ARGUMENTS FROM EMOTION

TERRY GLENN PENCE, Purdue University

Abstract

There exists in the philosophical literature a peculiar sort of argument which appeals to the nature and/or existence of particular emotions in order to make or support some philosophical point. In view of the popular and widespread opinion that emotions are the very antithesis of rational thought, the existence of these arguments in philosophy is remarkable. But even more astonishing are the conclusions which these arguments aim to establish: utilitarianism is false or inadequate; conceptual relativism in science is false; gratitude is unjustified; and the existence of free-will, God, and other minds, inter alia. Although these arguments from emotion have been employed extensively throughout the history of philosophy and by a number of philosophers, including Aristotle, R. M. Hare, H. L. A. Hart, Joel Feinberg, Keith Lehrer, Herbert Morris, John Rawls, Rudolf Otto, Max Scheler, Jean-Paul Sartre, Samuel Alexander, P. F. Strawson, John Hick, Israel Scheffler and Bernard Williams, they have not been seen as constituting a general argument form, and consequently there has not been a general assessment of these arguments. The aim of this thesis is to rectify this situation. Chapter One identifies the four major uses of emotion in philosophy in order to isolate the individual and shared assumptions of these arguments. The four uses are: (1) as an index of some cognitive state; (2) as objections to the truth or adequacy of theories; (3) as revealing or disclosing facts about the world; and (4) as targets for emotional reform and elimination due to their essential conflict with a theoretical or philosophical position. Some uses, especially (2) and (3), can take on ad hominem forms which, it is argued, are non-fallacious, barring any general defects in arguments from emotion. These uses raise four issues which are relevant to the general assessment of these arguments. Two are general and two are intramural. All arguments from emotion assume that emotions presuppose beliefs and that they are justifiable, at least to the extent that terms of moral and rational assessment can be warranted. Drawing upon psychological and philosophical sources, these claims are assessed and substantially vindicated in Chapters Two and Three. The intramural issues are addressed in the final chapter, Chapter Four. The revelatory arguments claim that emotions can reveal information about the world in the same manner and with the same epistemological status as faculties of sense. It is argued that this claim is possibly correct. The final issue is over the relative primacy of theory and emotion. The uses of (1)-(3) assume that significant emotional liabilities ought to inform and correct our theoretical understanding, but (4) assumes the exact opposite. It is argued that if revelatory emotion types exist they must be given primacy, but all other cases must be decided on a case by case basis. Unfortunately for type (4) arguments, however, they have been propounded in the absence of recognizing a distinction between emotion types and emotion tokens, and without a real understanding as to how and why emotions become immune to cognitive criticism. Thus, although they may be true, their initial prospects are dimmer than the other kinds of arguments from emotion.

Degree

Ph.D.

Subject Area

Philosophy

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