Review of Lepine (2023)

We are now in the age of affectivism (Dukes et al. 2021): while emotions have long been contrasted with cognition, they are now seen as a central element of our rational life. Lepine (2023) joins this paradigm, arguing that emotions are cognitive states, a source of axiological knowledge, and even an essential component of values.

Lepine’s original contribution consists of an extremely cautious and impressive interweaving of psychological and philosophical discussions of emotions as well as of values. We may take from La nature des émotions a set of entangled statements: (i) emotions are cognitive states distinguished by their evaluative nature; (ii) they are sui generis psychological modes that focus our attention and prepare our body for action; (iii) they are evaluative since we can ascribe a correspondence between the emotion and the value instantiated by the emotion’s intentional object (i.e., correctness conditions); (iv) the correctness and justification conditions of emotions partially depend on the background motivations on which every emotion is based because (v) values depend on some non-evaluative properties of external objects as well as on the agents’ motivations. These different points fit together to form the most comprehensive introduction to emotions I’ve read since Deonna and Teroni’s The Emotions (2012). Let us examine how.

Chapter (1) outlines the so-called “naive features” of emotions: automaticity, valence, intentionality, direction of fit, cognitive and motivational bases, etc. Chapter (2) focuses on the opposition between emotion and cognition. The notion of cognition is discussed with reference to the debate between Zajonc (1984) and Lazarus and Folkman (1984). Lepine (2023) endorses the appraisal theory of emotions in psychology (Lazarus’ view), arguing that (i) emotions are cognitive states insofar as stimuli processing in emotions makes them available for semantic processing (p. 61), the evaluative nature of the processing being the mark of emotions in cognition (pp. 59–60).

Chapters (3) and (4) explore the evaluative nature of emotions. Lepine first wonders whether emotions constitute a natural kind. Chapter (3) sets out Griffiths’s (1997) well-known objections to the idea that emotions share essential properties, coupled with considerations coming from constructivist theories (e.g., Russell 2003). Lepine concludes, in line with the appraisal theory, that “emotions would indeed constitute a natural kind insofar as each of them shares the function of detecting a specific core relational theme” (p. 87; I translate all quotations).¹

Chapter (4) then explores philosophical theories of emotions to understand further the notion of a core relational theme. According to Lepine, this notion is analogous to what philosophers call “formal objects” (pp. 108–109). A dog, a steep cliff, losing my money in the stock market, and my Ph.D. supervisor are objects I mention when answering the question, What are you afraid of?—they are the intentional objects of my fear. What do they have in common (when my fear is appropriate)? They all instantiate the same evaluative property, being dangerous. Danger is, thus, the formal object of fear. How are formal objects connected to emotions? Lepine follows Deonna and Teroni’s (2012, 2015, 2024) attitudinal view of emotions, according to which (ii) emotions are sui generis psychological modes (i.e., they are reducible neither to judging nor to perceiving, and so on)² constituted by unified bodily feelings that prepare the subject for action—e.g., fear prepares me to flee. Most importantly, (iii) the content of emotions need not be evaluative; the evaluative nature of emotions lies in the fittingness relation between fear, shame, pride…, and the evaluative properties instantiated by the intentional object of these emotions. In other words, the content of my emotion doesn’t need to go beyond a non-evaluative representation of the intentional object—“the dog,” “the steep cliff,” etc.

Lepine illustrates this relationship by interpreting the attitudinal theory through Cummins’s (1996) analysis of psychological attitudes. Attitudes are characterized by their cognitive function;³ the attitude sets a target and processes its content in a way that is correct when the target is reached:

My emotion of fear implies an evaluation of the dog as dangerous: I apply to the content of my representation (the dog) a target (dangerousness). And this emotion is correct if it targets a state of affairs that fits with the mobilized representation, i.e., if dangerousness (the target) is indeed one of the properties of the represented dog (the content). (p. 134)

A refinement of the attitudinal theory is then developed to circumvent the common objection that emotions are not reducible to bodily feelings (Goldie 2000; Mitchell 2021). Lepine insists on the way emotions direct our attention on aspects of the intentional object and considers that, at least in the case of mild emotions, we need to focus on this rather than on bodily feelings (p. 139). He argues that attention is a necessary component as well, and sometimes more salient than the bodily component (p. 141, see also Deonna and Teroni 2015).

