If you are a regular viewer of the podcast, it is probably obvious that I don’t like to think about the physiology and neurochemistry of feelings and states, whereas Lorenzo likes that angle. The reason why I don't like it is because it feels dehumanizing and it is contrary to the way I live my life. If you can use drugs or whatever to induce those feelings and states, it wouldn’t be the same for me. It wouldn’t be appealing without the actual experiences.
Without watching the sunrise, seeing the Brazilian fans cry after Germany destroy them in the beautiful game, or whatever real experience, I don't want to feel like life is beautiful. Strong feelings do not mean anything to me and are not desirable when I can't attach an experience to them. Moreover, as I have talked about in "how I experience things emotionally", it can't just be any experience either. I think having certain feelings be triggered by certain experiences is bullshit. It just seems like there is no reason nor any benefit to feel that way from that experience. In fact, from thinking this way, I eventually stopped myself from feeling those emotions and getting into those states from those experiences. As an example of specific emotions and specific experiences, what I talked about with how I was as a child showcases how I saw anger as a bullshit emotion and saw no point in getting bothered by other people's opinions and behaviours, then I ultimately stopped getting angry and became unbothered by all those different things that are out of my control (I have thoughts/opinions/stances about many things but it would take something pretty special to actually bother me).
I don't care for feeling certain emotions at all. Other emotions require specific experiences or else they feel like bullshit - they feel pointless, meaningless, and undesirable. There isn't any strong feeling or state I would want without any experience attached. I feel content, indifferent, and fulfilled enough to live my life with the most basic aspects of my day-to-day life. For me, I would rather stick with that than feeling any strong "fantastic" feeling that is induced by chemicals. Understanding all of this, it probably makes sense why I think it is too reductive and dehumanizing to think about the physiology and neurochemistry of feelings and states.
As a sidenote, this is why I identify as a demisexual but also don't like the label. For me, it's not about sexuality or sex; it's just an extension of how I experience the world, how my emotions work in general, and how my fulfillment is driven. I don't get enough out of sex to want to have sex, if there isn't a deeper connection and all those strong emotions. I don't want to have sex with some girl, if other forms of intimacy, comfort, and attraction are not already established between us. It is the same idea as everything else I talked about in this blog post. No matter what it is, if it feels bullshit and meaningless, I don't see any appeal for it - I have no desire for it and I'm not gonna do it. I mean...just look at the simplest way to describe my decision making process.
Lastly, everything here relates to how I think it is important to see how biological and social factors might be influencing you, which aspects actually matter to you, and ultimately how/how much you want them to affect you. People like to argue about nature versus nurture and how much each factor plays. However, while it is definitely both, with how I think and live my life, it often feels like there is also a deeper essence to our consciousness and identity than either of those, or rather there is a more profound level of nature that we don't realize and certainly don't understand.