How Emotions Are Made: 8: A New View of Human Nature

Here are my notes on chapter 8 of the “How Emotions Are Made” by Lisa Feldman Barrett.

• Culture helps us to wire our brain. Our brain can wire to its physical and social environment.
• Our personal responsibility: Our brain is predictive not reactive
• You have choices about what you expose yourself to, what you learn which creates concepts that drive actions.
• It is your responsibility to learn concepts that steer you away from harmful actions.
• Constructed emotion theory is biologically informed and psychologically explained. It is evolution and culturally aware.
• Essentialism — A belief in essences a true reality or nature. Darwin’s theory of evolution debunks that theory. 13 years after he published his book he backtracked on emotions and essentialism. There has been misinformation about William James view on emotions. He actually wrote that each instance of emotion has a biological fingerprint not each emotion. There are several theories on emotions that are based in Essentialism.
• Induction — Efficient way for the brain to extend concept by ignoring variation
• Emotion words reinforce the fiction that the equivalences we create are objectively real in the world, waiting to be discovered.
• Limbic system is only part of brain anatomy not the home of emotions.
• Buddhism — Recast dharmas as human constructions dependent on concepts