy is more direct. I will present the case for holding that emotions are sui generis bodily feelings that lack representational or intentional properties, and then I will defend that theory from various objections. If my defense succeeds, then we can conclude that other theories of emotion are mistaken without needing to painstakingly assess these theories and the arguments that have been given in their favor. Just a number of things to note before we get started. First, I call the theory of emotion that I defend a ‘feeling theory of emotion’, where such a theory is to be distinguished from a cognitive theory, or perceptual theory, or conative theory, or hybrid theory, or whatever. Now, there is a respect in which this way of putting things might not seem quite right, since the theories of emotion with which the feeling theory I defend are being contrasted may well also count as feeling theories, if ‘feeling’ is understood in one way that term is sometimes understood. This is because if emotion has a characteristic phenomenology and is identical with that phenomenology, then there is a respect in which emotions are feelings, even if emotions comprise a perceptual-like phenomenology or a conative phenomenology or a cognitive phenomenology. For on one way of understanding the word ‘feels’ to speak of the way something feels is to speak of the way something phenomenally appears to us, and therefore any theory that identifies emotions with the way they phenomenally appear to us will in that respect count as a feeling theory. However, in what follows I understand the label ‘feeling theory of emotion’ in the way that label is most commonly understood in the literature, namely as referring to a theory according to which emotions are, or are very closely akin to, (types of ) bodily sensations or what are sometimes known as ‘raw feelings’, where ‘raw’ implies the absence of complex representational properties. William James held a version of a feeling theory as that theory is normally understood, as did David Hume, the

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latter referring to the emotions as ‘original existences’, by which Hume means that emotions have no representational properties of their own. Second, as is now fairly standard practice, I consider ‘representational’ and ‘intentional’ as being more or less synonymous terms, both picking out ways objects are presented in mind. Thus, to talk about the intentional object of a mental state is to talk about an object as it is presented or represented by that mental state (for further discussion, see Searle 1992; Crane 2001; Whiting 2011). Consequently, because I do not think emotions are representational mental states, it follows that I do not think emotions are intentional or object-directed mental states. Now, this may or may not have been Hume’s view. On the one hand, in the passage where Hume talks about emotions being original existences, Hume claims that emotions have no representational properties and make no reference to objects. Here Hume seems to be clearly treating ‘intentionality’ and ‘representationality’ as being equivalent. On the other hand, Hume does elsewhere talk about ‘objects’ of emotions (for instance, he talks about the self being the object of pride and humility), thereby seeming to imply that emotions can be object-directed even if they are not representational (on this point, see Radcliffe 2018). But again, regardless of what Hume’s own view might be on this, I draw no distinction between intentional and representational properties, as will become clearer later on in the chapter. Third, I mentioned that my approach will not be to go through different theories with view to showing they are false. Nevertheless, and perhaps needless to say, many of the arguments that I advance in favor of the feeling theory of emotion can be viewed as reasons for not accepting other theories of emotion. To take a simple example, suppose my argument for holding that emotions fail to have intentional or representational properties is successful. In which case, not only would that serve as an argument for the theory of emotion I defend, namely that emotions are non-representational feeling states, but it would also serve as reason to reject perceptual and cognitive theories of emotion, which consider emotions to be representational states.

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The Feeling Theory of Emotion In its most concise form the theory of emotion I am advancing holds that emotions are sui generis feeling states that possess no representational or intentional properties of their own. I will now spell-out and provide positive arguments supporting three key features of the feeling theory of emotion as just formulated.

Emotions are Feeling States According to the feeling theory of emotion, emotions are types of bodily feelings or sensations, albeit as I explain in the next section feelings that are unlike other kinds of bodily feelings or sensations such as physical pains, aches, and itches. For instance, we might identify an episode of fear with a distinctive edgy feeling, a bout of anger with an irritable or hot-headed sensation, and a pang of sadness with a downcast or heavy-­ hearted feeling. And as the examples help to make evident, on this view emotions of different types can be distinguished from one another by virtue of the differences in how those emotions feel. Thus, fear, anger, and sadness differ from one another by virtue of feeling different from one another, that is, by virtue of the differences in their felt qualities. Again, whereas fear has a felt edgy quality, anger manifests a felt irritable or hot-­ headed quality, and sadness has a felt downcast or heavy-hearted quality. Why, then, should we accept a feeling theory of emotion? One reason is that such a theory seems to most closely accord with the folk-concept of emotion. If asked most people would likely say that emotions are feelings. Indeed, the claim receives empirical support. As Andrea Scarantino (citing Panksepp 2001) notes: “When asked to rank in order of importance five ‘attributes’ of emotion—facial expressions, vocal expressions, feeling states, cognitive changes, and autonomic changes—English speakers reliably pick feelings as most important”. (2016, 7) That a feeling theory of emotion accords with the folk concept of emotion provides some support for a feeling theory. As pointed out in Chap. 2, it is plausible to suppose the way we commonly think about things corresponds largely to the way things are, since it is plausible to

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suppose that how we think about the world is shaped largely by how the world is. Moreover, even if we decide that some revision of our pre-theoretical beliefs about emotion is needed, we might worry that substantial revision of those beliefs is likely not to clarify our understanding of emotion, but to lead to reservations over whether it is emotion and not some other mental state (for, instance, belief, perception, or desire) that is being considered (see Priest 1995). The above being said, the strongest argument for a feeling theory— one that vindicates and plausibly explains our pre-theoretical notions of emotion—is phenomenological, namely, that that theory accords with how emotions phenomenally appear to us in our experience of them. As way of example, consider the fear we undergo when confronted with something that threatens us. Such a mental state presents itself to us as being a distinctive edgy sensation and one that we often feel in our limbs and the pit of our stomachs. Or to take another example, consider a state of anger felt in response to some slight committed against us. Such a mental state presents itself to us as being nothing more than an irritable or incensed sensation, one that often pervades the head area (hence, such expressions as “a rush of blood to the head” when describing anger). William James’s subtraction argument for a feeling theory establishes much the same point. James writes: If we fancy some strong emotion, and then try to abstract from our consciousness of it all the feelings of its characteristic bodily symptoms, we find that we have nothing left behind, no ‘mind-stuff’ out of which the emotion can be constituted…. (William James 1884, 193)

James is here advancing a phenomenological argument for the claim that emotions are nothing but bodily feelings or sensations (on this point, see also Prinz 2004). Abstract from our experience of fear its distinctive edgy bodily quality or from our experience of anger its unique hotheaded or incensed quality, and we seem to ‘have nothing left behind, no ‘mind-­ stuff’ out of which the emotion can be constituted’. In fact, close attention to what it is like to undergo an emotion points to a number of features of emotion that support emotions being types of bodily feelings or sensations. First, as just explained it points to emotions

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having distinct felt qualities. Here we might compare with other types of bodily feelings—for instance, a headache or a sensation of movement in the bowels—which also manifest a felt or sensual quality. Second, attention to the phenomenology demonstrates that as with other feelings emotions vary in their intensity. A state of terror differs from a state of mild uneasiness not so much in terms of the felt qualities of the two mental states in question—thus, they both have an edgy feel to them (hence, the reason why they are types of fear)—but rather in terms of the strength of the feelings that characterize these two emotions. Third, the phenomenology evidences to us that emotions are passive mental states, things that happen to us, rather than things that we actively do. Again this is true of bodily feelings or sensations more generally. Finally, emotions, as with other kinds of bodily feelings, strike us phenomenologically as being mental states that wax and wane, that is change with respect to their felt intensity, over time. What might start as a mild edgy feeling can in the right circumstances gradually or quickly build up to a state of panic or terror. Again, compare with a stomach-ache, for instance, which can also start as a mild throbbing sensation but can soon build up to something more intense and unpleasant. Notice that I speak about emotions being types of bodily feelings. In actual fact, I am not sure whether it is quite right to talk of emotional feelings as being merely bodily in nature. That implies that emotions are no different in kind from such things as physical pains, itches, and various aches, which seem to be phenomenal states that relate us to the body and nothing else, whereas, as I explain more below and also in Chap. 7, emotions seem to be tied up with the self in some deep way. Nevertheless, if all we mean by calling a feeling ‘bodily’ is that the feeling is experienced as occurring in the body and/or its parts, then I think emotions qualify as bodily feelings, since emotions are feelings that we experience as taking place in the body. For instance, when we are frightened we might experience our fear as pervading our guts and limbs, and when we are sad we might experience our sadness as occurring in the chest area. Viewing emotions as types of bodily feelings or sensations gives rise to a couple of questions. First, is the claim that emotions are bodily feelings true for all emotions? Peter Poellner (drawing on Max Scheler 1980) holds that admiration, awe, indignation, and pity need not involve bodily

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feelings (2016, 272–273). Now, there is a legitimate question to be asked as to whether the mental states that Poellner mentions are nothing but emotions. Arguably, these mental states involve certain thoughts in addition to emotions. In other words, they look to be mental states that later in the chapter I refer to as ‘higher cognitive emotions’. For instance, indignation seems to involve the thought of some other person having committed a wrong-doing and pity the thought of some other person having suffered a misfortune. I will return to the question of how the ‘higher cognitive emotions’ should be viewed when considering objections to the feeling theory of emotion.1 Nevertheless, insofar as these mental states (also) involve emotions (which I assume they do), I believe Poellner is mistaken to hold they do not comprise bodily feelings. Admiration comprises a pleasure sensation that tends to pervade the head area. Awe seems to involve fear tinged with pleasure, where fear and pleasure have a bodily felt character. Indignation comprises an angry sensation that tends to pervade the head area along with other parts of the body. And pity comprises a sad or pained sensation that we often experience in the chest (hence why we say such things as ‘one’s heart aching with pity’). Moreover, since I am unable to think of any other mental state that serves as a compelling counterexample to the view that all emotions involve bodily feelings, then I think the claim that emotions are bodily feelings is indeed true for all emotions. Second, does the idea that we experience emotion as occurring in the body commit us to the view that emotion is directed at the body or its parts, which would make the body and/or its parts the intentional object of emotion? This seems to be James’s view. James writes: “My theory…is that the bodily changes follow directly the perception of the exciting fact, and that our feeling of the same changes as they occur is the emotion” (1890, 449). On James’s theory, then, emotions are feelings of bodily changes or patterns of bodily changes, where the bodily changes in question look to be intentional objects of the sensation.  As I will explain later in the chapter, whether we are to view higher cognitive emotions as nothing but emotions will largely depend on whether we think the thoughts involved in these mental states are parts of the mental states in question or are only what I later refer to as ‘individuating causes’ of the mental states in question. 1

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However, I think the answer to the question just posed is negative, since we can distinguish between the emotion and the experience or awareness we have of the emotion occurring or being instantiated in the body. Now, whereas the latter experience is most certainly directed at the body, I believe the same is not true of the former, and indeed I will later argue that emotions have no intentional or representational properties of their own. We might state the difference between James’s view and the view I am advancing as follows. Whereas James takes emotions to be feelings of bodily change, I take emotions to be feelings we are often aware of as occurring in the body, but which are not intentionally directed towards the body. On the feeling theory of emotion that I defend, then, emotions are not sensations of bodily change. The point is important for at least two reasons. First, it means that it cannot be complained against the feeling theory I am advancing that there is no strict one-to-one relationship between an emotion and the pattern of bodily changes that on a Jamesian view of emotion might be associated with the emotion in question (see, for example, Reisenzein and Stephan 2014). I do not know whether every emotion does have its own ‘bodily signature’ (it seems the evidence is inconclusive: Scarantino and de Sousa 2018). But clearly if a theory of emotion holds that an emotion of a certain type is identical with the sensation of certain bodily changes, and it turns out the emotion can be undergone without the associated bodily changes occurring, then that causes difficulties for the theory of emotion in question.2 However, it would not cause difficulties for a theory that holds only that emotions are types of feelings we experience as occurring in the body. For then the link between emotions and certain bodily changes need not be such a strong one. Thus, on the theory of emotion I defend we might hold that even if certain bodily changes often accompany emotions of different types, this need not always be the case. Indeed, that theory of emotion does not even  A defender of James might think the worry is not entirely insuperable, since they might argue the position that a person can experience bodily changes without those bodily changes occurring. Antonio Damasio nods towards such an idea when he speaks about there being ‘neural devices that help us feel “as if ” we were having an emotional state, as if the body were being activated and modified’ (Damasio 1994, 155), though Damasio goes onto say that he doubts ‘those feelings feel the same as the feelings minted in a real body state.’ (1994, 156). 2

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have to rule out the idea that an emotion can be undergone without any bodily activity occurring, though such an idea would be controversial. The second reason why the distinction I have drawn between James’s theory of emotion and the one I defend is important is that it cannot be so easily objected to my account of emotion that it commits us to the view that emotions discharge no kind of motivational role with respect to how we behave. James committed himself to such a view, because for James emotions follow on from certain behavioral displays and therefore cannot motivate the behaviors in question. As James provocatively puts the point: Common sense says, we lose our fortune, are sorry and weep; we meet a bear, are frightened and run; we are insulted by a rival, are angry and strike. The hypothesis here to be defended says that this order of sequence is incorrect, that the one mental state is not immediately induced by the other, that the bodily manifestations must first be interposed between, and that the more rational statement is that we feel sorry because we cry, angry because we strike, afraid because we tremble, and not that we cry, strike, or tremble, because we are sorry, angry, or fearful, as the case may be. (James 1890, 449–450)

For James, then, the idea that emotions are not themselves the things that motivate us to behave in certain ways is a consequence of the view that emotions are sensations of the behaviors and bodily changes in question and, therefore, cannot help to explain them. Now, it is questionable whether James needed to commit himself to this position. James might have advanced the view that emotions are feelings of involuntary physiological changes only, thus leaving open the possibility that emotion still has a role in motivating more purposeful human behavior. And in fact, this is a view that Reisenzein and Stephan claim James did come to advance in later work (2014, 40), though this has been disputed (see Deigh 2014). But regardless of whether James came to modify his view, the criticism that James’s theory of emotion commits us to the idea that emotions play no role in motivating behavior cannot be leveled at the feeling theory of emotion I defend, according to which emotions are not directed at the

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body or behavioral activity at all. Of course, this is not to demonstrate that emotions understood as feeling states do have a role in motivating behavior (we will return to that issue towards the end of the chapter and at length in the next chapter). But it is to say that one way of trying to justify the complaint that feeling theories of emotion are committed to the idea that emotions are motivationally inert mental states does not succeed in relation to the feeling theory of emotion that I defend, even if it succeeds in relation to James’s feeling theory of emotion.

Emotions are Feeling States of a Distinctive Kind It is difficult to see how emotions can be distinguished from other kinds of bodily feelings if emotions do not form a distinct class of feeling state. One might surmise that emotions can be distinguished from other bodily sensations in virtue of what causes them. Thus, perhaps a bodily sensation counts as an emotion if it is caused by a mental representation, such as thought or perception; otherwise the sensation counts as a mere bodily sensation only. However, this would be to recognize no difference in kind between emotions and other bodily feelings, which would seem less than satisfying. For surely emotions differ from other feelings with respect to their intrinsic properties, with respect to what they fundamentally are, and not merely with respect to what causes them. The suggestion being advanced also faces other problems making it unsuitable as a way of distinguishing emotions from other kinds of sensations. For instance, emotions are not always caused by intentional mental states. Sometimes the causes of emotion are purely physical, as, for instance, in the case of anxiety caused by drinking too much coffee or by an underlying heart condition. Fortunately, the idea that emotions form a class of feeling state distinct from other types of feelings is strongly supported by how emotions phenomenally appear to us. What it is like for us to undergo an emotion is different from what it is like for us to undergo any other kind of bodily feeling or sensation. David Rosenthal makes much the same point when he maintains that emotions occupy a different ‘phenomenological location’ from other kinds of bodily sensations, the idea again being that

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although emotions pervade many of the same areas of the body as do other bodily sensations—for instance, fear can pervade the visceral area in much the same way a mere physical ache can—emotions feel completely unlike other kinds of bodily feelings or sensations. In Rosenthal’s own words: Emotions are not simply bodily sensations; nor is the experiential field in which they occur the same as that in which bodily sensations occur, even though we describe them by using much of the same bodily vocabulary for the two cases. A generalized ache, like a feeling of fear, can be suffused over much of the visceral area; a pang of jealousy can be located in much the same way that a stomach ache is. But it is odd to think of the two, in either case, as actually occurring, phenomenologically, in the same space. A pang of jealousy, even if it is experienced in one’s stomach, for example, in no way intrudes phenomenologically on any body sensation one may have. Nor does such a pang seem even to overlap any such sensation. (Rosenthal 1983, 183)

Rosenthal is making what will strike many people to be an obvious phenomenological truism, namely that emotional feelings differ from mere bodily sensations in terms of their phenomenal properties, in terms of how they feel, even though feelings of both types may ‘suffuse’ many of the same bodily parts. For instance, the feeling we experience in the pits of our stomach when nervous seems very different from the sensation we experience when we have stomachache (cp. Rosenthal 1983, 183). Similarly, the feeling of anguish which William Styron (1990, 62) speaks about ‘devouring the brain’ when in the throes of depression seems totally unlike any other feeling that might also be suffered in the cranial area, such as a throbbing headache. And there is a further phenomenological difference between emotions and other types of bodily sensations, one that Rosenthal is also possibly alluding to when he talks about emotions and other feelings occurring in different ‘spaces’, and one that plausibly explains what all emotional feelings have in common that makes them belong to a shared kind (what makes them all emotions, in other words) and what all mere bodily feelings have in common that makes them belong to a shared kind (what

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makes them all mere bodily feelings, in other words). From the perspective of phenomenology, not only do emotions feel different from mere bodily sensations, but emotions also seem to relate us to the self in a way that other kinds of bodily feelings do not. To put the point figuratively, whereas mere bodily sensations seem to be in some sense external to us, things that intrude on us from the outside, so to speak, emotions seem to comprise feelings that we experience as being internal to us in some deep way. On this point, Descartes is instructive when he claims that whereas mere bodily sensations relate us to the body and its parts, emotions are felt ‘as being in the soul itself’, which I take to mean that emotions are felt to be part of us in a way that other bodily feelings are not.3 I return to the topic of how emotion relates to the self in Chap. 7, but for now I take the basic idea that emotions are tied up with the self in a way other feelings are not to be an intuitively plausible one.

 motions are Feeling States and Lack Intentional or E Representational Properties The mainstream view nowadays is that emotions possess intentional or representational properties, by which I mean the properties of representing the world and/or its objects in certain ways. More precisely, many hold that emotions possess two kinds of intentional objects or contents, the ‘target’ or ‘particular object’ of the emotion (the dog that is about to attack me, for instance), and what is sometimes referred to as the ‘formal object’ of emotion, which relates to the way the target of the emotion is represented in emotion (my fear representing the dog that is about to attack me as threatening or fearsome, for instance).

 The relevant passage from Descartes is worth quoting in full: “The perceptions we refer only to the soul are those whose effects we feel as being in the soul itself and for which we do not usually know any proximate cause to which we can refer them. Such are the feelings of joy, anger, and the like, which are aroused in us sometimes by the objects which stimulate our nerves and sometimes also by other causes. Now, all our perceptions, both those we refer to objects outside us, and those we refer to the various states of our body, are indeed passions with respect to our soul, so long as we use the term ‘passion’ in its most general sense; nevertheless we usually restrict the term to signify only perceptions which refer to the soul itself. And it is only the latter that I have undertaken to explain here under the title, ‘passions of the soul”. (Descartes in Cottingham et al. 1988, 337). 3

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For those who think emotions are representational, the formal object is of special importance. This is because, first, it is often supposed the formal object is what makes an emotion the particular emotion it is (see Kenny 1963). For instance, fear can be distinguished from anger in that the former presents its target as fearsome or dangerous, while the latter presents its target as offensive. And as the examples of anger and fear illustrates, typically the formal object is associated with some sort of evaluative property that the emotion presents its object as having. Second, the formal object is commonly considered to be that property of emotion that enables us to evaluate the emotion for its fittingness or appropriateness. For instance, fear might be thought fitting or appropriate if it correctly presents its target as being dangerous or fearsome.4 I don’t think that emotions possess objects of the formal or particular kind. It is my view that emotions have no representational or intentional qualities of their own. It follows that I do not think emotions are to be individuated on the basis of how they present the world as being. Rather, and as I have explained already, according to the feeling theory I defend, we distinguish between emotions in terms of how they feel, in terms of the distinctive bodily felt qualities that characterize different emotions. It follows also that I think the fittingness or appropriateness of an emotion cannot be a matter of how an emotion presents the world as being. This is not to say that emotions cannot be judged for their fittingness or appropriateness. It is not even to deny that an emotion might be fitting or appropriate only insofar as something instantiates certain properties, the property of being fearsome or dangerous, for instance. It is to say only that if emotions can be fitting this must be explained in a way other than how the representational theorist of emotion seeks to explain this feature  Note that the evaluative properties different emotion theorists think emotions represent objects as having are not always of the same type (on this point, see Tappolet 2016, 50). For instance, whereas some emotion theorists take the formal object of fear to be the property of being dangerous, where dangerousness is a relational property (namely, the property of posing a threat to our interests), other theorists take the formal object of fear to be the property of being fearsome, where fearsomeness is commonly viewed as being a ‘response-dependent property’ (namely, the property of meriting or making sense of a response of fear). Although differences between theorists regarding the formal object are of interest, those differences do not bear on my critique of the idea that emotions have representational properties (which seeks to show that emotions are not representational however the proposed representational content is spelt-out), and, therefore, will be largely over-looked in this chapter. 4

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of emotion. We will return to the question of emotion’s fittingness later in this chapter when considering objections to the feeling theory of emotion. My reasons for holding that emotions fail to have intentional objects are as follows. To begin with, the claim that emotions have formal objects—such as fearsomeness or dangerousness, in the case of fear— seems to require us to implausibly rule out animals and young children having emotions, since they seemingly lack the conceptual capacities to form the mental representations in question. Take the case of fear. According to representational theorists of emotion, to be afraid is to represent something as dangerous or fearsome. But what is it to represent something in either these ways? Plausibly to view something as dangerous is to view that thing as posing a threat to one’s interests (or the interests of someone else), and to view an object as fearsome is to represent the object as meriting a response of fear (on this point, see Whiting 2012). But mentally representing the world in such ways requires the possession of sophisticated concepts, such as the concept of posing a threat to one’s interests, or the concept of meriting or warranting a response of fear, and it is very difficult to see how animals and infants can possess such complex concepts (for further discussion of the difficulties that arise in assigning concepts to animals and infants, see Deigh 2009). Concerns regarding animals and young children should give us serious pause for thought. Someone could respond by claiming that emotions represent their formal objects in a non-conceptual way and for that reason emotions can be assigned to creatures that lack the sophisticated concepts in question. We will shortly look at one way that idea might be spelt out. But for now it might be remarked that on the face of it, it is difficult to see what we could mean by saying that a property like dangerousness or fearsomeness can be represented in a non-conceptual manner. Such properties look like complex abstract properties and arguably such properties can be objects of thought only, which requires the deployment of concepts. Another response might be to claim that animals and young children do possess the concepts required to represent such complex properties to themselves, and at the very least, we cannot rule this idea out a priori. I agree we cannot rule this idea out a priori, but the concern was never

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intended to be an a priori one. Rather, the worry is that from what we know about animals and young children, it is very difficult to see how they can represent to themselves such properties as dangerousness and fearsomeness.5 Still, even if animals and young children create difficulties for the idea that emotions have formal objects, they might not seem to create a problem for the idea that emotions have particular objects. And indeed we might think it obvious that animals and young children do undergo emotions with particular objects. For instance, we observe the cat is terrified of the postman and the child is amused by its parents pulling silly faces. The next reason, then, for thinking that emotions have no representational properties of their own is aimed at the idea that emotions contain any kinds of intentional properties, formal or particular. What I call the ‘argument from phenomenology’ holds that the phenomenology of emotion demonstrates that emotions as types of bodily feelings have no intentional or representational properties of any kind. As way of illustrating the argument from phenomenology, consider the awful edgy sensation that pervades our guts and limbs when we are in a state of fear, or the incensed or irritable sensation that overcomes us when we are in a state of anger. Certainly, such feelings or sensations are very often triggered by mental states that manifest an intentional nature. For instance, it might be the perception or thought of a dog that triggers in us fear-like sensations, and the perception or thought of a slight committed against us that causes in us the incensed sensation that characterizes anger. And these triggering thoughts and perceptions phenomenally manifest a representational character. But the fear and anger themselves? I think that it is evident when we attend introspectively to these emotions that they fail to phenomenally manifest any kind of representational or intentional quality. The feelings of fear and anger that pervade our bodies when we are afraid or angry phenomenally present themselves to us as having a merely sensuous nature or character.

 Another response, of course, would be to deny that animals and young children have emotions, a view that John Deigh attributes to the Stoics (2009, 27). Like Deigh I assume that such a view isn’t to be treated with seriousness. 5

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Hume’s observation, understood as a phenomenological one, resonates strongly in this regard: When I am angry, I am actually possest with the passion, and in that emotion have no more a reference to any other object, than when I am thirsty, or sick, or more than five foot high. (Hume 1896, 415)

James’s subtraction argument points in much the same direction. True, that argument is intended only as an argument for thinking emotions are bodily feelings. When advancing that argument James doesn’t say anything as such about whether emotions are representational mental states, in the sense of having objects of the formal or particular kind. Nevertheless, if the subtraction argument succeeds in showing that emotions are constituted entirely by bodily feelings—feelings of visceral stirrings, in the case, of fear, for example—then the most obvious thing to infer is that emotions are not directed towards objects of any kind, at least insofar as we are talking about emotions being directed at things distinct from the body and its activity.6 And recognize that it would be no good to reply that possibly the phenomenology of emotion, the way our emotions phenomenally appear to us in our experience of them, might be misleading or erroneous. For again, as argued at length in Chap. 2, there are very good reasons for holding that emotions are identical with the way they phenomenally present themselves to us. Therefore, if emotions do phenomenally present themselves as being feelings that lack representational or intentional characters, then strong reason exists for thinking that emotions are feeling states that lack representational or intentional characters.

 As I explained earlier in this chapter, James arguably took the view that emotions as bodily sensations have the body as their intentional object. However, as I explained when discussing James’s view, I disagree with James on this. And of course, even if James were correct to imply that emotions are directed at the body, this would not be the view advanced by many contemporary representational theorists of emotion, who hold that emotions are directed at things outside the body, including physical objects, people, events, and states of affairs. 6

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But what if it is objected that intentional properties are not phenomenal properties and, therefore, wouldn’t show up in the experience of emotion? For instance, someone might take the view that emotions have the intentional or representational properties they do by virtue of standing in some kind of causal relation with the objects and properties they represent. So perhaps fear represents danger by virtue of being reliably caused by danger or by having evolved to be triggered by danger (for a view of this kind, see Prinz 2004). On this account, the intentional content of an emotion will not be manifest in the emotion itself, since causes are logically distinct from what they cause and, therefore, not part of what they cause. And what is more, this account might seem to give us a pleasing way of responding to the worry regarding animals and young children. For perhaps the emotions of animals and young children have their intentional contents in virtue of those emotions being caused by the objects those emotions represent or are about. Indeed, we might surmise this is what is meant by saying that emotions represent their objects in a non-conceptual way. Notice that on the view being advanced here the intentional properties of emotion are extrinsic properties of emotion. As such they leave open the possibility that emotions of the same type (fear, anger) can be undergone without possessing the kinds of intentional properties or contents many emotion theorists assign to emotions of those types. Indeed, if the emotion that is fear, say, acquires it intentional content in virtue of standing in some extrinsic, perhaps causal, relation to danger, then there will exist some possible world in which that emotion will have a different intentional content from what it has in this world (namely, a world in which it stands in some extrinsic relation to something other than danger). Even if such a view is correct, it says nothing interesting about the nature of emotion as such, which pertains to those qualities of emotion that are intrinsic to emotion. Such a view, then, will not satisfy those emotion theorists and philosophers who think that intentional contents are intrinsic properties of bona fide representational mental states. Moreover, such philosophers and emotion theorists would be justified in thinking that representational states have their intentional or

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representational properties built into them, so to speak. Introspective observation shows that intentional or representational properties are manifest in mental states that are genuinely representational, and that, therefore, if emotions have representational properties those properties cannot be extrinsic to emotion. Consider, for instance, the belief that Paris is the capital of France or the perceptual experience of a dog in front of me. In each case the intentional or representational content of the mental state in question is phenomenally manifest in the mental state. Phenomenally manifest in my belief that Paris is the capital of France is my representing Paris as being the capital of France, and manifest in my perceptual experience of a dog in front of me is my representing there being a dog in front of me (see also Horgan and Tienson 2002; Chalmers 2004; Pitt 2004; Whiting 2016). But if intentional or representational properties are phenomenally manifest properties, as evident from introspecting mental states that are genuinely intentional or representational, then the present reply fails to show that emotions are representational mental states.7

 bjections to the Feeling Theory of Emotion, O and Replies I have argued that emotions make up a distinct type of feeling state and possess no representational properties of their own. In what follows, I answer what I take to be the main objections to the feeling theory of emotion.

 Alternatively, one might draw a distinction between different senses of ‘represent’, between the intentionalist sense of represent where to represent is a matter of presenting an object in some way in mind, and a non-intentionalist or teleo-semantic sense of represent where to represent is a matter of standing in some kind of causal relation to the thing being represented (on this point, see also Whiting 2012; Mitchell 2018). Were we to do this, it would be the former sense of ‘represent’ that would be relevant to the discussion of this chapter, since the claim that emotions possess no representational properties of their own is the claim that emotions fail to represent in the stronger intentionalist sense of represent. 7

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The Objection from the Object-Directed Emotions If emotions possess no representational properties of their own, then how are we to account for mental states such as the occurrent fear I have of a dog or the occurrent fear I have of falling off a chair? To be sure, emotions can lack intentional objects, but such examples as these show that in many cases emotions have objects, and, that, therefore, in many cases emotions cannot be non-intentional feeling states. But in reply, the objection would succeed only if such examples demonstrate that some emotions possess intentional properties. And we have very good reason for denying the examples demonstrate any such thing. For as the argument from phenomenology sought to show, the phenomenal appearance of emotion fails to vindicate the idea that the emotions in question have intentional or representational properties. For again when we attend to what it is like to be frightened of a dog or to be frightened of falling off a chair, the state of fear that we undergo phenomenologically presents itself to us as being nothing more than an unpleasant edgy sensation that fails to possess a representational or object-directed character of its own. So how are mental states, such as an occurrent fear of a dog or an occurrent fear of falling off a chair, to be treated if not as episodes of emotion that have intentional or representational properties? There are two ways such mental states might be treated by someone who thinks emotions lack representational properties. The first is to identify such mental states with non-intentional emotions that have the property of being caused by certain thoughts or mental representations, say, the perception of a dog, or the thought of falling off a chair. According to this view—we can call it the ‘individuating causes account’—so-called object-directed emotions are to be identified with non-intentional emotions, albeit emotions that are individuated according to what causes or triggers them. For example, we might identify a fear of a dog with a non-intentional episode of fear that has the property of being felt in response to a mental representation of a dog, and a fear of falling off a chair with a non-intentional episode of fear that is caused by the thought of falling off a chair.

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Note that according to the individuating causes account emotions do not come to acquire intentional properties when elicited by mental representations. As explained above the intentional properties of a bona fide mental representational state are part of the very nature or essence of the mental state in question; they are, so to speak, built into or are constitutive of the mental state in question. But nothing comes to have a property built into it by virtue of being caused by something that has that property built into it. According to the individuating causes account, there is no emotional intentionality present when people undergo the emotions in question. Again, on this account mental states, such as a fear of a dog or fear of falling off a chair, are to be viewed as non-intentional mental states, albeit non-intentional mental states that are caused in a certain way. It follows that on the individuating causes account the ‘of ’ in ‘fear of a dog’ (say) fails to pick out an intentional relation, even if the language suggests otherwise. If ‘of ’ in ‘fear of a dog’ is picking out any kind of relation it is picking out a mere causal relation, namely, a relation holding between the emotion that is being triggered and the object (or more accurately, a thought about the object) that is triggering the emotion (where, again, to repeat, causal relations are not intentional relations). The second way of treating mental states such as a fear of a dog or a fear of falling of a chair is to regard such states as being emotion-thought complexes or emotion-perception complexes. Thus, an occurrent fear of a dog might be identified with a state of fear along with a thought or perception of a dog, and feeling frightened of falling off a chair might be identified with a state of fear along with a thought or imagining of falling off a chair. We can call this the ‘hybrid mental state account’. Notice that unlike the individuating causes account, the hybrid mental state account is happy to view a fear of a dog or a fear of falling off a chair as possessing an intentional or representational character. For according to the hybrid mental state account, a mental state such as a fear of a dog or a fear of falling off a chair is an emotion-thought complex that contains representational properties in virtue of that part of the emotion-­ thought complex that is a thought or a mental representation. For this reason it follows that the hybrid mental state account allows that the ‘of ’ in ‘fear of a dog’ picks out an intentional, not merely causal, relation. But like the individuating causes account, the hybrid mental state account holds that emotions contain no intentional or representational properties

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of their own. For according to the hybrid mental state account, although an emotion is part of an emotion-thought complex that has representational or intentional properties, the emotion element of the emotion-­ thought complex fails to have any such properties. In previous works my sympathies lay with the hybrid mental state account (Whiting 2011, 2012). I took it to be a phenomenological datum that ‘object-directed emotions’ are compound states, comprising (non-intentional) emotions along with thoughts that trigger the emotions. For instance, I argued that the thought of my house is essential to the phenomenology of pleasure in my house (it is that thought that gives pleasure in my house its ‘self-alluding’ character), and the experience of a dog is essential to what it is like to undergo a fear of a dog (it is that thought that gives fear of a dog its distinctive ‘dog-like’ quality, so to speak). However, I am no longer confident that this is the best way to treat such mental states. Thus, with regard to the phenomenology, it is unclear to me whether a mental representation is part of what it is like to undergo a fear of a dog or a fear of falling off a chair or a pleasure in my house. Agreed, a mental representation is part of what it is like to undergo the sequence of mental episodes that typically occur when we are frightened of a dog or when we are taking pleasure in our house. For instance, when I feel frightened of a dog I undergo a sequence of mental episodes, comprising a mental representation of a dog followed by the fear that the mental representation causes in me, and the mental representation of the dog is part of what it is like to undergo that sequence of mental episodes. But it remains unclear as to whether my fear of a dog is the sequence of mental episodes and not merely one element of the sequence, namely the fear element. It is credible to hold that when I am frightened of a dog, the fear I feel presents phenomenally as a non-intentional edgy sensation, but qualifies as a fear of a dog (as opposed to a fear of a cat, say) by virtue of being triggered by a mental representation of a dog, and which, if true, supports the individuating causes account. Moreover, the idea that mental states such as a fear of dogs and fear of falling of a chair are unitary mental states, albeit mental states that are individuated in accordance with their eliciting causes, has a number of other things going for it. First, that idea aligns with the way standing or enduring emotions are to be treated. Take, for example, a standing fear of

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dogs, which I argued in Chap. 2 comprises occurrent episodes of fear that someone undergoes or tends to undergo in the perceived presence of dogs. Second, the individuating causes account allows us to retain the idea that a fear of a dog and a fear of falling off a chair are bona fide emotions while holding also onto the view that emotions are nothing more than feeling states that lack an intentional or representational structure. The hybrid mental state account, on the other hand, is unable to view such mental states as emotions proper, since according to that account such states are emotion-thought complexes. Third, whereas the individuating causes account can make good sense of what I will call the phenomenon of ‘object opaqueness’, the hybrid mental state account has more difficulties in explaining the phenomenon in question. The point is that when I am frightened or angry about something, the thing that we might call the object of the emotion need not be phenomenally manifest to me. We saw an example of this in Chap. 2 when considering counterexamples to the view that emotions are always conscious. There I gave the example of someone who believes they are angry about the unfairness of life, when really they are angry with their partner for dying. Now, such cases can be straight-forwardly explained on the individuating causes account. For instance, if to be angry about some object is for the object (or more accurately a thought regarding the object) to be the cause of the anger, then the possibility for object opaqueness clearly exists, because we are often opaque to the things that cause our emotions. The hybrid mental state account has more difficulties in explaining such cases, however, since according to that view an anger of something is a compound mental state comprising a state of anger along with a thought about the object. But then on that account, the nature of the object will necessarily be manifest to us in the compound mental state (since intentional relations are necessarily manifest to us), thus making cases of object opaqueness much more difficult to explain.8

 Such a consideration also brings into question whether the hybrid mental state account is in fact supported by the phenomenology. Cases of object opaqueness suggest the individuating causes account might be more faithful to the phenomenology, since such cases suggest that when we are, for instance, feeling angry about something the so-called object of that state of anger is not phenomenally evident to us in our anger of that thing. 8

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For the above reasons, I am inclined to think the individuating causes account is the right one, though I am not sure the hybrid view can be ruled out altogether, since I am not entirely sure the phenomenology does not support the hybrid mental state account. That is to say, I think it might still be open to someone to argue that mental states such as a fear of dog or fear of falling of a chair phenomenally appear to us as complex mental states. But in a sense it doesn’t really matter which account we adopt insofar as a defense of the feeling theory of emotion is concerned. For both the individuating causes account and the hybrid mental state account provide us with plausible ways of treating so-called object directed emotions and both are consistent with holding that emotions are sui generis feeling states that lack intentional or representational properties of their own. Both accounts, then, accept the surface appearance of the way we might sometimes talk about emotional states. Thus, both accounts allow that we often talk as if emotions have intentional or representational structures or properties. But both accounts claim that careful examination shows how the surface-appearance of the way we talk is misleading, namely, by recognizing that locutions of the form E about O can be treated as referring to either a non-intentional emotion, E, that has been triggered by a thought about an object, O (the individuating causes account), or a compound mental state or sequence of mental states that comprise a non-intentional emotion, E, along with a thought about the object, O (the hybrid mental state account). Regardless of which account we adopt, the important point is that both accounts provide compelling ways of treating the so-called object-directed emotions. And to my knowledge neither way of treating such mental states has been answered by those who think emotions have intentional objects.

 he Objection from Semantic Analysis of Intentional T Emotion Ascriptions The objection from semantic analysis of intentional emotion ascriptions holds that a correct analysis of locutions of the form S feels E about O demonstrates that emotions have intentional objects. Consider the view

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that locutions or statements of the form S feels E about O are equivalent to locutions or statements giving the reason for which the emotion is undergone. For example, to say John is angry about Laura’s poor behavior is to say that Laura’s poor behavior is the reason for which John feels angry (see Müller 2017, 2019; see also Mulligan 2010). Call this way of analyzing statements of the form ‘S feels E about O’ the ‘reason-for analysis’. According to the objection from semantic analysis of intentional emotion ascriptions our being able to provide such analyses is sufficient to show emotions have intentional objects. Now, the first thing to say in response to the objection from semantic analysis of intentional emotion ascriptions is that I am in fact sympathetic to the idea that locutions of the form S feels E about O can be treated as saying something like O is the reason for S feeling E. This is because I take it that for O to be the reason for S feeling E is for S’s belief about O to be the cause of S feeling E. For instance, to hold that Laura’s poor behavior is the reason for John’s anger is to say something like John’s belief that Laura has behaved poorly causes John to feel angry. And as we have seen when considering the objection from the object-directed emotions this is plausibly how locutions of the form S feels E about O are to be analyzed. But where I disagree with the proponent of the objection from semantic analysis of intentional emotion ascriptions is with their claim that this demonstrates emotions have intentional objects or properties. For note we would have reason to think that emotions have intentional objects only if what were being analyzed—namely, everyday statements or locutions of the form S feels E about O—were genuine intentional emotion ascriptions, or, in other words, locutions that denote actual intentional relations between emotions and objects. And, as will be clear from my response to the objection from the object-directed emotions, I believe we have very good reason to think that such locutions are not to be treated as genuine intentional ascriptions. That reason being that emotions do not manifest an intentional or representational structure. Therefore, given both that intentionality is a phenomenal property of a bona fide representational mental state (as evident by consideration of mental states such as beliefs and perceptual experiences) and that in the case of emotions there is no

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appearance-­reality distinction to be had, then it follows that everyday statements or locutions of the form S feels E about O cannot be taken to be denoting actual intentional relations. Consequently, if the reason-for analysis of everyday locutions of the form S feels E about O is correct (which plausibly it is), then it cannot be giving an analysis of genuine intentional emotion ascriptions, since everyday locutions of the form S feels E about O do not involve genuine intentional emotion ascriptions. And that the reason-for analysis isn’t giving us an analysis of genuine intentional emotion ascriptions is also made evident by the following two considerations. First, I have argued at length that intentionality, the way the world is presented in mind, is an intrinsic property of a mental state, one that is constitutive of the mental state in question. However, if the reason-for analysis succeeded as an analysis of a genuine intentional ascription, then intentionality could not be a constitutive property of a bona fide representational mental state. This is because the reason-for analysis, as we have seen, implies that emotions have intentional objects by virtue of being caused by mental representations of objects. But, as explained when replying to the objection from the object-directed emotions, nothing comes to have a property built into it by virtue of being caused by a mental state that has that property built into it. A reason-for analysis then would fail to satisfy an intrinsicness constraint for something to count an intentional object of emotion, and it follows that the reason-for analysis cannot be giving us an analysis of genuine intentional emotion ascriptions. Second, note that nothing like the reason-for analysis is remotely plausible in relation to bona fide intentional mental states, such as thoughts or beliefs. In relation to these mental states it is clear that to give the intentional objects of the mental states is not to give the reasons for which the mental states are formed. For example, we might say that John believes Laura has behaved poorly due to her behaving poorly (or due to John seeing her behaving poorly). But when giving the reason for which John believes Laura is behaving poorly we are not giving any kind of account or analysis of what it is for John to believe that Laura is behaving poorly. Rather, we are simply explaining why John has the belief that Laura is behaving poorly.

