Humans with no emotions

reply to post by oozyism


I think emotions are there as a safeguard in some cirumstances.

If you want to know what it is like not having emotions, take a look at a man called Harry S Truman.

Only without emotions could you make a decision to drop a Nuclear Bomb on innocent people. Some scientists at the time did not even expect the reaction to stop and were afraid he could destroy the entire planet but being such a noble man as he was he went ahead anyway.



(Warning - disturbing footage of hiroshima aftermath)

What a nice guy (sarcasm)

Revenge is a powerful thing and its easy to think that people forget the past, what makes anyone doubt that whats happening to the US now was never a revenge tactic? Sadly its always the innocent people that suffer for the minions that rule the world.

Without emotions we are nothing more than devious minions.

A lot of people lack emotion these days, thats the worry I have.

Interesting topic.



[edit on 7-10-2009 by XXXN3O]

reply to post by GypsK


Taste and pain can be called emotions in themselves depending on how you define them; they’re called homeostatic emotions.

But to find something pleasant or not, to taste something and determine that you like it does involve emotions regardless of your definition (within reason of course!). You can’t say that you can like something without having emotions.

experiences can tell you this. rational thinking can tell you this....

You can’t rationalise that you like the taste of chicken, you can determine that it isn’t going to harm you but that has nothing to do with liking it. You can also determine that you’ve like chicken in the past but that still involves evoking a prior emotional response.

As for mothers and their newborns I’d like to see the study that shows that the number that don’t quickly show an emotional response is as significant as you suggest.

Emotions are critical survival tools - at times we need to overcome them so that we can make the best choice. For example if you are affcraid of fire, but you know you have to run through a burning room to escape.

Personally - I like to cultivate my emotions and instincts - I think they are pro survival, and their power should be exploited. Sometimes displaying them can cause a negative result, so while cultivating their power - some abuility to mask them is essential.

reply to post by oozyism


I remember when I first sat in front of a computer, a ZX spectrum back in the mid eighties. The very first thing I typed was ‘Do you love?’ I knew nothing about computers at the time other than what I could see from science fiction movies and series like Blake seven so I had seriously anticipated a reasoned response (the innocence of childhood lol). I had seen the film “war games” where a supercomputer asked a boy if he would prefer to play chess rather than play the game of thermonuclear war. The teen on the other ZX spectrum had typed ‘LAUNCH MISSILES’ (obviously he had seen the same film).

I think that emotions can be a double edged sword. If we control our emotions long term we become stagnant and tend to find that we have withdrawn from society and yet if we give full vent to emotions we can end up in hospital or worse, in prison and I have ended up in both as it happens thanks to allowing my emotions to control my actions. Anger and rage and hate, love compassion and empathy. Those are the things that to my mind are a double edged sword and if the correct balances between the two sides of the coin so to speak are not held within check then we have nothing but turmoil of thought. Perhaps that is the true nature and a real curse for those with bi polar disorder.

It is a sad thing that emotion must be kept in kept in check either by discipline, peer pressure or sadly in many cases via the implementation of medication. I say a sad thing because I suspect that the higher emotions like love and compassion are the emotions that may be the key to furthering our species to the point where we may achieve some sort of consciousness shift or evolution of mind. One thing I am more certain of is the more base emotions that have our species engaged in warfare and violent crime are the emotions of degeneration and left unchecked could end with an enraged or unenlightened finger pressing the button of some sort of WMD.

It could be said and quite accurately that positive emotion within a certain context is a boon but it is moreover also curse because a person filled with “good vibrations” so to speak can become vulnerable to being manipulated by those who are damaged by the past, have little regard for compassion or are from a social environment where the higher emotions are seen as weakness, and thus are sometimes compelled to serve their more base needs.

Such a paradox the chemical reaction called emotion but as to living without it?

Without emotion I find it difficult to see how we could see the beauty in anything and for me I envision a world without emotion to be an utterly material world, a place of objects where the most important thing would be what can make one’s life easier so that energy is not wasted pointlessly in achieving what it is one needs. There would be no want without emotion because what one wants is rarely what one needs. I go with the premise that need comes from a feeling that the thing one wants will make one feel better but this only works for a short time and this transitory chase called retail therapy for instance is where we are letting ourselves down?

Even finding love and being engaged in the oneness that is being with a soul mate would be totally subverted to being a simple impulse to find a suitable mate rather than a lover based on what is buried within a person’s character. What is what is buried within their genes? I.e. what can you offer my progeny, my genetic line?

We love for many reasons too numerous to write here but the main reason I think is because we find something within a person we connect to on an emotional level that is akin to something spiritual and is an all encompassing thing that fills us up and floods us with endorphins, thus making the world a magical place of great promise. Without emotion would we become relegated to a more sexually promiscuous life where we would be forever hunting for the perfect mate in the physically/genetic sense and never in the – emotional/spiritual?

Without love I doubt there would be an appreciation of the arts. Without anger and hate there would be no wars except those wars which are based purely on resources or a threat like one species of ant perceives another species of ant to be a threat and thus wages war for that reason.
If we were to become a true space faring race and reached for the stars without emotion we would be reaching for the stars with a mindset based solely on exploration and expansion for resources, destroying other races we might come across if we have dispassionately assessed that they may need or want the same resources we “need”. Thus I hope we keep but evolve our emotions and not become akin to an insect race of hive minded and soulless creatures that fail to see the real value of the universe around us.

I do not think we are robots but we are wondrous biological machines that are capable of such deep thought and emotions but within our minds we are maintaining a balance between rational thought and a dichotomy of intense emotion. We have a vast distance to go where our minds are concerned but I sincerely believe that the destination is worth it. Sadly I doubt I will see it in my lifetime but I live in hope.

Perhaps I can help?

My emotions are broken and I have very little empathy.
Any questions?

reply to post by lightchild


Have you had this professionally diagnosed?

If so do you know the cause of this condition?

No and No

But I do seem to have many of the symptoms of Aspergers