Emoções e valores: uma abordagem sentimentalista

Abstract

In this paper, a qualified sentimentalist thesis is put forward to explain the relation between emotion and value, in special the acquisition of concepts and evaluative competences. This thesis advocates, on the one hand, that feelings are the essential elements for the characterization of emotions and, on the other hand, that values should be understood by reference to emotions. Two objections are considered: the circularity and the recalcitrance objections. To answer these, the idea that feelings can have intentional objects will be defended, along with the idea that evaluative concepts are higher-order concepts about adequacy conditions of evaluative emotional experiences. As for the recalcitrance objection specifically, we will argue that the sentimentalist thesis is in a better position than its main rival, the judgmentalist thesis. Lastly, we will show how the sentimentalist can explain levels of complexity among emotions and values. The final result is an attempt to show how a sentimentalist thesis may be coherent about the relation between emotion and value.