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After all, if what explains John’s belief that Laura has behaved poorly is a knock inflicted to John’s head or John hearing from a reliable source that Laura has behaved poorly, then Laura behaving poorly would not be the reason for John believing Laura has behaved poorly. But then Laura behaving poorly being the intentional object of John’s belief that Laura has behaved poorly cannot be a matter of Laura behaving poorly being the reason for which John has formed that belief. Giving an explanation for why John has that belief tells us nothing about the intrinsic nature of the belief itself, then, including the intentional properties that that belief exemplifies. That nothing like the reason-for analysis is plausible in relation to mental states that are indisputably intentional or representational by nature is strong reason again to think the reason-for analysis in relation to emotion is not an analysis of genuine intentional emotion ascriptions. In summary, the objection from semantic analysis of intentional emotion ascriptions fails because although the reasons-for analysis of everyday statements or locutions of the form S feels E about O is plausible, the reason-for analysis fails to be an analysis of genuine intentional emotion ascriptions. This is made evident by the fact that locutions of the form S feels E about O cannot be taken to be denoting a genuine intentional relation because emotions fail to have intentional objects (as made evident by the way emotions phenomenally appear to us in our experience of them). But it is also made evident by the fact that to speak about the intentional object of a mental state cannot be to speak about the reason for which the mental state is undergone (as to think otherwise would be to violate the intrinsicality constraint and anyway can be shown to be false by close consideration of bona fide intentional mental states, such as thoughts or belief states). The take home message being, then, that the proponent of the view that emotions have intentional objects will likely need to resort to something other than analyses of everyday locutions of the form S feels E about O. Indeed, if my claims regarding the inadequacy of a reason-for analysis as being an analysis of genuine intentional ascriptions are correct, then the proponent of the view that emotions have intentional objects might be well advised to steer away from relying on semantic analyses of

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locutions of the form S feels E about O, since plausibly such analyses actually support the idea that emotions do not have intentional objects.

The Objection from the Higher Cognitive Emotions The objection from the higher cognitive emotions holds that even if ‘basic’ emotions can be distinguished from one another in terms of their characteristic feel, many emotions cannot be differentiated in this way. And, in particular, so-called ‘higher cognitive emotions’ might seem to resist being treated in this way. Consider a state of pride or a state of guilt. We might concede that such emotions comprise certain feelings, say, a pleasurable-like feeling in the case of pride and an anxiety-like feeling in the case of guilt. However, these feelings cannot be all there is to such emotions, since such emotions are necessarily tied up with certain thoughts or mental representations. For instance, the thought of a personal achievement seems essential to a state of pride, and a thought regarding the committing of wrongdoing seems essential to a state of guilt. Arguably, pride and guilt are ‘bound up’ with such thoughts, but what are we to infer from this? Indeed, on the face of it, these states look to be no different from such states as a fear of a dog or a fear of falling off a chair or pleasure in my house, which are also bound up in some way with certain thoughts. And if that is the case, then one response to the objection from the higher cognitive emotions would be to hold that pride and guilt are compound mental states or emotion-thought complexes (the hybrid mental state account). So we might identify pride with a feeling of pleasure along with a thought of personal achievement, and guilt with an emotion of anxiety along with a thought of personal wrongdoing. Or, we could accept that states such as pride and guilt are nothing but emotions, while denying that attention to the phenomenology shows these emotions have the intentional properties they are claimed to have. For, perhaps, guilt manifests as a distinctive anxiety-like sensation, but qualifies as ‘guilt’ by virtue of being triggered by thoughts of personal wrongdoing, and pride presents as a pleasurable feeling, but qualifies as ‘pride’ by virtue of being triggered by thoughts of the self (the

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individuating causes account).9 This way of treating the so-called higher cognitive emotions would allow that pride and guilt are bound up with certain thoughts (for without the triggering thoughts the feelings would not qualify as pride and guilt), while at the same time deny that pride and guilt comprise those thoughts, the emotions themselves being pure feelings. And there is a further consideration that supports our treating mental states such as pride and guilt in either the two ways just suggested. Suppose someone has built a house and on reflecting on the fact that it was they who built the house is overcome with a warm pleasurable feeling or sensation. Surely that would be enough to justify our saying the person is proud. Would it not be odd if after learning about the pleasure they took when reflecting that it was they who built the house we are told that they also felt proud about the house they built? Were we not aware of that already? Or to take another example, suppose my neighbor on observing my well-kept garden is overcome with displeasure or anxiety or anger. Would that not be sufficient for us to say that my neighbor is feeling jealous about my garden? Indeed, would it not be odd if I said that in addition to my neighbor responding to my well-kept garden with displeasure (or anger, or anxiety) my neighbor also felt jealous?10  This seems to be Hume’s view when he says that pride is ‘that agreeable impression, which arises in the mind, when the view either of our virtue, beauty, riches, or power, makes us satisfy’d with ourselves’ (1896, 297). 10  Daniel Farrell writes, ‘[W]hat is essential for jealousy … is not some one affective state—anger, for example, or anxiety …—but rather, any of a number of affective states plus a certain intentional state, a combination which we might describe as “being bothered,” in any of a number of ways, by the very fact that one is (as one believes) not favored as one wants to be favored … Thus, there is indeed an “affective” side to jealousy, on my view, but it is not any one, special “affect”; it is, rather, an affective state that might very well be characterized by any one of a cluster of different feelings that vary from person to person. What remains constant is simply the “focus” or intentionality that is characteristic of jealousy on my view: to be jealous is to be bothered by the very fact that one is not favored in some way in which one wants to be favored’ (Farrell 1980, 543). Farrell’s treatment of jealousy appears very similar to the hybrid mental state account. On Farrell’s account jealousy consists of a cognitive state (namely the belief that one is not being favored as one wants to be) along with various non-cognitive emotions (namely those that make up the state of being ‘bothered’, which for Farrell includes feelings of anger and anxiety). I have some sympathy for Farrell’s treatment of jealousy. However, if is that if this is how jealousy is to be viewed then jealousy is not an emotion, but an emotion-thought complex. [Alternatively, if the individuating causes account 9

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The basic point is that so-called higher cognitive emotions seem always susceptible to being treated as involving non-cognitive emotions along with certain thoughts about objects. Either the thoughts in question are part of the higher cognitive state or those thoughts are triggers of the non-cognitive emotion with which the higher cognitive emotion is to be identified. But either way, all we are left with insofar as the emotional landscape is concerned are a number of non-cognitive emotions that stand in certain causal relations with thoughts and other representational mental states. On this way of treating the higher cognitive emotions, mental states such as pride and guilt turn out either to be emotion-thought complexes or non-cognitive emotions that have the property of being triggered by certain thoughts. Either way, the objection from the higher cognitive emotions fails to demonstrate that some emotions have intentional or representational characters. Of course, if either of these two ways of treating the higher cognitive emotions is successful, then our task will (if the hybrid mental state account is correct) be to distinguish between those mental states that are non-cognitive emotions and those mental states that are compound in nature, comprising emotions along with eliciting thoughts, or (if the individuating causes account is correct) be to distinguish between those emotions individuated according to their eliciting thoughts, and those emotions that are not. Plausible candidates for emotions that are not part of an emotion-thought complex (or not individuated according to their eliciting thoughts) include anger, disgust, displeasure, sadness, depression, happiness, pleasure, elation, joy, fear, anxiety, sexual arousal, amusement, and nervousness. And plausible candidates for mental states that are emotion-thought complexes (or emotions individuated according to their eliciting thoughts) include pride, awe, guilt, indignation, admiration, regret, pity, grief, jealousy, envy, shame, and resentment. It is curious as to why we have specific terms to pick out emotions that have been elicited by certain thoughts. But it is not entirely mysterious as to why this has occurred. The existence of such terms provides us with is correct jealousy comprises various emotions that have the property of being caused by certain thoughts].

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convenient, short-hand ways of referring to complex mental phenomena. Thus, rather than saying that such and such takes pleasure in the fact they have built their own house, we can just say that such and such is proud of the house they built. Or rather than saying that such and such is overcome with feelings of displeasure, anger, and anxiety whenever they think about what someone else has and they do not, we can just say that such and such is jealous of what someone else has. Furthermore, certain complex mental phenomena might play a very significant part in our lives, and this might partly explain why we have created special terms to refer to such phenomena. The mental phenomena involved in guilt and shame, for instance, are prominent in so-called guilt and shame cultures, and plausibly this is why such mental phenomena have come to be known by name.11 But we must avoid thinking that because certain mental phenomena have a prominence that leads to certain terms being created to denote them, then some new emotions come into being. This would be a badly mistaken idea because the emotional landscape has not changed at all; it still consists of the same sensations that existed already. All that has changed is the coming into existence of a new way of talking about the emotional landscape.

The Objection from Sparseness The objection from sparseness holds that my treatment of pride and guilt threatens to apply to almost every emotional state, including such states as fear, sadness, and anger. For example, someone might claim that fear and anger will end up being identified with either feelings of displeasure and particular thoughts (for instance, the thought of an offense in the case of anger and the thought of danger in the case of fear) or feelings of displeasure that have been elicited by particular thoughts (for instance,  Many other cross-cultural examples exist. For example, there is the German word Schadenfreude, which refers to pleasure elicited by another person’s discomfort. Or, consider that although the Aboriginal language Pintupi has at least five different words that have been compared with the English word ‘sadness’, none have the same meaning as the word ‘sadness’, as each implies the presence of thoughts that are not necessary to our concept of sadness (see Wierzibicka 1992, 293–295). For example, ‘yulatjarra’ requires the thought that one’s relative is sick or deceased, and ‘watjilpa’ involves the thought that one is away from home (see also Whiting 2006).

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the thought of an offense or the thought of danger). Either way it seems we will end up recognising only the existence of a couple of ‘real’ emotions, most likely the hedonic states of pleasure and displeasure. The worry then is that this might seem to commit ourselves to a picture of our emotional lives that is far too sparse or austere to be credible, since surely it should be no implication of a satisfactory theory of emotion that it recognises there to be two emotions only. In response to the objection from sparseness two things should be said. First, it is not obvious that we do have an objection here. This is because if it were possible to treat fear and anger (say) in either these two ways, then it would seem entirely right to hold that pleasure and displeasure are the only two basic emotion-types. It would then be correct to hold that both the fearful agent and the angry agent are feeling the same emotion (namely, displeasure), albeit for different reasons.12 The second thing to say, however, is that I do not believe those mental states I identified earlier as genuine emotions can be treated in the way being suggested by the proponent of the objection from sparseness. This is for two reasons. The first reason appeals again to the phenomenology or what-it-is-likeness of these emotions. If fear and anger, for instance, just are feelings of displeasure that have been elicited by different thoughts, then we would expect the phenomenology of the feelings that make up these mental states to be the same. However, the feelings that constitute these states do not present phenomenally in the same way. So for example, the ‘edgy’ feeling to be found in the case of fear presents very  Some of Irwin Goldstein’s remarks suggest he held the view that every emotion type is a state of pleasure or displeasure that is distinguished from other emotion types by virtue of the type of thought that triggers it (see Goldstein 2002). But, although Goldstein is none too clear, textual evidence suggests that he takes the thoughts in question to be elements of emotions, which would make his view of emotion a componential theory of emotion. For instance, Goldstein writes: “When people class anger as a feeling, what they conceive of as a feeling is a complex mental state. They are classing anger as a state of consciousness with a particular qualitative character that is caused by a particular thought. When people regard jealousy and fear as different feelings, they individuate feelings by cognitive elements”. (2002, 29; italics in original) This would distinguish Goldstein’s view from that suggested by my first response to the objection from sparseness, according to which all emotions are taken to be feelings and nothing but feelings, albeit feelings that might comprise only two basic emotion types. 12

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differently from the ‘hot-headed’ or ‘irritable’ or ‘incensed’ sensation to be found in the case of anger. And the same is true for other emotions. For instance, consider how the ‘heavy hearted’ or ‘down-spirited’ feeling that characterizes sadness differs from the ‘irksome’ feeling that identifies displeasure, the ‘uplifting’ or ‘exalted’ feeling that identifies happiness or joy, and the ‘repulsive’ or ‘nauseating’ feeling that is found in cases of disgust. The second reason for thinking that further treatment of these mental states is not possible draws on the fact that these mental states do not involve certain thoughts or beliefs. Indeed, as often pointed out, it is a convincing objection to cognitive theories of emotion that it is possible—even common—to undergo mental states such as fear, sadness and anger, without having the thoughts that the cognitive theorist of emotion associates with those emotions (cf. Pugmire 1998, 18–42; Prinz 2003, 76–77). For instance, a person might respond fearfully to something— say, a moth, or a balloon that is vulnerable to bursting, or a stuffed tiger, or a computer simulation—but not appraise the thing in question as threatening. In fact, I would argue that introspective observation of an emotion episode demonstrates that the judgment that the cognitive theorist usually associates with the emotion is often absent when the emotion is undergone. For instance, we catch the fleeting glimpse of a face at the window and feel instantly tense and edgy; we receive the news that we have not been selected to represent our local darts team and feel down-­ spirited or ‘heavy-hearted’; we think that someone has misunderstood an argument that we have made and straight away feel irritated or vexed. In each of these cases it is clear that an emotion is being felt (fear, sadness and anger respectively), but in none of these cases is it at all obvious that a cognitive appraisal or judgment has been made. Now, if I am right, then the worry that emotions such as fear, anger, and sadness may also necessarily involve the presence of certain thoughts is unfounded. Unlike the cases of pride and guilt it is possible for a person to feel an emotion such as fear, anger, and sadness, but not form the thought that some emotion theorists believe to be part of the emotion in question.

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The Objection from Phenomenology What I called the argument from phenomenology has it that we are to think of emotions as non-intentional  or non-representational feeling states because that is how emotions present themselves phenomenologically to us as being. What I am now calling the objection from phenomenology claims that, on the contrary, emotions present themselves to us as being mental states that have intentional objects or properties. Sometimes the point is made with respect to the so-called target of emotion. Bill Brewer, for instance, makes the point succinctly when he claims, ‘that one is afraid of that particular object or event is absolutely perspicuous, and intrinsic to the experience itself.’ (2002, 27; italics added; see also Goldie 2000, 2009; Deonna and Teroni 2012; Müller 2019). But probably more often the point is made with respect to the so-called formal object of emotion. On this view, manifest in feeling afraid, say, is the presentation of something as being dangerous or fearsome (cp. Döring 2007; Maiese 2011; Kriegel 2012; Lutz 2015; Poellner 2016; Mitchell 2018; Gorodeisky 2019). Now, I have explained already why I think my way of describing the phenomenology is supported by careful consideration of actual cases. When advancing the argument from phenomenology, I described the example of our experiencing an unpleasant edgy sensation when encountering a dog, a sensation that pervades the visceral area and limbs. It seems clear to me that such a case is one where we are experiencing fear. It also seems clear that the fear we are undergoing is constituted entirely by the edgy sensation. Again James’s subtraction argument makes that idea eminently plausible. Abstract from fear its distinctive edgy quality and we ‘have nothing left behind, no ‘mind-stuff’ out of which the emotion can be constituted’. And what is more, I think it is clear that the edgy sensation that is fear presents itself as having no intentional or representational properties. For example, that sensation does not present as a representation of a dog, and neither does it present as a representation of a dog instantiating properties like dangerousness or fearsomeness. On the contrary, it presents as having a wholly sensuous and non-­ representational nature.

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As will be evident already from my reply to the objection from the object-directed emotions, I think those who claim the phenomenology of emotion supports the idea that emotions are representational states fail to distinguish between the phenomenal appearance of an emotion and the phenomenal appearance of a mental state complex, comprising an emotion and an accompanying thought or perception. For instance, they fail to distinguish between the phenomenology of an episode of fear and the phenomenology of a mental state complex comprising fear and the thought or perception that triggers that state of fear. So to be sure, an emotion-thought complex phenomenally presents as having a representational character, namely in virtue of the element of the emotion-thought complex that is a thought. However, the same is not true of the emotion itself (on this point, see also Whiting 2011, 2012). But for all that has been said so far, some emotion theorists are likely to continue to hold that emotions manifest an intentional or representational character, including some emotion theorists who may even concur that emotions involve or comprise types of feelings or sensations but who will disagree with my view that the feelings in question do not manifest an object-directed nature (see Goldie 2000, 2009; Deonna and Teroni 2012; Müller 2019). Are there any additional considerations, then, that support my way of describing the phenomenology and which count against an intentionalist way of describing the phenomenology? In what follows, I advance two further considerations. The first appeals to cases where people have emotions but seemingly lack awareness of anything that would qualify as the objects of their emotions, and the second appeals to the phenomenon of object opaqueness discussed in Chap. 2 and earlier in this chapter. So to begin with, consider a study conducted by Servan-Schreiber and Perlstein, which found that if injected with the chemical procaine “subjects reported a range of affective experiences, including euphoria, sadness, fear and anxiety… [T]he experiences of…subjects were described as free-floating, seemingly detached from any particular external event, or from conscious thoughts. In the majority of cases, subjects were unable to associate a particular meaning to their affective experience or to explain it in terms of their present situation or recent mood states” (1998, 345). These procaine-induced experiences, the authors go on to explain, “seem

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related to the essential ‘qualia’ of some emotional states such as euphoria and fear. Subjects are able to describe unambiguously their experience, yet they cannot report cognitions or environmental clues that could have evoked this affect, nor can they justify their experience a posteriori” (1998, 347). Two features of this study stand out and to which I want to draw attention. First, although not stated explicitly in the study description, it seems obvious that the study participants would be unable to report on anything that might count as intentional objects of their emotions. Indeed, anything that might qualify as an intentional object seems to be palpably missing in cases of chemically induced emotions. This case then seems to clearly describe emotions that fail to manifest an intentional or representational character. Second, the failure of an intentional object being evident to the subjects in this study seems wholly intertwined with the absence of thoughts or perceptions that might normally accompany people’s emotions. That is to say, we want to say no intentional objects are evident to these people because these people are not cognitively or perceptually aware of an object of any kind when undergoing the emotion. Now, I think these two features lend solid support to the idea that where someone might be more tempted to say their emotions do manifest a representational character (say, where a person cognitively or perceptually apprehends an object and feels afraid on account of that), it is really an emotion-thought or emotion-perception complex that presents as having a representational character, not the emotion itself. It is not the emotion because as illustrated by the first feature of the study discussed, the emotion can be undergone without an object being evident to the person undergoing the emotion. Rather it is an emotion-thought or emotion-­perception complex that manifests an intentional character, because as made plausible by the second feature of the study just discussed, it seems to be a thought or perception accompanying an emotion that gives an experience (here one comprising an emotion and a thought or perception) an intentional character. The second consideration that speaks strongly in favor of my way of thinking about the phenomenology appeals to the idea that if emotions manifest an intentional character, then we will be hard-pressed to explain

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the phenomenon of object opaqueness described in Chap. 2 and earlier in this chapter. For in cases of object opaqueness, people fail to correctly identify what their emotions are ‘about’. For instance, someone believes they are angry about the unfairness of life but comes to realize they are really angry with their partner for dying. So how is the phenomenon of object opaqueness to be explained if emotions manifest an intentional character? For if emotions manifest such a character, then the intentional object of the emotion should be evident to the person undergoing the emotion (in much the same way the intentional object of thought or perception is always evident to the person having a thought or perception). That the so-called intentional object need not always be evident to people undergoing emotions is strong reason again for thinking that emotions do not themselves present as having representational characters. Those who think emotions have intentional characters will likely want to respond to the considerations just advanced. In relation to the study on chemically induced emotions, some may question whether participants underwent genuine emotions, or they may question whether the experiences reported really did fail to manifest an intentional character. However, it is difficult to avoid the worry that both responses seem largely ad hoc, their only apparent virtue being that of theory conservation (on this point, see Lamb 1987). Presumably chemically induced emotions feel like emotions proper to those who undergo them. Moreover, the study description makes very plausible the idea that chemically induced emotions lack intentional objects. After all, we are told that participants are ‘unable to associate a particular meaning to their emotions’ and that ‘their experiences seem related to some essential ‘qualia”. Consequently, I think we should take these findings at face value, and to be clear cases of where emotions fail to manifest intentional characters.13  And anyway there are other examples of emotions that fail to manifest an intentional character. For instance, people can feel tense and anxious all day long without being able to say why they feel anxious and without being able to identify anything that might qualify as an intentional object of their anxiety. Similarly someone who is a dark mood can feel low, angry, and irritable without being able to connect their feelings to anything going on around them, including whatever it was that might have put them in a bad mood originally. Also consider what Andreas Scarantino refers to as cases of ‘blind-fright’ (Scarantino 2010). People exposed to masked images can undergo a range of emotions but be unable to say what caused those emotions. For example, Öhman and Soares found that subjects with snake phobia experienced high arousal (along with high disliking and lack of 13

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Another kind of response might be to hold that even if the study lends support to the idea that emptions are not experienced as being directed at particular objects, this does not mean that emotions are not experienced as being directed at formal objects. For instance, someone might hold that study participants who reported to feel fear might have felt threatened or at risk, even if they were not able to point to any particular threat in the circumstances or consciously believed there was anything threatening around them. But we should reject this response, because for the intentionalist about emotion the formal object just is the way or aspect under which the particular object is presented in emotion. Therefore, if there is no particular object being presented in emotion, then there is no way or aspect under which a particular object is being presented in emotion either. And note the point is not undercut by the example advanced. Understood as a genuine mental representation, the state of feeling threatened involves assigning a formal property—the property of being threatened—to a particular object, namely to the person who feels threatened. Now, I take it that no intentionalist wants to say that the person who feels threatened is feeling frightened of themselves (which in itself is reason to discard the idea that fear comprises a representation of being threatened or at risk). But more to the point, if fear doesn’t present itself as being directed at a particular object, then neither can fear present itself as a representation of being threatened or at risk, since that would require fear to present itself as being directed at a particular object, namely the person who is feeling threatened or at risk.14 Now, in some ways it is harder to see what an intentionalist about emotion might say about cases of object-opaqueness. For there is no control) after being exposed to masked images of snakes despite not knowing why they felt afraid (Öhman and Soares 1993; cited in Scarantino 2010). Again I take blind-fright to be an example of an emotion that fails to manifest an intentional character, since anything that might qualify as an intentional object seems to be palpably missing. 14  Of course, denying that feeling frightened comprises a representation of oneself being threatened or at risk is consistent with supposing that we might often represent ourselves as being threatened or at risk in addition to feeling frightened (perhaps as a cause or effect of our feeling frightened). It is consistent also with the idea that the state of feeling threatened or at risk might not be a genuine mental representation at all. For instance, perhaps to feel threatened or at risk is not to represent ourselves as being in danger or at risk, but rather for our stomachs to churn and our hearts to pound in such a way as if we were being threatened or were at risk.

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suggestion that such cases do not involve genuine emotions. Also, one will struggle to argue that the intentional objects of the emotions in question are manifest to people undergoing the emotions, since object opacity is the distinguishing feature of such cases. And recognize that it will not help to propose that the intentional objects of the emotions in question are phenomenally manifest but are not consciously accessible to the people undergoing the emotions (for more on the distinction between phenomenal consciousness and access consciousness see Block 1995), since in the cases described there is very good reason to think that if the intentional objects are phenomenally manifest then they will be accessible to the people undergoing the emotions. This is because in the cases described the emotions in question are accessible to the people undergoing the emotions; it is just these people are unable to say what their emotions are ‘about’ when attending to them.15 But if the emotions are consciously accessible to the people undergoing them, then the phenomenal properties with which those emotions are identical must be accessible to them also. But then if the emotions to which people have conscious access manifest an intentional character, then the intentional character must be consciously accessible as well. I suppose one move the intentionalist might make is to say the phenomenon of object opaqueness merely illustrates that emotions’ objects need not always be phenomenally manifest to us. But this move is unlikely to satisfy proponents of the objection from phenomenology who claim that intentionality is a phenomenal property, one that is evident to the person undergoing the emotion. And, moreover, the idea that intentionality is a phenomenal property of a representational mental state is one that I have also argued for in this chapter. Again, the point is simply that introspection of mental states such as thoughts and perceptual experiences shows that intentionality, the way an object is presented in mind, is a phenomenal property. I have advanced a number of considerations that speak against the idea of emotions presenting themselves to us as having object-directed  Such cases then can be contrasted with those where people are unable to report on their emotions due to their emotions being short lived and/or faint in their presentation (see my discussion towards the end of Chap. 2). 15

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characters. Collectively these considerations constitute a powerful case for rejecting the objection from phenomenology. Emotion-thought complexes manifest intentional characters (namely, in virtue of the thought elements of such complexes). But emotions fail to manifest such characters. This is made evident by close consideration of the normal case, where we might undergo an emotion in response to a thought or perception and on account of that be inclined to say our emotion is directed at the thing being thought about or perceived. But it is made evident also by consideration of less standard cases, such as cases involving emotions induced by drugs and cases of object opaqueness. Such cases are very hard to explain if emotions manifest an object-directed nature. And such cases lend solid support to the idea that where we might be inclined to say an emotion manifests an object-directed character, we are mistaking the phenomenology of an emotion with that of a mental state complex of which an emotion is just one element.

 he Objection from the Rational Assessment T of Emotion According to the objection from the rational assessment of emotion, emotions can be rationally evaluated whereas non-intentional feeling states cannot. For instance, it is irrational for us to feel frightened of something that we know or have good reason to believe poses no threat to ourselves or anyone else. The first thing to say in reply is that this objection threatens to infect not only feeling theories of emotion, but any theory of emotion that doesn’t consider emotions to be beliefs or to have beliefs as constituents. For the irrationality in question is doxastic irrationality, which is the irrationality of believing that p even though all the evidence available to us (strongly) points to not p. Merely imagining that p or entertaining the thought that p in such a case would not count as irrationality. After all we can imagine there is (say) a goblin in front of us without believing there is a goblin in front of us, and as long as that remains the case we are not instantiating doxastic irrationality. The objection from the rational assessment of emotion, then, looks to be an objection to any theory of emotion

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that does not take emotions to comprise belief states. For instance, it is an objection also to perceptual theories of emotion, since perceptual states also do not seem to be proper objects of doxastic assessment. Only where the intentional content of a mental state is affirmed or denied do we seem to have the possibility for the existence of doxastic rationality or irrationality. Of course, this implication of the objection from the rational assessment of emotion does not answer that objection, but it helps to mitigate the force of the objection, since there are very good independent reasons for thinking that emotions are not judgments or belief states. Some of these reasons were outlined already when I explained why emotions do not have intentional properties. But even many of those who are sympathetic to the idea that emotions are representational mental states accept that the representational states in questions are not judgments or beliefs, hence the reason why these emotion theorists adopt other representational models of emotion, such as a perceptual model of emotion. The central problem with the objection from the rational assessment of emotion is that the feeling theorist of emotion can simply respond, so much for the view that emotions are assessable in this way! As Hume notes, if an emotion contains ‘not any representative quality [then it cannot] be oppos’d by, or be contradictory to truth and reason’ (1896, 416). And again that emotions do not contain any representational properties was strongly supported by the argument from phenomenology, which holds that emotions do not phenomenally present themselves to us as possessing any intentional or representational properties. The objection from the rational assessment of emotion simply presupposes a theory of emotion that is false according to a proponent of the feeling theory of emotion and for that reason fails to overturn the feeling theory of emotion. Still, this might seem to leave us with the appearance of irrationality. For instance, why are we inclined to say that the person who has good reason to think they are in no danger but who feels afraid is irrational? Here several things might be said in response. One response is to say that often when people are afraid their fear is accompanied by certain beliefs and it is these beliefs that we are really evaluating as rational or irrational in such situations. Hume expresses just such a view when he writes: ‘In

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short, a passion must be accompany’d with some false judgment, in order to its being unreasonable; and even then ‘tis not the passion, properly speaking, which is unreasonable but the judgment’ (see Hume 1896, 416). Another possibility is that when we say an emotion is irrational we are evaluating the emotion for something other than doxastic rationality. For instance, we might be expressing puzzlement or bewilderment, since we do not expect people to respond to the situations they are in with the emotions in question. For example, we expect people to feel afraid in situations where there is a threat and failure to meet this expectation causes in us a sense of disbelief. That this is what we are often doing when evaluating an emotion as irrational is suggested by cases in which we are inclined not to judge an emotion as irrational even though we should if emotions can be assessed for their doxastic rationality. Consider someone who knows a balloon that is about to burst poses no threat to them, but who feels frightened or edgy by the balloon’s presence. I think there is pressure on us not to judge the emotion as ‘irrational’. To be sure, the person in question believes themselves to be in no danger but their situation bears certain properties (such as the balloon’s liability to burst at any moment) that makes a response of fear seem intelligible, wholly ‘rational’, to us. If that is so, then it suggests that at least on some occasions we reserve the label ‘irrational’ for picking out emotions that fail to make sense to us, rather than emotions that fail to satisfy the kinds of doxastic norms that govern belief states. There are other responses available to us. For instance, perhaps when we think we are making a doxastic assessment of emotion, we are really evaluating the emotion for its practical utility. A feeling of fear is often a useful emotion to feel, especially in response to dangerous situations. For example, feeling frightened might motivate us to avoid the object that is triggering our fear. Fear might also play a role in how we conceptualise the world, by way of disposing us to attend to certain features of our situation or by way of disposing us to form certain beliefs that in turn lead to more adaptive behaviors (I return to the question of emotion’s role in explaining human behavior and thought in Chap. 4). In fact, so suited to threatening stimuli is fear that it seems to have evolved as a natural response of ours to such stimuli (a fact that might explain why fear felt in

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response to many non-threatening situations can strike us as senseless or ‘irrational’). On the other hand, fear can sometimes be an unhelpful emotion to feel. For instance, although the avoidance behavior that often accompanies fear can be adaptive it can on occasion be maladaptive (hence the reason why people who suffer from phobias often seek medical help). Our judgment that an emotion is unhelpful or counter-productive is not the same as the judgment that it is a senseless response, but it does comprise a common and important negative evaluation that we make of phobias and other problematic emotions (on this point, see Joyce 2000, 222). Finally, when we say someone should not feel certain emotions we might be making a claim about the moral suitability or appropriateness of the emotions in question. Perhaps, we think an emotion would betray some kind of human weakness or would make a person less trustworthy, and this is why we think people should not feel such emotions. Or perhaps people’s emotions matter to us solely for their own sake—you really should be upset by the harm you have caused—and this is why they are morally evaluable. It is sometimes held that emotions cannot be evaluated morally if they are involuntary mental states because we could not then speak about responsibility or blame. I accept that emotions are not voluntary but do not think it follows that emotions cannot be evaluated ethically. This is because, first, although we might fail to have direct control over our emotions we are often able to exercise indirect control over them (for example, we may be able to voluntarily suppress or cultivate an emotion), and we might take the view that this is all that is needed for the purpose of blaming people for their emotions (cf. Sankowski 1977; Oakley 1992). Second, even if it is the case that blame requires direct control this does not mean that emotions cannot be evaluated morally. This is because whereas right and wrong are properties of actions and mental states, blame attaches to people or agents (cf. Sinnott-Armstrong 1984; Stern 2004; Whiting 2011). Therefore, it seems entirely sensible to hold that even if a person is not blameworthy for their emotions that person might still be undergoing the wrong or right emotions. That emotions can be evaluated in various ways suggests also a response to a complaint that Christine Tappolet, a defender of a perceptual model

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of emotion, levels at feeling theories. Tappolet claims that one reason for rejecting theories such as mine “is that such theories cannot make room for the fact that emotions are assessable in terms of how they fit the world. My fear can be appropriate or not, depending on whether what I am afraid of is fearsome, that is, depending on whether it calls for fear.” (2016, 10–11). Now, if the worry is supposed to be that emotions cannot be feelings, because then emotions cannot be assessed for their epistemic warrant, that is, in terms of how they present the world as being, then the feeling theorist would have to concede the point (though they would see that as a reason to reject the idea that emotions can be assessed for epistemic warrant). However, note that talk of emotion being ‘appropriate’ or ‘fitting’ is vague. Indeed, on the face of it such language indicates only that emotions are governed by certain norms, namely those that make an emotion ‘appropriate’ or ‘fitting’, or, in other words, the kind of emotions that should be felt in the circumstances at hand. But if that is the case, then there is no reason why the feeling theorist cannot allow for emotions being assessable for their appropriateness or fittingness, given that the feeling theorist is able to allow for emotions being evaluable for things other than their epistemic warrant. And to be clear, this response to Tappolet’s complaint is in no way challenged by her claim that whether fear is appropriate depends on whether the object triggering the fear is fearsome. For, again, by ‘fearsome’ we mean something like ‘meriting or warranting a response of fear’. But even a feeling theorist can allow that whether fear is appropriate depends on whether the object triggering the fear merits a response of fear.16

 Immediately after the passage that I quote in the main text, Tappolet writes: “But feelings, such as an itch or a headache, are not things that can be assessed in terms of how they fit the world”. (2016, 11) But, of course, what might be true for things such as itches and headaches need not be true for the feelings that are emotions. Indeed, there is no reason why a feeling theorist cannot and should not elevate emotion to a position that would make them, but not other kinds of bodily feelings, appropriate objects for certain types of assessment. 16

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The Objection from Free-Floating Anxiety The objection from free-floating anxiety holds that we should reject my treatment of the so-called ‘object-directed emotions’, because it fails to be able to explain emotional phenomena such as free-floating anxiety and nameless fear. This is because we might think these mental states are to be identified with emotions that fail to have intentional objects. However, that way of describing these states is not available to us if we accept my way of treating the ‘object-directed emotions’, as on that account all emotions fail to have objects. In response, it might be suggested that we should just deny that mental states such as free-floating anxiety and nameless dread are emotions. Rather it might be held that these states are moods, not emotions. Now, I am not entirely sure how moods are to be best described, but however that issue is resolved I think this response to the objection from free-­ floating anxiety fails. Free-floating anxiety is a form of anxiety, albeit a form of anxiety that has the property of being ‘free-floating’. Anxiety is an emotion. Therefore, free-floating anxiety is an emotion, albeit an emotion that is free-floating. Consequently, if we are to answer the objection from free-floating anxiety then it is not the status of these mental states as emotions that we need to dispute; instead we need to be able to explain the property of being free-floating in a way that is consistent with my treatment of the so-called ‘object-directed emotions’. I think there are two possible responses available to us corresponding to the two different ways in which the ‘object-directed’ emotions were treated. Suppose the hybrid mental state account of the object-directed emotions is correct. In which case, we can say that free-floating anxiety and nameless dread are to be identified with emotions that fail to be components of the emotion-thought complexes with which the object-­ directed emotions are to be identified. On this view the emotion of anxiety counts as ‘free-floating anxiety’ if it is an emotion that fails to help constitute the hybrid mental state, anxiety-about-an-object. But suppose instead the individuating causes account is the correct one. Then in which case, we can say that free-floating anxiety is to be identified with a state of anxiety that fails to be caused by an intentional mental state.

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Now regardless of which account we adopt, the important thing to note is that both accounts identify mental states such as free-floating anxiety and nameless fear with emotions that fail to have any kind of cognitive or intentional antecedent (which is not to deny that the emotions in question have other kinds of causes, say, chemical or physiological causes). And support for this view derives directly from introspective observation of these mental states, which suggests strongly that these states do not have mental representations causing them; hence the strange impression experienced by those who undergo such states that they fail to be caused by anything that might normally make sense of such mental states.17

The Objection from Epiphenomenalism According to the objection from epiphenomenalism, emotions cannot be feelings since that would bar emotions from discharging any kind of causal or motivational role. In fact, it can be difficult to discern the exact reason for the objection. Sometimes the complaint seems to be leveled at the idea defended by William James that emotions come after bodily activity or behavior and therefore cannot help to explain such behavior (Reisenzein and Stephan 2014; Scarantino 2016). As I explained earlier in the chapter it is unclear whether James needed to commit himself to that view. But even if James was committed to that view, the objection in question would be an objection only to a particular kind of feeling theory of emotion. It would not be an objection to a feeling theory that does not view the feelings in question to come after the behavior that common-­ sense and anecdotal evidence tells us to be partly explained by emotion. But sometimes the objection seems to take the form of simple disbelief. If emotions are feelings then how can emotions explain behavior!? Consider the following passage by Rainer Reisenzein and Achim Stephan:

 If moods are emotions that fail to be components of the mental states that are sometimes thought of as ‘object-directed emotions’, or (alternatively) emotions that fail to have the property of being caused by a mental representation, then free-floating anxiety and nameless dread will count (also) as moods. 17

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[H]ow do emotions as bodily feelings, which do not contain information about the concrete eliciting objects… manage to generate an intention to act towards or against these objects? Information about the concrete nature of a threat or challenge (e.g., I might be eaten by the attacking bear) seems to be indispensable for this purpose. To solve this problem, one can either assume that the necessary additional information is provided by the emotion-­evoking appraisal; or that the emotion is after all not only a bodily feeling, but also contains a representation of the eliciting object. (Reisenzein and Stephan 2014, 40)

Notice that the authors do not say why they think bodily feelings cannot generate an intention to act in certain ways, or why information ‘about the concrete nature of a threat or challenge’ is necessary for that purpose. Rather, the authors just presume both these things are true. This would be reasonable, perhaps, were it really obvious that a mental state must have representational structure to give rise to an intention or desire to action. But that assumption seems anything but obvious. Why cannot a feeling give rise to desire or an intention to action solely in virtue of that feeling’s intrinsic felt qualities? Take physical pain. Clearly pain can dispose us to behave in certain ways and plausibly does so in virtue of pain’s unpleasant felt quality. Similarly, we might say that fear gives rise to an intention or desire to behave in certain ways (say, to avoid the thing that is causing the fear) in virtue of fear’s edgy quality. In both cases the mental states discharge an explanatory role in virtue of how those mental states feel. And in neither case does there seem to be any need to assign to the mental state in question a representation or appraisal. On the contrary, the mental states in question discharge their explanatory role in virtue of felt qualities of theirs that are non-representational or non-intentional by nature, the painfulness of pain, the edginess of fear. This leads me to make a second point in response to the objection from epiphenomenalism, namely that it can be argued that mental states with these intrinsic felt qualities are required for the possibility of motivation to action. After all, it is far from clear that beliefs or mental representations more generally can on their own give rise to intention or desire. Indeed, no matter how someone represents the world as being it seems to

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be an open question as to how they will desire to behave. That someone represents their situation as being dangerous or threatening, for instance, seems insufficient for them to be motivated to flee or escape, since they might not care about their situation being dangerous or threatening; their situation being dangerous or threatening might even be a source of attraction for that person. What else, then, might be needed for a desire or motivation to action? The examples just given and the remarks from the previous paragraph point very suggestively in the direction of emotions conceived as types of feelings being those things needed for us to be motivated to act. Thus, it is in virtue of the edgy sensation I undergo when reflecting on the dangerousness of my situation that I am motivated to flee, and in virtue of the exalted feeling you feel when reflecting on the dangerousness of your situation that you are motivated to embrace your situation. Feelings, then, promise to give us that key ingredient that leads us from occupying what would otherwise be a stance of indifferent passivity with respect to what is going on around us to occupying a stance where we are poised or ready to act.

Concluding Remarks I have been concerned to show that emotions are original existences, mental states that have no intentional or representational properties of their own. I began by arguing that emotions are feelings, closely akin to but not identical with mere bodily sensations, such as physical pains, aches, and itches. Not only do emotions feel different from other bodily sensations, but also, as Descartes recognized, whereas bodily feelings relate us only to the body, emotions are felt as belonging to the self. Again, this idea will be developed further in Part III of the book. I then argued that emotions fail to have representational properties. The case of animals and infants supports that view, the idea being that animals and infants seem to lack the conceptual capacities to form the kinds of intentional  or representational contents that representational theories of emotion assign to emotion. But the strongest justification for the view that emotions lack representational properties is

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phenomenological, namely that emotions present themselves to us as being types of bodily feelings that lack intentional  or representational properties. In arguing for a feeling theory of emotion various objections were considered. Common to a number of these is the idea that at least some emotions involve mental representations. For instance, my fear of a dog involves a representation of a dog, and a state of pride involves a mental representation of a personal achievement. And from which it is inferred that such emotions have  representational properties. However, my response to all such objections was in effect to show they end up begging the question against the feeling theory of emotion. If emotions are mere feelings, as strongly supported by the phenomenology of emotion, then emotions cannot have intentional or representational properties. To be sure, we might sometimes speak as if emotions have such properties, but we are misled by the way we speak. What we might commonly think of as emotions with objects are either complex mental states, consisting of thoughts and emotions (the hybrid mental state account), or objectless emotions that have been triggered by mental states with objects (the individuating causes account). I explained as well why the objection from the rational assessment of emotion similarly ends up begging the question against the feeling theory by assigning a property to emotion—namely, that of being assessable for doxastic rationality—that emotions conceived as non-intentional feelings do not possess. The last objection I answered has it that a feeling theory of emotion entails that emotions are epiphenomenal states. My reply was that on the contrary understanding emotions as feelings allows us to assign to emotions a role that other mental states might not be suited to discharge. If that is the case, then that is sufficient to answer the objection from epiphenomenalism. Still, clearly much more needs to be said about the exact nature of the role that I am assigning to emotion and why it is a role that emotion alone can discharge. In the first chapter of Part II of this book, then, I take up these matters further and provide a comprehensive defense of the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases for desires conceived as behavioral dispositions, and that emotions serve this role by virtue of being feeling states. Then in the two chapters that follow, I spell out the

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implications of that idea for emotion’s role in the formation of moral thought, virtue and vice.

