Abstract

Based on my remarks on feeling towards in the foregoing chapter, I offer the position-taking view (PT) as more adequate intentionalist alternative to the axiological receptivity view (AR). On this view, emotional feelings constitute a (dis)favourable position taken towards something in response to its (dis)value. After a brief survey of the early phenomenological pedigree of PT and some appearances of the view and its close cognates in the contemporary literature PT is elaborated and shown to offer a substantive, rather than mere metaphorical account of emotional feeling. More specifically, I argue that the hedonic character of emotional feeling constitutes a felt satisfaction or frustration of specific concerns of the experiencing subject. This makes feeling towards intelligible as a form of (dis)approval and, thereby, as the taking of a (dis)favorable position. Finally PT is contrasted with a recent, apparently similar proposal, according to which emotional feelings are evaluative attitudes (Deonna and Teroni 2012, chapter 7; 2014; 2015).