The Science Of Happiness

Hogwash McFly writes "There's an interesting article over at The Times that attempts to answer the question 'So what do you have to do to find happiness?' by exploring the biology and psychology behind this highly sought-after emotion. This article opens up new insight into the common perceptions of what makes us happy, such as having more friends and more money. Detailed in the article is the idea that our early ancestors' struggles against adverse weather and predators have led us to instinctually focus on what is wrong or out of place in order to react with more efficiency, then going onto autopilot when things are going well."

Comments

Happiness

[CmdrTaco (troll)]

Is a successful FP.

Simple

[Anonymous Coward]

Enjoy every day as if it was your last, life is a big party, Work is slavery

Re:Simple

[aaqubed]

Work is slavery

No...FREEDOM is slavery!

Re:Simple

[wattersa]

Unfortunately, that is exactly the mindset that credit card companies and advertisers _want_ you to take, because you spend more. In reality, you should think about the future, save for a rainy day, work in a field you enjoy, and party on weekends.

Eh, I gave up

[Quiet_Desperation]

I'm such a black hearted emotionless wreck at this point, looking for happiness is a fruitless endeavor.

Re:Eh, I gave up

[Anonymous Coward]

Blarg, I was going to suggest a shotgun mouthwash but then I read your username and felt kind of bad.

Re:Eh, I gave up

[rillopy]

Ok Marvin.

Re:Eh, I gave up

[Werkhaus]

Cheer up. You got a +5 Funny. Your shattered life has made other /.ers laugh, insensitive clods that we are.

Re:Eh, I gave up

[Quiet_Desperation]

What? And miss out on years of spreading my misery? Ha!

Re:Eh, I gave up

[Quiet_Desperation]

You laugh at my PAIN! Argh! You bastards! I'll show you! Vengence and race of atomic supermen and all that.

That was the fastest +5 I ever got, though.

Re:Eh, I gave up

[pdamoc]

you should have suggested something from this guys

Re:Eh, I gave up

[mattstorer]

Naw, blargh ain't any good... but is it any surprise that quick ping times make us happy? To answer: no, no it's not. (see definition #5).

Re:Eh, I gave up

[Stween]

Hanging on is the English way.

Re:Eh, I gave up

[Crazy Eight]

Oh, it's you again.

- H. D. Thoreau

happiness is overrated

[scenestar]

After having been chronically depressed for the past years i found out that happiness is just a balance of the right drugs.

Re:happiness is overrated

[Anonymous Coward]

Happiness can be had for nothing when you are bipolar. I have had the most intense short lived happiness for no plausible reason. Euphoria without cause is like a drug. You crave it most when you are slightly teased with an elevated mood.

True happiness is in proportion to a well founded perception of reality. Empty happiness is the euphoria of a drug induced haze.

Tis ironic that I'm down without reason and reflecting on happiness. I'll take either empty or true happiness. Sometimes it doesn't matter.

P.S. I don't do drugs or meds. I'm just a mule and carry whatever mood falls on my shoulders.

Re:happiness is overrated

[RobinH]

Now, now... anti-depressants don't actually make you happy... they just make the depression subside a bit so you can get moving again and make yourself happy. Taking anti-depressants is like if you have a hole in your boat and you're sinking, the drugs are like pumping out the bilge. It doesn't fix the problem, but it will keep you afloat until you can get to a safe harbour and repair the damage.

But I'm sure you knew that already... :-)

Re:happiness is overrated

[mabraham]

Parent is dead right!

Re:happiness is overrated

[Deviant Q]

Seconded. And unhappiness can be caused by the wrong drugs (by this I mean wrong dosages/types of antidepressants). It's rather amazing that way.

I don't agree with the sibling post that the drugs simply provide a medium for you to create your own happiness. If our definition of happiness is anything like "contentment," it can definitely be obtained simply with the right drugs, and lost without them.

Re:happiness is overrated

[404notfound]

To be more accurate, happiness is just a balance of the right chemicals in your body, which can be adjusted with drugs.