References Barlassina, L., & Newen, A. (2013). The Role of Bodily Perception in Emotion: In Defense of an Impure Somatic Theory. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 89, 637–678. Block, N. (1995). On a Confusion About the Role of Consciousness. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 18, 227–287. Brewer, B. (2002). Emotion and Other Minds. In P. Goldie (Ed.), Understanding Emotions. Aldershot: Ashgate. Chalmers, D. (2004). The Representational Character of Experience. In B. Leiter (Ed.), The Future for Philosophy (pp.  153–181). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Cottingham, J., Stoothoff, R., & Murdoch, D. (Trans.). (1988). Descartes: Selected Philosophical Writings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Crane, T. (2001). Elements of Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Damasio, A. (1994). Descartes’ Error. New York: Quill. Deigh, J. (2009). Concepts of Emotions in Modern Philosophy and Psychology. In P. Goldie (Ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Emotion (pp. 17–40). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Deigh, J. (2014). Author Reply: A Comment on Reisenzein and James. Emotion Review, 6, 47–48. Deonna, J., & Teroni, F. (2012). The Emotions. A Philosophical Introduction. Oxon: Routledge. Döring, S. (2007). Seeing What to Do: Affective Perception and Rational Motivation. Dialectica, 61, 363–394. Farrell, D. (1980). Jealousy. The Philosophical Review, 89, 527–559. Frijda, N. (1986). The Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Goldie, P. (2000). The Emotions: A Philosophical Exploration. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Goldie, P. (2009). Getting Feelings into Emotional Experience in the Right Way. Emotion Review, 1, 232–239. Goldstein, I. (2002). Are Emotions Feelings? A Further Look at Hedonic Theories of Emotions. Consciousness and Emotions, 3, 21–33. Gorodeisky, K. (2019). The Authority of Pleasure. Noûs, 53, 1–22.

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Green, O. (1992). The Emotions. London: Kluwer Academic Publishers. Horgan, T., & Tienson, J. (2002). The Intentionality of Phenomenology and the Phenomenology of Intentionality. In D.  Chalmers (Ed.), Philosophy of Mind: Classical and Contemporary Readings (pp. 520–533). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hume, D. (1896). A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume, Reprinted from the Original Edition in Three Volumes and Edited, with an Analytical Index (L. A. Selby-Bigge, Ed.). Oxford: Clarendon Press. James, W. (1884). What is an Emotion? Mind, 9, 188–205. James, W. (1890). The Principles of Psychology. New York, NY: Henry Holt. Joyce, R. (2000). Rational Fear of Monsters. British Journal of Aesthetics, 40, 209–224. Kenny, A. (1963). Action, Emotion, and Will. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Kriegel, U. (2012). Towards a New Feeling Theory of Emotion. European Journal of Philosophy, 3, 420–442. Lamb, R. (1987). Objectless Emotions. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 48, 107–117. Lutz, A. (2015). The Phenomenal Character of Emotional Experience: A Look at Perception Theory. Dialectica, 69, 313–334. Maiese, M. (2011). Embodiment, Emotion, and Cognition. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Mitchell, J. (2018). The Irreducibility of Emotional Phenomenology. Erkenntnis. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-018-0075-8. Müller, J. (2017). How (Not) to Think of Emotions as Evaluative Attitudes. Dialectica, 71, 281–308. Müller, J. (2019). The World Directedness of Emotional Feeling. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Mulligan, K. (2010). Emotions and Values. In P. Goldie (Ed.), Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Emotions. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nussbaum, M. (2001). Upheavals of Thought: The Intelligence of Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Oakley, J. (1992). Morality and the Emotions. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Öhman, A., & Soares, J. (1993). On the Automatic Nature of Phobic Fear: Conditioned Electrodermal Responses to Masked Fear-Relevant Stimuli. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 102, 121–132.

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Panksepp, J. (2001). Emotions as Natural Kinds Within the Mammalian Brain. In M.  Lewis & J.  Haviland-Jones (Eds.), Handbook of Emotions (2nd ed., pp. 137–156). New York: Guilford Press. Pitt, D. (2004). The Phenomenology of Cognition or What is it Like to Think that p? Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 69, 1–36. Poellner, P. (2016). Phenomenology and the Perceptual Model of Emotion. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 116, 261–288. Priest, S. (1995). Review of The Emotions, by O. Green. Mind, 104, 166–168. Prinz, J. (2003). Emotions, Psychosemantics, and Embodied Appraisals. In A. Hatzimoysis (Ed.), Philosophy and the Emotions (pp. 69–86). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Prinz, J. (2004). Gut Reactions. A Perceptual Theory of Emotion. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pugmire, D. (1998). Rediscovering Emotion. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Radcliffe, E. (2018). Hume, Passion, and Action. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Reisenzein, R., & Stephan, A. (2014). More on James and the Physical Basis of Emotion. Emotion Review, 6, 35–46. Rosenthal, D. (1983). Emotions and the Self. In G. Myers & K. Irani (Eds.), Emotion: Philosophical Studies (pp. 164–191). New York: Haven Publications. Sankowski, E. (1977). Responsibility of Persons for Their Emotions. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 7, 829–840. Scarantino, A. (2010). Insights and Blindspots of the Cognitivist Theory of Emotions. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 61, 729–768. Scarantino, A. (2014). The Motivational Theory of Emotions. In J. D’Arms & D.  Jacobson (Eds.), Moral Psychology and Human Agency (pp.  156–185). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Scarantino, A. (2016). The Philosophy of Emotions and Its Impact on Affective Science. In L. Barrett, M. Lewis, & J. Haviland-Jones (Eds.), Handbook of Emotions (pp. 3–48). New York: Guilford Press. Scarantino, A., & de Sousa, R. (2018). Emotion. In E. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2018 ed.). Stanford University. Retrieved from https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2018/entries/emotion/ Scheler, M. (1980). Der Formalismus in der Ethik und die materiale Wertethik. Berne and Munich: Francke. Scherer, K. (1984). On the Nature and Function of Emotion: A Component Process Approach. In K. Scherer & P. Ekman (Eds.), Approaches to Emotion (pp. 293–318). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

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Searle, J. (1992). The Rediscovery of the Mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Servan-Schreiber, D., & Perlstein, W. (1998). Selective Limbic Activation and its Relevance to Emotional Disorders. Cognition and Emotion, 12, 331–352. Sinnott-Armstrong, W. (1984). “‘Ought” Conversationally Implies “Can”’. The Philosophical Review, 93, 249–261. Solomon, R. (1993). The Passions: Emotions and the Meaning of Life. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company. Stern, R. (2004). Does ‘Ought’ Imply ‘Can’? And Did Kant Think it Does? Utilitas, 16, 42–61. Styron, W. (1990). Darkness Visible. London: Vintage. Tappolet, C. (2016). Emotions, Values, and Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Whiting, D. (2006). Standing up for an Affective Account of Emotion. Philosophical Explorations, 9, 261–276. Whiting, D. (2011). The Feeling Theory of Emotion and the Object-Directed Emotions. European Journal of Philosophy, 19, 281–301. Whiting, D. (2012). Are Emotions Perceptual Experiences of Value? Ratio, 25, 93–107. Whiting, D. (2016). On the Appearance and Reality of Mind. Journal of Mind and Behavior, 37, 47–70. Wierzibicka, A. (1992). Talking About Emotions: Semantics, Culture, and Cognition. Cognition and Emotion, 6, 285–319.

Part II On Emotion and Motivation

4 Urges of the Heart

For it must be observed that the principal effect of all the human passions is that they move and dispose the soul to want the things for which they prepare the body. Thus the feeling of fear moves the soul to want to flee, that of courage to want to fight, and similarly with the others. —René Descartes, in Cottingham et al. trans. (1988, 343)

Introduction Belief-desire psychology—known also as the Humean theory of motivation—holds that human behavior can be explained by belief-desire complexes. Desires set our goals, while beliefs provide us with the means to achieve those goals. My reaching for a glass of water, for instance, can be explained by my desire to drink some water along with my belief there is a glass of water on the table at which I am sitting. This leaves emotion in an odd position. If beliefs and desires can alone explain human behavior, then on the face of it that leaves nothing for emotion to do. Here we might be tempted to go in one of two directions. First, we could claim that emotions are epiphenomenal states that have no role in explaining human behavior. This is the implication that some © The Author(s) 2020 D. Whiting, Emotions as Original Existences, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54682-3_4

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philosophers see a feeling theory of emotion as having. But whereas these philosophers take this to be a reason to reject a feeling theory, we could bite the bullet and argue it is the view that emotions are explanatorily relevant that needs to be rejected, since beliefs and desires alone explain behavior. Or, second, we could seek to identify emotions with beliefs and/or desires and claim that emotion’s role in explaining human behavior is whatever role is played by emotion’s constituent parts. Neither option seems very compelling. The first fails to accord with anecdotal evidence, which shows that emotions can make a real difference to how we behave. Consider someone who is overcome with fear every time they are about to board a plane. It seems clear the fear they are undergoing can significantly impact on how they behave, such as making it less likely they step onto the plane. Of course, this leaves unanswered the question of how fear is involved. For instance, does fear directly cause someone to behave in certain ways, or is the effect more of an indirect one in that fear gives rise to something else—a desire, say—that directly causes behavior? Be that as it may, fear plays some role relevant to the generation of behavior. The second option is arguably the one adopted more often by proponents of a belief-desire model of human behavior. However, this option is unavailable to us if emotions are neither beliefs nor desires, but feelings. A third option, then, is to find a distinctive role for emotion, one that is separate from that discharged by belief and desire. But what distinctive role might emotion have? Arguably emotion is not the immediate cause of behavior in the examples just given. That role seems to be one discharged by desire. It is my desire for some water that directly causes me to reach for a glass of water. And even in the case of the person who is overcome with fear when boarding a plane, plausibly it is a strong desire or impulse not to step onto the plane that is the immediate cause of the behavior in question. Might the two examples suggest that emotion can be a source of desire and hence indirectly responsible for the behaviors in question? For instance, might the pleasure that is induced in me by the thought of drinking water explain my desire to drink the water, and the fear I undergo when about to board a plane explain why I am inclined not to step onto the plane?

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The idea that emotions are a source of desire is a promising one, but in itself would tell us little about the exact nature of the relationship holding between emotion and desire. Is the relationship supposed to be a causal one, whereby emotion causes desire? Or might the relationship be a stronger, metaphysical one, whereby desires are grounded in or realized by the emotions we undergo? In what follows, I argue for there being a grounding relationship holding between emotion and desire. By a ‘grounding relationship’ I mean roughly a relationship that involves one thing metaphysically determining or realizing another thing, in that the latter thing obtains in virtue of the former thing obtaining. In short, my claim will be that desires are behavioral dispositions and emotions serve as categorical bases for the behavioral dispositions in question. My strategy will be as follows. To begin with, I will spell out some key features of dispositions, stimulus events, and categorical bases, and say something about the relationship that holds between them. Here I wish to get clear on what these things are in their most general form, that is, with respect to how they relate to objects in general and not solely to human beings specifically. Thus, in the same way we can talk about human beings being disposed to behave in certain ways, we can talk about ordinary physical entities such as rocks and vases being disposed to behave in certain ways. But having spelt out some key features of dispositions, stimulus events, and categorical bases as these things relate to objects in general, we will be in a good position to think about how these things might relate to the human case specifically, about what in the case of human beings might play the role of dispositions, stimulus events and categorical bases. So in the second part of this chapter and drawing on claims developed in the first part I will defend the idea that in the case of human beings, desires (and desire-like states) are dispositions to behavior, beliefs (and belief-like states) are the stimulus conditions for the manifestation of dispositions to behavior, and emotions serve as the categorical bases for people’s dispositions to behavior. Towards the end of the chapter, I will also advance reasons for thinking the claims I make are true with respect to our dispositions to mental doings, such as attending to something in thought or inferring a certain conclusion when presented with supporting evidence.

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 ispositions, Stimulus Events, D and Categorical Bases A widely held view has it that the dispositional properties require categorical grounds or bases, properties in virtue of which objects are disposed to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain. For instance, the microphysical structure of a vase is the categorical basis for the disposition of a vase to shatter when struck with force by a blunt instrument. The microphysical structure of the vase is that property, then, that gives the vase the causal properties or powers that it has. And here we might distinguish between three ‘actors’, three distinct properties of the vase, each playing a unique role in relation to the points just made.

Disposition The first actor is the disposition, the way the vase is disposed to behave when struck. This property is the immediate cause of the vase breaking. That is, it is the disposition of a vase to shatter when struck that causes the vase to break in the event of being struck. Plausibly, this is more than an accidental feature of the disposition in question. Standardly dispositions are identified in terms of the causal roles they play, which I take to mean that dispositions are properties the essence or nature of which is to cause their bearers to behave in certain ways when the stimulus conditions obtain. For instance, a vase’s disposition to break when struck is that property of a vase whose nature or essence is to cause the vase to shatter in the event of being struck. A vast literature on dispositions exist, which I cannot survey here.1 Nevertheless, it is worth outlining a number of key features that dispositions have, as this will prove important to the discussion that follows. First, dispositions are higher-level properties, that is to say, properties of an object that are grounded in or realized by lower-level or base properties of the object (we will return to question of the exact nature of the  For a helpful summary of some key claims that have been made about dispositions, see Choi and Fara (2018). 1

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relationship between dispositions and their bases later in the chapter). This has been alluded to already with the example of the vase. Thus, a vase’s disposition to shatter when struck with force is grounded in or realized by the vase’s molecular structure. Here the disposition to shatter in the event of being struck with force is a higher-level property of the vase and the vase’s molecular structure is a lower-level or base property of the vase, that is to say, a property in virtue of which the vase is disposed to shatter when struck with force. Second, I take dispositions to be real or occurrent properties of objects. The idea that dispositions are real or occurrent properties is a consequence of the view that dispositions are causally efficacious, for only things that exist exert causal influence. Another reason for thinking dispositions are real is that they can sometimes be perceived by us, at least when the dispositions in question are our own dispositions to behavior.2 Thus, there is something it is like for us to be disposed to behave in certain ways, and again this is possible only if dispositions are real or occurrent properties of ours.3 That dispositions are higher-level properties, then, is no reason to think that dispositions are any less real than lower-level or base properties. From the fact that dispositional properties are real or occurrent properties of objects, it follows also that dispositions are to be conceived of as being actualities and not mere potentialities, things that might exist but do not.

 It may be true also for dispositional properties of objects like vases. For instance, consider a particularly fragile vase made out of glass or fine china. Isn’t it plausible to suppose that the fragility or delicacy of the vase, a higher-level property of the vase, is readily apparent or manifest to us in our experience of the vase? Isn’t that how we experience the vase? My personal sense is that when we perceive (see or touch, say) an object that is delicate, the delicacy of the object is perceptible to us. 3  It is true that dispositional properties are sometimes viewed as persisting states of objects and occurrent properties as transient or short-lived states of objects. However, this fails to give us a principled reason to think dispositions are not occurrent properties. For one thing, dispositions can be short-lived. This seems true of behavioral dispositions that we assign to human beings, for instance. Thus, I may be only momentarily disposed to behave in a particular way, say, to scratch my ear. For another thing, it is unclear why persisting states shouldn’t count as occurrent states. After all, why not say a persisting property of an object—a vase’s disposition to shatter when struck, say—is a property the instantiation or exemplification of which simply occurs over a long period of time, possibly as long as the object itself exists? But, more to the point, if all that is meant by an ‘occurrent property’ is a property that genuinely exists, then dispositional properties are occurrent properties, since dispositional properties genuinely exist (on this point, see Chakravartty 2007, 124). 2

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Third, I consider dispositions to be relational properties, holding between the bearers of the dispositions and their (potential or actual) manifestations. The idea that dispositions are relational is not accepted by everyone (though the idea has a number of notable proponents: see, for instance, Adams 2007; Van Cleve 2016),4 but in my view has to be true because dispositions depend for their identities on the relations they bear to the manifestations of the dispositions. Or to put the point in another way, dispositions must be relational because it is not possible to characterize or identify a disposition independent of the disposition’s circumstances of manifestation. For instance, a vase’s disposition to shatter when struck with force relates the vase to a possible or actual state of affairs in which the vase engages in an act of shattering when struck with force. In fact, as the example of the vase illustrates, dispositions are relational in two respects, since dispositional properties also relate their bearers to the relevant stimulus events or conditions for the manifestations of the dispositions (cp. Kistler 2011).5 Thus, a vase is not merely disposed to shatter, but is disposed to shatter in the event of being struck with force. Fourth, whether an object is disposed to behave a certain way when a stimulus condition obtains does not depend solely on the object instantiating certain lower-level or base properties (those properties that serve as the disposition’s categorical basis, in other words). For instance, a vase’s disposition to break in the event of being struck with force requires the vase to be a certain way, to have a certain atomic structure, but it also requires the object striking the vase to be a certain way, to have a certain atomic structure. It might also require the laws of nature to be a certain way (assuming the laws of nature are contingent, not holding in all possible worlds). Were the atomic structure of the thing striking the vase to undergo the right change, then the vase would no longer be disposed to shatter in the event of being struck by the thing in question, since the  Richard Adams makes much the same point when he writes: “[Dispositions] are constituted by relations between the actual or present state of the substance that has them and other possible states of affairs. Fragility consists in a relation between a present state of something and its possible future breaking” (2007, 43; see also Kistler 2011). 5  Max Kistler writes: “The identity conditions of a disposition depend in an essential way on circumstances which are in part external to the object that has the power and in particular on the laws of nature. In general, neither the triggering circumstances T nor the manifestation M are intrinsic properties…” (Kistler 2011, 125). 4

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vase would no longer have a property whose nature is to cause the vase to shatter when struck by the thing in question (cp. Van Cleve 2016). In that case, the vase would lose a power it once possessed, and would do so even if the vase underwent no kind of intrinsic change of its own.

Stimulus Event The second actor is the stimulus event, which is the thing that triggers the manifestation of the disposition under suitable conditions. In the case of the vase, the stimulus event is the event of being struck with force; for it is the event of being struck with force that under certain conditions will lead to the manifestation of the disposition. Strictly-speaking, the stimulus event is part of the disposition, since we cannot characterize or identify the disposition apart from the stimulus event. Thus, a vase is not merely disposed to shatter, but is disposed to shatter when struck with force. But, despite being part of the disposition, the stimulus event isn’t the same thing as the disposition. After all, an object can be struck by something with force but not be disposed to shatter when struck by that thing with force. Also one and the same event can trigger the manifestation of more than one disposition and therefore cannot be identical with any of those dispositions. Notice that I speak about the stimulus event that under certain conditions will lead to the manifestation of the disposition in question. I take the conditions in question to be what we might call ‘enabling conditions’, conditions that need to be met in order for the stimulus event to trigger the manifestation of the disposition. For instance, striking a vase with force will lead to a vase breaking only if the vase is not protected by bubble-wrap. Are enabling conditions part of the stimulus event? For instance, should we really be saying that a vase is disposed to shatter when struck in the absence of being protected by bubble-wrap (see, for instance, Gundersen 2002; Choi 2006)? I think enabling conditions are not part of the stimulus event nor part of the disposition that requires enabling conditions to obtain in order to manifest. This better accords with how we think about individual cases, including cases where our own dispositions to behavior are prevented from manifesting (that is, despite the

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stimulus event occurring) due to such things as stronger opposing dispositions and/or lack of physical ability or capacity, a point to which I will return later in the chapter.

Categorical Basis The final actor is the categorical basis, that property in virtue of which something is disposed to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain. For instance, the categorical basis of the vase’s disposition to break when struck is the vase’s microphysical structure, the way the vase’s constituent atoms are arranged. Notice that with regard to ordinary physical objects such as vases, the categorical basis is distinct from the dispositional properties that it grounds or realizes. For instance, the vase’s microphysical structure is not the same property as the vase’s disposition to break when struck. There are a number of reasons why dispositions and their bases cannot be one and the same. One reason is that the categorical basis grounds or explains the disposition, and the grounding (or in-virtue-of ) relation is typically taken to be irreflexive, never holding between properties and themselves.6 This isn’t to rule out the idea of there being entities that do not depend for their existence on anything. However, if there are any such entities we tend to think of them as being primitive, which is to say they are entities that are not grounded in anything (Tahko 2015). Another reason is that it is possible for a given disposition to have more than one categorical basis (dispositional properties are multiply realizable), which would not be the case if dispositions are their categorical bases (see Prior et al. 1982). For instance, weak intermolecular bonding and irregular atomic structure can realize a disposition to shatter when being struck with force, and so both must be distinct from the disposition they realize. If dispositions are not their bases, then what is the nature of the relationship between the two? This is not an easy question to answer, but the  Although not everyone agrees with the idea that grounding is an irreflexive relation (e.g. Jenkins 2011), many do (e.g. Fine 2001; Schaffer 2009; Audi 2012), and as I will later point out in the main text, it seems a very plausible view regarding the relation holding between our dispositions to behavior and their categorical bases. 6

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standard view is that dispositions are grounded in or exist in virtue of their categorical bases, where the grounding relation picks out something stronger than a causal relation but weaker than a relationship of identity. Intuitively, we might put the point by saying that dispositions are grounded in their categorical bases if and only if dispositional facts or truths obtain in virtue of categorical facts or truths obtaining—where the basic idea is that one set of properties (the categorical ones) metaphysically determine or realize another set of properties (the dispositional ones), at least when certain enabling conditions obtain. I say, ‘when certain enabling conditions obtain’, because as we have seen whether something succeeds in disposing an object to behave some way depends on a number of factors. For instance, the microphysical structure of a vase will dispose a vase to shatter when struck only if the thing striking the vase is made from the right kind of stuff. But assuming the right conditions obtain—assuming the thing striking the vase is made from lead, not candy-floss, for instance—then the microphysical structure of a vase will confer on the vase a disposition to shatter in the event of being struck by the thing in question.

Human Behavior and a Role for Emotion Desires as (Behavioral) Dispositions So with regard to human behavior what plays the role of the disposition, stimulus condition and categorical basis respectively? I believe desires play the role of dispositions. Indeed, it is commonly held that desires are behavioral dispositions, mental states whose essence or nature is to cause us to behave in particular ways under certain conditions. The idea is a compelling one. Conceptually-speaking, it accords with the way we tend to think about desires. That is to say, we tend to think of desires as mental states that are active by nature, in that they exert causal influence on how we behave, at least under certain conditions. For instance, barring such things as the presence of stronger opposing desires, my desire to drink some water will cause me to reach for a glass in the event of my believing

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the glass contains water. Also, a dispositional account of desire seems to describe correctly the phenomenology of desire or what it is like to be in a desire state from a first-person point of view. For instance, plausibly what it is like to desire some water is what it is like to be disposed to behave in ways that will satisfy that desire (Anjum and Mumford 2011; Ashwell 2017a). Note that a dispositional theory of desire is consistent with the idea that desires are occurrent or episodic mental states, since there is nothing on the dispositional theory that rules out the idea that behavioral dispositions are episodic mental states. Indeed, I think we should think of behavioral dispositions as being episodic states. For one thing, behavioral dispositions are often transitory states in the same way that mental episodes in general tend to be transitory. My disposition to eat a sandwich may persist only so long as I am hungry, for instance. For another thing, and as alluded to already, there is something that it is like from a first-­ person point of view to be disposed to behave in certain ways (for instance, to be disposed to eat a sandwich), a property of a mental state that is normally associated with episodic mental phenomena. True, we sometimes speak of desires or behavioral dispositions in a way that might suggest that desires sometimes persist over time and can be possessed even when a person is asleep and not experiencing any conscious mental activity. Consider, for example, how we might speak of my possessing a standing desire or disposition to travel the world, a desire that can be attributed to me even when I am dreamlessly sleeping. However, our discussion of standing emotions in Chap. 2 lends strong support to the idea that standing desires pose no objection to the idea that desires, indeed all desires, are episodic mental states with a phenomenology of their own. For if my treatment of standing emotions generalizes to other mental states, including desires (and it is unclear what could justify holding my treatment doesn’t generalize), then in the case of standing desires it is the possessing or having of a standing desire that persists over time and lacks a characteristic phenomenology, not the desire or disposition itself. On this view, standing desires or behavioral dispositions are nothing but episodic or occurrent desires or behavioral ­dispositions that we form or are disposed to form whenever certain

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circumstances obtain (for instance, when we are awake and thinking about things relating to our desires—our travelling the world, say).

Objections and Replies According to the dispositional theory, then, desires are behavioral dispositions, where the behavioral dispositions in question (and the desires associated with those behavioral dispositions) are to be viewed as episodic mental states with a distinctive phenomenology of their own. But although the idea that desires are behavioral dispositions is a widely held one (see Smith 1987, 1994; Ashwell 2014; Hyman 2014; Whiting 2018a), objections have been leveled at that view, which I now want to address. To begin with, it is sometimes objected that people can be disposed to do something without desiring to do that thing. For instance, a person might be disposed to fall to the ground in the event of being pushed without desiring to fall to the ground. But this objection fails to show that desires are not behavioral dispositions, because most dispositional theories consider desires to be what people are disposed to do in the event of forming some belief or mental representation about the world. Commonly this mental representation is taken to be a means-end belief (see, for instance, Stalnaker 1984; Ashwell 2014), though I will argue later that the mental representations in question need not be restricted to means-­ ends beliefs and can take the form of simple perceptual or sensory representations. The relevant stimulus event, then, is the forming of a belief or perceptual experience and not the event of being physically pushed. Note that if a person were described as being disposed to fall to the ground in the event of thinking they were being pushed, then it would seem much more plausible to say the person possesses a desire to fall to the ground. Another objection to dispositional theories of desire holds that people can desire certain things without being disposed to do anything (see Mele 1996; Schroeder 2004; Kind 2011; Arpaly and Schroeder 2014). Here two sorts of cases help to illustrate this objection. First, someone might desire something—say, that their favorite football team wins a game or that they were never born—without being disposed to do anything that

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will bring about the desired result (Arpaly and Schroeder 2014). Second, someone might desire to do something but lack the physical ability to do that thing. For instance, someone who is physically paralyzed might desire to eat a sandwich or take a walk. The paralysis case might seem to pose a problem for a dispositional theory of desire, because it is often supposed that dispositions and capacities are one and the same, that if someone lacks the capacity to do something then that person is not disposed to do that thing. The two sorts of cases just described demand different responses, so let us consider each in turn. One initial way of responding to the first sort of case described is to deny that behavioral dispositions are absent in such cases. True, the football fan who wants their team to win might not be disposed to do anything to bring about the desired result, but they might be disposed to do other things. For instance, perhaps they will be disposed to celebrate their team’s victory in the event of their team winning or be disposed to spur their team on in the event of believing their team is doing badly. Similarly, the person who wishes they were never born may not be disposed to bring about such a thing, but they might be disposed to behave in other ways. For instance, perhaps they will be disposed to engage in acts of self-harm when the opportunity arises or be disposed to answer in the affirmative if asked whether they wished they were never born. According to this initial way of responding to the first sort of case described above, the desires in question are behavioral dispositions, albeit behavioral dispositions that aim at a broader range of behaviors than we might have supposed originally. And we might think that our earlier characterization of behavioral dispositions very much rules that possibility in. Again, according to that characterization behavioral dispositions just are mental states the nature or essence of which is to cause us to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain. But such a characterization seems to leave open the possibility that the behaviors to which dispositions aim are wide-ranging, not restricted to any one behavior. However, there is another way of responding to the first kind of case described that doesn’t require us to suppose behavioral dispositions are present in the cases in question. This alternative response has the

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advantage, if successful, of conceding to the objection its way of conceptualizing the cases in question—namely, as cases where behavioral dispositions are absent—while at the same time denying that such cases show that desires (or at least an important subset of desires) are not behavioral dispositions. The response I have in mind holds that although a dispositional theory of desire is not true for all desires it is true for the sort of desires with which we are concerned in this chapter, namely desires to action. Thus, in the case of the football fan who desires their football team to win or in the case of the person who wishes they were never born, there is no desire to behave in any way and this is why there is no disposition to action. But where there is a desire to behave a certain way—consider a football player who desires to contribute to their team’s success or someone who desires to end their life—then we will find a disposition to action. This response does invite the worry that it leaves unexplained what unites every case of desire—what justifies saying these are all cases of desire—if not every desire is a behavioral disposition. For instance, what justifies holding that the desire to have never been born is the same kind of mental state than the desire to end one’s life if only the latter is a behavioral disposition? Now, we could try to resist this worry by claiming that only desires to action are desires properly-speaking. Thus, perhaps we should think of these other states as being wishes or hopes, or such like. But such a reply risks being ad hoc, its only real virtue being that of theory conservation. A proponent of the dispositional view does not wish to concede there are motivationally inert desires; therefore when offered a counterexample they respond by saying that it cannot be a desire. The concern is that it is not clear what can motivate such a response other than the very theory the response is designed to defend, namely the theory that all desires are behavioral dispositions. Moreover, even if we put this worry to one side, note that wishes and hopes are desire-like. But then the question arises: in virtue of what are such mental states like desires if not their being behavioral dispositions? I think a much better way of addressing the worry of what unites different kinds of desires is as follows. Agreed, desires that are not desires to action (say, a desire for one’s favorite football team to win or a desire

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never to be born) are not behavioral dispositions. However, what they have in common with desires that are behavioral disposition is the fact of their both being causal powers. For suppose we define a causal power as a property whose essence or nature is to cause certain things to happen when certain circumstances obtain. In the case of causal powers that are behavioral dispositions (or desires to action) the *certain things to happen* are all behaviors; thus, again behavioral dispositions just are mental states the nature or essence of which is to cause us to behave in certain ways. But, acknowledge that the definition of causal power just given doesn’t necessitate the idea that causal powers always aim at effecting changes in behavior. That definition leaves open the possibility that causal powers may sometimes aim at effecting other changes. And this is what I propose for desires that are not desires to action. Desires that are not desires to action are causal powers that aim at effecting changes other than changes in the behavior of the people with those desires. For instance, my desire never to be born is one of these sorts of desires or causal powers, the idea being that a desire never to be born just is a mental state the essence or nature of which is to cause a state of affairs in which I was never born. And that this is a plausible way of treating desires that are not desires to action is suggested by the following two considerations. First, this way of treating desires that are not desires to action is plausible from a phenomenological point of view. Thus, plausibly what it feels like to desire or to will something (for instance, to desire or will my never being born) is what it feels like to occupy a mental state that has as its aim the bringing about or causing of that thing. Second, consider the case of God. Presumably God (unlike us mere humans) needn’t form a desire to behave a certain way to cause changes in the world. For God it is sufficient merely to desire something to happen for that thing to happen; again God needn’t actually do anything to make that thing happen. But that suggests that desires that are not behavioral dispositions are still causal powers. Thus, we might say it is of the essence or nature of God’s desire for something to happen to cause that thing to happen (or at least to cause that thing to happen when certain circumstances obtain, including circumstances in which God doesn’t have a stronger opposing desire). Now, we are not like God, and arguably our desires are efficacious only with regard to our behaviors, but were the

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universe different (for instance, were objects such as to bend to our will in the way objects are such as to bend to God’s will) then our desires could effect changes in things other than our behaviors, and I think that suffices for the desires to qualify as causal powers.7 According to the view I am advancing, then, desires aimed at actions and desires aimed at things other than action are different species of the same genus. Both types of desire are causal powers but only desires to action are causal powers that are behavioral dispositions. A different response is called for in the case of the person who is paralyzed, where again the worry is that desires are not behavioral dispositions because a paralyzed person might desire to do something but lack the capacity to do that thing. Thus, with regard to the paralysis case it would be no good to hold that the person lacks only a certain kind of desire, namely the desire to do certain things. For the paralyzed person does desire to do certain things, albeit certain things they might be unable to do. Neither would it be any good to respond that such a person has behavioral dispositions that aim at effecting changes in a broader range of behaviors than we might have originally supposed. For according to the present worry, the paralyzed person might fail to be disposed to do anything at all, since they might lack the capacity to do anything at all. So how should we respond to the paralysis case? I think this particular kind of counterexample to the disposition theory of desire simply invites the response that behavioral dispositions are not capacities. This is because it makes good sense to suppose that a person can be in a mental state the essence or nature of which is to cause that person to behave in certain ways under certain conditions even if that person lacks the ability or capacity to behave in those ways. The existence of a physical capacity to perform a certain action seems to relate only to one of the enabling conditions that need to be met for a disposition to cause an action, rather than  With regard to desires that are not desires to action, the predicament we all face seems very much like the predicament facing the physically paralyzed person with regard to their desires to action. For the paralyzed person possesses desires to action that fail to be able to manifest themselves due the person occupying a body that refuses to bend to those desires. But the paralyzed person’s desires to action are still behavioral dispositions, hence causal powers, albeit ones that are prevented from being manifested. Those of us who are not paralyzed are in an improved situation insofar as our bodies are receptive to the demands of our desires, but in much the same situation as the paralyzed person with regards to anything other than our bodies. 7

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to a condition that needs to be satisfied for a disposition to be present in the first place. Thus, we might say that a paralyzed person who desires to walk is someone who occupies a mental state that would cause that person to walk were the person to possess the capacity or ability to walk. The basic idea here, then, being that paralysis acts merely as a ‘mask’ for the manifestation of the disposition. The incapacity doesn’t remove the disposition, but it prevents the disposition from manifesting itself in behavior.8 How then are behavioral dispositions to be distinguished from capacities? Consideration of the paralysis case above suggests the following way of distinguishing the two. Capacities differ from dispositions insofar as the former are properties of an object the essence or nature of which is to enable or make possible the object engaging in certain behaviors when certain circumstances obtain, while the latter are properties of an object the nature or essence of which is to cause the object to engage in certain behaviors when certain circumstances obtain. For instance, my being paralysed consists in my failure to possess a property whose nature it is to make possible my performing certain behaviors. However, I can still be disposed to perform those behaviors because my lacking the capacity is consistent with my possessing a property whose nature is to cause me to perform those behaviors were I to possess the capacity in question. This would also explain the sense many people have that capacities, unlike behavioral dispositions, are passive in nature—in Lockean terminology, they are passive powers—in that they do not themselves bear causal influence over what we do, but rather make possible certain behaviors in the event of our being disposed to perform those behaviors.

 eliefs and Other Mental Representations B as Stimulus Events I hope to have said enough to make plausible the idea that desires (or at least an important subset of desires) are behavioral dispositions. What,  Of course, many things other than physical paralysis can serve as masks. For instance, other stronger desires/dispositions can prevent the manifestation of a weaker desire/disposition (for further discussion, see Ashwell 2017b). 8

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then, about the stimulus event for the manifestation of our desires? My reply to the first objection to dispositional theories of desire suggests that beliefs and belief-like states, including perceptions and imaginings, occupy that role. This seems to be tacitly accepted by those dispositional accounts of desire that identify desires with the dispositions to do those things that one believes will bring about some situation or state of affairs, which I take to be equivalent to saying that desires are dispositions to do certain things in the event of thinking those things will result in the outcomes in question. Therefore, the triggering events in question are means-­ end beliefs. For instance, my desire to drink some water can take the form of a disposition to consume the contents of a glass in the event of my thinking the glass contains water. Or, given my earlier characterization of what it is to be disposed to behave some way, my desire to drink some water might take the form of a mental state the nature or essence of which is to cause me to consume the contents of a glass in the event of my thinking the glass contains water. The above being said, we should avoid the idea that the stimulus events for a behavioral disposition need always be as conceptually complex as means-end beliefs. True, such beliefs can play the role of stimulus events. But often the mental representations that serve as the stimulus events are very simple representations, plausibly often lacking any conceptual content. So for instance, I might be disposed to reach out for a glass of water in the event of my seeing a glass of water. In such a case, the simple visual perception of a glass of water is enough to serve as a stimulus event for the manifestation of my disposition to reach out for a glass of water without my needing to form anything as conceptually complex as a means-­ end belief. Indeed, it seems likely that many behaviors manifest dispositions that have simple stimulus conditions. This seems true of much habitual behavior, for instance, which can be triggered by basic perceptual or sensory cues in the absence of any prior conscious deliberation, a point to which I return later in the chapter. Now, one might query whether the sorts of behaviors just spoken about manifest desires, properly-speaking. If desires are mental states that contain or presuppose means-end beliefs, then behavioral dispositions that have simple stimulus conditions such as perceptual or sensory stimuli are not desires. However, it is unclear

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whether desires have to be characterized in this way. Moreover, even if we want to reserve the term ‘desire’ to refer only to mental states that contain or presuppose means-end beliefs, we will still be left with a range of mental states that are desire-like in the sense of being behavioral dispositions. Perhaps, some might choose to refer to such states as impulses, not desires, but for my part I am happy to identify impulses with desires, albeit simple desires, and in what follows I will make no distinction between impulses and desires. Does holding that beliefs and belief-like states (including perceptions and imaginings) serve as stimulus conditions for the manifestations of our dispositional states, rule out beliefs and belief-like states themselves being behavioral dispositions? Roughly, according to a behavioral dispositional theory of belief, to believe a glass is on the table is to be disposed to behave as if there were a glass on the table. For instance, it is to be disposed to reach for the glass, or to be disposed to answer in the affirmative if asked whether there is a glass on the table. I am unclear how to answer the question of whether regarding belief states as stimulus conditions disqualifies belief states from being behavioral dispositions. Nevertheless, it seems to me that good reasons exist to think beliefs and belief-like states are not behavioral dispositions. One reason is that a behavioral dispositional account of belief conflicts with the Humean view of motivation, according to which belief states have no motivational power of their own. The worry is that if such states are not motivating in and of themselves, then it is not clear how they can be behavioral dispositions, since behavioral dispositions are motivating in and of themselves. And that the Humean theory of motivation gets it right in implying that beliefs and other mental representations are not behavioral dispositions is borne out by the phenomenology of belief and belief-like states. That is to say, what it is like for us to believe or judge or perceive or imagine is nothing like what it is like for us to be disposed to behave in any way. In my view, the difference between behavioral dispositions and beliefs and belief-like states is as follows: whereas behavioral dispositions are mental states the essence or nature of which is to cause us to behave in certain ways, beliefs are mental states the essence or nature of which is to represent the world as being a certain way, where again to represent the world as being a certain way is not to be disposed to behave in any way.

