Innate or Learnt?

Damasio believes that emotions are both innate and learnt. He believes that primary and early emotions are innate or "hard-wired" but he also belives that secondary emotions derive from experience and acquired knowledge. Damasio mentions in his book that we're most likely not born with an innate "bear fear" per se, but we are "wired to respond with an emotion, in preorganized fashion, when certain features of stimuli in the world or in our bodies are perceived,"

. This was clearly seen in the Monkey and Snake experiment.