Today, you are a member of… A Beard and A Bear
William James, that great bearded gadfly of philosophy, psychology, and pragmatism, in one of his myriad acts of using free will to believe his will was free, trained a scholarly eye on emotion and asked: Upon meeting a bear, do we run because we are afraid or are we afraid because we run? Mr. James held firmly to the latter, that our emotion of fear is not innate, rather it is triggered by the act of running. This week Members, no matter what particular philosophical squeal vs. sweat matrix you find yourself in, remember this: it has nothing to do with the bear.