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Emotions as Categorical Bases If desires and beliefs are behavioral dispositions and stimulus conditions respectively, what discharges the role of the categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions? Our earlier discussion of physical objects, such as vases, might seem to suggest that our behavioral dispositions are grounded in or realized by certain physical states of the brain or the body. If this idea is to rule out the view that something with a mental or psychological nature serves as a categorical basis for our behavioral dispositions, then I think we have good reason to reject that idea. After all, when we ask in virtue of what are people or human beings disposed to behave in the ways they do—say, to travel to work, or to help people in times of trouble, or to do terrible things to one another during times of war—we always seem to be after a psychological explanation of some kind, that is to say, an explanation that refers us to certain facts about human nature or the individual natures or psychologies of the people in question (on this point, see also Lowe 2008; Mayr 2011; Whiting 2018a). At any rate, that seems to be true of behavioral dispositions that are desires. Plausibly there are some dispositions that people possess that might have their bases in something non-psychological. Consider, for instance, my being disposed to fall in the event of being pushed. It seems much less plausible to say that this disposition has its basis in something psychological. My being disposed to fall when being pushed seems to have its basis in certain physical properties of my body, such as its shape and mass. Now, there is a legitimate question as to whether my being disposed to fall when being pushed is a disposition to action or behavior, something that I do as opposed to something that merely happens to me. But even supposing my being disposed to fall when being pushed is a behavioral disposition, it fails to be a desire of mine (see the previous section), and so is not the sort of behavioral disposition with which we are concerned. For our question is that of what serves as the categorical bases for behavioral dispositions that are desires, and again I think an answer to

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that question requires us to seek out some psychological property that is suited to play that role.9 So our question is that of what psychological properties might serve as the bases for our desires. Might our desires ground or realize themselves? The answer is negative. As explained earlier in the chapter, grounding or in-virtue-of relations are standardly taken to be irreflexive, never holding between entities and themselves. And, certainly, it seems true to say that people’s behavioral dispositions are irreflexive. After all it makes very little sense to say that someone is disposed to do something (say, reach for a glass of water) in virtue of being disposed to do that thing. Another reason for holding that behavioral dispositions do not ground themselves is that, as explained already, dispositions are multiply realizable in that dispositions can have a variety of bases, can be realized by various base properties, and therefore cannot be their bases. Might our desires have behavioral dispositions other than themselves as their bases? For instance, might my desire to drink some water together with my believing a given glass contains water ground or realize my disposition to reach for the glass in question? As I see it, the problem facing us is conceiving of suitable behavioral dispositions that are distinct from the dispositions they supposedly underlie. The worry is that we will end up referring to the very same dispositional states that we are seeking to explain. Consider the example just given. On a dispositional theory, what is it to desire to drink some water? Presumably, it is going to be something like being disposed to do those things that one believes will result in drinking some water, including reaching for a glass in the event of thinking the glass contains water. But in which case my desire to drink some water cannot ground or realize my disposition to reach for the glass in question, since my desire to drink some water just involves or comprises my being disposed to reach for the glass in question. Therefore, unless some other dispositional property exists that is able to realize or ground my disposition to reach for a glass of water—and it is unclear  Note this would be consistent with holding that desires have physical states as their bases if the psychological states that realize desires are physical states. On its own, then, the claim that our desires have psychological states as their bases doesn’t rule out the possibility that those bases are physical. Another argument would need to be given for ruling that possibility out (for such an argument, see Whiting 2016, 2018b). 9

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what such a dispositional property might be—then my disposition to reach for a glass of water cannot have a behavioral disposition other than itself as its categorical basis.10 I think this leaves emotion as the most promising candidate for the categorical basis. That is to say, I want to say that our emotions ground or realize our behavioral dispositions. Support for that view comes from a number of sources. Most telling perhaps, emotions seem to have the right kinds of properties—hence, seem to be right kinds of things—to serve as categorical bases, and this for two reasons. First, the idea that emotions dispose us to behave in certain ways in virtue of how they feel seems a very plausible one. For instance, we might say that fear disposes us to behave in certain ways (say, engage in avoidance behavior) in virtue of fear’s felt edgy quality, and that anger confers on us a disposition to behave in certain ways (say, engage in retaliatory behavior) in virtue of anger’s felt incensed or hotheaded quality. Second, viewing emotions as the categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions accommodates nicely the idea that categorical bases are intrinsic, non-relational properties of objects, a point to which I return in Part III of the book. The point being that as we saw when discussing key features of dispositions, to speak of the way an object is disposed to behave is to speak of properties of the object that relate the object to certain ways of behaving. For instance, to say a vase is disposed to shatter when struck is to talk of a property of the vase that relates the vase to a behavior the vase engages in when struck. Now, it is unclear whether all relational properties are grounded in intrinsic properties of objects. Plausibly, my being two meters away from my door is a relational property of mine that isn’t grounded in any intrinsic properties I possess. However, it is very plausible to suppose that objects have their dispositional properties in virtue of their non-relational or intrinsic properties, that is to say, in virtue of the way objects are in and of themselves. This is  It is worth remarking that there are also deeper worries of a more metaphysical kind with the idea that desires and desire-like states have behavioral dispositions other than themselves as their categorical bases. Commonly dispositions are taken to be properties that are had in virtue of properties that are non-dispositional in nature. For otherwise we seem to be faced with an infinite regress, whereby each dispositional property is grounded in another dispositional property and so on ad infinitum. 10

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borne out by the example of the vase, the atomic structure of which characterizes the vase as it is in and of itself and which realizes the vase’s dispositions to behave in various ways. But if this is true of objects in general, then it must be true of human beings specifically. We too must be disposed to behave in various ways in virtue of our intrinsic properties, those properties that characterize what we are like in and of ourselves. And I argue that emotions conceived of  as original existences, that is to say, as  non-intentional  or non-representational feeling states, are those ­properties of ours that best fit the bill for these intrinsic, non-relational properties of ours. Indeed, it is very difficult to see what property other than emotion could serve as an intrinsic property of ours, one that characterizes what we are like in and of ourselves (see Chap. 7 for a detailed defense of the idea that emotions identify our intrinsic properties). And there are a number of additional considerations that lend solid support to the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases for desires conceived as behavioral dispositions. To begin with, that idea is supported by reflection on certain cases. For instance, plausibly the difference between the person who is disposed to board a plane and the person who is not lies in differences in the emotions undergone. Whereas the former person is disposed to board a plane in virtue of some positive emotion (pleasure, say) that the thought of boarding the plane triggers in them, the latter person is disposed to refuse to board the plane in virtue of the negative emotion (fear or anxiety, say) that the thought of boarding the plane triggers in them. Next, the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases is suggested by anecdotal evidence. In particular, it seems to me that we are often aware of our behavioral dispositions having their bases in our emotions. For instance, introspection leads me to see that it is in virtue of the pleasure I feel at the thought of drinking water that I am disposed to reach for a glass in the event of believing the glass contains water, and it is in virtue of the fear I undergo when contemplating boarding a plane that I am disposed to refuse to get onto the plane. Finally, that idea receives support from science. Here I am thinking especially of Antonio Damasio’s finding that people who suffer defects in emotion resulting from brain damage sometimes struggle to choose between different decisional options due to not having the ability to

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‘somatically mark’ the options available to them (Damasio 1994). It seems no course of action elicits in these people much emotion (excitement or anxiety, say) and as a result no one action becomes more salient or favorable than any other. Damasio’s work is a compelling source of evidence, because not only does it suggest that emotions underlie and realize our behavioral dispositions—for where there is no emotion there is no disposition to action—but it lends solid support also to the idea that behavioral dispositions have their bases in emotion alone. For it is a striking feature of the people studied by Damasio that their intellectual capacities (including memory, language, and intelligence) are well preserved, and yet this makes no or little difference to how they are disposed to behave.

Objections and Replies The case for emotion serving as categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions is a very strong one. However, I want to conclude this section by considering two objections to that view. The first objection holds that emotions cannot be categorical bases because a person can undergo an emotion and not be disposed or motivated to behave in any way. Consider emotional responses to fiction. Someone might feel unnerved by some serial killer on their screen but not desire or be disposed to behave in any way, including in ways that might be characteristically associated with the emotions in question, such as fleeing in the case of fear (on this point, see also Tappolet 2016, 64–65). Now, one way of responding to this objection is to hold that dispositions are present but are being masked by some belief state, say the belief that the object in question is fictional or doesn’t constitute an actual threat. This would be to treat these kinds of cases similar to the paralysis case discussed earlier, where the paralyzed person is someone who is disposed to behave in certain ways but is prevented from doing so due to physical paralysis. But although I think this sort of strategy works in the paralysis case, it seems much less successful as a strategy in the present case. Plausibly, the person who is frightened by an unpleasant fictional character on their screen needn’t be disposed to run away at all. Indeed,

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this is what motivates the objection to the idea that emotions are categorical bases, namely the intuition that someone can undergo an emotion but not the behavioral disposition that might be characteristically associated with the emotion. Another response, then, might be to hold that although in cases of fiction (say) we are not disposed to behave in ways that might be characteristically associated with the emotions induced in us, nevertheless we are disposed to behave in other ways. Now, I think it is unclear whether we can rule out entirely the idea that emotional responses to fiction always dispose us to behave in certain ways, even if not in ways they might typically dispose us to behave in the non-fictional case. So perhaps we are disposed to behave in certain ways when frightened by some character on our screens, even if we are not inclined to flee or run away, for instance. However, my sense is that close attention to how we engage with fiction suggests that the emotions we undergo need not dispose us to behave any way at all. This again is what seems to motivate the objection, namely the idea that emotions can occur without corresponding or associated dispositions. Fortunately, an alternative response is available to us that doesn’t commit us to the idea that certain dispositions will always be present when emotions are undergone. And that is to point out that it is no implication of the idea that emotions serve as the categorical bases for people’s behavioral dispositions that the existence of an emotion is always sufficient for the existence of a behavioral disposition. Indeed, there might be a number of reasons why an emotion fails to realize or confer on us a behavioral disposition that it might otherwise have realized or conferred on us. For instance, our believing certain things about the world might mean an emotion not conferring on us a behavioral disposition it would have conferred were it not for the beliefs in question. That I judge the character on the screen is fictional or poses no threat to me, for instance, explains why my fear doesn’t dispose me to hide or avoid the character in question. In fact, we should not be surprised about the idea that emotions can in some circumstances fail to confer on us certain behavioral dispositions or desires that in other circumstances they do confer on us, since it is an implication of the point made earlier in this chapter that the possession of a disposition depends on more than the possession of the thing that

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realizes the disposition in question. For instance, the atomic structure of a vase will dispose a vase to shatter when struck by something only if the thing striking the vase possesses a certain atomic structure. Similarly then we might say that a person will be disposed to avoid an object that inspires fear in them only in the event of that person not believing the object is fictional (or fails to be a threat to them for some other reason). If this is right, then the difference between the paralysis case and the fictional case might be put as follows. Whereas in the paralysis case we find some property of a person that prevents the manifestation of a disposition that has been formed already, in the fictional case we find some property of a person that prevents a disposition from being formed in the first place.11 The second objection holds that emotion cannot serve as categorical basis because we can be disposed to behave a certain way while not undergoing an emotion that could ground or realize the disposition. Consider, for instance, someone who forms a desire or disposition to perform a simple action, such as moving their finger, while occupying a state of complete calm or indifference. Now, this objection seems particularly pressing if we accept that the grounding or realization relation is synchronic, as many philosophers do accept. For if the grounding relation is synchronic, then it cannot be possible to be disposed to behave a certain way while not at the same time undergo the emotion that (allegedly) grounds or realizes the behavioral disposition in question or serves as the categorical basis for the behavioral disposition in question. I think there are two equally good ways of responding to the kinds of cases under consideration. The first is to hold that although a person may sometimes fail to consciously register or reflect on the emotions that underlie or realize their behavioral dispositions that is only because those emotions are very mild and/or short-lived, and therefore liable not to be consciously reflected on. We have already come across such cases in Chap.  The example and my response to it also nicely illustrates the distinction between how I view the relationship between emotions and behavioral dispositions and how those who argue that emotions are or essentially involve behavioral dispositions (including desires or action tendencies) view that relationship (see, for instance, Frijda 1986; Maiese 2011; Deonna and Teroni 2012; Scarantino 2014). An obvious advantage of my account is that it is able to allow for cases where there is the emotion but not the disposition that might commonly be associated with the emotion. Those who think emotions comprise or necessarily involve behavioral dispositions or desires clearly have a much harder time in responding to the cases in question. 11

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2 when considering the study conducted by Winkielman et al. (2005). And as the discussion regarding that study sought to show, saying that emotions are so mild and/or short-lived that we do not reflect on them is not to imply that such emotions are not phenomenally conscious. For again, an emotion can feel a certain way to us even if we fail to register that the emotion feels a certain way to us. The alternative way of responding to this kind of case is to draw a distinction that Hume draws between violent or heated emotions (such as fear, pleasure, anger and anxiety) and calm or cool emotions (as, for instance, we might undergo or experience when composed or untroubled or occupying an indifferent state of mind). The claim might then go that in cases where we conceive a behavioral disposition being formed when no emotion is present, we are often only conceiving of cases where there is no heated or violent emotion underlying and realizing the disposition in question. On this view, then, the disposition that someone has to perform a certain action when calm or emotionally indifferent still has its basis in emotion, albeit an emotion that lacks the color or vibrancy that might characterize the more violent emotions. And intuitively this does provide us with a correct description of a wide range of cases. There is something very plausible about the idea of a person who is disposed to behave in certain ways when occupying calm or emotionally indifferent states of mind possessing those behavioral dispositions in virtue of the calm or indifferent states of mind they occupy. Indeed, the character of the behavioral dispositions that such a person forms seems to reflect or embody the calm or indifferent state of mind that they are in, which is to be expected if such states of mind are what is realizing or grounding the dispositions in question.12  Someone might query whether assigning a cool or calm emotion to someone is really to assign no emotion to that person at all. On this view, when we say that someone is occupying a calm or indifferent state of mind we are really just saying that they are not undergoing an emotion. But in response, although I agree that to say that someone is occupying a cool or calm state of mind is just to say that they are not undergoing a heated emotion of any kind, I think we are still assigning to that person an emotion of some sort. Indeed, I am inclined to the view that we cannot fail to occupy an emotional state of some kind, at least when we are conscious or awake. My reason for thinking this is mainly phenomenological, namely that I think that waking life always has some kind of emotional phenomenology accompanying it. But I also think that calm or cool emotions must have a genuine existence if they are to ground or realize a subset of our behavioral disposi12

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What we commonly refer to as habits plausibly involve behavioral dispositions that are often realized by calm or cool or emotionally indifferent states of mind. Habitual behavior is usually characterized as behavior that takes place automatically in the absence of prior conscious effort or deliberation. I see a glass of water and without thinking automatically reach out for it; I hear my alarm go off and unhesitatingly get out of bed and walk straight to the bathroom. Habitual behavior, then, looks to be the output of behavioral dispositions that earlier in the chapter I characterized as mere impulses, behavioral dispositions that normally have basic perceptual or sensory cues as their stimulus conditions (see also Gardner 2015).13 Thus, if I am in the habit of getting out of bed on hearing my alarm, then I am likely to be disposed to get out of bed merely on hearing my alarm; that is, my being so disposed doesn’t require that I also deliberate on the positives or negatives of getting out of bed, on whether getting out of bed will secure any long-term goals of mine, for instance. True, people who behave habitually sometimes report they act from prior deliberation or a means-end belief (say, the belief that they need to visit the bathroom to get ready for the day), but it turns out these are afterthe-fact judgments and do not relate to actual habit performance (see, for instance, Wood et al. 2002). Now, none of this in itself entails that habits are realized by calm or indifferent states of mind. And indeed, it is not very difficult to conceive of cases where a habit seems to be grounded in more heated emotional states, such as anxiety or anger. Consider, for instance, the obsessive nail-­ biter who is disposed to bite their nails, unconsciously and unreflectingly, whenever occupying a nervous or anxious state of mind. Nevertheless, the empirical evidence does show that habit strengthening tends to go hand in hand with declining emotional intensity (see Wood et al. 2002), tions, namely those behavioral dispositions that lack the impassioned character associated with the more heated emotions. 13  Habits are sometimes treated as forms of behavior but as Gardner points out this this would preclude habits as being a determinant or cause of behavior (Gardner 2015; see also Maddux 1997, 335–336). Regarding habits as forms of behavior is inconsistent also with the fact that behavior is not always triggered when encountering a habit cue (Gardner 2015). According to the view that Gardner defends (and with which I am broadly sympathetic) a habit is a ‘process by which a stimulus automatically generates an impulse towards action, based on learned stimulus response associations’ (Gardner 2015, 280).

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a finding that also seems to be borne out by everyday experience. So to begin with I might be disposed to automatically get out of bed every morning on hearing my alarm in virtue of the irritation or anxiety that hearing the alarm causes me, but as my hearing of the alarm becomes more and more associated with the act of getting out of bed, the degree of irritation or anxiety needed to ground or realize the habit in question declines over time.14 And in a case of total habituation a disposition to behave habitually (that is, automatically and without any prior deliberation) might well be grounded in or realized by a state of mind that is entirely calm or indifferent.15

Dispositions to Mental Actions or Doings If the claims developed in this chapter are correct, people’s behavioral dispositions are grounded in or realized by emotions. One question I have not addressed is that of whether the dispositions in question relate to people’s dispositions to physical overt behaviors only or might include also dispositions to perform mental actions or behavior, such as attending to something in thought, or coming to believe something on the basis of supporting evidence, or listening attentively to what someone has to say.  In the case of habit formation, the repeated association of a behavior with the stimulus event looks to be an important part of the explanation for why the degree of emotion needed to realize a habit wanes over time. Plausibly as a behavior becomes increasingly associated with the stimulus event the stimulus event is able to exert more and more power over us, and in the process the disposition to behave a certain way comes to rely less on the degree of emotion or affect that we are experiencing. 15  On this point compare with David Hume when he writes: “‘Tis evident passions influence not the will in proportion to their violence, or the disorder they occasion in the temper; but on the contrary, that when a passion has once become a settled principle of action, and is the predominant inclination of the soul, it commonly produces no longer any sensible agitation. As repeated custom and its own force have made everything yield to it, it directs the actions and conduct without that opposition and emotion, which so naturally attend every gust of passion. We must, therefore, distinguish betwixt a calm and a weak passion; betwixt a violent and a strong one”. (1896, 419) As John Deigh points out when discussing this passage, for Hume the degree of ‘motivational force’ that an emotion possesses need not mirror the amount or strength of the emotion itself (Deigh 2014, 7). Thus, for Hume through a process of ‘repeated custom’ (by which Hume presumably means something like habituation) an originally violent emotion becomes a calm or weak emotion, whilst retaining its ability to motivate action. 14

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Is it also the case that emotions realize or ground (what I will call) cognitive or intellectual dispositions? If emotions serve as the categorical bases for how we are disposed to behave, then I think it is very difficult to argue that this is not true also for our cognitive or intellectual dispositions, which are also dispositions to act in certain ways, albeit dispositions to engage in mental actions or doings. And indeed the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases for our cognitive dispositions seems very plausible when we reflect on certain cases. For instance, in virtue of what am I disposed to listen attentively to what you say? Plausibly, I am disposed to listen attentively because I am excited by what you are about to say (I know you’re about to give me an award, for instance) or because I am anxious about what you have to say (you are about to tell me the results of my recent medical tests, say). Or in virtue of what am I disposed to judge or believe that p on the basis of certain evidence? Plausibly, I am disposed to believe such a thing because consideration of the evidence causes fear or anxiety in me (think of the beliefs you might be disposed to form on hearing a sudden loud noise coming from a hedgerow on one dark night), or because failure to believe such a thing would cause me too much anguish (consider someone who is disposed to believe their partner loves them despite all the evidence pointing to the contrary). Such examples strongly support the idea that emotions realize or ground our cognitive dispositions along with our dispositions to more overt physical behaviors.16 And note as well that it is very difficult to see what other than emotion could ground or realize our cognitive dispositions. Once again the dispositions in question cannot serve as their own bases, nor the bases for other cognitive dispositions. And it doesn’t help to nod towards such things as cognitive biases as possible bases. Plausibly cognitive biases are themselves dispositional states—for instance, to be biased towards believing that p is to be disposed to believe that p—and for that reason in need of being grounded in something non-dispositional. One might support that  This again being consistent with the idea that the emotions realizing our cognitive dispositions need not always take the form of heated or violent emotions but can sometimes take the form of calm or cool emotions. This seems particularly true of habits of thought, which might be identified with dispositions to engage in mental activity automatically and unreflectingly, and which over time come to be realized by calm or indifferent states of mind. 16

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certain physical or non-psychological states serve as categorical bases for our cognitive dispositions. But as with our dispositions to physical action, the question of why we are disposed to think in certain ways and/or perform certain other mental actions or doings, looks like a search for some kind of psychological explanation. Indeed, that idea has already been seen to be plausible by the kinds of examples described in the previous paragraph. Do cognitive dispositions count as desires, properly-speaking? On one hand, this might seem a strange way to talk about cognitive dispositions. We tend to reserve the label ‘desire’ for those states of mind that are involved in the generation of overt physical behavior. On the other hand, it is not wholly clear we always use the term ‘desire’ in this way. Isn’t there a respect in which we talk about closed-minded people (say) as people who form desires that are cognitive dispositions, such as the desire to ignore views different from their own? Perhaps for some people, desires are states of mind that are essentially aimed at overt physical behaviors, but for my part I am more sanguine about using the word ‘desire’ to also pick out intellectual dispositions, though insofar as I can see nothing important rests on the point and I will not be returning to it.

Concluding Remarks We have an account of how emotions might be involved in the explanation of human behavior. The account I have defended doesn’t entail that the belief-desire model of human behavior is wrong as such, since that model continues to be correct insofar as human behaviors can still be explained by belief-desire complexes. Nevertheless, that account does seek to enrichen the belief-desire model in such a way that emotion is also assigned a prominent role, and importantly a role distinct from that discharged by belief-desire complexes alone. I find this to be an extremely satisfying result for the following reasons. First, the belief-desire model can make very puzzling the question of why we have emotions if they are in no way involved in the explanation of human behavior or activity. My account finds a crucial role for emotion to play in the generation of human behavior after all.

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Second, the simple belief-desire model can seem very impoverished as a model of human behavior unless it also assigns a key role to emotion. Much human behavior possesses a passionate dimension, which is missing from the simple belief-desire model. By finding a distinctive role for emotion, my account promises to supplement the belief-desire model in such a way to enrichen that model and bring it to life and by so doing give us something that is truer, more authentic, to our picture of everyday human life. Third, and in some respects most satisfying of all, my account is wholly consistent with a feeling theory of emotion. In fact, not only is the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases consistent with the feeling theory but that idea both supports and is supported by a feeling theory of emotion. It is supported by a feeling theory of emotion because emotions could not serve as categorical bases if emotions were identical with beliefs, desires, or belief-desire complexes. For emotions could not serve as categorical bases if they were identical with those things that serve as the stimulus events and/or the behavioral dispositions themselves. Regarding emotion as something other than beliefs and/or desires evades that worry altogether. Moreover, viewing emotions as sui generis feelings captures something that is instinctively right about the idea of a categorical basis. As mentioned earlier, the idea that emotions dispose in virtue of how they feel is a compelling one and accommodates nicely the view that categorical bases pick out intrinsic, non-relational properties of objects—again a point to which I return in Part III of the book. A feeling theory of emotion, then, seems to be the right sort of theory to make sense of the idea of emotions serving as categorical bases. But in my view, this in turn gives us positive reason for endorsing a feeling theory of emotion. This is because if we find the idea of emotions serving as categorical bases a compelling one, including for the reasons spelt out in this chapter, but we also accept that a feeling theory of emotion is best able to make sense of the idea of emotions serving as categorical bases, then we should see that as a (further) positive reason for holding that emotions are sui generis non-intentional feeling states.

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References Adams, R. (2007). Idealism Vindicated. In P. V. Inwagen & D. Zimmerman (Eds.), Persons: Human and Divine (pp.  35–54). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Anjum, R., & Mumford, S. (2011). Getting Causes from Powers. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Arpaly, N., & Schroeder, T. (2014). In Praise of Desire. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ashwell, L. (2014). The Metaphysics of Desire and Disposition. Philosophy Compass, 9, 469–477. Ashwell, L. (2017a). Introspection and the Nature of Desire. In J. Deonna & F.  Lauria (Eds.), The Nature of Desire (pp.  325–336). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ashwell, L. (2017b). Conflicts of Desires: Dispositions and the Metaphysics of Mind. In J.  Jacobs (Ed.), Causal Powers (pp.  167–176). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Audi, P. (2012). A Clarification and Defense of the Notion of Grounding. In F. Correia & B. Schnieder (Eds.), Metaphysical Grounding: Understanding the Structure of Reality (pp. 101–121). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chakravartty, A. (2007). A Metaphysics for Scientific Realism: Knowing the Unobservable. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Choi, S. (2006). The Simple vs. Reformed Conditional Analysis of Dispositions. Synthese, 148, 369–379. Choi, S., & Fara, M. (2018). Dispositions. In E.  Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2018 Edition). Retrieved from https://plato. stanford.edu/archives/fall2018/entries/dispositions/ Cottingham, J., Stoothoff, R., & Murdoch, D., (Trans.). (1988). Descartes: Selected Philosophical Writings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Damasio, A. (1994). Descartes’ Error. New York: Quill. Deigh, J. (2014). William James and the Rise of the Scientific Study of Emotion. Emotion Review, 6, 4–12. Deonna, J., & Teroni, F. (2012). The Emotions. A Philosophical Introduction. Oxon: Routledge. Fine, K. (2001). The Question of Realism. Philosophers’ Imprint, 1, 1–30. Frijda, N. (1986). The Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Gardner, B. (2015). A Review and Analysis of the Use of ‘Habit’ in Understanding, Predicting and Influencing Health-Related Behavior. Health Psychology Review, 9, 277–295. Gundersen, L. (2002). In Defence of the Conditional Account of Dispositions. Synthese, 130, 389–411. Hume, D. (1896). A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume (L. A. Selby-­ Bigge, ed.), Reprinted from the Original Edition in Three Volumes and Edited, with An Analytical Index. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Hyman, J. (2014). Desires, Dispositions and Deviant Causal Chains. Philosophy, 89, 83–112. Jenkins, C. (2011). Is Metaphysical Grounding Irreflexive? Monist, 94, 267–276. Kind, A. (2011). The Problem of Imaginative Desire. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 89, 421–439. Kistler, M. (2011). Powerful Properties and the Causal Basis of Dispositions. In A. Bird, B. Ellis, & H. Sankey (Eds.), Properties, Powers and Structures. Issues in the Metaphysics of Realism (pp. 119–137). London: Routledge. Lowe, E. (2008). Personal Agency: The Metaphysics of Mind and Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Maddux, J. (1997). Habit, Health and Happiness. Journal of Sport & Exercise Psychology, 19, 331–346. Maiese, M. (2011). Embodiment, Emotion, and Cognition. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Mayr, E. (2011). Understanding Human Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mele, A. (1996). Internalist Moral Cognitivism and Listlessness. Ethics, 106, 727–753. Prior, E., Pargetter, R., & Jackson, F. (1982). Three Theses about Dispositions. American Philosophical Quarterly, 19, 251–257. Scarantino, A. (2014). The Motivational Theory of Emotions. In J. D’Arms & D.  Jacobson (Eds.), Moral Psychology and Human Agency (pp.  156–185). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Schaffer, J. (2009). On What Grounds What. In D. Chalmers, D. Manley, & R.  Wasserman (Eds.), Metametaphysics (pp.  347–383). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Schroeder, T. (2004). Three Faces of Desire. New York: Oxford University Press. Smith, M. (1987). The Humean Theory of Motivation. Mind, 96, 36–61. Smith, M. (1994). The Moral Problem. Oxford: Blackwell. Stalnaker, R. (1984). Inquiry. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

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Tahko, T. (2015). An Introduction to Metametaphysics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tappolet, C. (2016). Emotions, Values, and Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Van Cleve, J. (2016). Problems from Reid. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Whiting, D. (2016). On the Appearance and Reality of Mind. Journal of Mind and Behavior, 37, 47–70. Whiting, D. (2018a). Emotion as the Categorical Basis for Moral Thought. Philosophical Psychology., 31, 533–553. Whiting, D. (2018b). Consciousness and Emotion. In R.  Gennaro (Ed.), Routledge Handbook of Consciousness. New York: Routledge. Winkielman, P., Berridge, K., & Wilbarger, J. (2005). Emotion, Behavior, and Conscious Experience: Once More Without Feeling. In L.  Barrett, P.  Niedenthal, & P.  Winkielman (Eds.), Emotion and Consciousness (pp. 335–362). London: Guildford Press. Wood, W., Quinn, J., & Kashy, D. (2002). Habits in Everyday Life: Thought, Emotion, and Action. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83, 1281–1297.

5 Emotion and Moral Thought

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them… —David Hume (1896, 415)

Introduction The view that emotion plays an important role in the formation of moral thought is part of a venerable tradition stretching back to the works of eighteenth-century moral sentimentalists, including David Hume and Adam Smith. And the idea that emotion is involved in moral thought is certainly an appealing one. It is supported anecdotally, by first-person experience of moral thought. The moral judgments we make often seem to be triggered and amplified by the emotions we undergo. When angered by someone’s behaviour, we often find ourselves more likely to find fault with what the other person is doing, and the severity of our moral judgments seems to reflect the degree of anger we feel. And when we feel anxious or guilty, we are more likely to rebuke ourselves for actions we have committed and judge that we ought to have behaved differently,

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where again the more guilty or anxious we feel the more severe we tend to be on ourselves. Moreover, a large body of empirical data has accumulated over the years evidencing a strong link between emotion and moral thought. Emotion manipulation studies corroborate ordinary first-person experience by showing that when various positive emotions (pleasure or elation, say) and negative emotions (disgust or anger, say) are induced moral judgments are affected (Greene and Haidt 2002; Valdesolo and DeSteno 2006; Wheatley and Haidt 2005; Schnall et  al. 2008; Horberg et  al. 2009; Aquino et al. 2011; Strohminger et al. 2011; Pastötter et al. 2013; Capestany and Harris 2014; but for some doubts regarding the robustness of the evidence base, see Huebner et al. 2009; May 2014; May and Kumar 2018). And relevant also are studies of psychopaths, people who seem to struggle to distinguish between moral and conventional transgressions (Blair 1995; Blair et al. 1997; cf. Aharoni et al. 2012), as well as not undergo emotions such as anxiety and guilt (Cleckley 1941; House and Milligan 1976; Blair et al. 1997), leading some to surmise that defects in emotion are responsible for psychopaths’ poor moral understanding (Haidt 2001; Nichols 2002; Prinz 2007). But even supposing emotion is involved in the formation of moral thought, we are still none the wiser as to the nature of the relationship between emotion and moral thought. Are we to say that moral judgments are emotions? That seems far too strong. For one thing, emotions and moral judgments do not present themselves phenomenologically as being the same. Whereas moral judgments present themselves as being mental states counselling us on how we and other people should behave, emotions present themselves as being types of bodily feelings (see Chap. 3). And for another thing, it seems possible to have an emotion without making a moral judgment that some people might associate with the emotion. For instance, it seems possible to feel disgusted by some behaviour or activity while not judging the behaviour or activity to be morally wrong (on this point, see Hauser 2006; May 2014), a point to which I return later in the chapter. But is there reason to think that emotion might all the same be needed for moral judgment? For instance, might emotion play a role in directing our attention to morally relevant features of the world (Huebner et al.

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2009; Demaree-Cotton and Kahane 2018)? Suppose, as argued in Chap. 4, emotions realize our dispositions to perform mental acts, including acts of attending. In which case, emotions might seem to be instrumental in helping us to acquire the data (that a certain act is likely to cause harm, say) on the basis of which we form moral judgments. The idea being, then, that without emotion moral thought might not be possible due to our being unreceptive to features of the world that tend to issue in moral directives for us. Still, the question would remain as to whether emotion is more directly involved in the formation of moral thought. That is, the question would remain as to whether emotion is directly responsible for the formation of moral judgment, and not merely responsible for our grasping the empirical or non-moral data on which we base our moral judgments. We might illustrate the point as follows. Suppose I have some descriptive or non-­ moral belief about the world. For instance, suppose I think a certain action will cause much distress. Then suppose having calculated the action will cause much distress I judge that I should not perform the action in question. Now, it may well be that emotion plays a role in helping me to form the non-moral beliefs that inform the moral judgments I come to make. But might emotion have a further role in explaining why on cognizing certain non-moral features of the world—that a certain action will cause much distress, for instance—I come to judge I ought not to perform the action in question? Might emotion discharge some kind of bridging role by way of facilitating a transition from beliefs about the non-moral features of a situation to judgments about the moral features of the situation, regarding whether some action is permissible, say? In this chapter, I argue that if the view that is known as motivational internalism is a correct view regarding the nature of moral thought, then emotions do indeed play a bridging role, namely by way of serving as the categorical bases for the behavioral dispositions involved in moral thought. Admittedly, the argument that I am going to advance requires a certain view of moral judgment to be correct—namely, the view that moral judgments are intrinsically motivating states—and, therefore, the conclusion I reach will be a conditional one. That being said, the view of moral judgment in question is a widely accepted one and a number of powerful considerations have been presented in its favor. Also, for reasons

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that will become clearer, the argument I advance regarding the nature of the connection between emotion and moral thought makes such good sense of some key features of moral thought, that we might consider that to provide additional solid support for the view of moral judgment in question, a point to which I return at the end of the chapter. Motivating the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases for moral thought will take up much of this chapter (I also advance reasons for thinking my claims apply to the norms we employ when engaging in mental doings). However, in this chapter I am keen as well to make plausible the idea that emotion’s role is not solely an explanatory one. Thus, I am going to advance also the view that emotions discharge a critical normative role, not by way of justifying the behavioral dispositions involved in moral thought, but by way of regulating those behavioral dispositions, ensuring those behavioral dispositions are by and large the right ones to form in the circumstances at hand. In other words, I intend to make plausible the idea that if motivational internalism is true, then emotions ensure we make the right moral judgments, that is to say, moral judgments that are sensitive to the right and wrong making features of our situations. If the arguments of this chapter succeed, then they will give us a novel way of thinking about Hume’s remark that ‘reason is and ought only to be the slave of the passions’ (Hume 1896, 415). So we might say that reason is the slave of the passions because reason, comprising our moral judgments or norms of action has emotion underlying it, and reason ought to be the slave of the passions because emotions are those things that ensure our moral judgments are by and large the right ones to form in the circumstances in which we are placed.

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 motion as the Categorical Basis E for Moral Thought Motivational internalism claims that motivation is internal to moral thought in that to think sincerely we ought to do something is (at least in part) to be motivated to do that thing (Smith 1994).1 Motivational internalism comes in different forms. First, we can distinguish between strong and weak forms of internalism. According to the strong form, if we make a moral judgment then necessarily we will perform or at least attempt to perform the action that accords with the moral judgment. For instance, if I judge that harming people is wrong, then necessarily I will try to refrain from doing things that cause harm to people. According to the weak form, if we make a moral judgment then we will be motivated to some degree to perform the action that accords with the judgment, but we may not necessarily perform that action due to the presence of stronger opposing motivations. For instance, if a weak form of motivational internalism is correct then although I will be motivated to refrain from harming people if I judge harming people to be wrong, I may be subject to other motivational states, say a desire to exact revenge, that overrides my being motivated to act in ways that accord with my judgment that harming people is wrong. Second, we can distinguish between cognitivist and non-cognitivist forms of motivational internalism. Proponents of the cognitivist form hold that moral judgments are bona fide cognitive or belief states. On this view, beliefs or at least certain kinds of beliefs (including those associated with moral judgments) can be motivating in and of themselves (see Nagel 1970; McDowell 1979; McNaughton 1988).  Sometimes motivational internalism is held only to be the view that motivation is required for moral thought, thereby leaving open the possibility that motivation might always accompany moral thought without constituting it, either in whole or in part (see Tresan 2006; Bjornsson et al. 2015). Although in this chapter I interpret motivational internalism in the stronger constitutive way (cp. Nagel 1970; Mele 1996; Zangwill 2003), I think it would be easy to show that the non-­ constitutive understanding will need to assign to emotion much the same role that I think the constitutive understanding will need to assign to emotion. For as should be obvious from what I go onto say in the main text, any view that considers motivation to be required for moral thought, whether as a constituent or an accompaniment, will need emotion to explain the motivational or dispositional states in question. 1

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Notice that the cognitivst form of internalism conflicts with the Humean view of motivation, according to which desires set our goals, and beliefs merely provide us with the means to achieve those ends of ours. On the Humean view, beliefs have no motivational power of their own, possessing, as it were, a mind-to-world direction of fit. For any given belief that a person has about the world, it will always remain an open question as to how that person will be motivated to act. For the Humean, then, if motivational internalism is true, then we should accept the non-cognitivist form, according to which moral judgments are not belief-states or belief-like states, but rather have the character of desires (see Blackburn 1998 for one classical defense). As should be clear from what I have said elsewhere in the book, my own view is that the Humean theory of motivation is right and that, therefore, moral judgments are desires if motivational internalism is true. In Chap. 4 I argued that desires are mental states whose nature is to dispose us to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain. I also gave reason for thinking that beliefs are not to be characterized in this way. Rather, I take beliefs to be mental states whose nature is to represent the world as being a certain way. Now, taking as plausible the idea that to be disposed to do something is to be motivated to do that thing, a point to which I return below, then we seem to have strong reason to hold that moral judgments are desires if moral judgments are motivating in and of themselves, as the motivational internalist claims. The above being said, I don’t think anything important rests on the debate between cognivitist and non-cognitivist forms of motivational internalism insofar as the argument of this chapter is concerned. This is because for reasons that I will explain, it seems to me that motivational internalists of either the cognitive or non-cognitive stripe (along, we might add, with motivational internalists who hold that moral judgments have cognitive and conative elements: for instance, Ridge 2006) will be committed to assigning one and the same role to emotion in relation to the forming of moral judgments. I also think the argument I am about to advance is neutral on the question of whether motivational internalists should be strong or weak motivational internalists. Although I think the weak form of motivational internalism is by far the better one, since I think it accords much more

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accurately with the experience of moral thought and is able to better accommodate such psychological phenomena as weakness of the will, it again seems to me that both the weak and strong form will be committed to assigning one and the same role to emotion in relation to moral thought. So why should anyone be a motivational internalist? Why not hold with motivational externalists that motivation is external to the making of a moral judgment, that to be motivated to act in accordance with a moral judgment one needs to desire to behave morally in addition to making a moral judgment (e.g. Brink 1989; Svavarsdottir 1999; Zangwill 2003)? Indeed, doesn’t the existence of amoralists show that motivational externalism is true? For amoral people might seem to be people who know or believe they ought to behave a certain way but do not care one way or the other about behaving in a moral way. Nevertheless, a number of powerful reasons have been given for the truth of motivational internalism. One reason draws on the idea that there is something very unconvincing about someone, the amoralist, for example, who claims to believe a certain action is wrong or impermissible—harming other people, for example—while being in no way inclined to behave in ways that accord with the making of the moral judgment. Indeed we are likely to say of such a person that they are insincere in what they claim or that they lack insight into what they believe to be morally right or wrong. If this person really thought that harming other people, for instance, was wrong or impermissible, then we would expect them to feel the force of the moral judgment by way of being motivated to behave in ways that accord with the moral judgment. But in my view, an even more compelling reason for thinking motivational internalism is true is that that view seems very plausible on phenomenological grounds. Plausibly, what it is like to think something is right or ought to be done involves feeling moved or motivated to do that thing. What it is like to think harming others is wrong, for instance, is what it is like to feel motivated to behave in ways that do not harm others. Terry Horgan and Mark Timmons make this point when they speak about moral judgment involving a felt ‘to-be-done-ness’ (Horgan and Timmons 2000, 129). And notice that if motivational internalism does describe the phenomenology of moral thought accurately, then

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motivational internalism is very likely to be true, given there is very good reason to hold that mental states, including moral judgments, cannot be distinguished from their phenomenal appearances. In Chap. 2 I argued the point in relation to emotions and their ways of appearing, but as I pointed out in the concluding section of that chapter, it would be odd if this feature of emotion were not true also of other mental states with a phenomenology of their own. Supposing motivational internalism is true, what might the relationship between emotion and moral thought be? To understand how emotion might relate to moral thought, notice that common to all forms of motivational internalism is the view that moral judgments involve behavioral dispositions. This is because all forms of motivational internalism hold that to make a moral judgment is to be motivated to act in accordance with the moral judgment, which is the same as saying that to make a moral judgment is to be disposed to act in accordance with the moral judgment. Gunnar Bjornsson and colleagues make the point when they write that for the motivational internalist “forming a moral judgment seems to go beyond or to be other than registering that some fact obtains: At the very least it additionally involves forming a disposition to perform a certain action” (2015, 2; see also Doris and Stich 2007). Plausibly this commits the motivational internalist to holding that moral judgments are desires. As I argued at length in Chap. 4, desires just are behavioral dispositions, mental states whose essence or nature is to cause us to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain.. But again it need not rule out cognitivist forms of motivational internalism if certain kinds of belief states can also comprise dispositions to behave in certain ways. According to the motivational internalist, then, forming a moral judgment involves forming certain behavioral dispositions, where depending on the motivational internalist’s broader meta-ethical framework these dispositional properties of ours can be taken to be desire states or a certain kind of belief state. However, interpreted as the view that moral judgments comprise behavioral dispositions, motivational internalism is silent about the identity of the properties that ground or realize our behavioral dispositions. In other words, motivational internalism tells us nothing about what it is in virtue of which a person forms their moral beliefs along with their desires and other behavioral dispositions.

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In Chap. 4 I argued that our behavioral dispositions are grounded in or realized by emotions. There I ruled out behavioral dispositions themselves serving as categorical bases, either for themselves or for other behavioral dispositions. In that chapter I showed also why cognitive and perceptual representations are unsuited to serve as categorical bases. Although such mental states are not behavioral dispositions, they are better viewed as stimulus conditions for the manifestations of our behavioral dispositions. However, emotions, I argued, have a number of features that make them very attractive candidates for the categorical bases. In particular, emotions’ intrinsic felt qualities make them very suitable to serve as categorical bases. But if emotions serve as categorical bases for behavioral dispositions in general, then they must also serve as the categorical bases for behavioral dispositions involved in moral thought specifically. In other words, it must be the case that we form the moral judgments we do in virtue of the emotions we undergo. We have, then, a theory regarding the nature of the relationship between emotions and moral thought. And the strength of the view that I am advancing crystallizes when we consider how much it is supported by anecdotal evidence along with that view’s ability to explain some key features of moral thought. To begin with, that view is supported by anecdotal evidence, because the moral judgments we make do often seem to be grounded in or realized by emotion. For instance, you cause me to feel angry and I find myself feeling disposed to rebuke you for the wrong you’ve done. The thought of not doing something causes me anxiety and I judge the action in question really ought to be done, I feel compelled to perform the action. The thought of doing something else causes me discomfort and I find myself reluctant to do the action in question: it isn’t the right action to perform. In all these cases, familiar from ordinary life, we find our emotions issuing in moral directives, mental states that involve behavioral dispositions if motivational internalism is true. Notice as well how holding that emotion serves as the categorical basis for moral thought is consistent with the idea that undergoing an emotion need not always result in a moral judgment being made. For instance, it is possible to feel disgust without thinking some moral violation has been committed (see May 2014; Hauser 2006). Such a possibility poses serious problems for a view that takes moral judgments to be emotions.