Re:happiness is overrated

[bleppie]

Um, no. For some of us the drugs plug the hole in the boat. There's a very common attitude, which I seein your post, that antidepressants are only good as a temporary, often last minute, patch up solution. But actually some of us are better off taking them all the time, much like people with other chronic diseases might take meds for the rest of their lives.

Chronic depression is not something that will go away if you just 'buck up and get over it', 'deal with the problem and move on', 'get to a safe harbour', etc. Often it is a lifetime issue that can be managed with, among other things, medicine.

Re:happiness is overrated

[WormholeFiend]

You should look into current studies on the curative effects of psychedelics on depression.

Re:happiness is overrated

[phantomfive]

Wow, your understanding of the GP was different than mine. I read it and thought, "Oh yeah, of course, don't mix alchohol and speed."

Re:happiness is overrated

[at_slashdot]

You should have exercised and taken vitamines ;-)

Re:happiness is overrated

[matria]

After years of chronic suicidal depression, I found out that happiness was just a divorce. YMMV. (this is not a joke, it is the honest truth)

Re:happiness is overrated

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, now... anti-depressants don't actually make you happy... they just make the depression subside a bit so you can get moving again and make yourself happy. Taking anti-depressants is like if you have a hole in your boat and you're sinking, the drugs are like pumping out the bilge. It doesn't fix the problem, but it will keep you afloat until you can get to a safe harbour and repair the damage.

So true happiness is not affected by drugs? So true happiness must not be physiological and must reside somewhere other than the body/brain? So precisely _where_ does true happiness reside - in the soul, in the "great all of Buddha", in your mother?

You need to read Listening to Prozac by psychotherapist Peter D. Kramer, M.D. Kramer is a psychotherapist who once used primarily analytical techniques. He then prescribed a new drug, Prozac, to some of his patients. Many whose problems were unsolved by analysis were "cured" by Prozac within weeks - they became "different people": more productive, more outgoing, more intelligent, etc.

At the end of the book Kramer envisions a world where people can take designer drugs to boost their social status: failing to use drugs would result in lower social status, income, sexual success, etc. He also now doubts that analysis is a cure; medication works faster and is more certain.

Happiness is chemistry pure and simple.

Re:happiness is overrated

[node 3]

Now, now... anti-depressants don't actually make you happy...

They most certainly can (and do). Happiness is a state-of-mind. The state of one's mind is highly dependent on chemicals and drugs.

It doesn't fix the problem, but it will keep you afloat until you can get to a safe harbour and repair the damage.

You're thinking of drugs like alcohol and heroine, which make people feel better but also degrade that person's ability to interface with reality, and manage their life.

Anti-depressants are the exact opposite. Not onl to they make the depressed person normal, but they do so without crippling the person's ability to cope with real-life. In other words, for some people, these drugs do, in fact, "plug the hole".

Re:happiness is overrated

[QuestorTapes]

> For some of us the drugs plug the hole in the boat.

Very true; however, that is and generally should be a minority of chronic depression victims. Depression medications almost always have significant side-effects, so prescribing them cautiously is always indicated.

> There's a very common attitude, which I seein your post, that antidepressants
> are only good as a temporary, often last minute, patch up solution.

I didn't see that in the original post. The poster may have overstated the typical case, but it's a substantially accurate portrayal. For most depression victims, medication should only be used in conjunction with an effort to root out the cause, which may be organic.

I recall reading a story a few months ago written by a man about his child, where doctors were content to continue the prior course of medication indefinitely, in spite of -massive- side-effects. The side effects rendered the child almost completely non-functional, symptoms similar to severe autism. After 3 years of fighting with the doctors and research on his own, the man was able to help identify the root cause and a treatment with minimal side effects.

> But actually some of us are better off taking them all the time, much like
> people with other chronic diseases might take meds for the rest of their lives.

Very true. But only when other options have been exhausted. It's no different in that respect to high cholesterol, diabetes, or heart disease.

> Chronic depression is not something that will go away if you just 'buck up
> and get over it', 'deal with the problem and move on', 'get to a safe
> harbour', etc.

Agreed; but again, I didn't see that in the original post.

> Often it is a lifetime issue that can be managed with, among other things, medicine.

