“In the modern world where computers are capable of calculating faster and more accurately than any person, we like to believe our emotions, not our analytic abilities, make us human." Those are the words of Boston University scholar Charles Lindholm. "Accordingly," Lindholm writes, " we say that people who are cerebral and unemotional are 'inhuman' and 'heartless.' We want our friends and lovers to be compassionate and ardent, not rational and calculating. For the same reason, our leaders never portray themselves as logically minded technocrats, but as empathetic individuals who 'feel our pain.'" But, if emotion is what makes us human, does the masking of emotion make one less human? What does it mean when a society's collective emotional response results in genocide? Are they less human, or more? NPR's Lynn Neary discusses these, and other questions with some of the greatest thinkers of our time. What are emotions and how do they shape our worldview?
Lynn talks with pioneering researcher Paul Ekman, PhD., about the definition of emotion and asks how we use emotions to express ourselves, how we disguise our emotions and how we read the emotions of others.
Lynn talks withUniversity of Chicago professor Martha Nussbaum about the history of philosophical thought on emotion, and how emotion, which is personally experienced, underpins the functions of culture and society.
Lynn talks with French political strategist Dominique Moisi and Duke University cultural historian William Reddy about the role of emotions in two of human history's most controversial events: the rise of Nazi Germany and the Palestinian/Israeli conflict
Emotion