On rationalising emotions

I’ve got better. We’ve bought Monopoly. I finished my book and started another one.

Now that you’ve been completely updated about what has happened in the last two days, let’s look at a few of the thoughts that have been sparked off by Mr. Taleb and his randomness book (possibly the last, seeing I’ve already finished the book).

Somewhere in the last quarter of the book Nicholas discusses what he rationally knows and what he emotionally knows and how the two are not only different, but in many ways almost completely unrelated. I happen to agree with him, so I’m going to make a similar statement here.

I am an emotional creature, full of instincts, illogical assumptions and superstitions. Though I realise that many of the things I feel and believe are wrong and destructive (take for instance my smoking) I am in many ways powerless to stop them. Rationally I am aware that I’m making a stupid mistake and that there is a better choice available, but unfortunately my emotions generally end up winning the battle.

A good example Mr. Taleb uses is of being honked at in traffic. You know it serves no purpose to get angry at the person who is honking unfairly, but still you do. Your instincts take over and make you feel angry. You can control that anger by choosing not to act on it, but you can’t control the actual act of getting angry. That is instinctual and not under rational control.

An example from my own life happened last night when I was sitting on the beach drinking a bottle of wine with some friends (yes, very decadent) two girls that were obviously interested (and interesting) walked by. They’d been sitting in the restaurant we’d just vacated. One of the people in the group urged me to call out and intellectually I knew there was a very small chance of me being rejected. Even if nothing would have happened, we’d at least have got the chance of speaking to some (attractive) people.

Did I call out? No. I couldn’t do it. My mind came up with a dozen reasons why I shouldn’t, each worse than the last. The thing was my emotions had taken control and my mind was working hard to rationalise it away, so that I’d end up thinking it was a rational and well thought out reason that I didn’t call out.

My emotions high-jacked me and made me act in a manner that was not potentially the best course of action.

The thing is, I can sermon about it all I like, it won’t help. Any rational analysis of what I’m doing wrong won’t change the action. It isn’t my rationality that is the problem, it’s my emotions.

The way out of an emotional roadblock is not information or intellectualisation, it is action.

The thing is that this has crystallised in me the reason why I don’t like classical philosophy anymore. Almost all classical philosophy about people comes from the (completely incorrect) perspective that we are rational creatures that make rational decisions. But all our recent research has revealed that we aren’t so much rational creatures as post rationalising creatures.

Their philosophical musings, though interesting, are ultimately about a world that we do not, nor will we ever, live in. It’s like reading incredibly complicated fantasy novels, without the amazing landscapes and interesting beasties. Since I’ve stopped reading fantasy, I think there’s a great likelihood that I will also stop reading most philosophy. Of course, never say never, but you get the idea.