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Is The Brain Functioning When We..........

rhinefire

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We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?
 
Of course animals scream. Listen when a cat catches a mouse or a bird. It's an automatic response to fear, and the brain is definitely working, just in a different pathway.
 
We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?

Pretty sure screaming is "Help me! Look out, death is here!" hindbrain leftovers.
 
We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?
Do people scream because they are afraid or they afraid because they scream? I dunno, it boggles the mind to think about....maybe this will help....


William James' bear

"Why do we run away if we notice that we are in danger? Because we are afraid of what will happen if we don't. This obvious answer to a seemingly trivial question has been the central concern of a century-old debate about the nature of our emotions.

It all began in 1884 when William James published an article titled "What Is an Emotion?"[29] The article appeared in a philosophy journal called Mind, as there were no psychology journals yet. It was important, not because it definitively answered the question it raised, but because of the way in which James phrased his response. He conceived of an emotion in terms of a sequence of events that starts with the occurrence of an arousing stimulus {the sympathetic nervous system or the parasympathetic nervous system}; and ends with a passionate feeling, a conscious emotional experience. A major goal of emotion research is still to elucidate this stimulus-to-feeling sequence—to figure out what processes come between the stimulus and the feeling.

James set out to answer his question by asking another: do we run from a bear because we are afraid or are we afraid because we run? He proposed that the obvious answer, that we run because we are afraid, was wrong, and instead argued that we are afraid because we run:
Our natural way of thinking about... emotions is that the mental perception of some fact excites the mental affection called emotion, and that this latter state of mind gives rise to the bodily expression. My thesis on the contrary is that the bodily changes follow directly the PERCEPTION of the exciting fact, and that our feeling of the same changes as they occur is the emotion (called 'feeling' by Damasio).

The essence of James's proposal was simple. It was premised on the fact that emotions are often accompanied by bodily responses (racing heart, tight stomach, sweaty palms, tense muscles, and so on; sympathetic nervous system) and that we can sense what is going on inside our body much the same as we can sense what is going on in the outside world. According to James, emotions feel different from other states of mind because they have these bodily responses that give rise to internal sensations, and different emotions feel different from one another because they are accompanied by different bodily responses and sensations. For example, when we see James's bear, we run away. During this act of escape, the body goes through a physiological upheaval: blood pressure rises, heart rate increases, pupils dilate, palms sweat, muscles contract in certain ways (evolutionary, innate defense mechanisms). Other kinds of emotional situations will result in different bodily upheavals. In each case, the physiological responses return to the brain in the form of bodily sensations, and the unique pattern of sensory feedback gives each emotion its unique quality. Fear feels different from anger or love because it has a different physiological signature {the parasympathetic nervous system for love}. The mental aspect of emotion, the feeling, is a slave to its physiology, not vice versa: we do not tremble because we are afraid or cry because we feel sad; we are afraid because we tremble and are sad because we cry.

William James - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
The mental aspect of emotion, the feeling, is a slave to its physiology, not vice versa: we do not tremble because we are afraid or cry because we feel sad; we are afraid because we tremble and are sad because we cry.

I disagree.

The fear response is an instinctive survival mechanism. The body's anatomical systems go into automatic mode and help us make instant fight-or-flight decisions. I can't find a list of all that happens to our bodies when we are in a state of fear, but, for instance, our blood vessels retract from the surface of our skin...blood routes to our body's core...adrenalin is released to give us a burst of surprising energy and strength...other hormones are sent rushing through one's body to amp up aggression. A scream is most often an involuntary response, in my opinion. A call for help, a warning to others. My common sense tells me it may be a kind of pressure valve that allows us to better channel the automatic anatomical responses we endure when in a state of extreme fear and help us have a slightly better chance of survival. We've got "fight, flight or freeze." "Freeze" is seldom the correct response for our species, so, auto-anatomically, our bodies are probably doing everything they can when we're in extreme fear to prevent that from happening. I think a scream is part of that.

*Maggie's common sense. No references included.* Ha!
 
I disagree.

The fear response is an instinctive survival mechanism. The body's anatomical systems go into automatic mode and help us make instant fight-or-flight decisions. I can't find a list of all that happens to our bodies when we are in a state of fear, but, for instance, our blood vessels retract from the surface of our skin...blood routes to our body's core...adrenalin is released to give us a burst of surprising energy and strength...other hormones are sent rushing through one's body to amp up aggression. A scream is most often an involuntary response, in my opinion. A call for help, a warning to others. My common sense tells me it may be a kind of pressure valve that allows us to better channel the automatic anatomical responses we endure when in a state of extreme fear and help us have a slightly better chance of survival. We've got "fight, flight or freeze." "Freeze" is seldom the correct response for our species, so, auto-anatomically, our bodies are probably doing everything they can when we're in extreme fear to prevent that from happening. I think a scream is part of that.

*Maggie's common sense. No references included.* Ha!
That was good, Maggie...I'm impressed. :)

I got a brain cramp trying to think about it. lol Everytime I tried to write it the way James said ( we are afraid because we run) it just didn't make sense to me. Let me try again....first the perception or sense of danger ie: hair raising, pupil dialates, sweaty palms, etc. and then we see what the danger is (its a bear) and then here's where I get confused....do we reason how to react by fight, flight or freeze and then the emotion of fear?...or do we feel fear first and then try to reason how to react to the danger? James says its the former instead of the later.
 
