no life decisions are happenings based solely on logic.

In more modern terms, rationality depends upon finding ways to resolve 'cognitive dissonance'.Ĭognitive dissonance experiments themselves seem to indicate that whatever behavior we exhibit that cannot be explained rationally to ourselves becomes part of our future reason, usually in the form of perceptual bias. In the end, just as we may avoid accidents by trusting our fear, other successful use of logic rests upon developing a trustworthy relationship with other emotions, often this emotional sensation of harmony. Effective fear that has served us appropriately seems equally 'right'. But we expect the same of our other emotions when we learn to fear the sound of an oncoming car but not to be afraid of the dark. We rely upon our emotional machinery to accommodate our experience and to come to give this signal of 'rightness' in the presence of appropriately logical deductions. If we cannot reach that point in some way, we do not find the action reasonable, whatever its source. We have a feeling of 'rightness' or 'clarity' when we accept our own deductions, which is, in itself, a physiological sensation that accompanies or predicts the mind's ease with the decision. Even when you are acting logically, that logic is mediated through an emotion.

We are biological entities, and we refer almost every aspect of our state of mind through our senses and emotions. In attempts to contrast reason with emotion, we are confusing the message with its medium. This is a false dichotomy which falls apart under a little introspection.

No life decisions are happenings based solely on logic.