239. Richard Firth-Godbehere — A Human History of Emotion: How the Way We Feel Built the World We Know

The Michael Shermer Show

Michael Shermer

Dialogue, Science, Reason, Michaelshermer, Natural Sciences, Skeptic

4.4 • 921 Ratings

🗓️ 4 January 2022

⏱️ 118 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We humans like to think of ourselves as rational creatures, who, as a species, have relied on calculation and intellect to survive. But many of the most important moments in our history had little to do with cold, hard facts and a lot to do with feelings. Events ranging from the origins of philosophy to the birth of the world’s major religions, the fall of Rome, the Scientific Revolution, and some of the bloodiest wars that humanity has ever experienced can’t be properly understood without understanding emotions.

Drawing on psychology, neuroscience, philosophy, art, and religious history, Richard Firth-Godbehere takes us on a fascinating and wide ranging tour of the central and often under-appreciated role emotions have played in human societies around the world and throughout history—from Ancient Greece to Gambia, Japan, the Ottoman Empire, the United States, and beyond.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the Michael Sherman Shower
0:19.4	Welcome to the Michael Sherman Show. I'm your host Michael Sherman. I have a really interesting guest today Richard Earth Godbe here. Yes, that's his name and he's got an interesting story about the origins of that name, Firth God be here.
0:28.6	Anyway, Richard is one of the world's leading experts on disgust and emotions. He is an
0:34.2	independent researcher and consultant in the history, language, science, and
0:38.4	philosophy of emotions, which is what his new book is about. It's called a human history of emotion.
0:45.0	How the way we feel built the world we know.
0:49.0	He is also an honorary research fellow at the Center for the History of the Emotions, Queen Mary University of London.
0:56.4	He received a first-class degree from the University of London during which time he won two awards for
1:01.8	academic excellence,
1:03.5	alongside a master's degree from the University of Cambridge
1:06.8	and a PhD from Queen Mary University of London,
1:11.4	where he was a welcome trust scholar.
1:14.0	The welcome trust is a well-known history of science, technology, and medicine center.
1:20.0	His award-winning interdisciplinary research walks the line between history, psychology, linguistics, and futurism.
1:28.0	He examines how understandings of emotions change over time and how these changes can influence the wider world.
1:35.6	So we get into talking about what are emotions exactly, how do they define, how are they different
1:41.0	from say feelings or desires say the difference between
1:45.0	lust and love as an example how the understanding of the emotions has changed
1:51.2	historically and culturally people felt differently in the past
1:54.4	than we do today. The nature and nurture of emotions which is more powerful, biology or culture,
2:00.3	and the answer is both are important and we look at how they interact.
2:05.0	Talk about Paul Ekman's research on universal emotional traits and how some of that has failed
	...

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