What is an emotion? What is the point of emotion?

Question:The other night, I was listening to a beautiful song that struck a chord in me, and I started crying onto my pillowcase; and a thought hit me. There is no reason, no purpose, no real use for this emotion, there is no outlet; has anyone else felt similarly? What do you think an emotion is?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: The other night, I was listening to a beautiful song that struck a chord in me, and I started crying onto my pillowcase; and a thought hit me. There is no reason, no purpose, no real use for this emotion, there is no outlet; has anyone else felt similarly? What do you think an emotion is?

This is how I understand emotions.

Purpose of emotions is what meanings we willingly associate them with internal conditions of our bodies. Emotions are subjected to our instincts, experiences and preferences in life. Literally, emotions are generated by a hormone sub-system and converted to feelings within our bodies.

In a deeper sense, emotions are the subconscious evaluations of ourselves as related to this world -- the environment we live in. Emotions are self diagnostics.

An analogy would be like having two eyes to see two slightly different pictures. Commonalities and differences discovered in the two pictures would give us a more vivid understanding of our visual world.

Feelings as generated by emotions, form the basis of mental images we use to understand and to compare with our rational experiences. The final product is another dimension of how things are to the subjective minds.

human

emotion is a portal of expressing ourselves. without emotion, we would all be depressed.

I'd like to know. Somewhere in our long history they must have served a purpose. Let me know if you find out. Thank ahead.

I believe that the point of emotion is to keep our life dynamic and beautiful.
have you ever watch the movie 'equilibrium'? everything is stiff and ugly when we have no emotion.

This is common misconception about emotion look into neuroscience for the purpose of emotion, it is backed up with hard data not just speculation.
Emotion is basically different chemicals being processed by your brain, if the intention of the song was to communicate the artists own emotions by creating art that helped you to realize that emotion than you could say that the reason you cried was because the artist effectively communicated that emotion and it resulted in you experiencing it. If this is done intentionally then it is communication.
Communication is not useless, nor is art useless as a form of communication even if it is just communicating an emotion that you see no use for.

An emotion is energy-motion.

"Emotions," Marilyn Barrick, Ph.D.

"Expecting Adam," Martha Beck, Ph.D.

http://www.heartmath.org notes research that finds emotions, love, is a healthy director.

http://www.lolyoga.com