Horst Walther

My near philosophical musings about the world in general its problems and possible ways out.

2025-11-06

The Role of Emotions in AI


During one of my presentations for the Steinbeis Augsburg Business School (SABS) the question arose “Will AI systems someday have emotions?” I boldly expressed the expectation back then that AI systems, at least those that have to make quick, autonomous decisions, must possess something akin to feelings or emotions.

What I wasn't yet aware of was that the literature draws a fine line between emotions and feelings.

However, I was aware that some experts who play a very prominent role in the public debate categorically reject the possibility of consciousness, emotions, and/or feelings in artificially created systems. They try to steer the discussion in their favour by arguing that AI systems consist merely of bits and bytes. How could something like consciousness, a soul, or "real" feelings arise from that? Of course, they conveniently ignore the fact that while our brains aren't made of bits and bytes, they are nevertheless constructed from simple, elementary building blocks. A pointless discussion, then, reminiscent of the efforts of the Scholastics[1].

So, I withdrew and did some research. I'd now like to share the results of this convoluted search with you.

First of all, feelings, or emotions, serve an essential evolutionary purpose: they are adaptive mechanisms that help organisms survive, make rapid decisions, communicate with others, and reproduce.

1 Do only humans have feelings, or do animals have them as well?

Scientific consensus increasingly supports the idea that animals also have feelings and emotions, though they may not be identical to the complex subjective experiences of humans. The core emotional systems are ancient and shared across many species.

  • Shared Emotional Foundations: Charles Darwin was one of the first to argue that emotions are adaptations shared by humans and animals. Many mammals, birds, and even some invertebrates display behaviours and brain chemistry (e.g., dopamine, serotonin) that correlate with emotional states like joy, fear, anger, sadness, and empathy.

  • Examples in Animals:

    • Empathy and Grief: Elephants gather around and touch the carcasses of the dead, showing signs of grief. Rats have been shown to help a distressed fellow rat, even at the cost of a treat for themselves.

    • Joy and Play: Chimpanzees and rats emit specific vocalizations that are characteristic of joy or laughter when engaging in play.

    • Fear and Anxiety: Crayfish exhibit anxiety-like behaviour when stressed, which can be alleviated with the same anti-anxiety medications used for humans.

  • Feelings vs. Emotions: A common distinction in research is that emotions are the physiological and behavioural responses to stimuli (which are observable in animals), while feelings are the conscious, subjective experience of those emotions (which are harder to objectively measure in animals, as they cannot verbally report them). Most scientists agree animals are conscious beings capable of experiencing a range of emotional responses to some degree.

2 What purpose do feelings serve?

Feelings serve several crucial functions for survival and social interaction:

  • Motivating Action: Emotions are "programs for action" that allow an organism to respond quickly to environmental challenges without extensive conscious deliberation. Fear, for example, triggers the "fight-or-flight" response, preparing the body to escape danger rapidly.

  • Decision Making: Emotions influence thoughts and memories, helping us make decisions by colouring our experiences as positive or negative, which guides future behaviour (e.g., avoiding spoiled milk after feeling disgust).

  • Communication: Emotional expressions (facial expressions, body language, vocalizations) provide valuable information to others about our internal state and intentions, which is vital for social species. For instance, a clear expression of anger can signal a threat and cause others to back off.

  • Social Cohesion: Emotions such as love, guilt, and empathy help form and maintain social bonds, family relationships, and group dynamics, which are essential for the survival and protection of offspring and the group.

  • Personal Meaning: Emotions give meaning to life experiences; without them, events would be mere facts without value or flavour.

3 What are the necessary circumstances, conditions, and prerequisites for feelings to be of value?

For feelings to be valuable, an organism generally needs:

  • A complex nervous system: The capacity for emotions is linked to specific brain structures, particularly the limbic system, which processes and regulates emotional responses.

  • An environment with challenges and opportunities: Emotions evolved as responses to recurring adaptive problems in an organism's environment (e.g., predator avoidance, mate competition).

  • Self-awareness/subjective experience: To have "feelings" in the human sense (a conscious interpretation of emotions), some degree of self-awareness is necessary.

  • Social interaction (for complex emotions): Many complex social emotions like guilt, shame, and empathy develop their value within a social context, where understanding and responding to others' emotions is critical for group living.

  • The ability to learn and adapt: Feelings help organisms learn from past experiences and adjust future behaviours to seek positive outcomes and avoid negative ones.

4 What about autonomous AI systems?

Now comes the tricky question: Is it conceivable that, if these circumstances, conditions, and prerequisites apply, feelings could also be meaningful for artificially created systems, such as autonomous AI systems or robots?

This question indeed is a subject of ongoing debate in science and philosophy.

  • Functional Perspective: If AI systems are designed to navigate complex, unpredictable environments, make rapid decisions under uncertainty, and interact socially with humans or other AI, then incorporating something functionally analogous to emotions might be meaningful for their operation and survival. For example, a "fear" response could cause an autonomous system to rapidly avoid a perceived danger, or "satisfaction" could reinforce desired learning outcomes.

  • Conscious Experience Perspective: Whether such systems would actually feel these emotions in a subjective, conscious way (sentience) is a different, more complex question. The value for an AI would lie in the adaptive function of these internal states (e.g., as rapid information-processing systems or motivational drivers) rather than necessarily the subjective experience of them as humans understand it.

  • Ethical Implications: If AI ever developed genuine feelings, it would raise profound ethical questions about their treatment and rights, similar to current discussions regarding animal welfare.

In essence, feelings are powerful, evolved tools that provide an adaptive advantage by guiding behaviour toward survival and reproduction, a principle that could potentially be applied functionally to artificial systems designed to operate in complex, dynamic environments.

So, in the end my reputation was saved – at least partially

5 References

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholasticism

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