Far from confusing the issue, you open a very interesting topic.

According to Profs. Antonio and Hanna Damasio, emotions play a major part in decision making, and they must be present for any social life. Also, there is nothing esoteric about emotions: they are the result of physical and chemical changes in the brain which follow patterns and are triggered either by external factors or by representations of such factors.

The Damasios' work with and about patients with brain damage led them to the theory that emotions (pleasure, fear, ecc) shape our decisions, and that is a good thing. If we had to weigh pros and cons but did not have a feeling about them, conscious or unconscious, we would have a harder time deciding and would probably make more mistakes.

Antonio Damasio's book Descarte's Error emphasizes the fallacy that is trying to keep emotions out of the equation, and the fallacy that is to think that we have a disembodied, rational mind, different from and opposite to an emotional body. It is our body (brain, adrenal glands, muscles) which reacts to problems both by reasoning and by "emoting", and all of this is essencial for decision making and social and personal survival and progress.

This is a main difference between us and machines. Notice that we are still at the "reasoning" level as opposed to trial and error, only "reasoning" takes into account not only the problem at hand per se but the representation of previous experiences and the emotions triggered by all this.

I hope I was reasonably clear and haven't bored you to death.