Nature

I have personally observed that compared to all other life forms on this planet, humans are emotional, that is, they allow themselves to be governed by emotion before reason.

Plants and animals I believe are rational first before they are emotional. I have observed that no normal dog will attack you unless you provoke it.

However, I have seen people on TV and in the movies who were so emotional that they brutally committed crimes just because they liked doing it. Some criminals featured in the news and in films do all other sorts of evil things like torturing others not even for revenge but for the sake of fun. Yes, animals may kill but I am not sure if they would do so for entertainment.

On a more positive note, I have seen people on TV sacrifice even their very lives just to save someone they didnt even know or humans who would do the most ridiculous things just for the sake of a seemingly impossible relationship that they would desperately hold on to. And in all these acts, either their reasons were too personal, illogical or purely emotional. Some did not even have any reason for their acts.

Based on the above observations, I have come up with the following hypothesis That with the exception of those with abnormal physiology and psychological make-up, all humans, I strongly believe, are emotional, that is, they tend to do certain things regardless of whether the reason behind it is logical or not, or even whether there is a clear reason or not. It seems to me that humans do not do things primarily because they have a reason to but because they want to. Simply speaking, I think that humans are emotional first and only rational second. This, I believe, is the most distinct quality of humans in contrast with other creatures.

This hypothesis will be tested using information available on the Internet as well as using results from personal interviews.


Part Two
Based on the results of my research on the Internet, one of the most striking of my findings is the fact that most people are either torn between being rational or not, or simply cannot admit that that they are emotional that is why, even after sharing an emotional experience, they admit they can be both emotional and rational at times.

The article Our Brains and Decision-Making Emotional or Rational by Patti Krakoff clearly emphasizes the fact that the more ancient dog brain is activated as well as the executive brain and that the dog brain can just as easily win the debate even when logic should win out (Krakoff, 2006). Most sites have a similar opinion to this, with opinions that usually start with It depends on the situation.
However, it is interesting to note that the entry of a certain ez80227 in a yahoo blog states that humans are not emotional except the young ones (ez80227, 2010), which implies the age factor in determining whether a person is emotional or not. The blogger further states that older ones stop and think once in a while. This is slightly different from the other findings that base rationality and emotionality on external circumstances rather than on an intrinsic quality like age.
Most articles I have found on the Internet support my hypothesis and one of these articles worth mentioning is Humans are emotional creatures written by Elliot Lee. He says in his article that each and every thought and action is dependent on the mood, emotional state, and current disposition of all the people involved and though it is much more comforting to me to think that things can be perfectly logicalthats simply not the case at all. At all. Really, people make decisions based on their moods, and their moods change wildly and irrationally (Lee, 2006).


Part Three

The next test of my hypothesis involves an interview with randomly selected people to answer the same question that was answered in Part One. Their answers were varied and only one answer implied that humans were emotional.

My friend Ann, 23 years old, single and a Law student, said that humans possess well-developed cognitive abilities as shown by their refined culture and spoken language. There seems to be no connection between Ann and her neutral, unbiased answer to the question. This neutrality may still be due to the fact that, as far as I know, she answered the question during her free time when she was not under any kind of pressure. The neutrality of the question may also be due to Anns logical, rational character as a law student.

My mother Tess, 61 years old, widow and a member of a religious organization, said that humans are the only beings with a soul and the only ones created in the image of God. Obviously my mother gave an answer which is conveniently parallel to her own ideas and religious beliefs.

My co-worker Roma, 24 years old, single and has just broken up with her boyfriend, said that humans are the only creatures capable of hurting another for the sake of entertainment. Her answer seems to appear resentful and this may have been due to the recent breakup.

My hypothesis that The biggest difference between humans and other creatures is that humans are emotional creatures first before they are rational creatures was tested. The findings yielded slightly confusing results that cannot exactly confirm whether the tendency of humans to be emotional first is true or not. Most articles and blog entries support a neutral view between emotionality and rationality. On the other hand, the interviews yielded varied results. Hence this hypothesis remains inconclusive.
One particular observation, however, is that the opinions of people in the blog entries as well as in the interview seem to have a direct bearing to their personal circumstances. This, I believe, is seeing the question at hand in light of their own personal views and not necessarily based on objective observation. I therefore personally think that the emotionality of humans is innate and unconscious and that (allow me to use this pronoun) we do not even realize that we are already being emotional in simply answering the question asked in Part One.