From Justified Emotions to Justified Evaluative Judgements

ABSTRACT: Are there justified emotions? Can they justify evaluative judgements? We first explain the need for an account of justified emotions by emphasizing that emotions are states for which we have or lack reasons. We then observe that emotions are explained by their cognitive and motivational bases. Considering cognitive bases first, we argue that an emotion is justified if and only if the properties the subject is aware of constitute an instance of the relevant evaluative property. We then investigate the roles of motivational bases. Finally, we argue that justified emotions are sufficient for justified evaluative judgement

Which Attitudes for the Fitting Attitude Analysis of Value?

According to the fitting attitude (FA) analysis of value concepts, to conceive of an object as having a given value is to conceive of it as being such that a certain evaluative attitude taken towards it would be fitting. Among the challenges that this analysis has to face, two are especially pressing. The first is a psychological challenge: the FA analysis must call upon attitudes that shed light on our value concepts while not presupposing the mastery of these concepts. The second challenge is normative: the FA analysis must account for the fittingness of the relevant attitudes in terms of a kind of normativity intimately related to these attitudes, but again without presupposing the mastery of the relevant value concepts. In this paper, we show that real progress is possible if we pay close attention to the nature of the attitudes recruited by the analysis. More specifically, we claim that an FA analysis that appeals to emotions conceived as evaluative attitudes — as opposed to, for instance, evaluative judgements or evaluative perceptions — has the best prospects of meeting the two challenges and of putting the FA analysis on a strong footing

L’intentionnalité des émotions : du corps aux valeurs

Lorsque l’on considère les émotions indépendamment de toute entreprise théorique, deux constats s’imposent. D’un côté, les émotions possèdent une dimension phénoménale ou expérientielle : il y a un « effet que cela fait » que de ressentir une émotion, et cet effet se manifeste de manière particulièrement saillante dans la conscience des perturbations physiologiques propre aux expériences émotionnelles fortes. De l’autre, les émotions nous mettent en lien avec notre environnement et plus spéci..

The authority of pleasure

The aim of the paper is to reassess the prospects of a widely neglected affective conception of the aesthetic evaluation and appreciation of art. On the proposed picture, the aesthetic evaluation and appreciation of art are non-contingently constituted by a particular kind of pleasure. Artworks that are valuable qua artworks merit, deserve, and call for a certain pleasure, the same pleasure that reveals (or at least purports to reveal) them to be valuable in the way that they are, and constitutes their aesthetic evaluation and appreciation. This is why and how art is non-contingently related to pleasure. Call this, the Affective View. While I don’t advance conclusive arguments for the Affective View in this paper, I aim to reassess its prospects by (1) undermining central objections against it, (2) dissociating it from hedonism about the value of artworks (the view that this value is grounded in, and explained by, its possessors’ power to please), and (3) introducing some observations on the practice of art in support of it. Given that the objections I discuss miss their target, and given the observations in support of it, I conclude that the Affective View is worth serious reconsideration

The Self of Shame

The evaluations involved in shame are, intuitively at least, of many different sorts. One feels ashamed when seen by others doing something one would prefer doing alone (social shame). One is ashamed because of one's ugly nose (shame about permanent traits). One feels ashamed of one's dishonest behavior (moral shame), etc. The variety of evaluations in shame is striking; and it is even more so if one takes a cross-cultural perspective on this emotion. So the difficulty – the “unity problem” of shame- turns out to be the following: is there a common trait shared by all shame evaluations that will allow us to differentiate these evaluations from those that feature in other negative self-reflexive emotions like anger at oneself or self disappointment? Some progress is perhaps accomplished if we say that, in shame, a given trait or behavior is evaluated as degrading or as revealing one's lack of worth. Still, even if we agree with this last claim, truth is that these answers are less illuminating than we might wish. A theory of shame should surely further elucidate the aspect of one's identity relevant for shame, namely, the self of shame. In this connexion, philosophers have referred to “self-esteem,” “self-respect” or the “social self,” significantly disagreeing thus on which aspect of one's identity is at stake in shame. After critically discussing the different solutions to the problem, we offer our own. Shame, we claim, consists in an awareness of a distinctive inability to discharge a commitment that goes with holding self-relevant values. This conception solves the unity problem while illuminating other aspects of this emotion

Form Justified Emotions to Justified Evaluative Judgements

Are there justified emotions? Can they justify evaluative judgements? We first explain the need for an account of justified emotions by emphasizing that emotions are states for which we have or lack reasons. We then observe that emotions are explained by their cognitive and motivational bases. Considering cognitive bases first, we argue that an emotion is justified if and only if the properties the subject is aware of constitute an instance of the relevant evaluative property. We then investigate the roles of motivational bases. Finally, we argue that justified emotions are sufficient for justified evaluative judgements.Existe-t-il des émotions justifiées? Peuvent-elles justifier certains jugements évaluatifs ? Nous commençons par constater qu’une analyse des émotions justifiées est souhaitable car les émotions sont des états sensibles aux raisons. Nous soulignons ensuite que les émotions s’expliquent par leurs bases cognitives et motivationnelles. Notre examen des bases cognitives nous conduit à soutenir qu’une émotion est justifiée si et seulement si le sujet est conscient de propriétés qui constituent une instance de la valeur pertinente. Nous considérons ensuite les rôles des bases motivationnelles et donnons enfin des raisons de penser que les émotions justifiées peuvent justifier certains jugements évaluatifs

