Abstract

The central question governing this project is "How do we account for variation among the emotional experiences of individuals, given that all normal humans start with the same basic neurophysiology?" In other words, how do genetic and non-genetic developmental factors interact to produce an emotional phenotype? The ultimate goal of my project is to explain how emotions reflect the unique development of individuals in accordance with, but not completely determined by, their emotional genotype. ;In this work, I explore what I believe is the intrinsic connection between the imagination and the emotions, drawing my conception of "imagination" primarily from Kant. I argue that there is a strong, positive, non-causal correlation between a rich, active imagination and a vital, complex emotional life. My purpose here is to identify the function of the imagination, and to locate the precise position that it occupies, in the process of having an emotion. ;I believe that the imagination is a polymorphic heritable trait which casts a long shadow over the emotional development process and largely accounts for variation among the emotional experiences of individuals. I argue that, as a heritable trait, the imagination is a developmental factor which is implicated in what Susan Oyama calls "constructivist interaction" between individuals and their environments. As a polymorphic trait, the interaction between individuals and their environments itself largely shapes the imagination. According to developmental systems theory , as articulated by Oyama and Paul Griffiths, this reciprocity occurs among most developmental factors, but I argue that its influence is most pronounced with regard to the imagination because I believe that the imagination exerts considerable influence over emotional development. I claim that the imagination is the mental faculty responsible for constructing the images which comprise perceptions, consciousness and, arguably, even mind. As such, since emotions are responses to perceived stimuli, I believe that to a greater or lesser extent, every emotion bears the imprint of the imagination