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However, it is not a problem for a view according to which moral judgments are realized by emotions. For as we saw in Chap. 4, an emotion can fail to realize a behavioral disposition that it might have realized were something not preventing it from realizing the disposition in question. For instance, if you do something that triggers in me an unpleasant visceral reaction, then I might be disposed to rebuke you for the behavior in question. But, if I also believe that what you did was not harmful nor done with malign intent, then I might not be disposed to rebuke you despite my undergoing an unpleasant visceral reaction. In such a case another mental state—here a belief state—can prevent an emotion from realizing a moral judgment it might have realized were it not for the other mental state in question.2 Viewing emotions as those things that realize our moral judgments can accommodate cases where there is an emotion but not a moral judgment. But what about cases also familiar from ordinary life that might seem to suggest that moral judgments can be made without emotions being undergone? How is the claim that moral judgments are realized by emotions to make sense of the phenomenon of dispassionate moral thought? I think we should answer this question by drawing on the distinction made by Hume and in Chap. 4 of this book between violent or heated emotions (such as fear, pleasure, anger, and anxiety) and calm or cool emotions (as, for instance, we might experience when composed or untroubled or occupying an indifferent state of mind). We can argue that in cases of dispassionate moral thought we find moral judgments that are realized by or grounded in calm or cool emotions, not heated emotions. On this view, a dispassionate moral judgment has its basis in emotion, albeit an emotion that lacks the color and vibrancy that might characterize the

 This suggests a reason why in a study conducted by Fiery Cushman (2008), study participants didn’t impute blame to people who maliciously attempted harm but where harm occurred outside people’s causal responsibility, but imputed blame to people who maliciously attempted harm but where no harm occurred. We might surmise that in both cases a malicious harm attempt triggered a negative emotion, such as anger or displeasure. However, only in the second case did the negative emotion succeed in disposing participants to engage in blaming behavior. In the first case the negative emotion failed to realize a disposition to blaming behavior due to participants believing the harm resulting was outside people’s causal responsibility (see also, Trémolière and Djeriouat 2016). 2

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more heated emotions, and which may more often be associated with the moral judgment in question.3 And I submit that this does provide us with a correct portrayal of the dispassionate moral agent. In his classic paper, ‘What is an emotion?’ William James claims that if we subtract from anger or rage its felt bodily manifestation the “rage is as completely evaporated as the sensation of its so-called manifestations, and the only thing that can possibly be supposed to take its place is some cold blooded and dispassionate judicial sentence, confined entirely to the intellectual realm, to the effect that a certain person or persons merit chastisement for their sins” (1884, 194). The passage is normally cited as way of illustrating James’s subtraction argument for a feeling theory of emotion (see Chap. 3). But in my view the passage, and especially James’s choice of language in the passage, nicely illustrates also the point that dispassionate moral thought has its basis in some emotion. To be sure, where all we have is a “cold blooded and dispassionate judicial sentence…to the effect that a certain person or persons merit chastisement for their sins” we do not have anger, a violent or heated emotion. But talk of a ‘cold blooded and dispassionate judicial sentence’ still strongly implies the presence of an emotion that is calm or cool in its presentation, and one we might associate with someone, a certain kind of judge, say, who epitomizes cold rationality and/or objectivity.4  What about longstanding moral beliefs, including the moral belief that might be assigned to someone who is dreamlessly sleeping and not undergoing any sort of emotion? Again, I refer the reader to my treatment of standing emotions in Chap. 2 and standing desires in Chap. 4. But in a nutshell, I think we should identify longstanding moral beliefs with occurrent moral judgments that a person tends to form when certain circumstances obtain. 4  Or even someone whose moral judgments have, through a process of habituation, become associated over time with emotions of a calmer or cooler nature (see the related discussion of habit formation in Chap. 4). Indeed, this may explain why people who suffer profound emotional impairment due to ventromedial frontal damage in adulthood appear not to show deficits in moral judgment (Saver and Damasio 1991; Roskies 2003; May and Kumar 2018). If through habituation moral judgments have come to be realized by calm or indifferent states of mind prior to brain injury, then it is reasonable to surmise that moral judgments will continue to be realized by calm or indifferent states of mind after brain injury. And note this would be consistent with the finding that after brain injury people become more impulsive and antisocial (Saver and Damasio 1991; Roskies 2003), since that finding need only imply that after sustaining brain injury moral judgments come to bear less influence on how people behave (which might be due to a number of factors, including problems in inhibitory control: see also my discussion in Chap. 8 of psychiatric disorders featuring impulsivity). 3

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Next, the idea that emotion serves as the categorical basis for moral thought is able to make very good sense of some key features of moral thought. Consider that people often make moral judgments about certain novel cases rapidly and intuitively but in a way that often seems to comply with quite sophisticated moral rules or principles of action. For instance, people tend to judge automatically and without conscious deliberation that pushing a large person off a footbridge to stop an oncoming train from killing five other people is morally impermissible (Greene 2007). All the same, the moral judgment can seem to comply with complex moral principles or rules, such as a rule counselling us to treat other people as ends and never merely as means. Now, some theorists consider these features of moral thought—namely, moral thought’s automaticity and apparent compliance with moral rules and principles of action—to support the idea of their being an innate moral code that forces people to evaluate action in terms of its moral structure but with no conscious awareness (see Harman 2000; Hauser 2006; Mikhail 2007; Dwyer 2009). On this view, people make the moral judgments they do in virtue of some innate moral code comprising moral rules or principles of action that people fail to reflect on or consciously articulate. Proponents of the innate moral code view also point out that people tend to make the same moral judgments regardless of upbringing and culture. For instance, regardless of background people tend to agree it is acceptable to divert a train away from five innocents toward one innocent, but unacceptable to push an innocent in front of a train with the same outcome in terms of life saved and lost (Mikhail 2007). Again, proponents of the innate moral code view think this feature of moral thought can be accounted for by supposing that the principles we use in different situations to be part of an innate moral code, one that is insensitive to upbringing and cultural background. However, if motivational internalism is true, then we have good reason to reject this way of accounting for the features of moral thought in question. If motivational internalism is true, then it seems to follow that an innate moral code will itself turn out to be a collection of behavioral dispositions comprising judgments about those rules or principles that govern behavior. In fact, if motivational internalism is true then it seems to follow that an innate moral code will comprise the very same

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behavioral dispositions that an innate moral code is supposed to underlie and explain. For instance, if motivational internalism is true, then an innate moral rule counselling us never to treat people merely as means will seemingly consist of dispositions to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain, including in ways that do not involve pushing people off footbridges when we think this will prevent a greater loss of life. But if that is the case, then innate moral rules cannot underlie or explain the moral judgments we make (and for that reason cannot be suited to explain key features of the moral judgments we make), since the innate moral rules we employ in different situations will be nothing but the moral judgments we make in those situations (see also my discussion in Chap. 4 on why behavioral dispositions cannot serve as their own categorical bases). Holding that emotions are those things that realize and explain people’s moral judgments fares much better on the other hand. On this view, people make the moral judgments they do in virtue of the emotions they undergo. Not only is this view able to provide us with an intelligible explanation for why people make the moral judgments they do, but it is also very able to explain the key features of moral thought outlined above. First, viewing emotions as the categorical bases gives us a ready explanation for why people make moral judgments about novel cases instinctively and with minimal reflection. This happens by way of people undergoing an emotional response to the novel situation, which in turn realizes a behavioral disposition associated with a certain moral judgment. For instance, it is in virtue of the pang of discomfort we feel when presented with the option of pushing someone off a footbridge, that we straightaway come to form the behavioral disposition associated with thinking that we should refrain from performing such an action. Second, viewing emotions as the categorical bases gives us a way of thinking about why people’s moral judgments often seem to conform with certain moral principles. On one way of thinking about this they conform because they are explained by the moral principles in question. Now, thinking of emotion as the categorical basis for moral thought doesn’t support the thesis that our moral judgments are explained by moral principles or rules of action. However, it does support a different idea, namely that people are such as to undergo emotions that in turn

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realize or give rise to behavioral dispositions that tend to fit certain principles of action (see also Nichols 2005). For example, we might surmise that when reflecting on the idea of pushing a person in front of a runaway train most people undergo an aversive reaction that realizes or gives rise to a moral judgment that fits the moral principle of never treating people merely as means. To be sure, it might appear as if it is our employment of certain rules that explains the moral judgments we make, and post-hoc rationalization may often lead us to buy into the appearance, but in reality our moral judgments merely fit the rules and are explained by our emotions (see Haidt 2001, 823).5 Third, the idea that emotions serve as the categorical bases for moral judgments gives us a straightforward way of explaining why people often make the same moral judgments regardless of upbringing and culture. Again they do this not because of the existence of an innate moral code, but rather because most people have sufficiently similar emotional sensibilities to respond to different types of situations in similar ways (where this might be due to evolution and/or the influences people tend to have on each other: see Haidt 2001). For instance, for most people the idea of pushing an innocent person of a footbridge in the path of an oncoming train is a source of aversion, and as a result the moral judgments that ensue will tend to be the same as well. A final consideration that I want to advance in support of the view that moral judgments are grounded in or realized by emotions is that this view gives us a very satisfying way of making sense of study findings responsible for the development of ‘dual-process accounts’ of moral judgment (Greene et al. 2001; Greene 2007). Now, on the face of it this might seem surprising, since dual-process accounts are often taken to hold that moral judgments need not be based on emotion, since according to dual-­process accounts of moral judgment, while some moral judgments are the outputs of emotion others are the outputs of more deliberative cognitive processes.

 Jonathan Haidt refers to this as ‘the wag the tail illusion’. Haidt writes: “[the] illusion can be called the wag-the-dog illusion: We believe that our own moral judgment (the dog) is driven by our own moral reasoning (the tail).” (2001, 823). 5

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Consider, for example, our reactions to different types of trolley cases. Most people tend to think that pushing people off footbridges in front of oncoming trains is morally impermissible even in cases where doing so might be required to prevent an even greater loss of life.6 Yet when asked whether it would be permissible to divert a train away from five innocent people towards one innocent person, most people would answer in the affirmative, and this despite the fact that the outcome of behaving in such a way in terms of lives saved and lost is exactly the same as that of pushing someone in front of a train to save five other innocent people. How then explain the difference in people’s responses to these two types of cases? One plausible explanation appeals to the idea of there being two psychological pathways resulting in the two different types of moral judgment. The first psychological pathway and which is relevant to the case of pushing an innocent person in front of a train comprises an automatic response of aversion to the idea of performing the action in question, a response that succeeds in prompting the judgment that the action in question is morally impermissible. The second pathway, on the other hand, and which is relevant to the case of diverting a train away from five innocent people towards one innocent person, consists in a more deliberative and utilitarian way of responding to the case in question. What we find when the second psychological pathway is activated is not a moral judgment resulting automatically from a gut reaction to the immediate apprehension of a situation, but rather a moral judgment that results from a more deliberative cognitive process, a process that might typically involve a weighing up of the benefits (e.g. saving of five people) and harms (e.g. death of one person). Now, if this dual-process model is right then we might seem to be left with the view that while some moral judgments are prompted by emotion—aversion to pushing innocent people in front of trains, say—other moral judgments are the outputs of more deliberative processes (Greene et al. 2001; Greene 2007).  An exception are psychopaths who are more likely to think such an action is permissible (see Koenigs et al. 2012). This may be because psychopaths are more likely to make moral judgments that comport with utilitarian considerations. However, another possibility is that psychopaths tend to think such an action is permissible because they take pleasure in the idea of pushing people off footbridges into the path of oncoming trains (for details of a study that found feelings of pleasure to be associated with the abnormal moral judgments of sadists, see Trémolière and Djeriouat 2016), or because they are indifferent to the idea of performing such an act. 6

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Suppose a dual process account of moral judgment were correct. Are we to conclude that emotion is not always needed for moral thought? In light of the argument of this chapter, I think we can see why this idea of a moral judgment without a basis in emotion is erroneous. Even if it is the case that people sometimes make moral judgments informed by careful consideration of possible outcomes, something will be needed to explain why having thought through the possible consequences of acting in a certain way, these people then come to form the behavioral dispositions associated with judging that they ought to perform the action in question. To put the point in another way, there must be some lower-­ level intrinsic property that comes to ground or realize a higher-lever disposition to behave a certain way in the event of calculating the action that will likely lead to maximally beneficial outcomes. And again it is unclear what that lower-level intrinsic property can be other than emotion. One idea, then, might be that a person regards as permissible the action they calculate to have maximally beneficial outcomes in virtue of taking pleasure in the idea of performing the action in question. Indeed this conjecture is supported by study findings showing there to be a link between the induction of positive emotion and increased moral utilitarianism (Strohminger et al. 2011).

 Distinctive Normative Role for Emotion A with Respect to Moral Thought Suppose emotion is involved in moral thought in the way described. In what follows, I make a further claim, namely that not only does emotion discharge a key explanatory role in the sense of explaining the moral judgments we make, but emotion discharges also an important normative role with regard to the moral judgments we make. However, the normative role that I assign to emotion is not a justificatory role. That is, I do not claim that emotions serve as justifications for moral beliefs or the behavioral dispositions associated with moral judgments (in the way, say, some perceptual theorists of emotion claim that emotions serve as justifications for evaluative judgments: see, for example, Döring 2007; Pelser

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2014). On this it is my view that certain non-moral features of the world—certain right and wrong making features of the world—justify the moral judgments we form. Thus, what justifies my judging this action to be wrong is not the fact of the action causing in me an unpleasant visceral reaction, but the fact of it causing other people distress or the fact of it being unlawful.7 Instead, the normative role that I assign to emotion is essentially a regulatory one. More specifically I want to advance the idea that emotions ensure our moral judgments are responsive to the right and wrong making features of our situation, by way of ensuring our moral judgments are sensitive to those features of our situation that make a given action the right or wrong one for us to perform. As way of spelling out and motivating this idea, consider an adaptation of a trolley case. This time imagine you are asked whether redirecting a train towards an innocent person is permissible in situations where that will fail to serve the purpose of saving other lives. I suspect you would likely recoil in horror at the idea of redirecting the train in such circumstances and as a result would form the judgment that such an action is impermissible. And that is a good thing too. Redirecting trains in such circumstances would clearly be wrong. But notice that you form the moral judgment you do only because of the emotions you undergo. Were you to undergo very different emotions—say, pleasure or indifference at the idea of redirecting the train in the circumstances in question—you would likely fail to form the behavioral disposition associated with the belief that redirecting trains towards innocent people is impermissible. And from which it follows that recoiling with horror seems to be playing an important regulatory role, namely that of ensuring our moral judgments are responsive to those features of the situation—for instance, the great harm that will befall someone if struck by the train in question—that makes a difference to how we should behave. Of course, our emotions don’t always realize the right moral judgments. For instance, psychopaths and sadists often fail to feel emotions that realize the right moral judgments, and all of us are liable at times to  On this point, see also Michael Brady’s critique of the perceptual model of emotion: Brady 2013, chapter 3. 7

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feel emotions that fail to realize the right moral judgments. However, this doesn’t take anything away from the fact that in many cases we do undergo emotions that discharge the valuable role in question. All we need for the idea that emotion plays an important regulatory role to go through is the assumption that by and large our emotions help to ensure we form moral judgments that are appropriate to the circumstances we are in. And I am assuming this much is true: most of us for most of the time are good or decent enough to feel emotions that ensure we form moral judgments that are adequately sensitive to the particular features of our situation. Now, if that is the case, and we have reason to trust our emotions or think them reliable (at least for much of the time) then the fact of our emotions giving rise to certain moral judgments should be sufficient for thinking those will normally be the right moral judgments for us to make. And in that case emotions look to be kinds of things that do indeed play an important normative role with respect to the moral judgments we form, albeit again a regulatory, not justificatory, normative role. And there is something more to be said. Suppose we accept that by and large our emotions ensure we make the right moral judgments in the situations we are placed. I think it follows that where there is a disagreement about whether someone’s moral judgments are the right ones for that person to make, we will have to appeal to the moral judgments we think a good or decent emotion-feeler would form in the circumstances in question. As way of illustrating the point, consider Bernard William’s case of a lorry driver who runs over a child through no fault of their own (Williams 1981). A child wanders into a road at the exact moment the lorry driver is passing by. Now, what are to say about such a case? Suppose we are the lorry driver. How would we evaluate ourselves? Are we innocent or guilty of wrongdoing? On the one hand, perhaps we wouldn’t think badly of what we have done, since we had no control over what happened. Notice how such a view exemplifies a very ‘rational’ attitude towards the harm committed. I wouldn’t think I had done anything wrong if I accidentally injured or killed a child, since such an act wouldn’t have been my fault, as it would have been beyond my control. On the other hand (and probably more likely), we might take the view that we are not totally innocent

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of wrongdoing. After all, we might take the view that we caused serious harm and to a child. Notice, how this way of evaluating what we have done reflects a more human and understandable attitude, much less of a ‘rational’ one, towards what happened. But now comes the key question: which of the two different ways of evaluating ourselves would be the more appropriate one for us to adopt? Are we to say the first because the action we committed was beyond our control? Or are we to say the second because a child was seriously harmed by an action we performed, albeit through no fault of our own? Now undoubtedly to begin with we will try to answer this question by trying to get clearer on the non-moral facts relevant to the issue of whether what happened really was beyond our control. So for instance, we might query whether we were driving too fast or might have taken a different route. But I want us to imagine a situation where it is clear to ourselves and everyone else that there really was nothing we could reasonably be expected to have done to avoid the accident in question, and where we are left with a stark choice between thinking we should judge ourselves to have committed a wrong on the grounds that a child was seriously harmed by an action we performed, and thinking that we should not judge ourselves to have committed a wrong on the grounds that the action in question was beyond our control. I think at this point we will need to appeal to the moral judgments a decent or good emotion-feeler would form in the situation in question. For in the case I am imagining the problem facing us is a disagreement regarding the right and wrong making features of the situation in question. One side thinks their lack of control is sufficient reason not to think they are guilty of wrongdoing, while the other side disagrees, at least with respect to the case at hand. So how are we to resolve the disagreement? Clearly we cannot appeal to the right and wrong making features themselves, because in the case I am imagining these are precisely what the disagreement is about. Again, whereas one side thinks their lacking control is sufficient reason for not thinking badly of what they have done, the other side doesn’t accept that view. I believe the only way we might resolve the disagreement is by reflecting on what would count as right and wrong making features for someone who feels the right emotions. Now, I don’t want to conclusively settle

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the matter here, but I will venture to say that with regard to the case just described I think most of us are likely to side with the person who thinks badly about their actions with regard to the road accident in question. Such a moral evaluation would surely exemplify a more ‘human’ response to such a situation. To be sure, that something lies beyond our control is sometimes reason to think we are not guilty of wrongdoing, but any emotionally decent human being will see that in a situation in which they have caused a child serious harm, albeit through no fault of their own, it wouldn’t be the case they have done nothing wrong (cp. Williams 1981). And in this regard it is very telling that psychopaths tend to evaluate accidental harms less severely than non-psychopaths (Young et al. 2012). Now, of course, not everyone who fails to think badly of their actions in cases of causing serious accidental harm are psychopaths. But, it is difficult to avoid the worry that something is emotionally amiss in people who fail to think badly of what they have done when causing serious accidental harm, and for this reason we will likely evaluate the moral judgments that such people make with regard to their actions to be the wrong ones for them to make.8

Internalized Norms of Thought In Chap. 4 I argued that emotions serve not only as categorical bases for our dispositions to engage in overt physical behaviors, but also as categorical bases for our dispositions to engage in certain mental actions, such as the act of attending to something in thought or the act of forming a certain judgment when presented with supporting evidence. But in  Williams seems to make much the same point when he writes: “Doubtless, and rightly, people will try, in comforting him, to move the driver from this state of feeling, move him indeed from where he is to something more like the place of a spectator, but it is important that this is seen as something that should need to be done, and indeed some doubt would be felt about a driver who too blandly or readily moved to that position” (1981, 28). Of-course, I am speaking in the main text about the moral judgments that we think the driver should make about themselves, where again the idea is that a good emotion-feeler would form the judgement that they have done wrong. This might differ, however, from the moral judgment that a good emotion-feeler who is a mere spectator, for instance, would make in the circumstances; indeed, we might expect such a spectator to form the judgment that the driver has done nothing wrong, as the quotation from Williams serves to make plausible. 8

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which case, it seems sensible to suppose that emotions might also underlie and regulate our judgments of how we ought to proceed in thought. So to begin with, it seems sensible to suppose that emotions underlie or realize the norms or rules we employ when engaging in certain types of cognitive activity. Thus, if behavioral dispositions identify our commitments regarding how we ought to behave, then our cognitive dispositions plausibly identify our commitments regarding how we ought to think. For example, plausibly for me to think that I ought to believe that p on the basis of q is for me to be disposed to believe that p on the basis of q. My judging that I should believe something is just a matter, then, of my forming certain cognitive dispositions. And that view seems very plausible when we reflect on certain cases. For instance, consider how I might form the belief that I will be offered a job on the basis of what to you constitutes negligible grounds for that belief, say, on the basis of my interviewer giving me a friendly smile. I think such a case can be described as one where my taking certain evidence as reason to believe something comprises my being disposed to believe that thing on the basis of the evidence in question, while you not taking that evidence as a reason to believe something comprises you not being disposed to believe that thing on the basis of the evidence in question. And if that is the case, then we can see why emotions have a role in explaining our epistemic evaluations, since emotions are needed to realize the cognitive dispositions associated with our epistemic evaluations—our taking ourselves to have reasons to believe certain things, say.9 In the case described, we might imagine how I am disposed to believe I am to be offered the job—that is, take myself to have reason to think I will receive a job offer—in virtue of the excitement my interviewer’s smile causes me, while you fail to form the cognitive disposition in question because you remain unmoved by the interviewer’s smile.

 Plausibly we do not normally call epistemic evaluations or internalized norms of thought moral judgments. However, I take it that if judgments regarding how we ought to behave are dispositions, then so also are judgments regarding how we ought to proceed in thought, regardless of whether we call the latter judgments moral judgments. If motivational internalism provides us with a correct account of the nature of moral judgment, then it is difficult to avoid the idea that all internalized rules or principles or norms of thought and action are dispositional states. 9

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Furthermore, if the claims I made in the previous section are correct, then it is sensible to think that emotion also discharges an important regulatory role with regard to the epistemic evaluations that we make. The idea here again being that our emotions ensure our epistemic evaluations—our taking ourselves to have reasons to believe certain things, say—are responsive to what the particular features of our situations demand from us. This is not to say that our emotions always realize the cognitive dispositions or epistemic evaluations that are fitting to our situations. The job interview example illustrates the point well. If you are correct, then the fact of my interviewer smiling does not provide me with sufficient reason to believe that I am about to be offered the job, and therefore if you are correct my emotions fail to realize or give rise to an epistemic evaluation or cognitive disposition that is fitting or appropriate to the circumstances at hand (see also my discussion in Chap. 8 of the role of emotion in relation to the forming of delusional or aberrant beliefs). But again it seems plausible to suppose that by and large most of us are such as to undergo emotions that realize the right epistemic evaluations or cognitive dispositions in the circumstances we are placed. Indeed, this would seem supported by the fact that for the most part most of us seem to have a good enough grasp on reality, at least for the purpose of getting by in life. And, again, I think that suffices to justify the idea that emotions serve an important regulatory role with regard to the epistemic evaluations that we make.

Concluding Remarks In this chapter my primary concern has been to show that if motivational internalism provides us with a correct description of the nature of moral thought, then emotion is needed for moral thought because emotion is required to realize the behavioral dispositions associated with moral thought. Furthermore, I sketched out an important regulatory role that emotions serve as categorical bases, namely that of ensuring the moral judgments we make are sufficiently responsive to the right and wrong making features of our situations.

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Of course, objections to motivational internalism will need addressing before we can say for sure that emotion serves as the categorical basis for moral thought. That being said, I want to make two points. First, if motivational externalism were true instead we would still need some categorical basis for people’s behavioral dispositions to act in accordance with their moral judgments. And if motivational externalism is true the basis could not be the moral judgment, because our moral judgments—along with other cognitive and perceptual representations—would then be nothing more than stimulus conditions for the manifestations of our behavioral dispositions. In that case, the search for a basis would be a search for whatever it is that explains why we are disposed to behave in some way in response to our moral judgments. And, again, I think emotion would be the only plausible candidate for the categorical basis. That is to say, we would have to hold we are disposed to behave in some way in response to making a moral judgment in virtue of undergoing emotion (say, in virtue of the anxiety or pleasure that awareness of the moral fact occasions in us). Motivational externalism, then, also needs emotion to do important explanatory work, and this would be a significant result regarding our understanding of moral behavior even if motivational internalism were false. The second point I want to make is that it would be surprising if motivational internalism were false in light of the considerations advanced in this chapter. So compelling is the idea that emotions underlie our moral judgments by virtue of serving as the categorical bases for the behavioral dispositions involved in moral thought that we may well think that idea provides strong support for the truth of motivational internalism. This is because the role I am attributing to emotion with regard to the formation of moral thought—a role which entails that motivational internalism is true—is able to make very good sense of anecdotal evidence and some key features of moral thought, such as the fact that moral judgments are often made automatically and without conscious deliberation while seeming to comply with quite sophisticated moral principles. Theorizing, then, that emotions realize the behavioral dispositions involved in moral thought is consistent with and provides a comprehensive explanation for key features of moral thought. Indeed, it is unclear what better explanation could be given for the key features in question. But if these features

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of moral thought are best explained by supposing moral thought comprises behavioral dispositions that are realized by emotions, then that affords strong grounds for thinking that motivational internalism is true after all.

References Aharoni, E., Sinnott-Armstrong, W., & Kiehl, K. (2012). Can Psychopathic Offenders Discern Moral Wrongs? A New Look at the Moral/Conventional Distinction. Journal of Research in Personality, 121, 484–497. Aquino, K., McFarran, B., & Laven, M. (2011). Moral Identity and the Experience of Moral Elevation in Response to Acts of Uncommon Goodness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 100, 703–718. Bjornsson, G., Bjorklund, F., Strandberg, C., Eriksson, J., & Francen, R. (2015). Motivational Internalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Blackburn, S. (1998). Ruling Passions. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Blair, R. (1995). A Cognitive Developmental Approach to Morality: Investigating the Psychopath. Cognition, 57, 1–29. Blair, R., Jones, L., Clark, F., & Smith, M. (1997). The Psychopathic Individual: A Lack of Responsiveness to Distress Cues. Psychophysiology, 34, 192–198. Brady, M. (2013). Emotional Insight: The Epistemic Role of Emotional Experience. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Brink, D. (1989). Moral Realism and the Foundations of Ethics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Capestany, B., & Harris, L. (2014). Disgust and Biological Descriptions Bias Logical Reasoning during Legal Decision-Making. Social Neuroscience, 9, 265–277. Cleckley, H. (1941). The Mask of Sanity: An Attempt to Reinterpret the So-called Psychopathic Personality. St Louis, MO: The C. V. Mosby Company. Cushman, F. (2008). Crime and Punishment: Distinguishing the Roles of Causal and Intentional Analyses in Moral Judgment. Cognition, 108, 353–380. Demaree-Cotton, J., & Kahane, G. (2018). The Neuroscience of Moral Judgment. In K. Jones, M. Timmons, & A. Zimmerman (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Moral Epistemology. New York: Routledge. Döring, S. (2007). Seeing What to Do: Affective Perception and Rational Motivation. Dialectica, 61, 363–394.

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Doris, J., & Stich, S. (2007). As a Matter of Fact: Empirical Perspectives on Ethics. In F. Jackson & M. Smith (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Dwyer, S. (2009). Moral Dumbfounding and the Linguistic Analogy: Implications for the Study of Moral Judgment. Mind & Language, 24, 274–296. Greene, J. (2007). Why are VMPFC Patients More Utilitarian? A Dual-Process Theory of Moral Judgment Explains. Trends in Cognitive Science, 11, 322–323. Greene, J., & Haidt, J. (2002). How (and Where) Does Moral Judgment Work? Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 6, 517–523. Greene, J., Sommerville, R., Nystrom, L., Darley, J., & Cohen, J. (2001). An fMRI Investigation of Emotional Engagement in Moral Judgment. Science, 293, 2105–2108. Haidt, J. (2001). The Emotional Dog and its Rational Tail. Psychological Review, 108, 814–834. Harman, G. (2000). Explaining Value and Other Essays in Moral Philosophy. New York: Oxford University Press. Hauser, M. (2006). Moral Minds. New York: Harper Collins. Horberg, E., Oveis, C., Keltner, D., & Cohen, A. (2009). Disgust and the Moralization of Purity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 97, 963–976. Horgan, T., & Timmons, M. (2000). Nondescriptivist Cognitivism: Framework for a New Metaethic. Philosophical Papers, 29, 121–153. House, T., & Milligan, W. (1976). Autonomic Responses to Modelled Distress in Prison Psychopaths. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 34, 556–560. Huebner, B., Dwyer, S., & Hauser, M. (2009). The Role of Emotion in Moral Psychology. Trends in Cognitive Science, 13, 1–6. Hume, D. (1896). A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume, Reprinted from the Original Edition in Three Volumes and Edited, with an Analytical Index (L. A. Selby-Bigge, Ed.). Oxford: Clarendon Press. James, W. (1884). What is an Emotion? Mind, 9, 188–205. Koenigs, M., Kruepke, M., Zeier, J., & Newman, J. (2012). Utilitarian Moral Judgment in Psychopathy. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 7, 708–714. May, J. (2014). Does Disgust Influence Moral Judgment? Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 92, 125–141.

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May, J., & Kumar, V. (2018). Moral Reasoning and Emotion. In K.  Jones, M. Timmons, & A. Zimmerman (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Moral Epistemology. New York: Routledge. McDowell, J. (1979). Virtue and Reason. Monist, 62, 331–350. McNaughton, D. (1988). Moral Vision. Oxford: Blackwell. Mele, A. (1996). Internalist Moral Cognitivism and Listlessness. Ethics, 106, 727–753. Mikhail, J. (2007). Universal Moral Grammar: Theory, Evidence and the Future. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 11, 143–152. Nagel, T. (1970). The Possibility of Altruism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nichols, S. (2002). How Psychopaths Threaten Moral Rationalism: Is it Irrational to be Amoral? Monist, 85, 285–303. Nichols, S. (2005). Innateness and Moral Psychology. In P.  Carruthers, S.  Laurence, & S.  Stich (Eds.), The Innate Mind. Structure and Contents. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pastötter, B., Gleixner, S., Neuhauser, T., & Bäuml, K. (2013). To Push or Not to Push? Affective Influences on Moral Judgment Depend on Decision Frame. Cognition, 126, 373–377. Pelser, A. (2014). Emotion, Evaluative Perception, and Epistemic Justification. In S.  Roeser & C.  Todd (Eds.), Emotion and Value. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Prinz, J. (2007). The Emotional Construction of Morals. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ridge, M. (2006). Ecumenical Expressivism: Finessing Frege. Ethics, 116, 302–336. Roskies, A. (2003). Are Ethical Judgments Intrinsically Motivational? Lessons From “Acquired Sociopathy”. Philosophical Psychology, 16, 51–66. Saver, J., & Damasio, A. (1991). Preserved Access and Processing of Social Knowledge in a Patient with Acquired Sociopathy Due to Ventromedial Frontal Damage. Neuropsychologia, 29, 1241–1249. Schnall, S., Haidt, J., Clore, G., & Jordan, A. (2008). Disgust as Embodied Moral Judgment. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34(8), 1096–1109. Smith, M. (1994). The Moral Problem. Oxford: Blackwell. Strohminger, N., Lewis, R., & Meyer, D. (2011). Divergent Effects of Different Positive Emotions on Moral Judgment. Cognition, 119, 295–300. Svavarsdottir, S. (1999). Moral Cognitivism and Motivation. Philosophical Review, 108, 161–219.

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Trémolière, B., & Djeriouat, H. (2016). The Sadistic Trait Predicts Minimization of Intention and Causal Responsibility in Moral Judgment. Cognition, 146, 158–171. Tresan, J. (2006). De Dicto Internalist Cognitivism. Nous, 40, 143–165. Valdesolo, P., & DeSteno, D. (2006). Manipulations of Emotional Context Shape Moral Judgment. Psychological Science, 17, 476–477. Wheatley, T., & Haidt, J. (2005). Hypnotically Induced Disgust Makes Moral Judgments More Severe. Psychological Science, 16, 780–784. Williams, B. (1981). Moral Luck. In Moral Luck. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Young, L., Koenigs, M., Kruepke, M., & Newman, J. (2012). Psychopathy Increases Perceived Moral Permissibility of Accidents. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 121, 659–667. Zangwill, N. (2003). Externalist Moral Motivation. American Philosophical Quarterly, 40, 143–154.

6 Emotion, Virtue, and Situationism

Once hadst thou passions and calledst them evil. But now hast thou only thy virtues: they grew out of thy passions —Friedrich Nietzsche in Common, trans. (1917, 33)

Introduction Virtues and vices are commonly taken to comprise behavioral dispositions. For instance, the virtue of honesty involves the disposition to behave truthfully and the vice of dishonesty involves the disposition to behave falsely. Plausibly not any behavioral disposition to behave well counts as a virtue and not any disposition to behave poorly counts as a vice. Behavioral dispositions count as virtues and vices only if they are reliably acted on. Someone who has a disposition to behave truthfully but hardly ever acts truthfully (say, due to having a stronger disposition to behave dishonestly) cannot be said to possess the virtue of honesty. Equally, someone who possesses a disposition to act falsely but hardly ever behaves falsely (say, due to a stronger disposition to behave truthfully) cannot be said to possess the vice of dishonesty. In Chap. 4 I argued

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that behavioral dispositions are plausibly all desires. From which it follows that virtues and vices comprising behavioral dispositions are plausibly all desires that are reliably exercised or acted on. One might suppose that if virtues and vices are desires then the desires in question cannot be occurrent or episodic mental states. This is because virtues and vices are commonly considered to be traits of character or standing properties of ours,1 that is to say, properties we possess at all times and not only when we undergo or occupy certain occurrent mental states. For instance, the property of being honest is a property the virtuous possess at all times (including when the virtuous are dreamlessly sleeping) and not only when the virtuous form a desire to behave in an honest fashion. However, if we accept my treatment of standing desires in Chap. 4 (see also my discussion of standing emotions in Chap. 2), then we might respond as follows. We might maintain that although to have or possess a standing desire to behave honestly is to be such as to form a desire to behave honestly in honesty-relevant situations (where this may well be a matter of being disposed to form a desire to behave honestly in honesty-relevant situations), the standing desire itself is an occurrent desire or behavioral disposition that tends to be formed in honesty-­ relevant situations. On the account I think we should accept, then, what makes a virtue or vice a standing property of ours—or, in other words, a property we possess at all times—is not the fact of it being a mental state that persists over time, but rather the fact of it being an occurrent mental state that we tend to form in trait-relevant situations.2 On this view, the mistake to avoid  By ‘trait of character’, then, I am in this chapter just to be taken to mean a standing property or mental state, which for reasons that will become clearer in the main text, entails that on the account that I defend traits of character (including those traits that constitute particular virtues and vices, such as honesty and dishonesty) are occurrent mental states that we tend to form or occupy or exemplify in trait-relevant situations. 2  Or, at least, a mental state that we are disposed to replicate or imitate in trait-relevant situations (on this point, see also fn. 10). Again, I’ll remain neutral regarding whether one and the same mental state can be occupied on more than one occasion. If mental states are temporally located entities—in the way that events are widely considered to be temporally located entities—then no mental state can be formed or occupied on more than one occasion. But even if that is the case, certainly one and the same mental state can be replicated or imitated on more than one occasion, and the fact of something being a mental state that we tend to replicate in trait-relevant situations would be enough, in my view, for such a mental state to qualify as a standing mental state of ours. 1

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making is that of thinking that ‘occurrent mental state’ and ‘standing mental state’ pick out polar opposite mental state types, namely mental states that have a short-lived nature and mental states that have an abiding nature respectively. Rather, on the account I support, all mental states are occurrent or episodic mental states, but some occurrent mental states, including those occurrent mental states associated with certain virtues and vices, have (also) the property of being standing mental states, namely those occurrent or episodic mental states that we tend to occupy or form in trait-relevant situations.3 Now, those who believe in the existence of virtues and vices owe us an explanation as to why certain desires or behavioral dispositions count as virtues, and others as vices. One idea might be that behavioral dispositions that identify virtue are constitutive of a happy or good life, whereas those that identify vice are constitutive of an unhappy life or a life that is bad for the person living it. Another idea might be that people generally behave better if they have certain behavioral dispositions (the virtues) and behave worse if they have other behavioral dispositions (the vices). In Chap. 4 desires conceived as behavioral dispositions were identified with mental states whose nature or essence is to cause us to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain (say, when we haven’t formed stronger conflicting dispositions). Plausibly, then, a desire or behavioral disposition that is a virtue is so-called because it causes us to behave well, at least when certain circumstances obtain (for example, when we don’t have a stronger disposition to behave poorly), and a desire or behavioral disposition that is a vice is so-called because it causes us to behave poorly, at least when certain circumstances obtain (for example, when we don’t have a stronger disposition to behave well). But I want to remain neutral regarding why some behavioral dispositions count as virtues and others count as vices, though I find nothing odd about the idea as such. Instead, in this chapter I want to do three  I am very happy, then, to go along with the received view that virtues and vices are standing mental states or traits of character, so long as we recognize that my way of spelling out what makes something a standing mental state or trait of character differs from how that is sometimes spelt out. For instance, my way of defining a standing mental state or trait of character differs from the view that standing mental states or traits of character are dispositions or tendencies to occupy occurrent mental states. 3

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things. First, to the extent that virtues and vices involve behavioral dispositions,4 I argue that this entails that emotion has a key role in explaining the presence of virtues and vices. For again behavioral dispositions require categorical bases, and we have seen that emotions are the best candidates for the categorical bases. Second, I argue that if the virtues and vices in question have emotional bases, then this has obvious implications for the cultivation of virtue. Most notably it seems to imply that attention to people’s emotions will often be essential in pursuit of the cultivation of virtue. However, I will also give reasons for thinking that occasions might exist where attention will need to be given to things other than emotion. Third, I want to relate the idea that emotions are the categorical bases for virtues and vices to a well-known objection to the existence of virtues and vices. The objection begins with the observation that virtues are supposed to be traits or behavioral dispositions that are reliably exercised in a wide-range of trait-relevant situations. For instance, the honest person is the person who acts truthfully in all kinds of situations and not just in certain kinds of situation. The objection goes on to claim that what we actually find is much more situation dependent than this, that is to say, we find only people who in some situations behave truthfully but in other situations behave dishonestly. Now, I will return towards the end of the chapter to the question of whether this finding from social psychology is in fact a problem for the existence of virtues and vices. I will give reason to think it is not. However, my initial concern will not be to answer the objection, but to say why regarding emotions as the categorical bases for the behavioral dispositions involved in virtues and vices can go a long way to explain the situation dependent nature of how people tend to behave.

 My concern is solely with those virtues and vices that can be understood as behavioral dispositions. Consequently, I will say nothing about virtues and vices that are not behavioral dispositions if there are any such things. But for what it is worth, I am inclined to think that other mental states, including emotions and thoughts, may well qualify as virtues and vices, if virtues and vices are simply to be defined as mental states that are constitutive of a good or bad life or which play a role in our behaving well or badly, since plausibly mental states other than desires would satisfy such definitions of virtue and vice. 4

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 motions as Categorical Bases for Virtues E and Vices To the extent that virtues and vices involve behavioral dispositions, where we are to view desires or behavioral dispositions as being occurrent or episodic mental states, the lesson of the last two chapters is clear. Virtues and vices that are behavioral dispositions must have emotional bases. And that idea seems very plausible when we consider the kinds of things that are considered to be virtues and vices. First, there are those virtues and vices that involve dispositions to overt physical behaviors. For virtues, I have in mind such things as honesty (the disposition to tell truth-hoods), bravery (the disposition to overcome fear in situations of perceived threat), and justice (the disposition to acting fairly and equitably). For vices, I have in mind such things as cowardice (the disposition to behave in a cowardly or timid fashion), greediness (the disposition to have more than one’s fair share), and dishonesty (the disposition to tell falsehoods). Each of these virtues and vices involve behavioral dispositions and each plausibly admits of an emotional basis. Indeed, it is difficult to see what could underlie the behavioral dispositions in question other than emotion. What can underlie and realize a disposition to behave cowardly other than an emotion such as fear, or the disposition to behave honestly other than an emotion such as taking pleasure in being truthful? And it is not only the kinds of behavioral dispositions mentioned above that admit of an emotional basis. Consider also those virtues and vices that are commonly considered to be intellectual dispositions or traits of character. For virtues I have in mind such things as open-­ mindedness (the disposition to listen to and consider points of view different from one’s own) and attentiveness (the disposition to pay close attention to what someone says or an argument that is being advanced). For vices, I have in mind such things as closed-mindedness (the disposition to ignore or refuse to listen and consider different points of view) and gullibility (the disposition to accept what anyone says, even when one should know better). These intellectual dispositions, which we might identify with dispositions to certain mental doings, also seem to admit of

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an emotional basis. Indeed, it is difficult to see what could underlie and realize these dispositional states other than emotion. For instance, what else could underlie and realize a closed-minded attitude other than an emotion such as discomfort in having one’s views challenged, or the desire to play close attention to someone’s argument other than certain emotions, say, displeasure at the idea of getting the argument wrong? And the idea that emotions realize the dispositions to thought and behavior that characterize various virtues and vices has something else going for it, namely that idea captures and explains what seems inherently passionate about a life of vice and virtue. For when we picture to ourselves the honest or brave or cowardly or closed-minded or ignorant person, emotion or passion always seems to be hovering in the background. After all, try to image an honest or brave or cowardly person who is void of all emotion. In fact, I think we might go further and hold that the dispositions that are virtues and vices count as virtues and vices only because they are realized by certain emotions. Imagine two people who are equally disposed to tell the truth, but while one person’s disposition to tell the truth is grounded in a self-serving emotion (a fear of being caught out, say), the other person’s disposition to tell the truth is grounded in an emotion that is all the better (a love of honesty, say). Are we inclined to say that both possess the virtue of honesty? I think that when we reflect on what realizes the disposition to tell the truth in each case, we are inclined to say that only in the case where the disposition has its basis in the more decent emotion do we have the virtue of honesty. And this is not merely because we think the person who undergoes the more self-serving emotion is less likely to be disposed to tell the truth in honesty-relevant situations, though that may be true. For I think we would be inclined to say about the self-serving case that we wouldn’t have the virtue of honesty even in a world where we know the person’s emotions will always dispose the person to behave truthfully.

