1. WOK: Emotions
10/17

2. Agenda New Seats! Refresh our minds on emotions
TED Talk – “The Price of Happiness”
What makes a good discussion
Discussion Questions
End Goal – To what extent can you trust your emotions as a WOK?

3. New Seats – 2nd Period
Jamie/Ha Nikah/Mariella Judah/Luz Fernando/Tejasvi Kenny/Justine Luis/John Jocelyn/Zinnari Lesley G/Rahima Vera/Marvin Antonio/Jerome DJ/Jackie Itzel/Cristian Lesley M/Riti/Naomi

4. New Seats – 3rd Period
Ganeeat/Lygia Gaby/Johanna Alasia/Bryam Ahnia/Adriana Alina/Adeel Yassine/Jesus Ashley/Jezreel Jayla/Daniel Jennifer/Dereck Hekima/Dylan Shawana/Myreanna Jeremy/Luis Alexa/Hira/Jessica

5. Emotions
Take a few minutes to look over your notes and reflections from last week.
Briefly talk over some of your answers with your new partners

6. Ted Talk “The Price of Happiness” – Benjamin Wallace
During the talk:
What are the implications of this talk?
What are some of the main ideas?
What are some text-self connections that you can make?

7. What makes a good discussion?
Respect
Be kind.
Quality
Add on to the discussion. Do not just state what you think, add on to what has been already said.
Ideas
Do not just read what you wrote and said to your partner. What is something interesting or IMPORTANT that you can add to enhance the discussion?

8. Discussion 1
Share out your main ideas and your reactions with your partner

9. Question 1
What are some current items that are not worth their price in our society?
WHY are they so popular or expensive?
WHO is paying up for these items?
WHY are they paying so much?
Do you secretly/not so secretly want the item? Why or why not?

10. Quote 1
“But what was unexpected…their brain actually registered as experienced more pleasure from the same wine when it was labeled with a higher price tag”(Wallace).
What does this say about our society?
Is this a positive or negative piece of data?
How does it apply to you/the people in your life?

11. Agenda Wrap up TED Talk discussion
Continue on with emotion as a way of knowledge
Focus – Emotion as a an obstacle to knowledge
Agenda – To what extent can you trust the knowledge you gain using your emotions?

12. Question 2 To what extent can we control what makes us happy?
Can we control happiness?
Can we control other “positive” emotions – what makes us excited? Joyful? Loving?
Can we control “negative” emotions – what makes us scared? Nervous? Fearful?
Make sure you reference the TED Talk in your answer

13. Emotions as a way of knowing
Emotions as an obstacle to knowledge
Emotions as a source of knowledge
intuition

14. Obstacle to knowledge Perception Reason Language Emotional coloring
Blinded by love
Reason
Holding beliefs with too much passion can prevent being open-minded
Language
Slanted and emotive language

15. Obstacle to knowledge
To what extent do rival sports fans see and interpret what is happening on the field in accordance with their emotional prejudice?

16. Obstacle to knowledge Rationalizations
We tend to not reason in an objective way, but to rationalize our pre-existing prejudices
Emotional prejudice to immigrants:
Biased Perception – notices only lazy ones and overlooks hardworking ones
Fallacious Reasoning – hasty generalizations from limited experience
Emotive Language – “don’t know the meaning of hard work”

17. Obstacle to knowledge Irrational Behavior
Distort our beliefs and lead us to make poor decisions
Some emotions are urgent and short sighted – they can easily blind us to the long term consequences of our actions
The Stoics – ancient time philosophers
Believed in a state of mind “apathy”
Literally “without passion”

18. Question 1
What problems might there be with trying to be a good Stoic and striving to be apathetic?

19. Question 2
Under what emotional conditions do you think you are most likely to make an unbiased judgment about something? Explain with examples.
Neutral Mood?
What is that?
Good mood?
What emotions constitute a good mood?
Bad mood?
What emotions constitute a bad mood?

20. WOK: Emotions
10/24

21. Agenda Questions regarding emotion as a way of knowledge
Emotions as a source of knowledge
The relation between reason and emotion
Aristotle Reflection
End goal – To what extent can we trust our emotions when gaining new knowledge?

22. Question 1
What role do you think is usually played by reason and emotion when people decide which universities to apply to? What role do you think each of those SHOULD play?
Personal experience?
Observations in society?

23. Emotions as a source of knowledge
“Cold and emotional”
Spock – Lacking in emotions or in control of emotions?
Psychologist Antonio Damasio and his patient “Elliot”
Damasio speculates: Emotions help us to make rational decisions about things by narrowing down our options so that we can choose between a manageable number of them.
Reason alone = mental paralysis

24. Question 1 Can you ever feel literally nothing?
Can you ever think literally nothing?

25. Emotion and Reason
We tend to think of them as two different things, but in reality, they are closely related
Reason and emotion
Not “Either or”
“More or less”
A continuum
Emotions can be less rational

26. Emotion and Reason
An emotion that is sensitive to the real nature of a situation is more rational that one that is not
Angry that someone insulted you. You misunderstood them. Anger should vanish.
Aristotle
Emotions can be more or less rational
“Anyone can be angry – that is easy. But to be angry with the right person to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose and in the right way – that is not easy.”

28. Quote 1 “Happiness depends on ourselves” – Aristotle
To what extent do we control our happiness?
What outside influences affect our happiness?
Can others control our happiness? To what extent?
Is it easy or hard to control our happiness?

29. Agenda Continue on with Aristotle quotes
Emotion as a SOURCE of knowledge
Reflection – before intuition, is emotion more of a source or an obstacle?
End Goal – To what extent can you trust your emotions when gaining knowledge?

30. Quote 1
“The educated differ from the uneducated as much as the living from the dead.” –Aristotle
What does this quote mean? Do you agree with it?
What does it mean to be educated?
Are you educated? How do you know?

31. Question 1 Taking that Aristotle quote a step further..
To what extent can you trust someone who is in complete control of their emotions?
Is it better to “wear your heart on your sleeve”
Should you always conceal some emotions?
Does it matter where you are? Should the display of your emotions change if you are in public or private?
How do you know if you are in control of your emotions?

32. Aristotle Example
“Anyone can be angry – that is easy. But to be angry with the right person to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose and in the right way – that is not easy.”
Paul and Tom example
Tom is two minutes late. Paul starts screaming and shouting over Tom’s lack of consideration
Judy and John example
John is in a terrible car accident. Doctor calls Judy, she says, “That’s annoying. I wanted to play tennis today”

33. Aristotle A flaw in the emotion/reason continuum… Irrational fears?
Can you control fear and disgust?
The fear or disgust may not be rational, but can you control it or change it?

34. Question 1
According to statistics, you are more likely to die on the car ride to airport, than on a plane.
Is fear of flying an irrational fear?
How would you explain it?
What are some other common irrational fears in our society?
What can be some consequences to irrational fears?

35. Question 2
“If you are not horrified by genocide, then you have not understood it.”
Do you agree or disagree with this statement?
Does it follow that the more horrified you are by genocide, the better you understand it?
Could you be horrified by something and yet not really understand it at all?

36. Question 3 Think about your answers to the previous slide…
Is it possible to write an objective account of a genocide?
Think about 1994’s Rwanda genocide
What problems arise for someone who is trying to write that account?
Are there objective accounts of “horror” in history? Can we trust our historical text books on this one?