Abstract
Weak judgmentalism of emotions posits that emotions necessarily involve judgments. However, a standard critique of weak judgmentalism is that it cannot adequately account for the rationality of recalcitrant emotions, which persist despite the agent holding beliefs that conflict with them. This leads to the seemingly counter-intuitive conclusion that recalcitrant emotions are as irrational as logical mistakes. In response to this critique, I make two arguments. First, I distinguish between low-level and high-level beliefs, and argue that having two beliefs with contrary contents at different levels can be rational to some extent. Therefore, weak judgmentalism can explain why recalcitrant emotions are not as irrational as logical mistakes. Second, I argue that recalcitrant emotions involve mental conflicts, while normal emotions do not. By framing the issue in this way, weak judgmentalism can also explain why recalcitrant emotions are not as rational as normal emotions.
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Notes
Weak judgmentalism represents a weak version within the broader judgmentalism framework that closely associates emotions with judgments. Different from the strong version of judgmentalism, which regards an emotion exclusively as a judgment, the weak version recognizes a judgment as a necessary, but not the only, component of an emotion, thereby accommodating additional elements. In the following section, I will elaborate on the distinctions between these two versions in greater detail.
It needs to be noted that weak judgmentalism is distinct from another weakening strategy of judgmentalism, i.e., quasi-judgmentalism (or neo-judgmentalism). Quasi-judgmentalism regards emotions as an evaluative construe or assent, which falls short of fully-fledged evaluative judgment (e.g., Brady 2009; Helm 2015; Roberts 2003). It remains controversial whether quasi-judgmentalism can be categorized as a kind of judgmentalism, given that construes or assents might not be genuine kinds of judgments. In contrast, weak judgmentalism is obviously a genuine kind of judgmentalism.
Here is an example of implicit beliefs without explicit representation: you believe that 1 plus 1 is less than 3, and also that 1 plus 1 is less than 4, and also that 1 plus 1 is less than 5, and so on, for any number greater than 2 that one cares to name. There are countless such beliefs, but it is absurd to think that you have countless representations in the mind, so such beliefs do not have representation (cf., Schwitzgebel 2023).
Here is an example of implicit beliefs without conscious endorsement: people can harbor an unconscious bias against members of other races, which can have significant effects on their behavior, but which they consciously and sincerely disavow (cf., Schwitzgebel 2023).
D’Arms and Jacobson emphasize the distinction between the consideration of fittingness and the extraneous consideration. Unlike fittingness only caring about the objects of emotions, extraneous consideration includes some practical considerations, such as the considerations of morality or interest (D’Arms and Jacobson 2000, p. 80). For example, it is immoral to be amused by a cruel joke, so we have a moral reason to refuse the amusement although the joke is funny.
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Zhan, X. The rationality of recalcitrant emotions in weak judgmentalism. Mind Soc (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11299-024-00301-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11299-024-00301-0