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Implications for the Cultivation of Virtue and Elimination of Vice Suppose that virtues and vices have emotional bases, by which I mean the behavioral dispositions that virtues and vices comprise are grounded in or realized by our emotions. What might the implications of such an idea be for the cultivation of virtue and the elimination of vice? The obvious answer is that attention will need to be given to people’s emotions. If the behavioral dispositions that someone forms are realized by certain emotions, then improvement in those behavioral dispositions will come about only with an improvement in the emotions that realize those behavioral dispositions. And, indeed, it might be difficult to see how we can avoid this conclusion. Of course, this tells us nothing about how a person’s emotions might be improved in pursuit of cultivating better behavioral dispositions. Arguably relevant are behavioral techniques such as classical and operant conditioning (such as rewarding a person’s good behavior with view to producing a positive affective association with the behavior), along with such things as deeper engagement with the arts and humanities and use of role-modelling and simulation (for example, by way of ‘putting oneself in the shoes’ of another, thereby coming to experience their emotions and the behavioral dispositions those emotions realize).5 But regardless of how we should go about improving a person’s emotions, a change in emotion might seem to be required if virtue is to be developed and vice is to be eliminated or moderated. But in fact, the situation regarding the implications for the cultivation of virtue is more complicated than what has just been suggested. This is for a number of reasons. First, it is questionable whether changing a person’s emotions is always required, even allowing that emotions underlie or realize a person’s behavioral dispositions. As I explained in Chap. 4 behavioral dispositions depend for their existence not only on the emotions that realize them. For instance, a person’s beliefs can also make a difference to the behavioral dispositions that emotions come to ground or realize. For instance, consider a politician who feels a pang of  Also relevant is the discussion in Chap. 8 of this book regarding the treatment of emotional disorders. 5

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displeasure each time their party leader asks them to be dishonest with the press. But suppose this politician believes without sufficient justification that the press cannot be trusted with the truth. I think such a case describes someone who despite undergoing a strong visceral reaction that would normally dispose them to be truthful, has no disposition to be truthful due to the presence of another mental state, namely, the belief that the press cannot be trusted with the truth. Now, if this is correct, then it leaves open the possibility that acquiring better behavioral dispositions might sometimes require a change to something other than the emotions that normally realize the behavioral dispositions in question (say, a change to a person’s beliefs).6 Second, recall a point made earlier in this chapter, namely that virtues and vices are behavioral dispositions that reliably manifest themselves in behavior. Thus, it is not sufficient for being honest that one possesses the desire to be just or honest in honesty-relevant situations. To count as an honest person one’s dispositions to behave justly or honestly must reliably manifest themselves in behavior. Now, suppose a person possesses behavioral dispositions that would count as virtues or vices were it not for the fact that these dispositions do not reliably issue in action. It seems to me that in such a case it is an open question as to whether the acquisition of virtue will require a change to the emotions realizing the behavioral dispositions in question. For much will depend on the reasons for why the behavioral dispositions are failing to reliably manifest themselves in a way that would be sufficient for those dispositions to count as virtues. The point is that there may be a number of things other than the emotions underlying and realizing a person’s behavioral dispositions that prevent a person’s behavioral dispositions from being reliably exercised or acted on. Some of these things are internal to people themselves. For instance, perhaps a person is unable to act from a disposition to behave honestly or justly due to a failure in skill or know-how. So perhaps someone would behave justly in this situation if they knew how to act justly or knew what justice requires from them. Now, conceivably we can imagine  Though even then it may be that a change in belief will come about only with a change to the emotions that underlie and realize the cognitive dispositions that give rise to the beliefs in question (see also my discussion of cognitive therapy and the treatment of emotional disorders in Chap. 8). 6

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a situation in which a person is always wrong about what justice requires from them. That might be sufficient to disqualify that person’s disposition to act justly from qualifying as a virtue. However, what is needed in such a case is better know-how, not better emotions. Also, some things that prevent behavioral dispositions from being exercised may be external to a person, that is, things that are part of a person’s physical or social environment. For instance, perhaps an employee would behave honestly if only their employer would support them in a way that enables them to behave honestly. Here we seem to have a case where a person fails to possess the virtue of honesty despite, we can suppose, being disposed to behave honestly. However, in this case it is a feature of the person’s external situation  (namely, one relating to the unsupportive behavior of the employer) that will need to be modified if that person is to come to attain the virtue in question.

 motion and the Situationist Critique E of Virtue Theory A well-known objection to virtue theory questions whether the existence of virtues and vices is supported by the empirical data. According to the situationist challenge how people tend to behave turns out to be situation dependent. Thus, there is no such thing as the person who behaves honestly in all situations, but only the person who behaves honestly in some situations and dishonestly in others (Doris 1998, 2002; Harman 1999, 2000; Merritt et al. 2010). And indeed, the social psychological literature is replete with examples of studies that support the idea that how people behave is very much shaped or determined by the social environment. Consider, for instance, the Milgram study and the Princeton Theology Seminary study. In the former study, participants were instructed to administer electric shocks of increasing voltage to someone in another room (who unknown to the study participants was an actor). A large majority of participants obeyed even when the person in the other room made agonizing screams and/or withdrew their consent, and even when participants were asked to administer a lethal level of shock (Milgram 1974). In the latter study, participants who were students were told they

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needed to deliver a short presentation in another building. Some were told they had plenty of time to get to the seminar, while others were told they were on time or had very little time. Those who had been told they had very little time were much less likely to help a distressed person they encountered on the way to the seminar than those participants who had plenty of time (Darley and Batson 1973). Both these studies have been taken to demonstrate that behavior is situation dependent. Why is this a concern for those who believe in the existence of virtues and vices? It is a concern because according to many of those who believe in the existence of virtues and vices, the virtuous person will tend to behave virtuously (honestly, courageously, justly, benevolently, and so on) regardless of the social setting. Hence, the benevolent person will tend to help those in need regardless of whether they are in a rush, or acting from orders, or believe themselves to be at personal risk, and so on. As John Doris puts the point: [Virtues are] robust traits: if a person has a robust trait, they can be confidently expected to display trait-relevant behavior across a wide variety of trait-relevant situations, even where some or all of these situations are not optimally conducive to such behavior. (Doris 2002, 18)

Yet this doesn’t seem to accord with the way people actually are. For again what we find in the human case are behaviors that are very much dependent on the social setting. Now, of course, those who believe in the existence of virtues and vices could respond, well so much for human virtue. For perhaps the empirical facts show only that human beings (as opposed to divine beings, say) cannot be virtuous. Those facts do not in themselves demonstrate the incoherency of the idea of virtue or vice as such. However, it seems unlikely this response will satisfy those who believe in the existence of virtues and vices, as they will likely argue that the idea of virtue is supposed to relate to an ideal to which human beings can at least approximate. Virtues are supposed to be things we are able to acquire with the right training. If virtue theory is to have a valuable place in how we think about ethics, then it needs to be practically relevant for us (Doris 2002).

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Because it will prove important to the discussion that follows, let us be clear on what the situationist challenge would and wouldn’t succeed in showing. To begin with, that challenge wouldn’t show that traits of character don’t exist, for it is consistent with the social psychological findings that so-called ‘local character traits’ exist, which we might identify with behavioral dispositions that are situation dependent, say, the disposition someone might have when not being instructed by an authority figure, or when not in a hurry, to behave compassionately (cp. Doris 1998). The findings in question challenge only the idea that global traits exist, where global traits might be identified with desires or behavioral dispositions that people tend to form in trait-relevant situations regardless of what else is going on in those situations. And from which it follows that the situationist challenge threatens to falsify only those versions of virtue theory that identify virtues and vices with global traits. According to the situationist challenge virtues and vices cannot be identical with such traits, as such traits do not exist in the population at large. It is important to be clear on the above points because they correspond to two ways in which someone might try to respond to the situationist challenge. Either someone might seek to cast doubt on whether widespread possession of global traits doesn’t exist (see, for instance, Sreenivasan 2002; Montmarquet 2003; Snow 2010), or someone might accept there is no widespread possession of global traits, while holding that this need not threaten virtue theory because virtues and vices are to be identified with local, not global, traits of character (see, for instance, Goldie 2000; Merritt 2000; Kupperman 2009; Upton 2009). Now, I think the first way of responding to the situationist challenge is very unlikely to succeed. This is because if emotions serve as the categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions, then the idea that how we behave will always be situation dependent looks almost inescapable. Nevertheless, I think proponents of virtue theory are able to answer the situationist challenge because if emotions serve as categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions, then we have good reason for thinking that virtues and vices exist as local traits. So in what follows, I do two things. First, I show why viewing emotions as the categorical bases for the way we are disposed to behave

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commits us to the view that how people behave will be situation dependent. What is more, it provides us with a ready explanation for this finding from social psychology. The implication being that those who believe in the existence of virtues and vices will have to abandon the idea of virtues and vices comprising behavioral dispositions that are not dependent on social context. Second, I outline an argument supporting the idea that those who believe in the existence of virtues and vices should just embrace this finding from social psychology, as something they can use to revise and enrichen their way of thinking about virtues and vices. For I will argue that by and large it is a good thing our behavioral dispositions are situation dependent, expressing or reflecting, as it were, emotions that are sensitive to the particularities of the different situations in which we find themselves, and that this is something that a virtue theory that recognizes virtues and vices as comprising local traits can readily accommodate. Regarding emotions as the categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions provides us with a very compelling answer to the question of what explains the study findings supporting situationism. It answers that question because emotions are situation dependent. How we respond emotionally to the world and its objects depends greatly on how we perceive the world and its objects, including, though not limited to, features of our immediate environment. And I take it that this is not something we need social psychology to tell us. Just by reflecting on familiar examples we are able to see that emotions are situation dependent. Consider the act of telling the truth. Now, in many cases the idea of telling the truth will be a pleasurable one for many of us and the idea of telling a falsehood a source of aversion. But all of us can imagine or have experienced cases where the reverse holds. A traffic warden asks whether you have parked your car longer than is permitted (…you have). A member of the Gestapo asks someone if they are hiding a person they love in their basement (…they are). And so on. But if emotions are situation dependent, as is undeniably the case, then we would expect the behavioral dispositions that emotions realize to be situation dependent as well. Given the context sensitive nature of emotion and the behavioral dispositions that emotions realize, the finding from social psychology that how people behave is situation dependent should come as no surprise.

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Obviously people are likely to behave differently—sometimes well, sometimes not—in different circumstances, given that different circumstances can trigger different emotions in people, and therefore give rise to different behavioral dispositions. If I am in a rush to get somewhere or believe my safety is at risk if I stop, then the idea of helping someone in need of my assistance is likely to cause me a pang of displeasure or anxiety, which in turn is likely to dispose me to pass on by, thus making it more likely I will pass on by. On the other hand, if stopping to help someone is in no way going to cause me inconvenience or put me at any kind of risk, then the idea of passing on by is likely to cause me more anxiety, which in turn is likely to dispose me to stop and help, thus making it much more likely that I will stop and help. Of course, in real life things tend to be more complicated than has just been suggested. For instance, we can experience conflicting dispositions, reflecting different emotional responses to one and the same situation. Also, not everyone will be disposed to behave the same way given the differences in emotional sensibilities that exist between people. But then both these points are supported by the empirical findings. For instance, many of the participants in the Milgram study were conflicted owing to different emotional pressures bearing on them (distress caused by inflicting pain versus distress caused by disobeying orders from an authority figure). And as regards differences in dispositions between people, the social psychology studies in question show there exists some variation in how people respond to one and the same situation. For instance, not every participant administered high voltage electric shocks in the Milgram study, and some participants in the Princeton Theology Seminary study stopped to assist. Plausibly differences in how people behaved reflected differences in behavioral dispositions owing to different emotions or strengths of emotion. Here we might also recall findings in moral psychology regarding the different moral judgments that people make when engaging in certain thought experiments. There also we find variation between people in moral judgment, where plausibly this is to be explained in terms of differences in emotion underlying and realizing the behavioral dispositions involved in moral thought. For instance, while most people think pushing a person off a bridge to stop a train from killing five innocent

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people is morally impermissible, psychopaths are more likely to think such an action is permissible (Koenigs et  al. 2012)—a finding that is plausibly due to the fact that psychopaths and non-psychopaths respond to the thought experiment with different emotions. So viewing emotions as categorical bases for people’s behavioral dispositions is very able to make sense of the empirical data. And, in case the point needs emphasizing, if this is how we should answer the question of what explains the situationist findings, then it would be surprising if it turned out that not all behavioral dispositions are situation dependent to some degree. I say ‘to some degree’ because even though how we respond emotionally to things (and hence how we are disposed to behave) depends on the particular features of our situations, we may still exercise some degree of consistency in our emotions and behavioral dispositions. For instance, for many people the idea of telling a lie, even a white lie, will normally cause them discomfort, and as a result they will normally be disposed to tell the truth. But even then it is likely that certain situations exist in which a different emotion will be triggered and a different behavioral disposition will ensue. And, therefore, the idea that there may be behavioral dispositions that do not depend for their existence on contextual or situational factors seems very difficult to sustain. If behavioral dispositions are realized by emotions and emotions are always dependent on the particular features of our situations, then it isn’t at all clear what could justify the idea that some behavioral dispositions are not situation dependent. Suppose what I have said is correct. Does answering the question of what explains the situationist findings provide us with anything relevant to answering the question of whether virtue theory is threatened by the fact that behavioral dispositions are situation dependent? To be sure, on the account defended here we would seem to have reason to doubt that virtues and vices can be global traits of character. This is because my answer to the question of what explains the situationist findings presupposes and, in my view, consolidates the idea that there are no such things as global traits, in the sense that how we are disposed to behave always depends on the particular features of our situations. But note, first, that it doesn’t follow that character traits do not exist. If character traits comprise desires or behavioral dispositions and

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behavioral dispositions are situation dependent then clearly character traits exist, albeit as traits that are situation dependent. So for example, we might say that it is in someone’s character to be disposed to help others when they are not in a hurry or obeying orders (cp. Doris 2002). Second, it follows that whether virtues or vices exist depends now on whether virtues and vices can comprise local traits of character. The traditional view is that virtues and vices are global traits. But perhaps the traditional view is wrong. For perhaps there is more reason to think that vices and virtues are local traits, that is, behavioral dispositions that are situation dependent (see, Goldie 2000; Merritt 2000; Kupperman 2009; Upton 2009). And indeed it seems to me that if my answer to the question of what explains the situationist findings is right, then this paves the way towards the view that virtues and vices exist as local character traits. My argument for saying this again rests on the idea that emotions often play an important regulatory role in giving rise to behavioral dispositions that are situation dependent (see Chap. 5). Now, it is possible that the fact of our undergoing certain emotions in certain situations is a brute fact about us, so to speak, discharging no important role at all. But it is reasonable to suppose that some purpose is being served by the fact in question, that some reason might exist for why people undergo certain emotions in certain situations. And, plausibly, as I argued in Chap. 5, one key role often served by emotion is that of ensuring we are sufficiently responsive to the particularities of our situation, by way of ensuring that how we are disposed to behave is sensitive to what the particular features of our situations demand from us. Consider the case in which the Gestapo are wanting to know whether someone is hiding a person they love in their basement. If placed in such a situation many people would recoil in horror at the idea of being truthful, and as a result would be strongly disposed not to be truthful. This is a good thing too, since it would be wrong to be truthful in such a case. But for our purposes the important thing to note is that people are disposed not to be truthful in such cases only because they recoil in horror. And from which it follows that recoiling with horror seems to be discharging an important regulatory role, namely that of ensuring that people are responsive to those features of their situations—for instance, the

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great harm that will come to a loved one if the Gestapo is answered truthfully—that makes a difference to how people should behave. Now, of course, our emotions don’t always realize the right behavioral dispositions, as the studies from social psychology illustrate. But it seems reasonable to suppose that for most of us (that is, putting psychopaths and such like to one side) our emotions are such as to ensure that by and large we form the right behavioral dispositions, and that given this is the case, the right behavioral dispositions to form will always be situation dependent, since the emotions that underlie and realize them are always situation dependent.7 If something like the above is true, then plausibly this is something that can be built into a theory of virtue. So rather than viewing the situation dependent nature of how people are disposed to behave as a threat to virtue theory, we can build the situational dependency feature into how we think about virtue. For plausibly if the undergoing of certain emotions whose role it is to ensure that we form the right behavioral dispositions entails our forming behavioral dispositions that are situation dependent, then the behavioral dispositions that are virtues and vices are situation dependent. Again, acceptance of this idea is revisionary insofar that it requires virtues and vices to be identified with local, not global, traits. Thus, the completely virtuous person should not be viewed as the person who is disposed in all situations to behave in an honest way but should only be viewed as the person who is disposed in some (possibly most) situations to behave in an honest way. But we still end up with a version of virtue theory, since we are still left with something that places value in certain behavioral dispositions and disvalue in certain others, albeit dispositions that are situation dependent.  Do we need to draw on the fact that emotions play an important regulatory in ensuring we form the right behavioral dispositions to justify the claim that the right behavioral dispositions to form are situation dependent? Why not just claim, for instance, that it would be wrong to be honest in a Gestapo-type case because being honest would cause great harm? The worry, as I see it, with such a claim is that it doesn’t tell us why the right behavioral dispositions are situation dependent, but merely presupposes that idea. In effect it is saying that whether honesty is right depends on certain situational factors (say, on whether honesty is likely to cause great harm or not), while our question is that of what justifies our thinking that whether honesty is right depends on such situational factors. Holding that the rightness or wrongness of honesty depends on situational factors because that is what our emotions prescribe or legislate for us, so to speak, does promise to answer our question, on the other hand. 7

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Furthermore, even if virtues and vices are local traits, there is no reason why we cannot borrow the language of the global-trait theorist, and for many everyday purposes (say, for the purpose of identifying traits we should aim to cultivate in ourselves and others) speak of honesty, compassion, and justice, as being virtues tout court, that is to say, without any nod to situations where such traits would not be the right ones to have. This is because even if what counts as the right behavioral disposition is situation dependent, it seems likely that many situations will require us to form behavioral dispositions of the same general type, as supported by the fact that we tend to be fairly consistent in how we respond emotionally to things. For instance, the thought of acting falsely tends to elicit feelings of aversion in many people most of the time, and hence many people tend to be disposed to behave truthfully. Now, given the idea that by and large the behavioral dispositions our emotions realize are the right dispositions for us to form in the situations we are placed, then the fact that in most situations we are disposed to behave truthfully seems sufficient for us to speak of honesty unqualified as a virtue for many everyday purposes. So as a general rule, we ought to be honest, just, and compassionate, and for many everyday purposes that suffices to speak of honesty, justice, and compassion as virtues tout court, even though there are likely to be exceptions to the general rule.8  Might any exceptions to the rule even be built into a proper characterization of the virtue in question? For instance, might we say that honesty is a disposition to act honestly, except when acting honestly is not called for? Again consider the case where the Gestapo are demanding to know whether someone is hiding in your basement and where someone might want to say that being disposed to be truthful would count not as honesty but as excessive moralism, especially if acted on. Here we might seem to have an example of a virtue (honesty) that has situation or context-specific exceptions built into its very identity. This may have been Aristotle’s view. As Jonathan Webber writes: “Aristotle makes it abundantly clear that the kinds of traits that he recommends as virtuous are certainly not dispositions to behave in a certain kind of way whenever or almost whenever a certain kind of situational feature is present. He considers such traits to be vices of excess: giving money away at every or almost every opportunity is not generosity, but profligacy; never or hardly ever recoiling from danger is not courage, but foolhardiness; and so on”. (2006, 206). But I am not at all sure about this, as it exempts all displays of honesty (say) from criticism, which seems incorrect to me. In a Gestapo-type case, for instance, I want to say it would simply be wrong to display honesty, and hence honesty in such a case is a vice, not a virtue. Agreed, the person who behaves honestly in such a case is displaying excessive moralism in behaving honestly, but they are being honest all the same, albeit when they should not be behaving honestly. 8

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I will finish by returning to a concern that might be raised to the idea I have been advancing. In the case of the person who reveals to the Gestapo the whereabouts of a loved one they are hiding we don’t want to say the person felt an emotion that succeeded in realizing the right behavioral disposition. So again it might be asked what justifies thinking that emotion discharges an important regulatory role if emotion is able to realize non-virtuous dispositions. Again I think the worry being raised here suffices to show that emotions don’t always discharge a valuable role in realizing certain behavioral dispositions. Thus, in the case just described a person’s emotion—say, displeasure occasioned by the thought of behaving dishonestly—fails to realize a behavioral disposition that would be the right one to form in the circumstances in question. However, this doesn’t in itself take anything away from the fact that in many cases people do undergo emotions that discharge the valuable role in question. All we need for that idea to go through is the assumption that by and large people undergo emotions that help to ensure they have the behavioral dispositions that are fitting to the situation they are in. Now, if that is the case, and we have reason to trust our emotions or think them reliable, at least for the most part, then the fact of our emotions realizing behavioral dispositions that are situation dependent should be sufficient for thinking those will be the right dispositions for us to form for much of the time, and therefore dispositions that qualify as virtues. Of course, exceptions exist. The perfectly vicious person is the person whose emotions never succeed in realizing the right behavioral dispositions, and all of us are flawed to varying degrees, as the studies from social psychology show. But our concern was never with the question of whether the fact of emotion giving rise to behavioral dispositions that are situation dependent is consistent with the presence of vice. Rather, our concern was only whether the fact of emotion realizing situation dependent behavioral dispositions gives us a way of responding to the situationist challenge. And again the answer to that question is affirmative if we take the view that for the most part our emotions ensure that how we are disposed to behave is sensitive to the particular features of our situation. That view meets the situationist challenge because although that view accepts there are no global traits of character in the sense that people’s behavioral dispositions are always situation dependent, that view gives us

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reason to think that virtues and vices should not be identified with global traits of character anyway. Rather, on the view in question virtues and vices are to be identified with local traits, since these are the traits or behavioral dispositions that our emotions prescribe us to have.

Concluding Remarks I have been concerned to show how viewing emotions as the categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions has implications for how we think about virtue and vice. To begin with, it implies that emotions underlie those virtues and vices that involve behavioral dispositions, since it is our emotions that underlie and realize the virtues and vices in question. I also argued that it has implications for the cultivation of virtue and vice. For instance, it will often entail that attention will need to be given to the emotions that realize the behavioral dispositions involved in virtues and vices, though a couple of exceptions to that idea were also spelt out. Much of my attention in this chapter was given to addressing the situationist critique of virtue and vice. I accepted the critique insofar as global traits are concerned. Indeed, I claimed that the idea that emotions serve as categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions supports there being no behavioral dispositions that fail to be situation dependent, since the emotions that realize our behavioral dispositions are situation dependent. However, I also sought to show how viewing emotions as the categorical bases for our behavioral dispositions points to a revised version of virtue theory if we accept, as seems plausible, that emotions discharge an important regulatory role by way of ensuring that we form the right dispositions in the situations we are placed. On this version of virtue theory, virtues and vices turn out to be behavioral dispositions that are situation dependent, or what are commonly referred to as local traits of character. It might be remarked in conclusion that needless to say and consistent with what I say elsewhere in this book, I take my claims regarding the situation dependent nature of virtues and vices to apply not only to moral virtues, such as honesty, justice, and compassion, but also to intellectual or epistemic virtues, such as open-mindedness and attentiveness. How people are disposed to think also seems to be situation dependent (see

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Alfano 2012; Olin and Doris 2014). Again this is unsurprising if intellectual dispositions are also realized by emotions (see Chap. 4). This creates problems for a virtue theory that sees intellectual virtues to be global traits, since plausibly no such traits exist. But if emotions discharge a regulatory role with respect to our intellectual dispositions in the way they discharge a regulatory role with respect to our dispositions to overt physical behaviors, then we have good reason to think that intellectual virtues are local not global traits. And that idea seems very plausible, as reflection on certain cases show. Take open-mindedness. Consider a case where someone is attempting to persuade you to endorse a wholly objectionable view, say, the view that certain ethnic groups are intellectually inferior to your own. As with our earlier examples, I imagine most people would recoil in horror at the thought of doing what is being asked of them, and as a result would be strongly set against endorsing the view in question. An attitude of open-­ mindedness in relation to such objectionable views would be the wrong attitude to have. So once again emotion is discharging an important regulatory role, namely by way of ensuring people’s intellectual dispositions are sensitive to the particular features of that person’s situation. And all of which strongly points to the idea that intellectual virtues are best conceived of as being local dispositions or traits, since it is local intellectual dispositions or traits—dispositions that are situation dependent—that again our emotions legislate or prescribe us to have.

References Alfano, M. (2012). Expanding the Situationist Challenge to Responsibilist Virtue Epistemology. The Philosophical Quarterly, 62, 223–249. Darley, J., & Batson, C. (1973). ‘From Jerusalem to Jericho:’ A Study of Situational and Dispositional Variables in Helping Behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 27, 100–108. Doris, J. (1998). Persons, Situations, and Virtue Ethics. Noûs, 32, 504–530. Doris, J. (2002). Lack of Character: Personality and Moral Behavior. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Goldie, P. (2000). The Emotions: A Philosophical Exploration. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Harman, G. (1999). Moral Philosophy Meets Moral Psychology: Virtue Ethics and the Fundamental Attribution Error. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 99, 315–331. Harman, G. (2000). The Nonexistence of Character Traits. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 100, 223–226. Koenigs, M., Kruepke, M., Zeier, J., & Newman, J. (2012). Utilitarian Moral Judgment in Psychopathy. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 7, 708–714. Kupperman, J. (2009). Virtue in Virtue Ethics. The Journal of Ethics, 13, 243–255. Merritt, M. (2000). Virtue Ethics and Situationist Personality Psychology. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 3, 365–383. Merritt, M., Doris, J., & Harman, G. (2010). Character. In J.  Doris & the Moral Psychology Research Group (Eds.), The Moral Psychology Handbook. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to Authority. New York: Harper & Row. Montmarquet, J. (2003). Moral Character and Social Science Research. Philosophy, 78, 355–368. Nietzsche, F. (1917). Thus Spake Zarathustra (T. Common, Trans.). New York: The Modern Library. Olin, L., & Doris, J. (2014). Vicious Minds. Philosophical Studies, 168, 665–692. Snow, N. (2010). Virtue as Social Intelligence: An Empirically Grounded Theory. New York: Routledge Press. Sreenivasan, G. (2002). Errors About Errors: Virtue Theory and Trait Attribution. Mind, 111, 47–68. Upton, C. (2009). The Structure of Character. The Journal of Ethics, 13, 175–193. Webber, J. (2006). Virtue, Character and Situation. Journal of Moral Philosophy, 3, 193–213.

Part III Emotion and the Self

7 Our Emotional Cores

Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! What an exquisite life you have had! You have drunk deeply of everything. You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than the sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the same. I am not the same, Henry. —Oscar Wilde (1986, 245) We are not necessarily thinking machines. We are feeling machines that think. —Antonio Damasio (1994, 16)

Introduction Very often when characterizing objects we talk about how objects are disposed to behave. For example, we might characterize a vase in terms of its hardness and fragility, where both properties are dispositional properties of the vase. Thus, to say a vase is fragile is to say a vase is disposed to shatter in the event of being struck, and to say a vase is hard is to say something like a vase is disposed to resist penetration. We might also

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characterize a vase in terms of its ‘appearance qualities’, so to speak, the way a vase is disposed to appear to us when it is perceived by us. For instance, we might say that a vase is disposed to look vase-shaped and tends to feel smooth and hard to the touch, these again being dispositional properties of the vase. Indeed, the idea that objects can be characterized in terms of their dispositional properties is true not only of everyday physical objects, such as vases, tables, and rocks, but also of entities at the microphysical level, such as atoms, electrons, protons, and quarks, which, again, physics characterizes in terms of how those things are disposed to behave and interact with one another.1 This is all well and good. But it does give rise to the following question: what are things like when they are considered apart from their dispositional properties? After all, to speak of the way an object is disposed to behave and interact with other things is to speak of properties of the object that relate the object to certain ways of behaving. For instance, to say that a vase is disposed to shatter when struck with force is to talk of a property of the vase—namely its disposition to shatter when struck with force—that relates the vase to a behavior the vase engages in when struck with force. This idea is entailed as a matter of necessity by our earlier definition of dispositional properties, namely as properties whose essence or nature is to cause their bearers to behave in certain ways when particular circumstances obtain. On this account, it is of the essence or nature of a dispositional property that it relates the bearer of the disposition to the manifestation of the disposition (on this point, see Chap. 4; see also Adams 2007; Kistler 2011).2 But this then gives rise to the following question. What is an object like when considered apart from the relations it bears to its potential or actual manifestations? For instance, we can ask what a vase is like in and of itself when considered apart from its dispositional properties. Call the

 Of course modern physics doesn’t characterize such things in terms of how they tend to appear to us, as such entities are too small to be perceptible to normal senses. 2  It is also of the nature of a disposition to relate its bearer to the triggering conditions (see Chap. 4). Thus, a vase is not merely disposed to shatter, but is disposed to shatter in the event of being struck with force. 1

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search for the properties that characterize what an object is like in and of itself, a search for the object’s intrinsic nature. In fact, it is a moot point as to whether everything possesses an intrinsic nature in this sense. If modern physics is to be believed, atoms and subatomic particles may be exhausted by how they are disposed to behave and interact with one another. This is because modern physics employs only dispositional or relational talk when describing such things as atoms and subatomic particles. The jury is out on this. Although some philosophers and physicists accept the idea of fundamental physical atoms being describable only in terms of how they are disposed to behave and interact with other particles, a number of philosophers have argued that even atoms and subatomic particles possess intrinsic natures, albeit natures that modern physics does not presently tell us about.3 These intrinsic natures might comprise some unknown or undiscovered fundamental physical or non-psychic property. Alternatively, they might comprise psychic or proto-psychic properties (proto-psychic inasmuch that on their own they don’t have psychic natures, but collectively and when arranged in the right way they can constitute psychic properties). Indeed, in recent years a number of philosophers have argued for panpsychism or proto-panpsychism, largely on the basis of the idea that atoms must possesses intrinsic natures that characterize what atoms and subatomic particles are like in and of themselves, that is, when considered apart from their dispositional profiles (for instance, Sprigge 1999; Strawson 2003, 2006; Goff 2017). For these philosophers, psychic or proto-psychic properties—paradigmatically phenomenal or proto-­ phenomenal properties—are the best, perhaps only, candidates for those properties that make up the intrinsic natures of such things. The idea that atoms and subatomic particles have intrinsic natures— natures distinct from their dispositional or relational profiles—is a controversial one. Even more controversial is the idea that the intrinsic nature of such entities (if they have an intrinsic nature) has a psychic or proto-­ psychic, phenomenal or proto-phenomenal, character. Attributing psychic or phenomenal qualities to such things as atoms and subatomic  Bertrand Russell writes: “The physical world is only as regards certain abstract features of its space-­ time structure—features which, because of their abstractness, do not suffice to show whether the physical world is, or is not, different in intrinsic character from the world of mind” (1948, 240). 3

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particles can seem to be stretching things too far. Also, all versions of panpsychism face the ‘combination problem’, namely that of explaining how the phenomenal or proto-phenomenal properties in question can combine in such a way to give us the rich and unified experiences that we all undergo (for statements of the objection and sympathetic consideration of possible replies, see Seager 1995; Chalmers 2016; Goff 2017). Fortunately, we don’t have to take a stance on whether entities at the atomic or subatomic level have intrinsic natures or not. For regardless of how that issue is to be resolved, one thing seems clear. When we consider ordinary objects or entities, such as rocks, vases, chairs, trees, cats, and human beings, it is very plausible to suppose these objects have intrinsic natures, properties that identify what these things or objects, animate or inanimate, are like in and of themselves. We have seen this already in relation to ordinary physical objects, such as vases, which have intrinsic natures comprising these objects’ unique atomic or molecular structures. To be sure, the atoms and subatomic particles that collectively constitute an object’s atomic structure may themselves lack intrinsic natures if modern physics is to be believed, but on the face of it that is a fact about the things that collectively make up an object’s intrinsic nature and not a fact about the intrinsic nature of the object itself. And the idea of something possessing an intrinsic nature is very plausible also when we consider people or human beings. After all, the question of what characterizes people in and of themselves, that is, when considered apart from the various ways they are disposed to behave, seems just as sensible a question as that of what characterizes ordinary physical objects in and of themselves. In this chapter I argue that our intrinsic natures are emotional ones, that, in other words, emotions are those properties of ours that make up our inner cores, so to speak, in much the same way the molecular or atomic structure of a vase might be said to make up the inner core of a vase. I begin by saying something about why the search for an object’s intrinsic nature is an important one. Then I outline and motivate five criteria for something to count as an intrinsic property of an object as well as make some general observations regarding these five criteria. Next I consider a number of psychological states or properties, including beliefs, desires, and emotions, with view to seeing which might be most suited to serve as intrinsic properties of ours. My

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claim will be that only emotions, conceived of as non-intentional feeling states, meet the five criteria for being an intrinsic property.

 hy the Search for an Object’s Intrinsic Nature W is an Important One In what follows, I mention three reasons why getting to know the intrinsic nature of something is of importance. First, there is a sense in which talk of an object’s intrinsic nature is talk of what in one respect seems most central in terms of understanding the nature of the object. After all, an object’s intrinsic nature is supposed to be that what characterizes the object in and of itself, the way the object is once it has been stripped of all its extraneous clothing, so to speak, the object’s dispositional or relational qualities. It is what characterizes an object when the object is laid bare before us. Knowing the intrinsic nature of a thing, then, promises to give us an insight that is deeper, and plausibly truer, to what that thing most fundamentally is. The second reason why understanding the intrinsic nature of things is important is that there is a respect in which to understand the intrinsic nature of something is to understand that which underlies and explains an important subset of that thing’s non-intrinsic or relational properties. Consider, for instance, that an object is disposed to behave in some way in virtue of its intrinsic properties, the way the object is in and of itself. For instance, a vase is disposed to shatter in the event of being struck by force in virtue of its microphysical structure, the microphysical structure of a vase making up the intrinsic nature of the vase. To be sure, the relationship between something’s intrinsic properties and its dispositional properties is not one of causation. The molecular constitution of a vase doesn’t cause the vase to be fragile and smooth to touch. Nevertheless, a thing’s intrinsic properties are deeply explanatory of its dispositional properties in that the latter exist only in virtue of the former existing. Again, as suggested in Chap. 4, the relationship between the two types of properties is a grounding or in-virtue-of relationship, whereby one set of

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properties (namely, the intrinsic ones) metaphysically determine or realize another set of properties (namely, the dispositional ones). The above being said, observe that the intrinsic properties of an object don’t seem to ground all of an object’s relational properties. For instance, the atomic structure of a vase doesn’t explain why a vase possesses the property of being three meters from where I am sitting, or the property of being an object of thought for me. Nevertheless, the intrinsic nature of a vase does seem to ground and explain an important subset of a vase’s properties, which intuitively are those relational properties of the vase that together with the vase’s intrinsic properties make up and characterize the vase considered as a whole. The thought here being that although a vase does not comprise all its relational properties (for instance, the distance it stands from other objects) it does comprise an important subset of its relational properties, intuitively its dispositional properties, and it is these relational properties of a vase and only these that are realized by the vase’s intrinsic properties. This leads us onto a third reason why understanding the intrinsic properties of objects is important, namely that by so doing we seem to learn something about what binds the dispositional properties to one and the same object. If an object’s dispositional properties are metaphysically dependent on the intrinsic properties, and therefore in some deep way not entirely separable from those intrinsic properties, then it is plausible to suppose that it is an object’s intrinsic properties that ‘anchors’ the dispositional properties and in virtue of which the dispositional properties belong to and characterize one and the same object. For instance, a vase has many ways of being disposed to behave. But what is it that binds these properties to one object, one vase? Plausibly, what binds all these dispositions is some more fundamental ‘binding property’, namely the atomic structure of the vase, which binds by way of grounding or realizing the vase’s multiple dispositional properties.

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Five Criteria for Being an Intrinsic Property So how can we know whether something is a good candidate for being an intrinsic property? The discussion of this chapter so far suggests four criteria for something to count as an intrinsic property of an object, which I will name ‘Constitutive’, ‘Categorical ’, ‘Non-Relational ’ and ‘Binding’. To the list I will add the condition of being ‘Non-Essential’. I’ll now explain and justify each of these criteria for intrinsicality in turn.

1. Constitutive Intrinsic properties collectively constitute or make up the way an object is as it is in itself, that is when considered apart from the dispositional and other relational properties of the object. Note this criterion is compatible with the idea that the object as a whole comprises its intrinsic properties along with its dispositional and other relational properties. So there is nothing to the criterion that rules out a bundle theory, according to which objects are just collections of their intrinsic and relational properties. That being said, the idea that an object’s intrinsic properties pick out those properties that characterize the way an object is as it is in itself is compatible also with the idea that at some more basic level objects are composed entirely of their intrinsic properties, which we might capture by saying these properties make up the core or being of the object. The idea here being that in some possible world an object can exist entirely independent of its dispositional and other relational properties. Thus, intuitively there is some possible world in which an object can exist as one and the same object even if it loses all of its dispositional and other relational properties.4 We might say then:  William Seager writes: “One of the core intuitions about intrinsic properties is that they are the properties that things have ‘in themselves’, the properties that something would retain even if it was the only thing in the universe. If we add the premise that things can exist as the sole denizen of a world (in some appropriately weak modal form—that fact that I need oxygen to survive will not prevent me from having intrinsic properties) we have an argument against relationalism. Individuals can, on this view, be ‘pulled out’ of the relations they may find themselves in and exist entirely apart from them.” (2006, 11) 4

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For any given property, that property will be a viable candidate for being an intrinsic property only if there is good reason to suppose that it helps to characterize the object as the object is in itself, that is, when the object is considered apart from its dispositional and other relational properties.

How can we know whether a property characterizes an object as it is in itself? Here I take what I will call the ‘test of deep change’ to be important. This is the idea that a property helps to characterize an object as it is in itself if alteration of the property entails a deep change in the object, a change to the core or being of the object. For instance, were a vase’s atomic structure to change then a change would occur to the very core or fabric of the vase. A change to a vase’s atomic structure, then, passes the test of deep change and for this reason comprises the core of the vase. On the other hand, if a vase’s dispositional properties alone change, then although something about the vase will change, the change in question will not constitute a deep one, the reason being that the vase as it is in itself will be the same as before its dispositional properties changed. The last sentence of the above paragraph presupposes the idea that objects can change with respect to their dispositional properties without undergoing change to their intrinsic properties, and this might not strike everyone as obvious (see Strawson 1994). But that idea has to be true if the dispositional properties conferred on an object by its intrinsic properties depend on external circumstances as they surely do depend. For instance, how a vase is disposed to behave when struck with force depends not only on the intrinsic nature of the vase but also on the nature of the thing that is striking the vase. Consequently, were the nature of the thing striking the vase to undergo the right change, the vase would lose its disposition to shatter when struck by the thing in question, even though the intrinsic nature of the vase does not change. The same intrinsic properties, then, can ground or realize different dispositions in different circumstances, and this is why there can be a change in how an object is disposed to behave without the intrinsic properties of the object changing.

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2. Categorical Intrinsic properties are categorical in that they are properties in virtue of which an object has its dispositional properties. Note that saying intrinsic properties are categorical is not the same as saying an object’s intrinsic properties are occurrent properties, since as I argued in Chap. 4 dispositional properties—properties whose essence or nature is to cause their bearers to behave in certain ways—are occurrent properties. This is because dispositional properties bear all the hallmarks of occurrent properties. For instance, they can be active in that they exert causal influence on the bearer of their properties, they cause their bearers to behave in certain ways. Also, dispositional properties that are psychological states, such as desires, possess a characteristic phenomenology—there is something that it is like to be in a mental state whose nature or essence is to cause us to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain— and again this could not be the case if dispositional properties failed to be occurrent properties. Intrinsic properties of objects are categorical, then, in just the sense they ground or explain or realize the dispositional properties of objects. So we can say: For any given property, that property will be a viable candidate for an object’s intrinsic nature only if that property underlies and explains or realizes the dispositional properties of the object in question.

Can we say anything more about whether a property is suitable to serve as a categorical basis for an object’s dispositional properties? I think a number of things might be said here about what makes a property unsuitable. First, as I argued in Chap. 4, if as commonly supposed the grounding or realization relation is irreflexive, then dispositional properties cannot underlie or realize themselves. In Chap. 4 reason was also given for holding that dispositional properties cannot be realized by other dispositional properties, at least insofar as the dispositional properties in question are behavioral dispositions possessed by human beings. Also, I take it that some given property is unsuited to serve as a categorical basis if the property in question serves as the stimulus condition for the

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manifestation of the disposition. Finally, I consider that the categorical basis cannot comprise the disposition’s possible or actual manifestation, since the categorical basis has to exist prior to the causal output of the disposition that the categorical basis realizes.

