TA's Question

Think back to the last time you played make-believe. Compare it to reading a book or enjoying some other narrative art-form. Are they completely the same? What are some similarities? Differences?


Similarities:  Similarities consist of, in my opinion, "suspending disbelief," in the sense that one must pretend, and the best imaginations create an entire game or world of make believe, because the better the logistics, the more emotional satisfaction one can derive from the experience.  


Differences:  These seem to lie in the length of imagination taken to produce a proper and entertaining world of make believe.  For example, many books or other works of fiction are successful because they can greatly assist in the configuration of your imaginative processes, through logistics of the make believe world in the book, characters that display very human like traits, and even imagery.  While these are provided as a good base in many works of fiction, simply playing make believe requires one's mind to do all of the leg work.  Whether that is more rewarding or not is up to interpretation, however, the differences are evident as far as the length one must go through, creating the world in make believe, and simply playing in one in a well written novel.

What are some potential problems surrounding Walton's quasi-emotions?

The best counter argument to Walton's theory (in my opinion) was one put forward by Glenn Hartz, stating, in short, that these emotions were not based on belief but almost as a subconscious, initiated by visual stimuli.

"He [Hartz] argues not that our responses to fiction are independent of belief, to be understood on the model of the startle effect, but that they are pre-conscious:  that real (as opposed to pretend) beliefs which are not consciously entertained are automatically generated by certain visual stimuli."

Hartz's ideas are very intriguing to say the least, and as I mentioned in my Q&A, it is probably a problem Walton could have avoided by using a different terminology for "quasi."

Walton would bring up a few points.  Among them being, the misuse of other physical related reactions, incorrectly stipulated to be fear, or simply that if they were to truly suspend belief than they would once again resort to the behavioral equivalent of someone in fear, and therefore call for help, fight or flee, etc. 

The misuse of other physical reactions to a physical work of fiction can sometimes be misconstrued to be legitimate or authentic fear.  For example, the adrenaline kick a person gets in the climax of a horror film could be described as fear, when it is simply adrenaline.  Being startled, surprised, or fearing other things can also be in Walton’s words, quasi emotions, or quasi fear. 

Fear of other things can be substituted for fear of or for fictional characters as well.  For example, one might be afraid of the dark, or the concept of mysterious origins, and misplace that as fear for the green slime.  Perhaps the fear of  the concept of being murdered is sparked by viewing a horror film in which a character is murdered.