Who Needs Emotions? The Brain Meets the Robot

338 conclusions
Presumably, the fact that the annoyance is mild rests on cognitive
computations showing that the meeting is not urgent; this
mild reaction was further defused when it was found that the
meeting could be rescheduled prior to any pressing deadline.
2. On Wednesday, my secretary took the day off because her mother
was ill. When I heard the news that morning, I felt slightly frustrated
that some correspondence would be delayed, but equally
concerned for the mother’s health and had no question about the
appropriateness of my secretary’s action. The matter, having been
accepted, had—as far as the next few hours were concerned—no
further effect upon my mood.
Absence of secretary → realization of delayed work →
mild annoyance → mother’s ill health; absence is appropriate
→ concern for mother ; annoyance dissipated (2)
This diagrams the transition in emotions as serial, when it
was probably a parallel process in which annoyance and concern
were simultaneously activated. What seems to unite the
sequences in (1) and (2) is that the blocking of the performance
of a plan yields annoyance . What determines the intensity of
affect is a point to which I return in (5). What is important here
is that the emotional state can continue, coloring and modifying
a variety of cognitive states until it is in some way resolved.
The resolution in (1) can be put down to the formulation of an
alternative plan (a new appointment); the resolution in (2) is
more complex, accepting that circumstances require a delay.
The experience of concern is separate but helps to mitigate
the annoyance by offering an acceptable reason for this particular
change of plan. Moreover, I assumed my secretary would care
for her mother, so this concern dissipated in turn. 3
3. At midday, I was transiently and mildly upset by the cancellation
of a luncheon appointment.
Luncheon cancelled → mild disappointment → other activity →
disappointment dissipated (3)
Why disappointment and not annoyance? The former shades
toward resignation; the latter shades toward anger and the possibility
of impulsive action.
Why did this new cancellation not have the aggravative effect
of the second disappointment with N, to be recounted in
(5)? The notion is that an emotional state may be terminated