Shouldn't action that gives you pleasure have a rational reason for giving you pleasure?
Doesn't the fact that an action gives you pleasure, regardless of what it is, make it rational for you to pursue it? Assuming that it won't harm you in some other way. Reason and emotion are two distinct things, but it seems that the purpose of reason is to determine which actions best promote self-interest by creating the most pleasure. Pursuing a pleasurable outcome would only be irrational if some harm was going to come from it that would outweigh the happiness gained. Rational self-interest.
or feeling pleased, content, happy when it's sunny out
At least this makes some sense. Feeling happy in this case has a rational cause, the physical pleasure from radiation.
What causes are irrational? I assume the people who have said they experience some positive reaction from opening doors for people do so because it makes them feel appreciated or helpful or any number of other things. Is feeling appreciated an irrational cause for happiness?
Isn't pleasure the ultimate end in any life, with many different ways of being gained?
Yes, but shouldn't these many ways have a reason for giving you pleasure?
Yes. All actions are just means to an end, though. It's the end that gives pleasure. Probably the ultimate end is pleasure itself, but the secondary end would be something else. Feeling needed, or whatever. The goal isn't to open doors, it's to experience whatever feeling you get when you open the door.
I don't believe he would consider feeling sad when someone you love is in pain/dead/etc. is an irrational use of emotions. I think he's saying something more along the lines of your happiness because it's a pretty day is irrational.
Actually, it's the opposite. Feeling happy is at least conducive to productivity.
Feeling sad does not make any sense. Things don't get better because you grieve.
I don't think emotions are irrational in themselves.
It depends on which way you are using the term irrational.
It can mean either it doesn't even try to be logical, or it tries and fails.
I thought you were using irrational to mean that it tries and fails to be logical. In writing this I think I've decided that emotions can be irrational (not logical), if they fail to be in the best interest of the person experiencing them. Sadness would an irrational emotion in this sense, but it's not as cut and dry as that. The human mind is complex, and when attachments are formed it's natural to experience a feeling of loss when they're gone. A grieving process when someone close dies is considered so important because to ignore it undermines a natural healing process. For example, the death or loss of a parent in young life appears repeatedly in literature on depression as a trauma sometimes likely to create irreversible emotional turmoil due to incomplete mourning. In such a case, letting yourself feel sad and mourn would be most likely to promote the overall longevity of happiness. So sadness wouldn't always be irrational either. Although it certainly could be.
I ramble and repeat because I went one by one.
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Topic: Holding Doors Open (Read 14855 times)