0.8 Mental processes and cognition

What are the significant mental processes? That question is basically asking how the mind works. The mind thinks in various different ways, and it feels in complex ways also.

Humans have different ways of thinking about things – there are ways of framing something from a different emotional or objective perspective. An objective perspective could be an intellectual viewpoint, however, emotions could also be intellectual (combining viewpoints with non-biased information and biased information).

Emotions are basically feelings – emotions are theoretically the basis for feelings, when someone is motivated to do something – then that comes from an emotion, which is a strong feeling. Feelings are shallow because they are more sensory, however when someone feels strongly that should be labeled as an emotion. So I could simply define an emotion as 'any strong feeling'. That is why emotions are the base of human behavior, and feelings are shallow, sensory and stimulation is also a type of feeling.

Humans aren't motivated to do things because of shallow, sensory feelings. That is why emotions motivate people and make them feel more strongly. People don't feel everything deeply – there are an infinite number of feelings, however there are only a few defined emotions. Feelings are how we feel things; while emotions are also how humans feel – they also are more complex because they are deeper than feelings and require more resources for the mind to process.

Feelings and emotions also relate to the other cognitive functions.

Such as the regulation of emotion through the modification of attention, which is a significant mental process.

Humans can change their attention, and what they are paying to - depending on what they are paying attention to and how much and what kind of attention they are giving - their emotions are going to fluctuate accordingly.

What are the different types of attention? Emotions could theoretically tilt someones attention in certain ways.

Attention relates to the different cognitive abilities.

Attention, memory, emotional processes, thinking, and arousal (which is more physiological) are the main ways in which human minds perform. Emotional processes and arousal evokes feelings, while attention, memory and thought are cognitive.

1. Life and Subjectivity

Life is subjective – everything is dependent on human feelings, they determine our perceptions and our emotions, and how everything works. Life is basically just feelings interacting with each other, or is it an intellectual understanding that comes from the experience of life? This is obvious is you look at lesser animals like dogs, who basically just feel and are obviously very emotional or feeling-based. Humans intellectualize their feelings and that is why they are human.

Feelings comprise life – what makes feelings complex? Different objects alone wouldn't seem to be very complicated or intellectual. It must be the emotions that make people intellectual such as love, disgust, contempt, anger, sadness, surprise, and joy. Those emotions come from very complex feelings and understandings. The 'understandings' are basically of other things in life that also comprise feelings.