"The brain is a cognitive organ, and regions of the brain that traverse brain stem and cortical sites orchestrate the expression of bodily sensibility : intelligent action. Schulkin presents neuroscientific research demonstrating that thought is not on one side of the brain and bodily sensibility on the other; from a biological point of view, they are integrated. Schulkin further argues that this integration has important implications for judgments about the emotions, art and music, moral sensibilities, attraction and revulsion, and out perpetual inclination to explain ourselves and our surroundings. He begins the book by setting forth a view of the emotions not as a bodily burden to be borne but rather as a great source of information.

He then moves on to other domains, claiming that underlying the experience of aesthetics in at least some instances is the interplay between expectation and disappointment and suggesting that, among other things, repulsion and attraction to the cries and joys of others underlie moral responsiveness. This book should appeal to researchers in behavioral neuroscience, emotion, and psychophysiology, as well as cognitive and social psychologists and philosophers of the mind."--BOOK JACKET.