Hi Rob, and welcome
About cats I strongly disagree. Wild cats have a very complex social behavior,
that just lately has been discovered. I've recently watched one of those BBC
ethology documentaries, not about the usual Lions or Sharks, but about the
wild cats in Rome suburbs, and they have nothing to envy to wild wolves on that.
Just, cats tend more easily to isolate themselves than dogs and wolves, and
their social interaction is not so omnipresent (does it make them more
intellectual than dogs?). But it is question of quantity (of time), not of
quality. There are roles, chiefs, cooperation...
Anyway, this is not the point. Actually, it could even enforces your idea that
emotions arise in a social context. But still I don't think so. By the way,
Pirsig himself writes in a letter to Bodvar you can find on the forum page:
" My own addition might be that if the implication of "emotivism" is true -
that emotion and value is identical - then banking may be considered an
emotional activity. I think the MOQ would classify emotions as mere
biological responses to value, not value itself" .
Well, there's no reason to assume that all what Pirsig writes is law, but let's
not dismiss it. I agree that socially emotions have an important role, (actually
we all know how emotional are the fluctuations of the stock exchange) but IMHO
we can't say that emotions are "highly complex social behavior". Rituals,
market, "giants", governments are that. Emotions are a biological response to
value (not the only response), and, in those *emotive* animals like many
mammals, the social patterns use also emotions in order to pursue the social
purposes. So the Giant teaches us to hate the enemy, desire celebrity, be proud
of the nation.. but also to save love for the right occasions, and possibly
abolish rage against the neighbor (call the police if you have problems, they
say).
And actually there are societies in which emotions are probably not involved at
all. Bees, ants, for example. They have roles, and even I've read somewhere that
ants have a sort of market, an exchange of goods between anthills. But probably
their biological structures don't provide the possibility of emotions. It could
mean simply that their social patterns use what they can use....
Of course, I could be wrong about cats, ants and the evolutionary step in which
emotions arose, but it would not be a big problem. Biological or social, my
point is that emotions can well be used by intellect. Just like thought and
intelligence, rituals and language, matter and energy.. for its own purposes.
Thanks,
Marco
ROB wrote:
I would say that emotions are highly complex social behavior, not
biological. The only animals that appear to show any emotion are the most
socially complex animals. A dog will whimper when you leave and be happy
when you return, a cat will barely notice. The difference: dogs in the wild
have highly complex social behavior whereas the solitary hunter cat has very
little social interaction.
Rob
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