3. Non-Relational Intrinsic properties are widely assumed to be non-relational, by which I mean that something is a suitable candidate for an intrinsic property only if its exemplification doesn’t entail the bearer of the property standing in relation to something else. Fragility doesn’t count as an intrinsic property of an object because its instantiation relates the bearer of the property to the potential or actual manifestation of the disposition. Again, it is plausible to suppose that dispositions are properties whose essence or nature is to cause their bearers to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain. Therefore, their instantiation entails there being a relation between objects and how objects behave when certain circumstances obtain. So we can say: For any given property, that property will be a viable candidate for an object’s intrinsic nature only if the property in question does not relate the bearer of the property to something else.

Note that it is possible for something to satisfy the non-relational criterion even if the intrinsic nature in question consists of more basic elements that themselves have only relational or dispositional natures. For instance, a vase has an atomic structure, which it possesses without bearing a relation to anything else. And this is so even if the individual particles that make up the atomic structure of the vase are identifiable only in terms of the relations they bear, in terms of how they are disposed to act and interact with other particles.

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4. Binding Intuitively-speaking, an object’s intrinsic properties are those properties that bind its dispositional properties to one and the same object. What makes a vase’s dispositional properties—its disposition to fracture when struck and its disposition to hurtle through the air when thrown, for instance—belong to one and the same object? What binds all these distinct properties to the vase? Answer: the object’s intrinsic, non-­ dispositional, non-relational properties, the vase’s molecular structure, in other words. The idea is particularly appealing if we conceive of an object’s dispositional properties as being grounded in or realized by—therefore not entirely separable from—the object’s intrinsic properties. For instance, if the way an object is disposed to behave is grounded in or realized by the object’s intrinsic properties, then this makes readily intelligible how an object’s dispositional properties are anchored to those properties that make up the core of the object. So we might say: For any given property, that property will be a viable candidate for an object’s intrinsic nature only if that property can serve as a binding property, that is. a property that ties an object’s dispositional properties to the object and which together with the object’s dispositional properties make-up the object as a whole.

Can we say anything more about what can and cannot serve as a binding property? I think we can say at least one other thing, namely that the binding property cannot be the manifestation of an object’s disposition to behave a certain way. That is to say, the binding property cannot be the causal output of an object’s dispositional properties. This is because a binding property is supposed to be one that in some deep sense underlies and is responsible for the object’s dispositional properties, and hence cannot be a property that the object’s dispositional properties are themselves responsible for. Moreover, I take it that the binding property has to exist at the time the disposition exists, since otherwise it cannot bind the disposition to the object in question. But then that rules out the manifestation of a disposition serving as a binding property, since objects can have their dispositional properties long before those properties manifest

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themselves. In fact, objects can possess their dispositional properties without those dispositional properties ever manifesting themselves.

5. Non-Essential Talk of the core of an object might seem to suggest that an object’s intrinsic properties are essential to the object. However, there is good reason to think that an object’s intrinsic properties are not an object’s essential properties. For it seems clear that an object’s intrinsic properties can change without the object ceasing to be, and in which case intrinsic properties are not those needed for an object’s numeric or continuing identity (on this point, see Dunn 1990; Francescotti 2014). Consider a physical object, such as a rock or a vase. Underlying its dispositional properties is an atomic or microphysical structure that can undergo some degree of change without the vase ceasing to be. Similarly, there is good reason to think people can undergo change with respect to their intrinsic properties—can change with respect to the way they are as they are in and of themselves—without ceasing to exist, a point to which I return later in the chapter. We can then say: For any given property, that property is a viable candidate for being an intrinsic property of an object only if its possession is not necessary for the (continued) existence of the bearer of the property.

Note that claiming an object’s intrinsic properties are not essential to the object is consistent with holding that the intrinsic property kind might be essential to the object. For instance, even if a vase’s atomic or molecular structure can change without the vase ceasing to exist, it is an open question as to whether a vase could survive a situation in which its atomic or molecular structure was replaced by an altogether different, non-­ atomic or non-physical structure. I don’t have a clear idea on whether anything can survive such a change, but even if nothing can survive such a change this entails only that a certain relational property is essential to an object, namely, the property of having intrinsic properties of a certain

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kind. It doesn’t entail that the intrinsic properties of the object are themselves essential to the object and its ongoing existence. * * * Any viable candidate for an object’s intrinsic nature must satisfy each of the five criteria described above. A vase’s intrinsic nature comprises the atomic structure of the vase because, first, it satisfies the Non-Relational criterion. The atomic structure of a vase does not relate the vase to anything external to the vase. Second, the atomic structure of a vase satisfies the Constitutive criterion because the atomic structure constitutes the core of the vase and accounts for our sense of deep change when the atomic structure changes. The atomic structure satisfies, third, the Categorical criterion, because it is the atomic structure that grounds an important subset of the vase’s relational properties, namely its dispositional properties. For instance, a vase is hard, brittle, and smooth to touch in virtue of its unique molecular constitution. Fourth, the microphysical structure of a glass promises to satisfy the Binding criterion, because it is that property of the vase which grounds all the dispositional properties of the vase and by so doing ties those properties to one and the same object, one and the same vase. Finally, a vase’s atomic structure satisfies the Non-­ Essentiality criterion because a vase can undergo a change to its microphysical structure or properties without ceasing to exist or to be. A number of observations are in order. First, plausibly each of the first four criteria for something counting as an intrinsic property are logically connected. That is to say, each of the first four criteria are logically entailed by the other criteria. For instance, if a property is a non-relational property of an object then plausibly it must be a property that grounds or realizes the relational properties of the object (or at least an important subset of these properties). Moreover, if a property is a non-relational (hence, categorical) property, then plausibly it is a property that ties an important subset of the  relational or non-categorical properties to the object. It is plausible also to suppose that if a property is non-relational then it is a property that characterizes what an object is like when considered apart from the various relations in which the object stands or

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partakes. The only criterion for an intrinsic property that doesn’t seem to be entailed logically by the other criteria is the Non-Essential criterion. Although intrinsic properties are not essential properties of an object, it is also the case that non-intrinsic properties can fail to be essential properties of an object. For instance, an object can change with respect to its spatial location without ceasing to exist. All of which points to the following idea. Although it is necessary for a property to count as intrinsic that it satisfies the Non-Essential criterion, it is necessary and sufficient for a property to count as intrinsic that in addition to satisfying the Non-Essential criterion it satisfies any one of the remaining criteria (since satisfaction of any of the four remaining criteria entails satisfaction of each and every one of those criteria). Second, and relatedly, the Constitutive criterion arguably explains the Categorical criterion (for arguably it follows from the idea that intrinsic properties characterize the core of an object, that those same properties underlie the dispositional properties of the object), the Non-Relational criterion (for if intrinsic properties characterize objects in and of themselves, then it follows that intrinsic properties cannot be properties that relate the object to anything external to the object), and the Binding criterion (for arguably it follows from the fact that an object’s intrinsic properties make up the core of an object, that those properties must be the ones that bind all the other properties to the object and by so doing give rise to one composite object). For this reason, I take the Constitutive criterion to be the most fundamental one. Nevertheless, there is value in treating each of the four criteria in question as separate, since each criterion provides a different way of considering whether something is a viable candidate for being an intrinsic property. Third, the five conditions outlined do not accord with the way everyone thinks about intrinsic properties. Consider, for instance, the view advanced by Jaegwon Kim that an intrinsic property is one that is compatible with the loneliness or independence of the object (Kim 1982), a view that James Van Cleve also attributes to Immanuel Kant (Van Cleve 2016, 111). On this view of intrinsicality, a dispositional property would count as intrinsic because an object can be disposed to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain even if it is the only object that

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exists. Therefore, dispositional properties satisfy a ‘compatible with loneliness’ criterion, and for that reason count as intrinsic. I reject the compatible with loneliness criterion and for that reason I reject the justification given for thinking dispositions are intrinsic. My reason for rejecting the criterion in question is that I think the criterion is incompatible with the Non-Relational criterion. That is to say, I think something can bear relational properties even if it is the only thing that exists (on this point, see also Van Cleve 2016). For instance, as I have argued already dispositions are relational because they are properties whose nature or essence relates their bearers to the actual or possible manifestations of the dispositions in question, and this is so even in a world where the bearers of the dispositions are the only objects to exist.5 And again I believe the Non-Relational criterion has to be accepted, because it is a consequence of the view that intrinsic properties characterize objects in and of themselves, that is, when considered apart from the relations they bear to other things.6 But in which case an intrinsic property cannot be characterized as a property that is compatible with an object’s loneliness, for even lonely objects can have relational or non-­ intrinsic properties.

The Core Self I have been concerned to spell out the idea of an intrinsic nature and what criteria need to be satisfied for something to count as a viable candidate for being an intrinsic property of something. In the process of spelling these issues out, reference was often made to everyday physical  For similar reasons I disagree with Langton and Lewis’s definition of intrinsic property, according to which an intrinsic property is one that an object can possess independent of whether it is lonely or accompanied (Langton and Lewis 1998). An object bearing dispositional properties is independent of the object being lonely or accompanied (thus, an object can possess dispositional properties regardless of whether it is accompanied or lonely), but again such properties are not intrinsic properties. 6  One might query whether dispositions (or causal powers more generally) are relational only as they are represented by us (see e.g. Langton 2006). I think the way dispositions are to be defined rules that idea out. That it is of the nature of a disposition to relate an object to something external to the object is a fact about what dispositions are, and not merely a fact about how we think about dispositions. 5

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objects, such as vases. Plausibly, physical objects in general have intrinsic natures that comprise their unique physical or atomic structures. To be sure, the microphysical structures that make up the core of different physical substances will differ, as will therefore the dispositional properties these physical structures realize. For instance, a vase has a different molecular structure from a rock or hammer, and this difference explains why vases but not rocks and hammers are fragile. Different molecular structures realize different dispositional profiles, then. Nevertheless, all physical entities share something in common, namely their intrinsic natures are physical natures. But the idea that everything has an intrinsic nature that is a physical one is not entailed by the mere fact of something possessing an intrinsic nature. There is nothing to the idea of an intrinsic nature as such that rules out the idea that some entities might possess intrinsic natures or properties that are not to be characterized in the way we think about and characterize the intrinsic nature of physical objects. And I think when we consider people or human beings, we will come to see that their intrinsic natures are not physical natures. Indeed, the idea that our intrinsic properties are not physical ones was advanced in Chap. 4, where I argued that the search for those properties underlying how we are disposed to behave is a search for some sort of psychological property of ours. For when we ask why we are disposed to act and think in the ways that we do (such as travelling to work, helping those in need of assistance, committing war against one another, and making certain inferences in thought), we invariably seem to be after a psychological explanation of some kind—where in Chap. 4 I argued this is most plausibly to be spelt out in terms of the emotions that we undergo. In what remains of this chapter, I want to spell out this idea further.

 hat Psychological Properties Might be Suitable W Candidates for Our Intrinsic Natures? Let us, then, consider a number of psychological states or properties with view to seeing which might be suited to serve as intrinsic properties of ours. To begin with, what about a person’s beliefs and perceptual states?

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Now, undeniably such states satisfy the Non-Essential criterion, as people can undergo many changes to their beliefs and sensory states without ceasing to exist. But, as explained already in this chapter, satisfying the Non-Essential criterion is not sufficient for something to be an intrinsic property. To be an intrinsic property something needs to satisfy the remaining four criteria as well. And good reasons exist to think that representational mental states satisfy none of those four remaining criteria. First, they fail to satisfy the Non-Relational criterion, since such states are relational by their very nature, that is to say, mental states that by their very nature relate the bearer of those states to other things in the world. For instance, my belief that Paris is the capital of France relates me to Paris and France, and my perceptual experience of a dog in front of me relates me to a dog I am perceiving in front of me. As such beliefs and perceptual experiences cannot characterize what I am like when considered apart from the cognitive and perceptual relations in which I partake. Second, such states fail to satisfy the Constitutive criterion. For instance, they fail to satisfy the test of deep change. My beliefs can undergo a radical change without my undergoing any kind of deep change in myself. Indeed, I have many different beliefs today from yesterday (including beliefs about the events of today) but need not have undergone any kind of deep change in myself since yesterday. Of course, something about me has changed (for my beliefs have changed), but the properties in question seem to be quite superficial properties of mine, ones that belong to my outer-layer and not my inner core, so-to-speak. Third, such states seem to fail to satisfy the Categorical criterion. Beliefs and perceptual states do not ground or realize my behavioral dispositions because as I argued in Chap. 4 representational mental states are better thought of as being stimulus conditions for the manifestations of our dispositions to behavior, and hence unqualified to serve as categorical bases for how we are disposed to behave. Fourth, it follows from the discussion so far that beliefs and perceptual states fail to satisfy the Binding criterion, the reason being that such states cannot bind a person’s dispositional properties to a person if such states are themselves relational by nature. Moreover, beliefs states are the causal outputs of certain dispositions of ours—namely, our cognitive dispositions—and that disqualifies belief states from serving as those things that

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tie the dispositional properties in question to us as the bearers of these properties. What about our behavioral dispositions, including our desires and character traits? Are they suited to serve as intrinsic properties of ours? Often when we consider what a person is like we do have in mind dispositional properties or traits of character. Included on such a list are what we might call dispositions to overt physical doings, such as the disposition to act truthfully (honesty) or the disposition to overcome one’s fear when facing adversity (courageousness). Thus we might say that someone is an honest or a courageous person, that they possess a disposition to behave in courageous or honest ways. Also included on such a list are intellectual dispositions, such as open-mindedness, close-mindedness, gullibility, and attentiveness. For, strictly speaking intellectual dispositions are also behavioral dispositions, albeit dispositions directed at mental doings. For instance, open-mindedness involves a willingness or disposition to listen to and consider views different from one’s own, and the gullible person is the person who is disposed or willing to believe what anyone might tell them, even when they should know better. But although a person’s intellectual and practical dispositions are important to understanding what a person is like when such dispositions are thrown into the mix, so to speak, they are not important when we consider what a person is like in and of themselves, that is, when considered apart from their various dispositions to thought and behavior. That someone is honest or courageous or gullible or open-minded, for instance, tells us something about the character of the person—thus we might say that such and such is an honest, courageous, gullible, or open-minded sort of person. But since honesty, courageousness, gullibility, and open-­ mindedness, are dispositional properties, these features of people cannot be part of their intrinsic natures, which comprise those properties that explain and realize people’s dispositions to thought and action. More specifically dispositions to thought and action fail to satisfy four of the five criteria for something to count as an intrinsic property. Undeniably, such states satisfy the Non-Essential criterion, as people can undergo many changes to how they are disposed to think and act without thereby ceasing to exist. But, again, satisfying the Non-Essential criterion is not sufficient for something counting as an intrinsic property, for to be

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an intrinsic property something needs to satisfy the remaining four criteria as well. And good reasons exist to think that dispositions to thought and action satisfy none of the four remaining criteria. To begin with, dispositional states obviously fail to satisfy the Categorical criterion, since something counts as an intrinsic property only if it underlies and explains a person’s dispositional properties. But we have seen already in Chap. 4 that dispositions cannot be their own bases, nor the bases for other dispositions. The search for the categorical basis is a search for something that must be distinct from a person’s dispositions. Second, dispositions to thought and action fail the Non-Relational criterion, the reason being that such states relate us to possible states of affairs. For instance, my disposition to tell the truth relates me to a possible state of affairs in which I tell the truth, and my disposition to reason in certain ways relates me to a state of affairs in which I reason in a certain way. As such, dispositions to thought and behavior cannot be potential candidates for those properties that characterize what I am like when considered apart from the relations I bear to these possible states of affairs. Third, dispositions to thought and behavior fail the Constitutive criterion. For instance, they fail the test of deep change, the reason being that a person can undergo changes to the way they are disposed to think or act without undergoing a deep change, a change to their inner core, so to speak. This isn’t to deny that often change to a person’s behavioral and intellectual dispositions signify deep change, since such a change might be due to a change in those intrinsic properties that realize or ground people’s dispositions to thought and behavior. For instance, a person might cease being closed-minded in virtue of undergoing some deep change in themselves, brought on perhaps by a significant life event or experience. But even then the change seems to be symptom of the deep change in question and not constitutive of that change. Moreover, changes in people’s dispositions need not always signify deep change. Changes to how a person is disposed to think or behave may be due to something other than a change to those properties that are intrinsic to a person. The point is nicely illustrated by the testimonies of family members and care givers of people with dementia, who sometimes comment on how the people they are caring for remain much the same

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at core, despite undergoing quite dramatic changes in how they are disposed to think and/or behave.7 And, finally, dispositions to thought and behavior fail the Binding criterion. According to that criterion our intrinsic properties are those properties of ours that tie or bind our dispositional properties to us by way of underlying and realizing those properties. But for a property to discharge such a role, it must be distinct from the dispositional properties that it binds to us, including our dispositions to thought and behavior.

Our Emotional Cores The case for emotion being the property that make up our intrinsic natures might seem quite straightforward, especially in light of the arguments given in earlier chapters. To begin with, emotions satisfy the Non-­ Relational criterion, since as I argued at length in Chap. 3 emotions are feeling states that put us in no kind of relation—dispositional, intentional or otherwise—to any other thing. Again, the main argument for that view of emotion is phenomenological, namely the idea that emotions present themselves to us as being mental states that do not relate us to anything separate from ourselves. For instance, in feeling angry I am aware of undergoing only an agitated or incensed sensation that relates me to nothing in the outside world. In short, then, it is not of the nature of emotion to relate us to things distinct from ourselves, in the way it is of the nature of desire and thought to relate us to things that are distinct from ourselves. Second, emotions satisfy the Categorical criterion for counting as an intrinsic property. This was argued at length in Chap. 4 with regard to people’s dispositions to thought and behavior. There I argued that  See, for instance, the views expressed by some dementia carers who were interviewed by Julian Baggini (2011). Of one carer named Jill, Baggini writes: “Dementia took the lid of darker aspects of her mother’s personality. The balance was shifted within her existing personality; she did not acquire a completely new one. The evil looks and snide remarks were simply no longer repressed. Although her memory went along with her ability to recognise her daughter, in Jill’s view she was very much ‘still there’. Jill had no sense of a reduction or diminution of the self ” (2011, 53–54). The view that dementia need not change people is one often held by people with dementia also (see e.g. MacRae 2010; Caddell and Clare 2012). 7

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emotions were the only viable candidates for serving as the categorical bases for people’s desires conceived as behavioral dispositions. In other words, it is in virtue of undergoing certain emotions that we come to possess those properties whose nature or essence is to cause us to behave in certain ways when certain circumstances obtain. Again, this point seems true of intellectual dispositions as well. Why is the closed-minded person disposed to ignore or suppress views different from their own? Plausibly, certain emotions underlie the disposition in question, for instance, discomfort at having a person’s own views challenged. Third, emotion satisfies the Constitutive criterion, the reason being that on this view emotions collectively constitute the core or being of a person, or what we might refer to as a person’s core self. Of course, this follows if emotions satisfy the other criteria for being an intrinsic property. But it is made plausible also by the fact that emotions seem to pass the test of deep change for something to count as an intrinsic or constitutive property of a person. In particular, note that people seem to undergo a deep change in themselves whenever there is a change in how they respond emotionally to the world and its objects. A person who one day responds with distress to other people’s suffering but who the next day responds with indifference or joy, is someone who has undergone a deep change in themselves. The emotions that make up that person’s core on the one day are very different from the emotions that make up that person’s core on the other day. Indeed, a number of examples from fictional and non-fictional literature make very persuasive the idea that emotional changes comprise deep changes. To begin with, consider the non-fictional case of Phineas Gage who suffered brain damage when an iron rod penetrated his skull while working on a railroad in the US during the 1840s. The change the injury caused in Gage was dramatic. His doctor at the time commented that Gage’s “equilibrium, or balance, so to speak, between his intellectual faculties and animal propensities seems to have been destroyed. He is fitful, irreverent, indulging in the grossest profanity (which was not previously his custom), manifesting but little deference for his fellows, impatient of restraint or advice when it conflicts with his desires” (Harlow 1868). And although many of the changes being described here are behavioral in nature, there is little doubt that underlying these changes is a change

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in emotion (compare Damasio 1994; Blackburn 1998).8 Gage’s lack of ‘deference’ for his fellows, failure to respect social norms and conventions, and failure to follow through ‘plans of future operations’ speak strongly of someone whose emotional life had changed substantially, deteriorated even. Whereas previous to his accident other people, social conventions, and plans for the future elicited strong emotion in Gage, after his accident these things no longer elicited such strong emotions in Gage. And it is this shift in Gage’s emotional structure, to his emotional responses to the world, which describes the deep changes that we detect taking place in Gage. The change in Gage is striking but one for which Gage is innocent. An equally striking but less innocent change is that which occurs to Dorian Gray in Oscar Wilde’s A Picture of Dorian Gray. For in Gray we sense someone who allows himself to become corrupted and therefore the changes he undergoes are of his own doing, ones for which he is not blameless. But the changes are still emotional changes, as reflected by the changes that Gage observes taking place in his portrait. As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in the locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it had been? Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel every sign of evil passion from the face. (Wilde 1986, 251)

The portrait represents the deep changes that Gray undergoes and the changes are emotional by nature. The ‘touch of cruelty in the mouth’ described early on in the novel (p. 107) represents an acquired coldness of heart (as displayed when viewing Sibyl Vane ‘lying at his feet sobbing like a child’ (p.  109), for instance). And the ‘vanity’, ‘curiosity’ and ‘hypocrisy’ (p. 252) written on the portrait’s face and described later in the novel represent and manifest the self-love or pride we see emerging and playing out in Gray (along with allied emotions such as the pleasure  As Simon Blackburn writes of Gage and similar cases: “The reason for the inability to function normally…seems to be that these patients have lost any normal association between representing aspects of the situation, and the stable onset of the affect or emotion. Scenes which would excite positive or negative emotions in normal people may leave such patients entirely cold. They do not become excited at the prospect of gain, or fearful at the prospect of loss. In these emotional lives, everything has either disappeared, or at least become unstable.” (1998, 126) 8

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had from viewing what is base) and which crystallizes in his decision to ‘spare’ Hetty Merton (p. 238). The portrait so disturbs Gage because it presents vividly to him how his inner being or core has changed and the monster that he has become. Observe also how regarding emotion as making up our cores explains why people with dementia need not undergo a deep change in themselves despite undergoing changes to their ways of thinking and behaving. What are family members responding to when they say their loved ones have not changed deep down? I think they are responding to those emotions that make their loved ones recognizable to them on some deep level, such as their loved ones’ distress when seeing people upset, or pleasure when seeing family and friends. Fourth, emotions satisfy the Binding criterion, as it is plausible to suppose that the emotions we feel are those properties of ours which bind our behavioral dispositions to us. For if a person’s dispositions to thought and behavior are realized by or grounded in a person’s emotions, then it is plausible to suppose that it is a person’s emotions that anchor those dispositions to the person and in virtue of which those dispositions belong to and characterize one and the same person, one and the same self. Thus, I might form multiple dispositions to thought and physical action. But what is it that binds these behavioral dispositions to me and makes these dispositional properties mine? Plausibly, what binds these dispositional properties to me is some fundamental ‘binding property’— plausibly, the emotions I feel when encountering the world and its objects—a property which grounds or realizes my multiple dispositions to thought and behavior. And finally it is worth remarking that emotions satisfy the Non-­ Essential criterion, as people can undergo changes to emotion without ceasing to exist or to be. Dorian Gray’s change is undoubtedly an emotional change, but we have no sense of Dorian ceasing to exist and being replaced by someone else. Of course, it would still be an open question as to whether a person could survive their emotions being replaced by properties of an altogether different non-emotional kind. Again, I don’t have a clear idea on whether a person can survive such a change, but even if no person can survive such a change this entails only that a certain relational

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property (namely, the property of having an intrinsic nature of a certain kind, namely, an emotional kind) is an essential property of a person.

Concluding Remarks Good reasons exist to think emotions make up our intrinsic properties, those properties that characterize what we are like when considered apart from how we are disposed to think and behave. Again, to be clear this is not to say that our behavioral and cognitive dispositions are not important to understanding ourselves or the beings that we are. If a bundle theory of the self is correct each of us may comprise our intrinsic and non-intrinsic or dispositional properties. But it is to say that only emotion characterizes our cores, and which in one respect delivers us a picture of the self that reflects what we most fundamentally are. As Antonio Damasio explains in the passage I quoted at the beginning of the chapter, we are not first and foremost thinking machines but rather feeling machines that think (Damasio 1994, 16). I want to finish by sketching out a couple of reasons why this picture of the self matters. First, we might find it to be a cheering picture of the self. If emotions lie at our core, then people can suffer certain cognitive or non-emotional misadventures or injuries, such as those that accompany or characterize Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementias, while surviving in large measure with respect to that part of them that seems most distinctive and fundamental to them. I believe this is something we might take some solace in when thinking about our own futures and the futures, sometimes present realities, of those who we care about. Second, this picture of the self promises to have implications for how we think about moral responsibility. If emotion lies at the core of self and is that property that underlies and binds to us those behavioral dispositions of ours that issue in action, then plausibly the responsibility we bear for our behavioral dispositions and actions has its source in emotion. Now, of course, much more will need to be said to make this idea an entirely plausible one. And, in particular, some consideration will need to be given to the questions of what it is for a person to lack responsibility for their behavioral dispositions and subsequent behaviors. Relevant to

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answering that question, I think, might be what Susan Wolf refers to as a ‘condition of sanity’, according to which we are responsible for our desires and other attitudes only if they have their source in a self that is sane (Wolf 1987). Now, for Wolf sanity is a matter of having desires and beliefs that are ‘controlled by processes that afford an accurate conception of the world’ (1987, 369). But what if by calling a person’s self ‘sane’ we are implying some positive fact about that person’s emotions, that, for instance, their emotions are the kinds of emotions that a sufficiently good emotion feeler would undergo, or the kinds of emotions that would likely afford an accurate conception of the normative or empirical features of the world? On this view, we might say that people lack responsibility for their desires and values and subsequent behaviors if their emotional cores are so disturbed that substantial contact with empirical and moral reality is lost as a result (I say more about how disturbances in emotion might negatively affect thought and behavior in the next chapter). The idea needs to be spelt out further, but it seems to me we might have here the seeds of an argument for assigning a key role to emotion in our ascriptions of moral responsibility.

References Adams, R. (2007). Idealism Vindicated. In P. V. Inwagen & D. Zimmerman (Eds.), Persons: Human and Divine (pp.  35–54). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Baggini, J. (2011). The Ego Trick. What Does it Mean to be You? London: Granta Publications. Blackburn, S. (1998). Ruling Passions. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Caddell, L., & Clare, L. (2012). Identity, Mood, and Quality of Life in People with Early-Stage Dementia. International Psychogeriatrics, 24, 1306–1315. Chalmers, D. (2016). Panpsychism and Panprotopsychism. In G. Bruntrup & L. Jaskolla (Eds.), Pansychism: Contemporary Perspectives (pp. 19–47). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Damasio, A. (1994). Descartes’ Error. New York: Quill. Dunn, M. (1990). Relevant Predication 2: Intrinsic Properties and Internal Relations. Philosophical Studies, 60, 177–206.

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Francescotti, R. (2014). Editor’s Introduction. In R.  Francescotti (Ed.), Companion to Intrinsic Properties (pp. 1–16). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. Goff, P. (2017). Consciousness and Fundamental Reality. New  York: Oxford University Press. Harlow, J. (1868). Recovery from the Passage of an Iron Bar Through the Head. Publications of the Massachusetts Medical Society, 2, 320–347. Kim, J. (1982). Psychophysical Supervenience. Philosophical Studies, 41, 51–70. Kistler, M. (2011). Powerful Properties and the Causal Basis of Dispositions. In A. Bird, B. Ellis, & H. Sankey (Eds.), Properties, Powers and Structures. Issues in the Metaphysics of Realism (pp. 119–137). London: Routledge. Langton, R. (2006). Kant’s Phenomena: Extrinsic or Relational Properties? A Reply to Allais. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 73, 170–185. Langton, R., & Lewis, D. (1998). Defining ‘Intrinsic’. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 58, 333–345. MacRae, H. (2010). Managing Identity While Living with Alzheimer’s Disease. Qualitative Health Research, 20, 293–305. Russell, B. (1948). Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits. London: Routledge. Seager, W. (1995). Consciousness, Information, and Panpsychism. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 2, 272–288. Seager, W. (2006). The Intrinsic Nature Argument for Panpsychsim. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 13, 129–145. Sprigge, T. (1999). Panpsychism. In The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. London: Routledge. Strawson, G. (1994). Mental Reality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Strawson, G. (2003). Real Materialism. In L. Antony & N. Hornstein (Eds.), Chomsky and His Critics (pp. 49–88). Oxford: Blackwell. Strawson, G. (2006). Realistic Materialism: Why Physicalism Entails Panpsychism. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 13, 3–31. Van Cleve, J. (2016). Problems from Reid. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wilde, O. (1986). A Picture of Dorian Gray. London: Marshall Cavendish. Wolf, S. (1987). Sanity and the Metaphysics of Responsibility. In F. Schoeman (Ed.), Responsibility, Character, and the Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

8 Emotion and the Fractured Self

Madness is the extreme of tragic passion. Oedipus’s curse against his sons is uttered in pain and anger with ‘a raving heart.’ Antigone’s phrén ‘is mad with grieving’ at her brothers’ deaths. Clytemnestra is suspected of being ‘mad with pleasure’ to hear of Orestes’ death. Hippolytus’s horses are mad with fear; Medea went off with Jason mad with love, ‘with a raving heart.’ In Greek tragedy, as in other eras of tragedy, ‘the possibility of madness is … implicit in the very phenomenon of passion.’ —Ruth Padel (1995, 164) Again, that Madnesse is nothing else, but too much appearing Passion, may be gathered out of the effects of Wine, which are the same with those of the evill disposition of the organs. For the variety of behavior in men that have drunk too much, is the same with that of Mad-men: some of them Raging, others Loving, others Laughing, all extravagantly, but according to their severall domineering Passions. —Thomas Hobbes, in Macpherson, ed. (1968, 141–142)

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Introduction Thomas Hobbes tells us that madness is ‘too much appearing passion’ (Hobbes, in Macpherson, ed. 1968, 141). But as the passage from Ruth Padel illustrates, the thought that madness relates to disordered emotion—again typically excessive emotion—is assumed (though not necessarily expressly stated) in philosophical and non-philosophical works long before Hobbes, especially by the ancient Greeks (see Padel 1995). Emotion or passion—often demonised or personified, and often violent—is central to Greek images of madness, as is demonstrated by Greek language, tragedy, thought, and practice. For example, ‘lyssa’, the Greek for madness, is associated with wolfish rage (‘lyssa’ can also mean rabies: see Padel 1992, 125, 163). It is lyssa that acts through Heracles, that makes him snort and bellow ‘like a bull about to charge’ (Padel 1992, 151). ‘Melancholiao’—‘I fill with black bile’— means either ‘I am passionate’ or ‘I am mad’, and signifies black furry (Padel 1992, 24). And ‘oistros’ is mating (or erotic) madness (Padel 1992, 120). Phaedra is said to have been stung by the mad oistroi of Eros (Padel 1992, 121). A similar picture of madness is found in certain Greek practices, for example, in Dionysian worship, which involved its participants, maenads (mad women), working themselves up into a (sometimes violent) frenzy (see Padel 1981, 106; Dodds 1951, 270–282). Moreover, in philosophy we find in Plato’s Republic the picture of the mad man as someone who has been ‘purged of all moderation’ and has become ‘drunken, erotic, and melancholic’ (Plato, in Bloom, trans. 1968, 573b–c, 253). Given such rich and appealing images of madness we might expect philosophers who are interested in understanding madness to look to emotion for insights. For it would be quite easy to show, I think, that maladaptive or distressing emotions are essential to our understanding of a whole spectrum of disorders normally associated with madness or poor mental health: for example, bipolar disorder (elation, happiness, depression, despair, worthlessness), anxiety and phobic disorders (anxiety, fear), paranoid disorders (mistrust, hostility, fear), sexual disorders (lust or sexual interest), and antisocial personality disorder (indifference,

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callousness). And even in the case of schizophrenia, often claimed to be the most cognitive of the psychoses, emotional disturbance is generally recognised to be one of the criteria for a correct diagnosis of schizophrenia. In fact, it might even be suggested that underlying (and I would, therefore, argue essentially characterizing) schizophrenia is some emotional disturbance, say, a disturbance in emotional states associated with ‘endogenous’ feelings of significance or conviction, hence the highly unusual nature of the schizophrenic’s beliefs about the world (on this point, see Oepen et al. 1988; Maher 1999; Sass 1992). In this chapter, then, I want to begin by outlining some of the ways that emotion might be involved in poor mental health. Indeed, I think it can be argued that very many mental health conditions and/or the clusters of symptoms associated with those conditions, have an emotional source in ways to be explained. However, my concern will not solely be that of showing how emotion might be implicated in poor mental health. For I also want to say something about the treatment implications that might follow in cases where a mental health condition has its source in emotion. And in particular I want to examine the extent to which cognitive therapists are justified in thinking that problematic emotions are triggered by maladaptive thoughts. Although I consider the usefulness of a form of therapy to be an empirical, not philosophical matter, I explain why we should reject the cognitive model of emotional disorder that underpins the cognitive approach to treating disorders of emotion, and why this likely has implications for issues relevant to treatment.

Emotion and Poor Mental Health How, then, might emotion be involved in poor mental health? Sometimes the link between emotion and a given mental health condition seems straightforward. This is particularly the case for conditions such as anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorder (once more commonly known as manic-depression), which—as their very names suggest—are largely describable in terms of their affective elements. Anxiety and depression are so-called only because they are associated with certain negative emotions.

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However, there is also good reason for holding that other mental health conditions, including conduct and impulse control disorders and conditions associated with aberrant thought processes, have their basis in emotion. To begin with, consider those psychiatric disorders that feature impulsivity, including addictions, obsessive-compulsive disorders, substance disorders, and personality disorders. Common to all such disorders seems to be the presence of desires or impulses to behave in maladaptive ways. For instance, someone with a gambling addition continually feels a need to gamble, and someone who has obsessive-­ compulsive disorder is continually plagued by strong impulses to do such things as wash their hands. But in which case, common to all these disorders are behavioral dispositions, namely behavioral dispositions associated with the desires or impulses in question. And from which it follows that if the claims made elsewhere in this book are correct, then such behavioral dispositions—and hence the mental health conditions those dispositions help to characterize—are grounded in or realized by emotions. For instance, we might hypothesize that anxiety is what often underlies and realizes a person’s disposition to wash their hands continually, and excitement or anticipatory pleasure is what often realizes a desire or impulse to gamble. And there is another way that emotion might be implicated in disorders featuring impulsivity. A number of these disorders involve not only impulses to behave in certain ways but also what we might call failure of inhibitory control. Take anti-social personality disorder or what is more informally known as psychopathy. This disorder is characterized by a number of traits that involve behavioral dispositions that are realized by certain emotions. For instance, psychopaths tend to have dispositions to behave anti-socially, dispositions plausibly realized by emotions such as pleasure or excitement. But what is also striking about psychopaths is that they lack inhibitory control, that thing that holds most people back from acting on their anti-social desires or impulses. Psychopaths tend to act on their desires regardless of the harm this causes themselves or others. Now, it is  reasonable  to surmise that inhibitory control comprises behavioral dispositions, namely, dispositions to refrain from acting in certain ways. So we might say that psychopaths tend not to be disposed to hold back from acting out their more harmful or anti-social desires or

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behavioral dispositions. Where, then, does emotion fit into the picture? Emotion fits into the picture because if to have inhibitory control is to be disposed to refrain from behaving in certain ways, then emotions must be those things that realize the behavioral dispositions involved in inhibitory control. And from which it follows that where inhibitory control is missing, then also missing will be the emotions that realize the behavioral dispositions associated with inhibitory control. Psychopaths’ lack of inhibitory control—a feature of psychopaths that looks to be largely responsible for their behaving impulsively—has its basis in certain emotional deficits. This plausibly ties up with the fact that psychopaths lack the capacity to feel emotions such as anxiety, fear, and guilt, or, at least, they experience these emotions to a much lesser degree than most non-psychopaths. Behaviors that would cause most people anxiety or fear or guilt fail to affect psychopaths in the same way. Of course, the absence of such emotions has long been known to have a role in explaining psychopaths’ anti-­ social behaviors. Moreover a number of writers have sought to link psychopaths’ failure of inhibitory control with deficits in emotion. Robert Hare, for instance writes: “Psychopaths have little aptitude for experiencing the emotional responses—fear and anxiety—that are the main springs of conscience” (1993, 76). What I am pointing out is how this link between emotion and inhibitory control (or what Hare refers to as ‘conscience’) can be explained or made sense of in light of the claims and arguments advanced in this book. What we end up with is a picture of the psychopath whose practical stance towards the world is grounded in two types of emotion. The first is the emotion that confers on the psychopath a disposition to act in anti-­ social or harmful ways. The second is the reduced anxiety or fear, often bordering on indifference, that the psychopath undergoes when contemplating the action in question and which fails to realize a disposition that if present would cause the psychopath to refrain from acting out their anti-social or harmful dispositions. Now, plausibly, other mental health conditions that feature impulsivity involve difficulties in inhibitory control along with desires or impulses to perform certain (harmful) behaviors. I submit that where that is the case emotion will be involved in both ways just outlined. And note the point is likely to be important from a clinical perspective, because—and

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I return to the point later in the chapter—it suggests there may be two ways in which a condition featuring impulsivity might be treated, namely either by helping to eliminate an emotion that realizes a disposition to behave in a harmful way, or by helping cultivate an emotion that would realize a disposition that would inhibit someone acting out their more harmful or anti-social dispositions. What, then, are we say about distortions in thought, such as those describing delusions of grandeur or persecution, and which are commonly associated with conditions such as schizophrenia? How might emotions be involved in the formation of aberrant or unusual belief states? In what follows I remain largely neutral regarding the question of what makes a delusion a delusion, as to whether delusions are false beliefs or unjustified beliefs or beliefs that are resistant to counter-evidence, though I will assume that delusions are belief states or at least belief-like states (‘acceptances’, say: see Dub 2017). My interest is in the question of what might explain the beliefs that characterize different delusions. Why does the paranoid personality believe people want to harm them, or the person with schizophrenia believe they are the Emperor of Antarctica, for instance? Plausibly, many, perhaps all, delusions involve beliefs that are the causal outputs of certain reasoning biases, such as the so-called ‘jumping-­ to-­conclusion bias’, which involves the tendency to draw conclusions on the basis of limited evidence (see Garety and Freeman 1999; Garety et al. 2011). Notice that biases as just described seem to be cognitive dispositions. For instance, the jumping-to-conclusion bias can be identified with a mental state whose nature is to cause people to make certain inferences (come to believe certain things) on the basis of limited or insufficient evidence.1 The idea that such biases are causally responsible for  This might be illustrated with the following example by Peter Chadwick: “As the months went by, my mind was getting riskier and riskier in decision making style. [In time] I was actually walking past people listening almost masochistically for “comments at my expense”. Every “him” or “he” was now a hit… A woman in a main street took a long, very hard look at my face as she was walking towards me, ran ahead, with urgency, to catch up her partner and said loudly, “Hey”. I didn’t hear the rest of what she said but it must have been about me.” (2008; cited in Garety et al. 2011, 334). Plausibly, then, this person’s reasoning bias consisted in a mental state whose nature was to cause the person to believe that someone was talking about them in the event of receiving certain auditory stimuli (comments such as ‘he’ or ‘him’) and visual stimuli (such as long and very hard looks). 1

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delusional thinking is an appealing one. Even those of us who do not suffer from paranoia as a clinical condition are familiar with what it is like to form paranoid beliefs or ideations. Consider the example of our taking an evening walk on a country lane. We hear a noise in the hedgerow and find ourselves entertaining the idea that someone is about to attack us. We might not actually come to believe someone is about to attack us, but for a moment the possibility we are about to be attacked strikes us a very real one. That is to say, for a brief moment we are strongly disposed to form the belief that someone is about to attack us. According to the picture of delusion I am offering, people come to form the peculiar or atypical beliefs they do due to certain biases of thought that are cognitive dispositions. But cognitive dispositions, such as the disposition to draw conclusions on the basis of limited evidence, need categorical bases. That is, there has to be something that realizes the cognitive dispositions in question. And again if the claims advanced in this book are correct, then it will be emotion that realizes the cognitive dispositions or biases in question. And that this is the right way of thinking about the mechanisms sub-­ serving delusion formation is strongly supported by the following consideration. Delusions often have an intentional content that is circumscribed to one particular theme. Such delusions go by the name of monothematic delusions. For instance, persecutory delusions are about threats, delusions of grandiosity are about grandeur, and the Capgras delusion is about loved ones being replaced by impostors. I have suggested that delusions are the result of cognitive biases conceived of as cognitive dispositions. But why are the deluded individuals in question disposed to have delusions with these thematic contents? It is difficult to avoid the idea that in all such cases people are disposed to beliefs with these contents in virtue of undergoing certain emotions. For instance, the paranoid personality is disposed to think someone wants to harm them in virtue of the fear the other person inspires in them, and the Capgras sufferer is disposed to think a loved one has been replaced by an impostor in virtue of their loved one no longer triggering emotions such as those associated with warmth and familiarity. And even in the case of polythematic delusions and which are often associated with schizophrenia, good reason exists for thinking emotion

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must be involved in the formation of the beliefs in question. For instance, Coltheart and colleagues describe the case of the mathematician, John Nash, who suffered from schizophrenia and who exhibited a range of delusional beliefs such as the belief that “he would become Emperor of Antarctica, that he was the left foot of God on Earth, and that his name was really Johann von Nassau” (Coltheart et al. 2007). Now, it is difficult to see quite what leads someone to exhibit such an odd range of beliefs. However, schizophrenia is often accompanied by certain emotions that plausibly go a long way to explain the delusional beliefs in question. Indeed, this has been recognized by a number of theorists of delusions. Brendan Maher, for instance, argues that endogenous or unexplained ‘feelings of significance’ underlie many of the schizophrenic’s delusions (1999; see also Oepen et al. 1988). According to Maher certain experiences or thoughts reverberate a kind of ‘felt significance’, which leads to the formation of certain beliefs as a way of explaining or making sense of the experiences in question. And Louis Sass provides the following characterization of the schizophrenic experience, one which describes the emotional states that might help to explain the polythematic delusions often associated with schizophrenia: As in the case with epileptic seizures, schizophrenic breaks are often preceded by an aura. Klaus Conrad, a German-speaking psychiatrist, named this preliminary stage the Trema, a term of theatrical slang referring to the stage fright an actor feels before the performance begins. At these moments that patient will be suspicious and restless, often filled with anticipation or dread. Normal emotions like joy and sadness will be absent, the mood veering instead between anxiety and a kind of electric exaltation. Generally the person has a sense of having lost contact with things, or of everything having undergone some subtle, all-encompassing change. Reality seems to be unveiled as never before, and the visual world looks peculiar and eerie— weirdly beautiful, tantalizingly significant, or horrifying in some insidious but ineffable way. Fascinated by this vision, the patient often stares intently at the world… Usually the person becomes quiet and withdrawn, through an abrupt and seemingly senseless breach of decorum or discipline may also occur. This mood is sometimes followed by the development of delusions, especially

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the symptom called ‘delusional percept’—where a relatively normal perception is experienced as having a special kind of meaning, a meaning not obviously contained in the percept itself and with a special relevance for the perceiver. A good example is the schizophrenic who noticed that people in a train car were crossing their legs from time to time, and then suddenly concluded that they were all performing some kind of play for his benefit. (Sass 1992, 43–46)

Common to both Maher’s and Sass’s way of thinking about how schizophrenic delusions originate seems to be the thought that the person with schizophrenia is overcome with a powerful, possibly endogenous, emotional experience, one ‘veering…between anxiety and a kind of electric exaltation’, that infects the whole way that person thinks about the world. Now, if everything—every thought, every perception—resonates or triggers in someone an elation-anxiety complex, then that person is likely to be disposed to believe any thought or perception they might entertain. Such a pervasive and powerful emotional experience might come, then, to ground or realize strong dispositions to form beliefs with a variety of thematic contents. If merely entertaining the idea that I am the Emperor of Antarctica and the left foot of God on Earth fills me with some elation-anxiety complex, then I may well be disposed to believe I am the Emperor of Antarctica and the left foot of God on Earth. Emotions that run amok in a person’s entire cognitive architecture might easily, then, effect the pervasive cognitive distortions identifying polythematic delusions. The idea that emotions are involved in the formation of delusions is not a novel one (see, for instance, Ellis and Young 1990; Maher 1999; Dub 2017). Moreover, emotions such as anxiety have been hypothesized as plausible explanations for jumping-to-conclusion biases (Garety et al. 2011, 334). What I am advancing here is simply a proposal regarding how emotions might be implicated in delusion formation. If what I am saying is right, then emotions are implicated in the sense that they are what realize the cognitive biases or dispositions to reason in certain ways or to form certain beliefs. Emotions might not be the direct causes of delusion, but they are what realize or underlie the things that are the immediate causes of delusions.

