In your opinion, to what extent can emotion be a way of knowing anything?

Question:This sounds like it's from a ToK class.

I think that emotion is a way of knowing, sometimes. And sometimes it is an effect of knowing. I mean, think of mood swings. You can feel absolutely terrible, or incredibly angry, without understanding why. You just know that something made you are sad, or angry. Sometimes (teenagers - usually) you can just feel something for no reason at all, let alone understanding why you feel it.

Then of course, there is the gaining of knowledge, which then plays on your emotions.

So, I think emotion is a way of knowing something, but probably not the most important or largest way.

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: This sounds like it's from a ToK class.

I think that emotion is a way of knowing, sometimes. And sometimes it is an effect of knowing. I mean, think of mood swings. You can feel absolutely terrible, or incredibly angry, without understanding why. You just know that something made you are sad, or angry. Sometimes (teenagers - usually) you can just feel something for no reason at all, let alone understanding why you feel it.

Then of course, there is the gaining of knowledge, which then plays on your emotions.

So, I think emotion is a way of knowing something, but probably not the most important or largest way.

none at all. Emotion is an effect of knowing, not a cause

'knowing' is what you do with your brain.
'emotions' is what you feel with your feelings.

if you feel 'emotions' that make you think you 'know' something' you need 'proof' to make it stick.

Emotions can be very misleading. We get all emotional about something only to find out we misplaced our feelings. That if we had known more, we would not have got emotional about it.

In a relationship, if we don't invest emotions, we don't experience fully the relationship.
If we have a child and don't love it, we both miss out.

A person who is immature will face life more emotionally than intellectually. This is what gets them into "trouble" a lot. Life is subjective for them. It's always all about them. How the world relates to them. It is a narrow view.

We can evolve emotionally. We can test something like putting our toe in the water before we throw our whole heart into something.

"Passion and reason cannot exist side by side." ---I Ching

When we explore something emotionally we have stopped analysing it mentally and are experiencing it more personally and intimately.

By feeling emotions we are widening our scope on a situation. We are adding strength to our thoughts. And we are closer to manifesting that which we are emotional about.

When we create our own reality, we put some passion behind the thought and really really want it to manifest. That lends power to the thought. Thoughts, emotions, are energy. All is energy. If we have positive emotions, it goes a long way toward creating a reality we would like to live.