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second converging feedback loop introduced in the model, inspired the Somatic
Marker Hypothesis (Damasio, 1994, 1996), involves the interaction back from the
feeling to the belief. Thus a combination of two loops is obtained, where connection
strengths within these loops in principle are person-specific. Depending on these
personal characteristics, from a dynamic interaction within and between the two
loops, an equilibrium is reached for both the strength of the belief and of the feeling.
To illustrate the model, the following example scenario is used. A person is park-
ing his car for a short time at a place where this is not allowed. When he comes back,
from some distance he observes that a small paper is attached at the front window of
the car. He starts to generate the belief that the paper represents a charge to be paid.
This belief generates a negative feeling, which has an impact on the belief by
strengthening it. Coming closer, some contours of the type of paper that is attached
become visible. As these are not clearly recognized as often occurring for a charge,
the person starts to generate a second belief, namely that it concerns an advertising of
a special offer. This belief generates a positive feeling which has an impact on the
latter belief by strengthening it.
In this paper, first in Section 2 Damasio's theory on the generation of feelings
based on a body loop is briefly introduced. Moreover, the second loop is introduced,
the one between feeling and belief. In Section 3 the model is described in detail. Sec-
tion 4 presents some simulation results. In Section 5 a mathematical analysis of the
equilibria of the model is presented. Finally, Section 6 is a discussion.
2 From Believing to Feeling and Vice Versa
In this section the interaction between believing and feeling is discussed in some more
detail from a neurological perspective, in both directions: from believing to feeling,
and from feeling to believing.
2.1 From Believing to Feeling
As any mental state in a person, a belief state induces emotions felt within this person,
as described by Damasio (1999, 2004); for example:
'Even when we somewhat misuse the notion of feeling - as in “I feel I am right about
this” or “I feel I cannot agree with you” - we are referring, at least vaguely, to the feel-
ing that accompanies the idea of believing a certain fact or endorsing a certain view.
This is because believing and endorsing
cause
a certain emotion to happen. As far as I
can fathom, few if any exceptions of any object or event, actually present or recalled
from memory, are ever neutral in emotional terms. Through either innate design or by
learning, we react to most, perhaps all, objects with emotions, however weak, and sub-
sequent feelings, however feeble.' (Damasio, 2004, p. 93)
In some more detail, emotion generation via a body loop roughly proceeds according
to the following causal chain; see Damasio (1999, 2004):
belief → preparation for the induced bodily response →
induced bodily response → sensing the induced bodily response →
sensory representation of the induced bodily response → induced feeling
As a variation, an 'as if body loop' uses a direct causal relation
