“Hope is not an emotion; it's a way of thinking or a cognitive process.”

“Empathy is the capacity to think and feel oneself into the inner life of another person. It has both emotional and cognitive aspects, involving the ability to tune into the emotions experienced by another.”

“Emotions can get in the way of truth-seeking. People do not process information in a neutral way.”

“One of the difficulties I experienced in trying to learn about the biology of emotions was the definition of terms...How would [Prof. Richard Davidson], as an experimental psychologist, deconstruct [hope]? "I understand hope as an emotion made up of two parts: a cognitive part and an affective part. When we hope for something, we employ, to some degree, our cognition, marshalling information and data relevant to a desired future event. If...you are suffering with a serious illness and you hope for improvement, even for a cure, you have to generate a different vision of your condition in your mind. That picture is painted in part by assimilating information about the disease and its potential treatments. "But hope also involves what I would call affective forecasting--that is, the comforting, energizing, elevating feeling that you experience when you project in your mind a positive future. This requires the brain to generate a different affective, or feeling, state than the one you are currently in.”

“Tell me a way you think this can work.""We'll find a way," I tell her."That's not an answer. It's a hope.""Hope's gotten us this far. Not answers.”

“Creativity becomes more visible when adults try to be more attentive to the cognitive processes of children than to the results they achieve in various fields of doing and understanding.”