Читать книгу The Matter of Vision - Peter Wyeth - Страница 22

Emotion is the heart of the matter. The importance of Emotion is such that the proposition put forward is that the brain is Emotion. Emotion is created as a response to the body/brain system sensing a threat to Survival (however distant or indirect, it is always linked). Survival is the prime engine of Evolution. Vision evolved as the most efficient medium for the identification of threats to survival. Emotion is a matter of survival.

Emotion has entered the paradigm of scientific method, a change so substantial as to constitute a New Scientific Method with Reason finally holding hands with Emotion. In neuroscience and evolutionary biology, Emotion has come to the fore, and together these three elements constitute the approach outlined here: Affective Neurobiology.

In contrast to the emphasis on the affective, cognitive approaches are in thrall to the word. Cognition is predicated upon thought. Thought is conceived as occurring mainly within Language. The proposition here is that thought does not occur in Language, but in Vision, and indeed only in Vision.⁴⁷ Apprehension of the Matter of Vision is only possible through Emotion – the affective. Affective Neurobiology starts from the perspective of Emotion and traces its operations through neuroscience and biology, through the operations of the brain and evolution, seen as inextricably linked, working hand-in-hand.⁴⁸