Astinus

"because they happen" meaning have a cause based in reality. This causes this emotion. Seeing something big and scary running at you causes fear. Thinking of painful past memories causes a feeling of sadness. Et cetera.

EDIT: What I'm saying is that emotions are neither rational or irrational; they can't be assessed by any standard of rationality, because they merely exist. It's only voluntary actions/decisions that can be judged irrational/rational, because the latter chooses to use reason, whereas the former doesn't.

1olddog

Are we getting "reason" (justification) and "reasoning" (a thought process trying to get at the facts) mixed up?

Peter Kirby

Well, 1olddog, a page back I did put in the request that people be clear and up-front as to how they are using the words 'rationality' and 'irrationality'. When is something rational? When is something irrational? Nobody seems to have taken me up on it.

kind thoughts,
Peter Kirby

1olddog

doubtingt and Oxymoron,
your posts make a lot of sense to me. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

1olddog

Maybe no one knows, I certainly wouldn't dare to get into those tricky details with my lack of education.

Preno

No, reason means a specific human capability. You are simply abusing the ambiguity of the word "reason" in English.
Agreed.
No. What's happening is you mixing up "reason" (the human capability of logical thought) and "reason" (justification).