cousciousness

I watched a PBS special last night that was very interesting on the subject of human emotions. They said that the amygdala, part of the cerebral cortex which is influenced heavily by secretions in flight or flight, is where a person develops anger. Now when a person develops that anger, there is a direct pathway or bunch of connecting pathways to our cortex which initiates a response. This would have to mean that whatever a person is doing, be it video games or not, is strong enough to illicit a secretion to trigger an emotion. Playing video games I believe can trigger this, and it has been scientifically proven that it can. However in the argument of conscienceness if that part of the brain where taken away, as suggested in the article New Empiricism, we as individuals would still have some means of knowing our surroundings or being aware of our experiences. Another idea that was presented in the PBS program was the fact that our frontal lobe is what truly experiences our emotions and the rest of our brain interprets them in there general respect. However, there is not a straight pathway to the cortex in which our bodies can illicit a response, there are several channels and they leisurely make there way to the cortex. Scientist believe that, according to this program, the frontal lobe is still developing and is the newer part of the brain. The part that allows the person to ponder on their emotions. Where as the amygdala is old and has been used in the fight or flight response. When playing a video game I guess it would have to depend on the persons experiences in life as to how the game is perceived and how much consciousness they put into the game. A person who whole heartily puts themselves into a game and depends apon it would illicit a greater response than a person who knows that it is just a game and has had greater life experiences, such as being in a war and knowing what is real.