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No Emotions do not serve any purpose. It's a abstract concept describing certain psychogical process in human that is not characterized by so-called rational t

No Emotions do not serve any purpose. It's a abstract concept describing certain psychogical process in human that is not characterized by so-called rational thinking. Most non artificial things are not serving any purpose, they are coincidents filtered through natural selection. Most artificial things serve some purpose of its makers.

blacksmith_tb 5y ago
They may certainly be counterproductive at times, but if they truly served no purpose it seems unlikely we'd have them? Also there's at least mixed evidence for the existence of similar states in animals[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_in_animals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_in_animals
- epgui 5y ago
  An important part of the question is semantic: what do we mean when we say that something has a "purpose"? This is very much a live (and possibly a dead-end) question in evolutionary biology: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology_in_biology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology_in_biology
  - blacksmith_tb 5y ago
    Hmm, that feels a bit like the difference between verifiability and falsifiability to me. It doesn't seem like adaptations need to be goal-driven, but if they were flat-out bad/destructive/unhelpful to the species, I would tend to expect them to fade over time? Pointing to any specific trait and saying it's useless, though, opens you up to arguments that you just haven't found the use yet.
    - epgui 5y ago
      There are a lot of accidents of evolution that don't have a "purpose". The shape/trajectory of the vagus nerve, the appendix, the human tailbone, etc... This goes to the root of what we mean when we say "purpose". Are we saying the trait is "helping" to "achieve" some "goal", or are we really just saying that there's some relationship between the trait and the individual's environment, or that the existence of the trait can be explained by properties of the environment? If the latter, then are we stretching the meaning of the word "purpose"? It's a bit like how some people say "everything happens for a reason" (in this sense reason points to a purpose), whereas I'm more of the mind that no, most things more or less happen for no particular reason (ie.: serving no particular purpose). I would argue that it's not exactly clear whether you could even say that evolution itself has a "purpose". It's just something that happens, given a bunch of organisms competing for resources.
epgui 5y ago
I understand why you're being downvoted, but I do think there is value in your comment. It's perhaps not the most artful articulation of ideas, but it points to serious (afaik) philosophical questions. Whether emotions have a purpose is both a semantic and a philosophical question. I would point anyone who thinks this comment is unreasonable to discussions about teleology and science: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology#Science https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology#Science
- bigcat123 5y ago
throwaway98797 5y ago
emotions give reasons to live and reasons to end life. there is no purpose without emotions.
Bayart 5y ago
From a purely rational point of view, isn't it safer to assume that by default every element of our species is purposeful unless proven otherwise ?
- epgui 5y ago
  No more "purposeful" than a bag of chemicals, or molecules in a gas, bumping into each other at random, really.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]

blacksmith_tb 5y ago

They may certainly be counterproductive at times, but if they truly served no purpose it seems unlikely we'd have them? Also there's at least mixed evidence for the existence of similar states in animals[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_in_animals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_in_animals

epgui 5y ago
An important part of the question is semantic: what do we mean when we say that something has a "purpose"? This is very much a live (and possibly a dead-end) question in evolutionary biology: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology_in_biology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology_in_biology
- blacksmith_tb 5y ago
  Hmm, that feels a bit like the difference between verifiability and falsifiability to me. It doesn't seem like adaptations need to be goal-driven, but if they were flat-out bad/destructive/unhelpful to the species, I would tend to expect them to fade over time? Pointing to any specific trait and saying it's useless, though, opens you up to arguments that you just haven't found the use yet.
  - epgui 5y ago
    There are a lot of accidents of evolution that don't have a "purpose". The shape/trajectory of the vagus nerve, the appendix, the human tailbone, etc... This goes to the root of what we mean when we say "purpose". Are we saying the trait is "helping" to "achieve" some "goal", or are we really just saying that there's some relationship between the trait and the individual's environment, or that the existence of the trait can be explained by properties of the environment? If the latter, then are we stretching the meaning of the word "purpose"? It's a bit like how some people say "everything happens for a reason" (in this sense reason points to a purpose), whereas I'm more of the mind that no, most things more or less happen for no particular reason (ie.: serving no particular purpose). I would argue that it's not exactly clear whether you could even say that evolution itself has a "purpose". It's just something that happens, given a bunch of organisms competing for resources.

epgui 5y ago

I understand why you're being downvoted, but I do think there is value in your comment. It's perhaps not the most artful articulation of ideas, but it points to serious (afaik) philosophical questions. Whether emotions have a purpose is both a semantic and a philosophical question. I would point anyone who thinks this comment is unreasonable to discussions about teleology and science: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology#Science https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology#Science

bigcat123 5y ago

throwaway98797 5y ago

emotions give reasons to live and reasons to end life. there is no purpose without emotions.

Bayart 5y ago

From a purely rational point of view, isn't it safer to assume that by default every element of our species is purposeful unless proven otherwise ?

epgui 5y ago
No more "purposeful" than a bag of chemicals, or molecules in a gas, bumping into each other at random, really.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]