ANSWERS: 4
  • Evolution does not act on "purpose." It is teleologically better to look at the function of something that evolved rather than a purpose behind it appearing, though the function served can maybe be thought of as a "reason" why that trait stayed around. Emotions affect the response of the individual, generally moving it away from bad things and toward good things (like females).
  • Some fundamentalists argue that emotion plays a large role in human evolution. Their argument states that mothers who are more in tune with their children were better able to care for them - thus the families with more loving relationships had children that survived longer. This also applied to fathers - they argue that fathers who felt more pride in their families were able to provide more sustenance. The well nouriched children lived longer and passed on their traits to their children.
  • Every emotion evolved for a different purpose. About half of the emotions encourage you to reproduce, such as infatuation and love. The other half evolved to encourage you to help your group, such as compassion or pride. The evolutionary purpose of each emotion is identified in The Origin of Emotions. The first 18 chapters of this book can be read online at www.theoriginofemotions.com
  • I'd say emotions are the most primal form of communication between humans. Anyone can look at the face of someone experiencing happiness, sadness, anger, or love and instantly feel what they are feeling. Scientists have even found neurons in our brains, aptly called "mirror neurons", which fire whenever a human face displaying emotion is seen. These provide the empathy which links all of us together :)

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