True to Our Feelings What Our Emotions Are Really Telling Us

by Solomon, Robert C.

• ISBN13: 9780195368536
• ISBN10: 0195368533
• eBook ISBN(s): 9780190451325
• Additional ISBN(s): 9780195306729
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-10-02
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• More Book Details

Summary

We live our lives through our emotions, writes Robert Solomon, and it is our emotions that give our lives meaning. What interests or fascinates us, who we love, what angers us, what moves us, what bores us--all of this defines us, gives us character, constitutes who we are. In True to Our Feelings , Solomon illuminates the rich life of the emotions--why we don't really understand them, what they really are, and how they make us human and give meaning to life. Solomon provides a guide to cutting-edge scientific research, as well as to what philosophers and psychologists have said on the subject, but he also emphasizes the personal and ethical character of our emotions. He shows that emotions are not something that happen to us, nor are they irrational in the literal sense--rather, they are judgments we make about the world, and they are strategies for living in it. Fear, anger, love, guilt, jealousy, compassion--they are all essential to our values, to living happily, healthily, and well.

Author Biography

The late Robert C. Solomon was Quincy Lee Centennial Professor of Business and Philosophy and Distinguished Teaching Professor at the University of Texas at Austin. A past president of the International Society for Research on Emotions, he was the author of more than forty books and did several video and audio "Superstar Teacher" courses for the Teaching Company.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
Acknowledgments	p. xi
Introduction	p. 1
Emotional Strategies: An Existentialist Perspective
Anger as a Way of Engaging the World	p. 13
Why It Is Good to Be Afraid	p. 29
Varieties of Fear and Anger: Emotions and Moods	p. 39
Lessons of Love (and Plato's Symposium)	p. 51
We Are Not Alone: Compassion and Sympathy	p. 63
Extremes of Emotion: Grief, Laughter, and Happiness	p. 72
Self-Reproach in Guilt, Shame, and Pride	p. 90
Nasty Emotions: Envy, Spite, Jealousy, Resentment, and Vengeance	p. 101
Toward a General Theory: Myths about Emotions
What an Emotion Theory Should Do	p. 117
Myth 1: Emotions Are Ineffable	p. 127
Myth 2: Emotions Are Feelings	p. 137
Myth 3: The Hydraulic Model	p. 142
Myth 4: Emotions Are "in" the Mind	p. 150
Myth 5: Emotions Are Stupid (They Have No Intelligence)	p. 159
Myth 6: Two Flavors of Emotion, Positive and Negative	p. 170
Myth 7: Emotions Are Irrational	p. 180
Myth 8: Emotions Happen to Us (They Are "Passions")	p. 190
The Ethics of Emotion: A Quest for Emotional Integrity
Emotions as Evaluative Judgments	p. 203
Emotions, Self, and Consciousness	p. 218
Emotional Experience ("Feelings")	p. 232
The Universality of Emotions: Evolution and the Human Condition	p. 245
Emotions Across Cultures	p. 252
Happiness, Spirituality, and Emotional Integrity	p. 263
Annotated Bibliography	p. 271
Index	p. 281
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