L'intentionnalité des émotions: du corps aux valeurs

Lorsque l'on considère les émotions indépendamment de toute entreprise théorique, deux constats s'imposent. D'un côté, les émotions possèdent une dimension phénoménale ou expérientielle : il y a un « effet que cela fait » que de ressentir une émotion, et cet effet se manifeste de manière particulièrement saillante dans la conscience des perturbations physiologiques propre aux expériences émotionnelles fortes. De l'autre, les émotions nous mettent en lien avec notre environnement et plus spécifiquement avec certains de ses aspects : ressentir une émotion, n'est-ce pas réagir à certains traits saillants des situations auxquelles nous faisons face ? Nous avons peur de tel homme peu avenant, nous sommes indignés par telle remarque ou soulagés de retrouver notre portefeuille. C'est là la dimension intentionnelle des émotions. Il n'est pas étonnant, dès lors, que les théories des émotions se soient toujours distinguées précisément par l'importance respective qu'elles accordent à ces deux dimensions. En effet, il est notoirement difficile de les articuler de manière satisfaisante au sein d'une théorie des émotions. Pourquoi ? Les perturbations physiologiques liées aux émotions ont été bien souvent citées pour affirmer qu'elles se situent au mieux en dehors du champ de la rationalité, au pire dans une relation conflictuelle avec celui-ci. Il est cependant aujourd'hui courant de souligner le rôle important des émotions dans l'exercice de nos facultés rationnelles1. Est-ce à dire que la dimension intentionnelle des émotions qui, nous allons le voir, permet de parler d'une rationalité au moins minimale dans le domaine des émotions, doit être conçue comme indépendante de leur dimension corporelle ? La réponse à cette question est délicate, car si de nombreuses théories contemporaines insistent sur la dimension intentionnelle des émotions sans nier leur dimension phénoménologique, elles sont rarement explicites quant aux liens entre intentionnalité et phénoménologie d'une part, entre phénoménologie et corps ressenti de l'autre2. Notre objectif dans cet essai consiste à montrer qu'il est possible de comprendre l'intentionnalité des émotions, et donc ce qui permet de parler d'une rationalité affective, en terme de phénoménologie corporelle

Taking Affective Explanations to Heart

In this article, the authors take seriously the categories of emotions, moods,temperaments, character traits and sentiments. They define them and offer an account of therelations existing among the phenomena they cover. They argue that whereas ascribingcharacter traits and sentiments (dispositions) is to ascribe a specific coherence and stabilityin the emotions (episodes) the subject is likely to feel, ascribing temperaments (dispositions)is to ascribe a certain stability in the moods (episodes) she is likely to feel. The rationale for this distinction, the authors claim, lies in the fact that, whereas appeal to character traits or sentiments in explanation is tantamount to making sense of a given behaviour in terms of anindividual's specific evaluative perspective --- as embodied in this individual's emotional profile --- appeal to temperaments makes sense of it independently of any such evaluative perspective

Is Shame a Social Emotion?

In this article, we present, assess and give reasons to reject the popular claim that shame is essentially social. We start by presenting several theses which the social claim has motivated in the philosophical literature. All of them, in their own way, regard shame as displaying a structure in which ‘others' play an essential role. We argue that while all these theses are true of some important families of shame episodes, none of them generalize so as to motivate the conclusion that shame is an essentially social emotion. We consider each thesis in turn, explaining in the process their connections with one another as well as the constraints on a theory of shame they help uncover. Finally, we show how a non-social picture of shame is not only capable of meeting these constraints, but has the further virtue of shedding light on those situations in which others seem to play no role in why we feel shame

In Defense of Shame: The Faces of an Emotion

"Is shame social? Is it superficial? Is it a morally problematic emotion? Researchers in disciplines as different as psychology, philosophy, and anthropology have thought so. But what is the nature of shame and why are claims regarding its social nature and moral standing interesting and important? Do they tell us anything worthwhile about the value of shame and its potential legal and political applications? In this book, Julien Deonna, Raffaele Rodogno, and Fabrice Teroni propose an original philosophical account of shame aimed at answering these questions. The book begins with a detailed examination of the evidence and arguments that are taken to support what they call the two dogmas about shame: its alleged social nature and its morally dubious character. Their analysis is conducted against the backdrop of a novel account of shame and ultimately leads to the rejection of these two dogmas. On this account, shame involves a specific form of negative evaluation that the subject takes towards herself: a verdict of incapacity with regard to values to which she is attached. One central virtue of the account resides in the subtle manner it clarifies the ways in which the subject's identity is at stake in shame, thus shedding light on many aspects of this complex emotion and allowing for a sophisticated understanding of its moral significance. This philosophical account of shame engages with all the current debates on shame as they are conducted within disciplines as varied as ethics, moral, experimental, developmental and evolutionary psychology, anthropology, legal studies, feminist studies, politics and public policy.