That was good, Maggie...I'm impressed. :)

I got a brain cramp trying to think about it. lol Everytime I tried to write it the way James said ( we are afraid because we run) it just didn't make sense to me. Let me try again....first the perception or sense of danger ie: hair raising, pupil dialates, sweaty palms, etc. and then we see what the danger is (its a bear) and then here's where I get confused....do we reason how to react by fight, flight or freeze and then the emotion of fear?...or do we feel fear first and then try to reason how to react to the danger? James says its the former instead of the later.

Thanks! I think we feel fear first. That's an automatic response. Warriors learn to control that first response and use it to their advantage. The rest of us? Scream like little girls. :rofl
 
We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?

I think the idea of 'scream if you're scared' is over-dramatized. I've been in a lot of traumas and near tragic situation, and screaming rarely happens.
 
We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?

Screams alert any other potential prey a predator is near by. As social animals, that is the purpose of screaming, it's an instinctive survival trait.
 
I disagree.

The fear response is an instinctive survival mechanism. The body's anatomical systems go into automatic mode and help us make instant fight-or-flight decisions. I can't find a list of all that happens to our bodies when we are in a state of fear, but, for instance, our blood vessels retract from the surface of our skin...blood routes to our body's core...adrenalin is released to give us a burst of surprising energy and strength...other hormones are sent rushing through one's body to amp up aggression. A scream is most often an involuntary response, in my opinion. A call for help, a warning to others. My common sense tells me it may be a kind of pressure valve that allows us to better channel the automatic anatomical responses we endure when in a state of extreme fear and help us have a slightly better chance of survival. We've got "fight, flight or freeze." "Freeze" is seldom the correct response for our species, so, auto-anatomically, our bodies are probably doing everything they can when we're in extreme fear to prevent that from happening. I think a scream is part of that.

*Maggie's common sense. No references included.* Ha!
Good Morning Maggie,
Good observations! part of the scream may be a leftover from when we were not at the top of the food chain.
A sudden loud noise, might startle the predator, and improve your odds of survival.
Of course it may also be, I may not survive, but the tribe may be eating lion tonight:mrgreen:.
 
Thanks! I think we feel fear first. That's an automatic response. Warriors learn to control that first response and use it to their advantage. The rest of us? Scream like little girls. :rofl

I agree, I think conditioning does have something to do with how one reacts. So emotion first, then react. I'm trying to remember how it feels when startled like when someone sneaks up behind....and it seems like the reaction comes first and then the scream and rush of andrenline happen simulataneously. Like jumping out of the chair and then a yelp or aaah. lol
 
We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?
The scream from being startled is an autonomic reflex, like pulling your hand away from a hot stove. It takes no conscious decision making. A reaction is more complicated because it requires the brain to assess the situation, weigh the options and make a conscious decision as to the best way to react to the stimuli. That takes time, usually between 200 and 600 milliseconds depending on the number of alternatives available.
 
We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?

my guess is that the scream is designed to notify other animals that there is danger, and to call for help.

when we hear someone scream, we instinctively look, assess the situation, and decide whether to aid or run. It happens in a split second because the program is hard wired.
 
Screams alert any other potential prey a predator is near by. As social animals, that is the purpose of screaming, it's an instinctive survival trait.

That sounds about right. I don't think anyone in a state of panic rationally decides that screaming is the best option. It's just an automatic reaction, like trying to catch yourself when you fall, or ducking when something is whizzing toward your head.

Cats, on the other hand, obviously scream so that we know that they're having sex while we're sleeping and just dreaming about it. It's a part of their superiority complex.
 
We see people scream. Is the brain without a solution at that split second point? We witness or experience, then realize something is not right, then scream. What is that? When the screaming is over then the brain tells us what to start doing, like run away or call the cops or whatever but for a few seconds there is only screaming. Is screaming like joy or elation or other emotions? Is screaming an emotion or a total loss of reason? Why scream then react, why not just react? Do animals scream?

Screaming is a stimulus response to danger or fear, back in the days of the cave man which your brain still basically thinks you're living, a reaction to scream without a conscious thought especially if you're "paralyzed with fear" may save your life if it scares off say an animal that frightening you or lets your friends know that you're in trouble.
 
You have all read testimonies of people so scared they could not move ie., "paralyzed" with fear. I will guess when that happens there is little screaming since the entire body locks up in fear. I don't know that to be a fact but... A couple months ago I had a dream where I did exactly that-froze in fear because something was coming at me. I cannot recall freezing in fear in real life but that dream will stay with me a very long time. I believe fear causes enzymes to release causing a weird taste in our mouths. I think a good question here is what is your greatest fear? Mine I think is the unknown. There was a plane incident yesterday Oct. 16,2013 where one engine exploded in flight and filled the cabin with smoke somewhere over Texas but the plane landed safely. The news said the reactions were varied from screaming, praying, while some remained calm and some calling home to say goodbye.
 
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