This elegant (and plausible!) refinement makes sense of the idea that bodily feelings are directed toward the external world—since they accompany and are calibrated by an attentional mechanism. In addition, just as Brady (2013), Lepine can explain how emotions, while not representing values in their content, lead us to focus on natural properties in the world that constitute the basis for an understanding of values (p. 143).

Chapter (5) focuses on the correctness conditions of emotions and, therefore, on what it means for an emotion to fit a value. In a new and stimulating way, Lepine contrasts an independentist view with a motivational view of correctness. According to the first view—attributed to Tappolet (2016) and D’Arms and Jacobson (2000)—correctness is determined solely by the natural properties instantiated by the intentional object of the emotion. For instance, my sense of humor is irrelevant to determining the correctness of my amusement at Julie’s joke; the only thing we need to consider is whether the joke is objectively funny. Lepine rejects this analysis and suggests that (iv) the correctness of emotions also depends on their congruence with our “background motivations”—i.e., desires, preferences, feelings, character traits…—as well as the coherence of these motivations, as we shall see later (p. 192).

There are psychological and axiological elements in Lepine’s view. On the psychological side, motivations are considered as a necessary base of emotions (p. 163, see also Baier 2004; Roberts 2003). On the axiological side, Lepine adopts (v) a form of (neo-)sentimentalism according to which values are understood in terms of appropriate emotions (p. 151)—e.g., injustice is what deserves indignation (Brentano 1902). Thus, if appropriate emotions underlie values, and if emotions are based on motivations, then (by transitivity) motivations underlie values (at least partially). This leads to a subjectivist view of values: it is only when \(x\)’s natural properties are prized by humans (or sentient creatures) that \(x\) deserves pro-attitude \(\mathrm{A}\) and thus is good.

Note that Lepine considers that motivations are themselves subject to correctness conditions: motivations are considered correct until proven otherwise, i.e., until they contradict our experience, higher-order beliefs, or (social, prudential, moral…) norms (p. 180). It is thus difficult to possess racist motivations without encountering contradictions (p. 182). Motivationalism is thus a naturalist view on value that occupies a middle ground between “raw” subjectivism and naïve realism.

Finally, in chapter (6), Lepine argues that the justification of emotions is also impacted by motivations. The independentist argues that emotions are justified when we can mention natural properties on which the corresponding value may supervene (“Why am I afraid of that dog? Did you see its teeth, its bloodshot eyes, its lowered tail?!”). The motivationalist replies that subjective motivations also play a justificatory role—as we shall see later.

In the very last section of La nature des émotions, Lepine attempts to demonstrate that emotions, despite their subjective nature, are a trustworthy tool for evaluative judgment (p. 224). Contrary to the idea that emotions are prone to many “false positives” (see Goffin 2023), Lepine argues that even when we “confabulate” to justify our (inappropriate) emotions, these confabulations are relatively plausible (p. 218) and should not prevent us from trusting our emotions most of the time (p. 224).

Considering the author’s clear view on emotions and values, I may suggest only a few challenges aimed at extending the discussion he proposed.

Among these challenges, we might mention that Lepine does not substantiate his parallel between core relational themes and formal objects. Yet, as Teroni (2023) points out, psychologists have a hard time reconciling the core relational theme or “molar value” (such as injustice, dangerousness, sublime…) and the “molecular values” targeted by each appraisal check (such as relevance, urgency, power…). Since psychologists tend to subjectivize molecular values, this might confer an advantage to the motivational view, as long as the shifts between molecular value, molar value, and, finally, formal object are conceptually possible.

