| Damasio, A. (2006). Descartes' error. Revised ed. London: Vintage. (Original work published 1994). |
 
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| Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard 11/05/2012, 09:04 |
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| "Somatic markers probably increase the accuracy and efficiency of the decision process. Their absence reduces them." |
| "When a negative somatic marker is juxtaposed to a particular future outcome the combination functions as an alarm bell. When a positive somatic marker is juxtaposed instead, it becomes a beacon of incentive." |
| "somatic markers [...] assist the process of sifting through [the] wealth of detail [involved in decision-making] -- in effect, reduce the need for sifting because they provide an automated detection of the scenario components which are more likely to be relevant." |
| Damasio proposes a Somatic-Marker hypothesis which integrates feelings generated by secondary emotions into rational decision making. |
| Evans, D. (2001). Emotion: A very short introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. |
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| Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard 28/05/2011, 07:52 |
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The higher cognitive emotions, guilt, love, revenge etc., "seem to exhibit a kind of 'global rationality' that saves pure reason from itself" (p.36).
Robert Frank says that such emotions, which evolved later than the basic emotions, are related to commitment issues. e.g. facial expressions of guilt demonstrate untrustworthiness -- if you can be trusted, others are more happy to work with you. Signs of love demonstrate commitment to another. A reputation for revenge means you will be less likely to be a victim. |
| Merleau-Ponty, M. (2014). Phenomenology of perception. D. A. Landes, Trans. New York: Routledge. (Original work published 1945). |
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| Last edited by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard 08/01/2024, 07:05 |
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| Criticising Descartes' view of the body-mind separation and thus object-subject and the experience of one's own body, "our body remained subordinated to knowledge through ideas because behind man, such as he in fact is, stands God as the rational author of our factual situation. Supported by this transcendent guarantor, Descartes can blandly accept our irrational condition, for we are not the ones required to bear reason and, once we have recognized reason as the foundation of all things, all that remains for us is to act and to think the world." |
| Szabó Gendler, T. (2010). Intuition, imagination, & philosophical methodology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. |
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| Last edited by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard 21/10/2023, 06:42 |
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| "[A] thought experiment is just a process of reasoning carried out within the context of a well-articulated imaginary scenario in order to answer a specific question about a non-imaginary situation." |
| Quoting Thordyke (1922, p.33) "the mind is ruled by habit throughout" and reasoning is no more than "the organization and cooperation of habits." |
| Contagion: "...the evocation of perceptual and evaluative schemata is relatively indifferent to whether the evocation occurs as a result of something in the ambient environment, something in memory, or something brought to mind merely as a result of imaginative rehearsal. In all these cases, the consequent availability of the object, event, or schema plays a central role in subsequent attention, perception, and even reasoning." |
| "imagination requires a sort of participation that mere hypothetical reasoning does not." |
| SG follows the work of Antonio Damasio and Paul Harris in suggesting that it is not necessary to believe situations and characters to be non-fictional in order to have real emotional responses towards them. "Rather, we will suggest, our cognitive architecture is such that without the tendency to feel (something relevantly akin to) real emotions in the case of merely imagined situations, we would be largely unable to engage in practical reasoning." |
Affective contagion: "There are numerous occasions where the mere contemplation of an emotionally charged situation causes the subject to behave as if the situation were probable enough to influence prudent behavior." (p.246)
"though there may well be differences in intensity between emotional responses to real and imagined scenarios, quarantining is decidedly ineffective, and contagion is the norm." (p.247)
Hence the role emotion plays in rational thinking and decision making (cf Damasio). |
| The ability to reason properly and correctly is usually better "when the materials are presented with familiar content." e.g. the facility to undertake simple arithmatic is improved when the symbols used are simple rather than complex. If x = 1 and y = 2 then x + y = ? rather than if B1 = 1 and B2 = 2 then B1 + B2 = ? If nonsense terms are used, this becomes difficult although some individuals have no problem. |
Examples of belief-bias in selection tasks and matching-bias.
Matching-bias -- in a selection task, if items available for selection are given in the statement to be tested, subjects will invariably pick them even if the reasoning is invalid.
There are examples of context-based effects too. |
Reasoning (according to Steven Sloman's Two Systems) involves two systems: Associative and Rule-based. The first (System 1) operates on similarity, contiguity, is automatic, uses generalization, soft constraints and is exemplified by intuition, imagination, fantasy, creativity etc.
Rule-based reasoning (System 2) uses symbol manipulation, derives knowledge from language, culture and formal systems, uses hard constraints, can operate on concrete, general and abstract concepts and is exemplified by explanation, deliberation, verification, formal analysis, strategic memory.
Division into two systems may be simplisitic but there is certainly not just one system used for reasoning. |
