Let’s say you contract some dread disease of the brain. Let’s call it cerebral measles, or CM. Left untreated, CM is invariably fatal, and though the progression from infection to death takes only about two days, those are two days of agonizing, bone-crunching pain.
All is not lost, though. There is a cure, which works in well over 99% of all reported cases. It involves a drug regimen that attacks the microbe behind CM, and said regimen must begin before the bone-crunching pain starts. However, every single person who has taken the drugs in question discovered that all their prior emotional connections were destroyed afterwards. No matter how passionately they loved their spouses, their children, their friends, or their pets, they come out the other side utterly indifferent to them. This happens in EVERY case in which the patient survives. Moreover, about ninety percent of the time, the patients are never again able to form new emotional attachments, of any sort. The others are able to form superficial attachments afterwards, but none ever succeed in rekindling their prior feelings for spouses, children, and so forth.
Now you’re one of the lucky ones. You know exactly when you were exposed, and you learn about it before in time to take the drugs, which are available. Your doctor tells you the pros and cons of the treatment and offers you two options. One is the above-described regiment; the other is a chemically-induced coma to spare you the pain.
Which do you choose, why? And, for bonus points–if your spouse or child were making the choice, which decision would you want them to make, and why?
I forgot to mention, but the curative cocktail causes Vulcans to burst into flame, and they can only avoid that by having gay sex with the captain of the Enterprise.
Give my family the cure, as well, if they’ve got the disease.
From a biological standpoint, my emotional connections aren’t beneficial (nor are my families), and my genes stand a far greater chance of being passed on if I and my family survives.
From an emotional standpoint, better we all survive to be happy another day than to die.
From a societal standpoint, we’re all better off alive, and productive if a little lonely, than dead.
Sign me up for the treatment. Dead v. emotionally dead, I’ll pick emotionally dead- at least I can do something with my time, and presumably enjoy the beauty of mathematics.
Do I get no pleasure, or just no emotional attachment?
Yes, but that’s because you’re capable of emotional connections. If you were incapable your incapacity would mean you wouldn’t be unhappy about it. It’s like Commander Data being sad because he doesn’t have emotions. Not having emotions makes him a Sad Panda. Except of course it doesn’t, because he doesn’t have emotions.
I would argue that Data does, in fact, have emotions (even pre-Emotion Chip), but is self-deceived about that fact. But that’s a CS thread.
But you rather hit the nail on the head as to why I would choose death. I wouldn’t want to live that life; nor would I want to choose to stop loving my family. I’d rather die loving them.
Also, what Harmonious Discord wrote about sociopathy.
You just described the worse type of death, a fate worse then Hell, a state that is called ‘outer darkness’, it is a horrible horrible state beyond description, while still alive in the body it is painfully lonely where one is crying out for the pain of emotional isolation to end, outside the body (after death) is it a lone soul in a totally empty, dark, cold universe crying out of loneliness.
I think the thing to do here is take the cure. Even if emotional ties are severed, duty and honor can replace them to a certain extent. If I were to wake up tomorrow no longer loving my family members, I would still have certain duties to them that must be honored. If I no longer feel friendship, those affected are still people I know who share some common interest with me, and generally known for not pissing me off, so it’s not like I can’t hang out with them anymore.
You ask the toughest questions! I only have a couple of serious emotional attachments and have already thought it through.
I would choose to die rather than lose the emotional bond with my son. Also living the rest of my life without forming attachments of value is not attractive to me. This reminds me of Alzheimers disease. That isn’t living to me.
I don’t think so. You may not still love your spouse, but it doesn’t seem to mean that you won’t feel sympathy for someone being hurt.
As for me, I’d go for it. I’ve never been much for such attachments to people; and the few people who I had such attachments for are almost all dead, or far enough away I’m unlikely to ever meet them again. And I don’t think my emotional attachments to other people are as strong as that of most people anyway.
I’m in; pass me that cure. Lack of emotional attachment is very freeing. However if this makes me forget why I do not like certain people then I will need to leave myself a note.