Another challenge concerns both psychological and axiological motivationalism. The two aspects seem inseparable in Lepine’s mind, and this, in my opinion, implies that adopting motivationalism carries a lot of presuppositions. For instance, we find very little argument against the realist approaches to values except the evocation of one aspect of the queerness of values (Mackie 1977): isn’t it odd that an “objective” property of the world (value) has motivating or normative power (pp. 169–170)? The motivational view dissolves this issue, but it is far from being the only solution (see Enoch 2011), and it comes with costs and concessions.

Consider the cost at the psychological level. A direct and acknowledged consequence of motivationalism is that there can be no such thing as emotional discoveries (p. 167, p. 173). Just as Sartre (1940) claimed that we can never discover anything with imagination other than what we’ve put into it, Lepine maintains that we never acquire new motivations by feeling an emotion. This is questionable. Consider Pablo being forced to attend opera—a musical genre he has no motivation to listen to. However, this time, he is touched; from now on, he is willing to come back every month and add opera playlists on Spotify. According to Lepine, Pablo’s emotion necessarily arises from a pre-existing motivational basis. At a certain degree of generality, this is indisputable: maybe Pablo has a preference or a desire for music (in general), beauty, or pleasant moments. Yet, this seems to miss the point raised by scholars acknowledging the possibility of emotional discoveries. If we work with a fine-grained notion of motivation, we seem to acquire new specific interests or re-evaluate (quite radically) states of affairs thanks to our emotions. The only replies available to Lepine are either to assume that emotions that are not based on pre-existing motivations are inappropriate (see p. 185, p. 222) or that the relevant specific motivations are unconscious (see p. 188). This is unfortunate considering that the latter is painfully ad hoc, whereas the former clashes with cases of “outlaw emotions” that seem fitting even though they contrast with our personality (Silva 2021). Now, if Lepine rejects the fine-grained approach, one might ask why congruence with background motivations should count as correctness conditions (p. 192): a condition that cannot be incorrect is incongruent with the common understanding of correctness conditions.

At the axiological level, the motivational approach is convincing when we consider personal values (see Rønnow-Rasmussen 2007). For instance, my disappointment at a friend’s betrayal may be justified by my twenty-year attachment to that friend (see Bell 2011). It is so because betrayal is the kind of value that depends on a relationship; it cannot be instantiated between two strangers. But when we consider impersonal values, motivationalism loses its panache. Epistemic values, for example, hardly seem to depend on our motivations. Invoking subjective motivation to justify an epistemic emotion comes across as odd—my astonishment at discovering a mathematical demonstration cannot be justified by my passion for Pythagoras. This provides a psychological explanation of the emotion (someone who does not share my passion for Pythagoras would not have been astonished), not a justification, which depends, e.g., on whether there are reasons to think that the proof is sound and noteworthy.

Lepine is aware that motivationalism blurs the justification/explanation contrast (p. 200) and might reply that impersonal values are based on interests shared by all mankind (see p. 174). I disagree because I think that impersonal values render the world better for human beings, even when they currently have no motivation to promote them. In the world depicted by the movie Idiocracy—where the planet’s most foolish inhabitants have reproduced in large numbers to the point of engendering a society with no culture or historical knowledge—nobody is motivated to acquire knowledge. I would not say, however, that knowledge has no value in this world. People are just wrong! You may say that they should be motivated by knowledge. Then, if knowledge possesses value not because people have motivations but because knowledge deserves to motivate them, we lose the motivationalist view on the way and go back to pure (neo-)sentimentalism.

Samuel Lepine’s monograph is subtitled “une introduction partisane”: it is introductory in the noblest and most exciting sense of the word; it offers an overview of affective topics in philosophy and psychology without detracting from the precision and complexity of the debates. Written in crystal-clear French (guarantee without any trace of Sorbonnian style!), La nature des émotions results in a conceptually plausible and empirically supported defense of the appraisal theory, the attitudinal view (re-visited), and the motivational view (introduced here).