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The story that I have given regarding how emotion is involved in delusion formation isn’t to rule out the idea that there may sometimes exist other factors that help explain the formation of delusions. For instance, anomalous experiences other than emotional experiences (for instance, anomalous perceptual experiences) may be involved in some delusions (e.g. Maher 1999). Consider, for example, the case of someone who comes to believe that people want to harm them on the basis of hearing voices that are persecutory or malevolent in nature. Also brain injury is likely to be involved in some cases of delusional formation. Therefore, the story that I am advancing does not rule out multi-­ factorial explanations of delusion formation, explanations that, for instance, might involve brain injury, anomalous perceptual experiences, cognitive biases, and emotion. Nevertheless, in all cases I do want to say that emotion will be involved in the formation of the delusions in question in something like the way I have described. For in all cases a person will have certain cognitive dispositions (certain reasoning biases or internalized rules of thought) that lead them to form the beliefs or judgments they do. For instance, the person who forms persecutory delusions on the basis of an anomalous perceptual experience, such as hearing a voice that is malevolent in nature, does so only because they are disposed to form persecutory delusions in the event of having such perceptual experiences. But this again will require an emotion—perhaps fear triggered by the hearing of a malevolent voice—to ground or realize the cognitive dispositions that cause the formation of the persecutory delusions in question.

Implications for Treatment and Therapy So far I have sought to show how emotions in their role as categorical bases might be involved in generating a variety of behavioral, volitional, and cognitive symptoms of poor mental health. In the remainder of this chapter, I want to address a different question. Supposing that emotions are often found to be at fault in cases of poor mental health, do the claims advanced in this chapter and elsewhere in the book have implications for the treatment of such emotions? Now, I don’t think anything I have said in this book will tell us much about whether existing

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forms of treatments are effective or not. The question of whether a treatment works is to be answered empirically and not on the basis of philosophical theory. Nevertheless, I do think the claims I advanced may be useful both for the purpose of gaining greater conceptual clarity regarding what needs to be treated in cases of emotional disorder and for the purpose of critiquing existing models of emotional disorder, and that this promises to have some important clinical implications.

 reating of Non-emotional Symptoms of Poor T Mental Health Let us assume that emotion is involved in the formation of cognitive and behavioral symptoms of ill mental health as just described. What might the implications be when thinking about treating such symptoms? Most obviously, it might be argued, will be the need to address the underlying disruptive emotions. And that looks right insofar as the objective is to modify the dispositions that are directly causing distress or problematic behaviors and beliefs. Thus, possibly the behavioral or cognitive dispositions in question are themselves a source of distress for the individual in question (consider, for instance, the distress suffered by someone who continually has an urge to wash their hands), or perhaps the behavioral or cognitive dispositions are so dominant, so powerful, that behavioral change will come about only if those behavioral or cognitive dispositions are modified by means of changing the emotions that are realizing those dispositions. However, one concern that might be voiced here relates to cases where the emotions realizing the harmful behavioral dispositions are resistant to change. Clearly this is a concern where it is felt that improvement in behavior will come about only if there is a change in the behavioral dispositions that directly cause the behavior. But suppose improvement in behavior doesn’t require modifying the dispositions that cause the behavior. This might be the case where it is possible to help someone develop new behavioral dispositions that would inhibit the person from acting on the dispositions that have been causing them to engage in harmful behavior. In Chap. 4 I argued that behavioral dispositions are mental states

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whose essence or nature is to cause people to behave in certain ways under certain conditions or when certain circumstances obtain. Plausibly, one of these conditions is that there are no stronger inhibiting dispositions present. With regard to the treatment context, then, it might not always be possible for a person to get rid of their desires or dispositions to engage in dysfunctional or harmful behavior. But it might be possible for those dispositions to become less dysfunctional or harmful if that person acquires effective inhibitory control, thereby ensuring that one of the conditions for the manifestation of the originally harmful dispositions fails to be met. Of course, helping a person to form inhibiting dispositions will require helping that person acquire emotions that realize those dispositions, and this might not be a straightforward matter either. I think this is likely to be a serious problem in relation to the treatment of psychopaths, for instance, whose emotional deficits seem deep and largely permanent. However, I’m not sure we can rule out the possibility that helping someone develop inhibitory control might on occasion be an easier task than helping them lose their existing more entrenched dispositions. For instance, although encouraging psychopaths to think about the harmful consequences of their actions might have little effect in inducing emotions that would realize better inhibitory control, the same might not be true for other people who suffer from conditions featuring impulsivity. Indeed, therapy and education often seem to proceed by way of helping people to think through the consequences of their actions with view to inducing emotions that will lead to more effective inhibitory control. Similar claims might be made with regard to those who are prone to having atypical or aberrant beliefs. Again, if certain cognitive dispositions to atypical belief formation are grounded in emotion, then insofar as the cognitive dispositions are themselves the things that need changing (say because they are a source of distress, or are so powerful that cognitive change will come about only if the underlying dispositions are weakened), then treatment will have to change the emotions realizing these dispositions. However, there may be times when a person can be helped to develop less troublesome beliefs by being helped to acquire new cognitive dispositions that have the power to inhibit the existing ones. Consider the evening walk example. What is it that prevents us from coming to

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fully endorse the paranoid ideations that plague us when hearing a noise in the hedgerow? We are disposed to believe someone is about to attack us, and yet something prevents us from believing we about to be attacked, at least until corroborating evidence of an attack is presented to us. Something kicks in to stop us developing an outright paranoiac belief. Something holds us back from forming such a belief. I submit the thing holding us back is some stronger opposing cognitive disposition, a kind of cognitive resistance to forming a belief without further evidence. Think about how this disposition might express itself in private instructions, such as ‘Get a grip!’ or ‘Hold yourself together!’. If this is right, then it suggests that in the case of delusion formation, therapy might sometimes best proceed by way of helping an individual develop cognitive dispositions that inhibit the manifestation of their existing cognitive dispositions, rather than by way of helping the individual amend or eliminate their existing cognitive dispositions. It might even be hypothesized—though this would need to be tested—that many of those suffering delusions have simply failed to develop effective inhibitory control, that is, dispositions to thought that keep them ‘cognitively grounded’. After all, many of us find ourselves being strongly disposed to believe certain things when worked up into strong emotions, such as those triggered when alone on dark country lanes. And yet many of us don’t come to form delusional beliefs (though the risk is often there, and sometimes we ‘fall to pieces’). Why is this? The idea that most of us have developed certain dispositions to thought that serve to keep us cognitively grounded seems a plausible one, and one that lends support to the idea that therapeutic attention should sometimes focus on restoring what is absent or missing in people who are prone to forming delusions, rather than on changing or eliminating what might be present in them already.

 reating of Emotional Symptoms of Poor T Mental Health Suppose that someone presents with certain emotional problems that need treating. In other words, suppose someone presents with emotions that either are distressing for the person feeling those emotions or are

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emotions that underlie other distressing or harmful mental health symptoms. Do the arguments advanced in this book have any bearing on matters pertaining to the treatment of such emotions? I think the most obvious implication of the arguments I have advanced relate to the way the relationship between maladaptive emotion and thought is to be theorized. The issue is particularly important given the prevalence of cognitive-behavioral forms of therapy, forms of therapy that take as a theoretical given the idea that underlying or generating difficult emotions, such as those associated with different mental or emotional disorders, are dysfunctional or maladaptive beliefs or thoughts. Indeed, cognitive therapy takes it inspiration from the Stoic, Epictetus, who claimed that “men are disturbed, not by things, but by the principles and notions which they form concerning things”. According to the theoretical model motivating cognitive therapy—call it the ‘cognitive model’—we help people overcome their emotional difficulties by tackling the dysfunctional thoughts that trigger the difficult emotions in question. Now, proponents of the cognitive model tend not to think that any kind of thought generates emotional problems. Rather the thoughts in question tend to be circumscribed, limited to negative thoughts and often negative thoughts that are not consciously entertained. Thus, the depressed person is depressed because they evaluate themselves or the world negatively and often does so without noticing or registering the negative thoughts in question. There are several assumptions made by the cognitive model, then, and which I want to evaluate in what follows. First, is the assumption that problematic emotions have maladaptive beliefs as causal antecedents. Second, is the assumption that the maladaptive thoughts in question tend to be negative in nature—though, as we shall see the idea of a negative thought can be variously interpreted. Third, is the assumption that the maladaptive thoughts in question tend not to be consciously entertained. In actual fact, cognitive therapists tend to accept a slightly more elaborated version of the cognitive model than that just outlined. In particular, according to the classical model developed by Aaron Beck the thoughts an individual might form in a particular situation are usually conceived as being the output of more entrenched dysfunctional assumptions about

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the self and world (Beck 1976). For instance, a person who is depressed might have the core belief: if people think badly of me then I cannot be happy. In the right circumstances (say, a situation in which someone criticizes the person with the belief in question) this core belief gives rise to certain automatic negative thoughts (such as: I am never going to be happy) which in turn gives rise to symptoms of depression. Beck refers to these core attitudes or assumptions as ‘cognitive schemas’. Now, plausibly cognitive schemas comprise internalized norms or rules of thought or belief, that is, internalized rules that govern belief formation. And if that is the case then consistent with my argument in this chapter and elsewhere in this book, core attitudes or assumptions are types of cognitive dispositions. The claim that problematic emotions are based on maladaptive beliefs would be a very compelling one if emotions possessed such beliefs as constituents, or, at least always had such thoughts as their causal antecedents. However, in Part I of the book I took pains to argue that emotions are types of bodily feelings that have no cognitive or intentional content. Now, of course this is not to deny that emotions are often triggered by certain thoughts, and to the extent that they are triggered by certain thoughts it remains a valid possibility that on occasion we will find difficult emotions being triggered by maladaptive or dysfunctional beliefs. For instance, if I have been mistakenly led to believe that I am about to lose my job, then I am likely to feel depressed and possibly so depressed that I engage in maladaptive behavior. In such a case, targeting the underlying mistaken belief might be the right thing to do. But on the view of emotion defended in this book the real possibility opens up that in some cases harmful emotions are not based on maladaptive beliefs. First, there can be cases where a difficult emotion is not triggered by a thought or mental state with cognitive content. Someone who has ingested large amounts of caffeine may feel very anxious or edgy despite there being no thoughts or beliefs causally explaining their anxiety. Basic perceptual stimuli can also trigger emotional responses without there being any mediating cognitive processes. Sometimes these emotional responses might be very distressing or dysfunctional. Phobias often seem to have this form, where the mere perception of something (a

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spider, say) can elicit strong aversive emotional reactions without there being any mediating cognitive evaluation or appraisal. Second, there are likely to be cases where an emotion is triggered by a cognitive representation, but where the fault lies not with the cognitive representation. For instance, consider two people who receive the same piece of bad news—that they have lost their job, say—but while one reacts with moderate depression, the other person responds with severe depression, possibly so severe that they risk harming themselves or others. Now, it is possible that the difference in emotion is partly explained by differences in belief. Thus, we might imagine that while one person is optimistic they will find new employment, the other isn’t optimistic, and this is why the two people are suffering different levels of depression. But, it is surely plausible to suppose that there needn’t always be a difference in the beliefs that trigger the emotions that are undergone, that on some occasions we find people who share all the same beliefs about the world but who respond emotionally to those beliefs in different ways. And if that is the case, then there may well be times when what needs treating are not the thoughts triggering an emotion but rather whatever it is that is responsible for people responding to their thoughts with certain maladaptive or dysfunctional emotions. At this point someone sympathetic to a cognitive model of emotional disorder might respond in the following way. Agreed, in cases of emotional disorder we may find no problem or distortion in a person’s initial apprehension of a situation. To return to our earlier example, perhaps the two people who lost their jobs both correctly believed they had been made redundant. However, we will find problems in how the situation apprehended is evaluated or appraised (see the cognitive model’s second assumption described above). And in support, the following considerations might be offered. First, as a matter of empirical fact, distortions in how people evaluate their situations are often present in cases of emotional disorder. For instance, depressed people tend to appraise themselves and the world very negatively, and those suffering from anger-­related disorders might perceive themselves to have rights or entitlements that others do not possess. Second, such distortions in evaluation must underlie a person’s disturbed emotions, since otherwise the presence of these emotions is very

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hard to explain. For suppose two people apprehend their situation in the same way—for instance, both form the belief that they have lost their job—but suppose that only one of these people responds to their situation with anxiety or depression. What can explain the difference in emotional response other than some negative evaluation or appraisal of the situation in question? (c.f. Lazarus and Folkman 1984, 23; Roseman and Smith 2001). Admittedly, people need not always be conscious of the evaluations that explain the differences in how they feel (see the cognitive model’s third assumption described above), but the existence of such thoughts has to be assumed if we are to explain why people who initially represent their situations in similar ways come to feel very different emotions. Let us deal with each of these claims in turn. First, with regard to the claim that underlying dysfunctional emotions are certain mental states the existence of which we are not consciously aware clearly runs the risk of being ad hoc unless such mental states really do discharge a necessary explanatory role.2 After all, if we are not aware of there being a mediating cognitive evaluation between our descriptive or non-evaluative beliefs and our emotions, then that provides evidence for thinking there is no such evaluation. Thus, only if such an evaluation or appraisal is required to explain the presence of certain other phenomena—here the emotions undergone by people who initially form what seem to be identical non-­ evaluative or descriptive beliefs—would we have reason to think such unconscious evaluations must exist. And the problem then is that it is not clear that some kind of cognitive evaluation is required to explain the ways in which people respond emotionally to their descriptive or non-­ evaluative mental representations. The point is that there are all kinds of non-cognitive factors that can explain why certain non-evaluative or descriptive beliefs trigger certain  To be clear, I am speaking here of mental phenomena regarding which we might fail to consciously register or reflect on, and not mental phenomena that fail to possess a characteristic phenomenology (see Chap. 2 for a detailed explanation of the relevant distinction). We can leave it an open question as to whether the evaluative thoughts that the cognitive theorist has in mind lack a characteristic phenomenology or not, though as far as I can see the cognitive theorist is certainly not committed to the view that the thoughts in question lack a phenomenology (which arguably is a good thing too, since plausibly thoughts, as with emotions, are nothing but their characteristic ways of appearing—on this point, see Chap. 2 and Whiting 2016). 2

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emotions and why therefore there can be variation between people with regard to the emotions they feel. For instance, some people might just be more emotionally sensitive to certain cognitive and perceptual stimuli than other people. In other cases, mental processes other than cognitive evaluations might determine how people respond emotionally to how they represent the world. For instance, perhaps someone is quick to anger because they are feeling anxious about something, or perhaps someone is feeling low about life due to the presence of one or more repressed desires. Other people, again, may be under the influence of drugs or alcohol, and this is what explains the emotions they undergo. So perhaps drinking coffee is making someone respond anxiously to what is going on around them. And plausibly on some occasions a number of causal factors come together to explain the emotions that people undergo. Consequently, the claim that certain unconscious evaluative thoughts are needed to explain why people feel the emotions they do seems very difficult to sustain, and hence the justification for thinking that such thoughts must precede how people respond emotionally to the world seems lacking altogether. What, then, are we to say about the first consideration offered in support of the idea that underlying difficult emotions are certain kind of evaluative states, namely the consideration that as a matter of empirical fact people who are depressed or anxious (say) do have certain negative thoughts about the world? To be sure, people may not always be consciously aware of such thoughts at the time of being depressed. Still there is reason to think that people have such thoughts, since people often come to recognize the existence and nature of these negative thoughts during therapy. But now the following worry arises. Suppose this is true. What are we to conclude? That these negative thoughts are responsible for the emotions in question? Or should we conclude that the emotions in question are responsible for the negative thoughts? To answer the above, it might help to get clear on what constitutes a negative thought on the cognitive model. In fact, we can broadly distinguish between two ways in which such thoughts might be understood on that model. According to the first, a negative thought comprises a negative evaluation of something, which might be oneself or one’s attributes or one’s situation. For instance, someone suffering from depression might evaluate themselves as being worthless or as not deserving of love or

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success. According to the second way of understanding ‘negative thoughts’, negative thoughts are taken to refer to non-evaluative properties or features of oneself or the world to which a negative evaluation might normally be attached. For example, someone suffering from depression might think they lack certain parenting or employment skills, or they might think they will always be unhappy, these being things that people normally evaluate in a negative way. Now, it seems to me that on either way of understanding what constitutes a negative thought, good reasons exist to think that negative thoughts do not precede our emotions, but rather arise from them in some way. Indeed, the thematic content of such thoughts strongly point in that direction. For how explain the depressed person’s thoughts of being worthless or undeserving, or thoughts of being forever unhappy, other than by appealing to that person’s depression? Thus, with regard to the depressed person’s evaluations of themselves or the world, it is plausible to suppose that evaluations (as ‘evaluations’ is standardly understood, namely as referring to judgments of good and bad, or right and wrong) are behavioral dispositions  (see Chap. 5). For instance, the depressed individual who evaluates themselves as worthless or underserving of respect is the person who is disposed to behave in certain ways, say, in ways that might be harmful or neglectful. But understood as such these evaluations cannot be what explain our emotions, but rather must be explained by our emotions. In other words, if the negative evaluations that we find in cases of emotional disorder are behavioral dispositions, then it is they that are explained by the emotions and not the other way around. What if we take ‘negative thought’ in the second way spoken about, namely as referring to thoughts about properties or situations to which a negative evaluation is normally attached, such as the thought that one will always be unhappy? Now, admittedly it is not clear that these kinds of thoughts are themselves grounded in or realized by emotions. Nevertheless, they are plausibly the output of cognitive dispositions that are grounded in emotions. First, these thoughts are plausibly the output of certain cognitive dispositions or internalized rules or norms for belief. We saw that according to the classical cognitive model developed by Aaron Beck, such thoughts are to be explained by certain entrenched dysfunctional assumptions,

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which plausibly are to be conceptualized as internalized rules or norms for belief formation. For instance, the depressed individual seems to be operating with an internalized norm that prescribes them to form the belief that they will always be unhappy in the event of perceiving some personal misfortune. Second, the cognitive dispositions causing certain negative thoughts are plausibly grounded in or realized by the depressed person’s emotions. For there must be some property of the depressed person in virtue of which the depressed person is disposed to interpret the world in the negative way they do, and again it is unclear what that property can be other than emotion and depression in particular. But if someone’s depression is what grounds or realizes that person’s dispositions to form certain negative beliefs (say, the belief they will be eternally unhappy or the belief they lack the skills to be a parent), then those dispositions and the beliefs to which those dispositions give rise cannot be responsible for the person’s depression. Once again, the cognitive model gets things altogether back to front. I have spelt out why the theoretical framework that underpins cognitive therapy is highly problematic. In short, even if some cases exist where an emotional disturbance has its source in something cognitive, powerful reasons exist to think that is not always the case. Reflection on everyday examples strongly suggests that the cognitive model is mistaken to maintain that difficult emotions are always preceded or triggered by dysfunctional beliefs, and none of the reasons given in support of that idea are very convincing. So where does this leave us? To begin with, we cannot conclude from my evaluation of the cognitive model that cognitive therapy doesn’t work and/or should be replaced by something wholly different. There is reason to think that cognitive therapy is often effective for treating emotional disorders (see, for instance, Leichsenring et al. 2006; Clark et al. 1999; Butler et  al. 2006), though it might be noted that a recent systematic review showed that the effectiveness of cognitive therapy for depression and anxiety disorders has significantly decreased since its early inception in the 1970s and 1980s (Johnsen and Friborg 2015). My negative assessment of the cognitive model is consistent with cognitive therapy being effective for two reasons. First, someone might point

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out that problems in thought can sometimes help maintain or exacerbate an existing emotional problem, even if problems in thought fail to be the underlying cause of the problem. Indeed, proponents of the cognitive model sometimes claim that cognitive therapy is aimed mostly at addressing the dysfunctional cognitions that maintain an emotional disorder, and not the underlying causes of the emotional problem and which may not be cognitive in nature (see Beck et al. 1979; Clark and Steer 1996). For instance, even if a maladaptive episode of anxiety fails to have a problematic thought as its cause, nevertheless the anxiety may lead to the forming of dysfunctional thoughts or beliefs that trigger further maladaptive episodes of anxiety. The idea, then, might be that we can bring an end to this vicious cycle of maladaptive emotions and thoughts by treating the negative thoughts that help to sustain this cycle. Now, I think this idea has some plausibility, and may go some way to explain why cognitive therapy might work in some cases. That being said, reason exists to be cautious. For one thing even if certain thoughts are helping to maintain an emotional problem, they are not the underlying cause of the problem. These thoughts are themselves the output of maladaptive emotions. But in which case it remains unclear how the thoughts maintaining an emotional problem can be successfully treated without treating the emotions giving rise to these thoughts, and, as we have seen, these emotions might not be the output of maladaptive or dysfunctional thoughts. And for another thing it is an open question as to whether maladaptive thoughts do maintain emotional problems. Agreed, people who have negative thoughts may subsequently undergo further episodes of distressing emotion. But why think these further emotional outbursts are triggered by the negative thoughts rather than whatever caused the earlier emotional outbursts? For instance, suppose drinking too much caffeine causes me to feel edgy, which in turn leads me to have certain negative thoughts. Now, suppose subsequent to having these thoughts I suffer further episodes of anxiety. According to the cognitive model, these further anxiety episodes are caused by negative thoughts. But why think this? Why not think it continues to be my drinking too much coffee that is causing me to undergo further episodes of anxiety?

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The second reason why we cannot conclude from my critique of the cognitive model that cognitive therapy doesn’t work is that the practice of cognitive therapy might be effective even if the underlying theory is flawed. Agreed, if the underlying theory is wrong, then cognitive therapy isn’t working for the reasons suggested by the cognitive model. However, the possibility remains that cognitive therapy might work for other reasons. For instance, it might be that the therapeutic alliance that develops between therapist and client has a positive effect on treatment outcomes. Also, we know from other areas in medicine that the placebo effect can be very powerful. Possibly many of those who have cognitive therapy experience an improvement in symptoms due to forming a belief that cognitive therapy works. Indeed, Johnsen and Friborg point out in their systematic review that the observed decrease in the effectiveness of cognitive therapy over the past twenty years or so may be due to the placebo effect, the idea being that people believe less now in the efficacy of cognitive therapy than they did in the past (Johnsen and Friborg 2015). So to be clear, nothing I have said should be interpreted as an evaluation of the effectiveness of cognitive therapy. Nevertheless, I want to conclude by offering some positive comments regarding the potential clinical implications of my critique of the cognitive model. First, if my critique is successful, then at the very least that provides us with a rationale to take a closer look at the practice of cognitive therapy and to try to understand why it works, when it works, if not for the reasons advanced by cognitive theorists. What, then, are the non-cognitive elements of cognitive therapy that help to make it an effective form of treatment when it is effective? Second, my assessment of the cognitive model provides a strong justification for exploring therapies that attend to the non-cognitive causes of emotional disorder. For suppose in cases of maladaptive emotions we find not a problem in people’s thoughts, but rather problems in the emotions triggered by people’s thoughts. In such cases an explanation for why people have the emotions they do will refer us to something other than people’s thoughts or beliefs. If this is right, then the important implication for treatment seems to be that in such cases the therapist will have to address a number of non-cognitive causes for the distressing emotions.

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Now, of course, it is a further question as to what these non-cognitive factors might be, and clearly how these factors are described will have some bearing on the treatments a therapist should utilize. However, that it is intelligible to think various explanations are available for why people respond to their mental representations of the world in less than ideal ways means we should be open to the possibility that various different treatment methods may be appropriate. For instance, where a person is undergoing emotions due to some unresolved psychological fact about themselves—say, some desire being continually repressed—then treatment might help that person address that unresolved psychological fact about themselves. However, in cases where a person is undergoing certain emotions due to a chemical imbalance, then we might think that treatment should aim to effect changes in the chemical imbalance (say, by the use of medication).

Concluding Remarks In this chapter I have sought to show how arguments spelt out earlier in the book bear on a number of key topics within psychopathology. In particular, I sought to show, first, how the arguments I have advanced imply a central role for emotion in explaining a number of symptoms of poor mental health, including behavioral and cognitive symptoms. If emotions as non-cognitive feelings are those things that realize people’s cognitive and behavioral dispositions, people’s internalized norms for action and thought, then it is difficult to see how emotions are not involved in the formation of distorted or maladaptive thoughts and behavior. Manipulate anyone’s emotions in the right way and we can expect them to develop the unusual cognitive, volitional, and behavioral states commonly associated with different mental health conditions. Second, with regard to the treatment of maladaptive or distressing emotions, I was keen to show how the arguments advanced in this book give us reason to be skeptical of the cognitive model of emotional disorder that underpins the practice of cognitive therapy. Again, my critique of that model bears in no way on the question of whether cognitive therapy works or not, though if the critique is successful then it provides

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reason to think that the effectiveness of cognitive therapy is not to be explained by the cognitive model. Nevertheless, my critique of the cognitive model does seem to justify our trying to understand why cognitive therapy is effective when it is effective if not for the reasons suggested by the cognitive model. Moreover, my critique creates space and a possible justification for exploring alternative forms of therapy. A number of outstanding issues remain. One is the question of whether distressing or maladaptive emotions might help explain other mental health symptoms, including disturbances in perception. That emotion is involved in the generation of such symptoms is again strongly suggested by the character or thematic content of perceptual disturbances. For instance, auditory hallucinations are often very distressing, possibly taking the form of internal voices that torment or give malevolent instructions. It is difficult to see what could be responsible for such symptoms other than emotion. Indeed in this regard it is telling that such symptoms often dissipate after a person becomes less emotionally distressed. Somewhat unclear, though, is the mechanism by which emotion might give rise to hallucinations and other perceptual disturbances. On the face of it, perceptual experiences are not sensitive to internalized norms in the way behavior or cognition is. This suggests that emotions do not realize dispositions that are causally responsible for the perceptual disturbances in question. But then how might emotion influence abnormal perceptual experiences? With regard to the treatment of emotional disorders, two issues stand out for me. The first is that of why cognitive therapy has proven to be effective given that its underlying theory appears to be deeply flawed. In my view, a need exists to try to better understand the reasons why this form of therapy is often successful. Gaining such an understanding may also help with developing forms of therapy that better target the underlying problems in cases of distressing or maladaptive emotion. The second issue is a largely aspirational one of whether we might hope for a day when many, perhaps all, mental health conditions are treated by means of targeting the distressing or maladaptive emotions that seem to be the source of many such conditions. Now clearly people’s emotions are not the only things to be worried about in cases of poor mental health, but if emotions are the source of many mental health conditions in ways

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described in this chapter, then that does raise the question of whether the primary aim of treatment should always be about trying to understand and address the underlying distressing or maladaptive emotions.

References Beck, A. (1976). Cognitive Therapy and the Emotional Disorders. London: Penguin Books. Beck, A., Rush, A., Shaw, B., & Emery, G. (1979). Cognitive Therapy of Depression. New York: Guilford Press. Butler, A., Chapman, J., Forman, E., & Beck, A. (2006). The Empirical Status of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy: A Review of Meta-Analyses. Clinical Psychology Review, 26, 17–31. Chadwick, P. (2008). Delusional Thinking from the Inside. Paranoia and Person Growth. In D. Freeman, R. Bentall, & R. Garety (Eds.), Persecutory Delusions (pp. 3–19). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Clark, D., Beck, A., & Alford, B. (1999). Scientific Foundations of Cognitive Theory and Therapy of Depression. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons Inc. Clark, D., & Steer, R. (1996). Empirical Status of the Cognitive Model of Anxiety and Depression. In P. Salkovskis (Ed.), Frontiers of Cognitive Therapy (pp. 75–96). New York, NY: Guilford Press. Coltheart, M., Langdon, R., & McKay, R. (2007). Schizophrenia and Monothematic Delusions. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 33, 642–647. Dodds, E. (1951). The Greeks and the Irrational. London: University of California Press. Dub, R. (2017). Delusions, Acceptances, and Cognitive Feelings. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 94, 27–60. Ellis, H., & Young, A. (1990). Accounting for Delusional Misidentifications. British Journal of Psychiatry, 157, 239–248. Garety, P., & Freeman, D. (1999). Cognitive Approaches to Delusion: A Critical Review of Theories and Evidence. British Journal of Clinical Psychology, 38, 113–154. Garety, P., Freeman, D., Jolley, S., Ross, K., Waller, H., & Dunn, G. (2011). Jumping to Conclusions: The Psychology of Delusional Reasoning. Advances in Psychiatric Treatment, 17, 332–339. Hare, R. (1993). Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us. London: The Guildford Press.

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Hobbes, T. (1968). Leviathan (C. Macpherson, Ed.). London: Penguin Books. Johnsen, T., & Friborg, O. (2015). The Effects of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy as an Anti-Depressive Treatment is Falling: A Meta-Analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 141, 747–768. Lazarus, R., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, Appraisal, and Coping. New  York: Springer Publishing Company. Leichsenring, F., Hiller, W., Weissberg, M., & Leibing, E. (2006). Cognitive-­ Behavioral Therapy and Psychodynamic Psychotherapy. American Journal of Psychotherapy, 60, 233–259. Maher, B. (1999). Anomalous Experience in Everyday Life: Its Significance for Psychopathology. The Monist, 82, 547–570. Oepen, G., Harrington, A., Spitzer, M., & Fünfgeld, M. (1988). Feelings of Conviction: On the Relation of Affect and Thought Disorder. In M. Spitzer, F. Uehlein, & G. Oepen (Eds.), Psychopathology and Philosophy (pp. 43–55). Berlin: Springer. Padel, R. (1981). Madness in Fifth-Century Athenian Tragedy. In P. Heelas & A.  Lock (Eds.), Indigenous Psychologies. The Anthropology of the Self (pp. 105–131). London: Routledge. Padel, R. (1992). In and Out of the Mind. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Padel, R. (1995). Whom Gods Destroy. Elements of Greek and Tragic Madness. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Plato. (1968). The Republic (A. Bloom, Trans.). New York: Basic Books. Roseman, I., & Smith, C. (2001). Appraisal Theory: Overview, Assumptions, Varieties, Controversies. In K. Scherer (Ed.), Appraisal Processes in Emotion (pp. 3–19). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sass, L. (1992). Madness and Modernism. Insanity in the Light of Modern Art, Literature, and Thought. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Whiting, D. (2016). On the Appearance and Reality of Mind. Journal of Mind and Behavior, 37, 47–70.

Index

A

Access consciousness (as contrasted with phenomenal consciousness), 74 Action tendencies, 37 See also Behavioral dispositions Admiration, 42, 43, 65 Animals and emotion, 50, 51, 53 Anxiety, 20, 21, 32, 46, 63–66, 70, 72, 80–81, 112, 113, 116–119, 126, 133, 134, 147, 165, 204–207, 210, 211, 217, 219, 222, 223 Awe, 42, 43, 65 B

Behavior, 3, 31, 45, 46, 60, 77, 78, 81, 91–93, 95, 97–121, 134, 136, 147, 158–160, 162, 178,

© The Author(s) 2020 D. Whiting, Emotions as Original Existences, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54682-3

193–196, 199–201, 207, 213, 214, 217, 225, 226 Behavioral dispositions as causal powers, 104, 105 as desires, 3, 27, 99–106, 109–112, 114, 115, 132, 154–157, 163, 166, 194, 206, 214 and moral thought, 4, 127, 128, 133, 146–148, 165 and virtue and vice, 3, 4, 85, 153, 156, 157, 171 Belief-desire psychology, 91 Beliefs nature of, 62, 130, 205 as stimulus conditions, 93, 108, 109

229

230 Index C

Capacities distinct from dispositions, 30, 106 nature of, 106 Categorical bases as distinct from dispositions, 98, 195 as emotions, 4–6, 84, 93, 109–114, 119, 121, 127, 128, 133, 137, 138, 144, 147, 156–158, 163, 164, 166, 171, 197, 212, 213 as intrinsic properties, 5, 111, 121, 133 Children and emotion, 50, 51, 53 Cognitive dispositions and cognitive biases, 6, 119, 208, 209, 212 as dispositions to thought, 215 as internalized norms, 217, 225 Cognitive model of emotional disorder, 205, 218, 225 and cognitive therapy, 216, 222–226 Conscious mental states, 2, 34 D

Damasio, Antonio, 24, 44, 112, 113, 135, 198, 200 Delusions and emotion, 146, 210–212 monothematic vs. polythematic, 209 Descartes, Rene, 48, 83 Desires as behavioral dispositions, 3, 27, 84, 93, 99–106, 109–112,

114, 115, 132, 136–138, 140, 145, 147, 148, 154, 155, 157, 163, 166, 167, 194, 206, 207 as causal powers, 104, 105 as episodic mental states, 100, 101, 154, 157 standing desires, 100, 135, 154 Disorders of behavior, 206 of desire, 206 role of emotion, 6, 146, 205–207, 209, 211, 212 of thought, 6, 208 treatment of, 159, 160, 205, 226 Dispositions distinct from categorical bases, 93, 98, 99, 144, 209 distinct from stimulus conditions, 93, 94, 99, 107, 109, 193 as higher-level properties, 94, 95 nature of, 28, 29, 94, 96, 98, 99, 102, 104, 108, 109, 184, 186, 191 as occurrent properties, 95, 185 as relational properties, 96, 183, 189 Dual process account of moral judgment, 138–140 E

Emotions as categorical bases for dispositions to behavior, 93 as categorical bases for dispositions to thought, 119, 196

 Index 

as categorical bases for moral thought, 128, 133, 136, 137 as categorical bases for virtues and vice, 156–158 cool versus heated, 116, 134 as discharging a regulatory role, 141, 142, 146, 170–172 as episodic mental states, 157 and habits, 117 as original existences, 1, 37–85, 112 as phenomenally conscious mental states, 2, 20, 31, 33 and the self, 48, 83, 180, 196 standing emotions, 29–31, 100, 135, 154 theories of, 14, 38, 39, 46, 68, 75, 76, 83 as types of bodily feelings, 2, 4, 12, 15, 16, 40–42, 51, 84, 126, 217 Epiphenomenalism, 81–84 F

Fear, 14, 15, 17, 20–22, 25–31, 40–43, 47–53, 55–59, 63, 65–71, 73, 76–82, 84, 92, 111–116, 119, 134, 157, 158, 194, 204, 207, 209, 212 Freud, Sigmund, 24 G

Grounding relationship, 93 Guilt, 21, 63–66, 68, 126, 207

231

H

Habits and emotion, 117, 118 as impulses, 117 of thought, 119 Higher cognitive emotions, 21, 43, 63–66 Hume, David, 1, 2, 5, 38, 39, 52, 64, 76, 77, 116, 118, 125, 128, 134 on emotion and reason, 76, 128 on emotions and habits, 118n15 on emotions as original existences, 1, 37–85 I

Indignation, 42, 43, 65 Inhibitory control, 135, 206, 207, 214, 215 as involving behavioral dispositions, 206, 207 Innate moral code, 136–138 Intentionality and emotion, 56 and formal object, 48–51, 73 and particular object, 48, 51, 73 and phenomenology, 60, 74 and representation, 39, 60, 61, 74 Intrinsic properties as binding properties, 182, 187, 199 as categorical properties, 189 as constitutive properties, 61, 197 and emotion, 5, 112, 200 as non-essential properties, 183, 188–191, 193, 194 as non-relational properties, 5, 111, 112, 183, 186, 187, 189 of physical objects, 188, 192 and the self, 200

232 Index

Introspection empirical-based methodology, 24 indispensability of, 24, 34 reliability of, 24 J

James, William, 2, 14, 15, 17, 24, 38, 41, 43–46, 52, 69, 81, 135 Jealousy, 28, 30, 31, 47, 64, 65, 67 M

Madness, 204 and emotion, 204 Mind-brain identity theory, 18 Moral thought automaticity of, 136 compliance with moral rule or principles (see also Innate moral code) as comprising behavioral dispositions, 132 and emotion, 4, 85, 125–148, 165 as intrinsically motivating, 4 (see also Motivational internalism) Motivational internalism, 4, 127–133, 136, 137, 145–148 vs. motivational externalism, 131, 147 P

Pain, 2, 13, 15, 40, 42, 82, 83, 165, 217 Panpsychism, 179, 180 Perceptions (perceptual states), 13, 107, 108

Phenomenal appearances, 12–18, 20, 24, 26–28, 33, 55, 70, 132 See also Ways of appearing Phenomenal consciousness, 19, 74 Phenomenology and desire, 100, 104, 185 and emotion, 12–16, 22, 25, 28, 31–34, 38, 41, 42, 47, 48, 51, 52, 55, 57, 63, 67, 69–71, 74–76, 83, 84, 126, 132, 196, 219 and thought, 14, 67, 131, 219 (see also What-it-is-likeness) Pity, 42, 43, 65 Pleasure, 43, 57, 63–67, 92, 112, 116, 126, 134, 139–141, 147, 157, 198, 199, 206 Pride, 21, 63–66, 68, 84, 198 Psychopaths, 126, 139, 141, 144, 166, 168, 206, 207, 214 R

Rationality (doxastic), 76, 77, 84 Realization, 115, 185 See also Grounding relationship Reason, 5, 55, 76, 128, 131, 145, 146, 195, 211 S

Sadists, 139n6, 141 Self and emotion, 5, 42, 48, 83, 158, 196, 200 and moral responsibility, 200 Semantics of emotional ascriptions, 59–63 and the reason-for analysis, 60–62 Situationism, 153–172

 Index 

and cognitive dispositions, 145 and emotion, 153, 156–159, 161, 163, 171 as local traits, not global traits, 5, 163, 168, 172

Standing mental states and emotions, 28, 29 and virtues and vices, 154, 155 T

Test of deep change, 6, 184, 193, 195, 197 Traits, 5, 154–157, 162–164, 166–172, 194, 206 V

Virtue theory, 5, 161–172 Virtues and vices as behavioral dispositions, 4, 153–158, 160, 163, 164, 168, 171

233

W

Ways of appearing, 11, 16–18, 20–26, 28, 34, 132, 219 See also Phenomenal appearances What-it-is-likeness, 67 See also Phenomenology Wilde, Oscar, 198 Williams, Bernard, 142, 144