Emotional Stimuli

Kendall Walton, in his essay on emotional responses to fiction, argues that emotions in general have a cognitive dimension. Walton goes on to argue that those who suppose that emotions arise independently of cognition are question-begging; they start with the premise that the individual does in fact feel the emotion and set out to explain why he does.

It seems to me that it is altogether reasonable, in dealing with emotion, to take into consideration of one's perceived feelings in response to a particular stimulus. It was, in my understanding, that particular feeling which was one's emotional response to phenomena. If one were to find a dead animal in the forest, must one first decide whether the event is worthy of emotional response before feeling sad? It seems to me that emotions arise as (seemingly) pre-cognitive responses to stimuli. Why we felt those emotions at the time is a matter of analysis post-fact. I would also like to note here that I do believe that emotions can also arise in response to conceptual stimuli as well, but that is a matter for another post.