True. Thanks for your comments.

Re:happiness is overrated

[Rycross]

Eh, its more like when you take the pills you can see that the big black blotch is just a small dab of spilled ink on an otherwise perfectly white sheet of paper. I've taken anti-depressants, and they didn't make me happy. They allowed me to get my head under control, and gain some perspective. That, in turn, allowed me to be happy.

Re:happiness is overrated

[Fred_A]

Quite a number of anti-deressants have side effects, in some cases they can be crippling. And the problem is that it isn't easy to know beforehand which one will work best on a given patient. So typically you have to try a few before you settle on a given treatment.

The products with "heavy" side effects are typically not used for a long time though and only as a transition to another "softer" treatment. The duration of that treatment is very variable, from a few weeks to a lifetime. Although usually it takes a couple weeks for progress to show in depression cases. It doesn't go away like a headache.

The discovery of those new products and the social acceptance that psychiatric affections like depression can be cured or at least fairly successfully treated like anything else is a major medical breakthrough of the last century.

Re:happiness is overrated

[radtea]

i found out that happiness is just a balance of the right drugs.

And satiation is "just" a matter of good food in appropriate amounts.

This, and a number of other posts, suggest that the experience of happiness is not "real" somehow, because it is subjective, or subject to chemical intervention, or something.

But we are real. What we experience is real. What we experience is causally connected to the material world that we are inseparably part of. This does not make the experience unreal. It means that happiness, like life, is a property of matter.

No one says, "I used to think that birds could fly, but then I found out it was just their wing structure." Flight is a capacity of matter, no less than happiness. Put matter in the right configuration (a seagull, say) and it'll take off every time. This does not make flight unreal.

So why does anyone think that happiness is any less real than mass or pH?

Re:happiness is overrated

[VernoWhitney]

Who said he was talking about anti-depressants?

Re:happiness is overrated

[milimetric]

I'm reading a lot of posts about people being sad and giving up on happiness and being all cynical about it. Maybe I have some insight, with no offense intended for those of you that have any chronic illnesses.

Try hard to place yourself. Go out into a field and spend an hour or so just breathing, looking at the little bugs going about their life. Check out what the animals are up to. They are far wiser than you or me. They just are what they are, without shame or disrespect for anything. Doing this regularly can help you actually realize that you're different. That you disrespect and are ashamed of many things. It is this that contributes to so much unhappiness. So then you have a choice of two courses of action:

1.) Stay in society. Make a plan and carry it through (house, money, curing cancer, whatever). This will give you a sense of purpose and you will attach your life meaning to that plan.
2.) Ignore everyone's busy bustle and seek a simpler life. If someone chooses this course of action and is still chronically depressed, I would be terribly surprised. Much like the busy bee, you have no time to be depressed when you're growing your own food and a flood hits. Stop and realize for a second. There are millions of stars out there exploding and burning and millions of ants and flies having sex and millions of people orgasming, and millions of unknown things happening. Nobody gives a shit about you being depressed. For me, personally, that comforts the crap out of me. If the universe doesn't care about me, I can just live life however the fuck I want. I just try to stay respectful of other living beings and to be less and less ashamed of myself.

Actually, I chose course 1.) believe it or not. My goal is to develop sustainable housing. Want to help?

Re:happiness is overrated

[tabrnaker]

YOur small view of reality limits your vision.

As long as YOU believe you need the drugs, then you will. Depression is all about growing up and facing reality. Yes reality isn't what you thought it was going to be like, but that's because you've been fed a lie all your life.

The question is, can you see the lie, expose it, accept it and move on.

Clear up your backlog of decisions, every pending decision in our head takes away processing time to deal with reality.

Do you wear glasses? Have problems with the sun? Back tension when you actually have the energy to move?

Re:happiness is overrated

[JhohannaVH]

So true happiness is not affected by drugs? So true happiness must not be physiological and must reside somewhere other than the body/brain? So precisely _where_ does true happiness reside - in the soul, in the "great all of Buddha", in your mother? Well, no, I don't think that true happiness is affected by drugs. Speaking as someone who is undergoing both cognitive therapy and medication therapy, I can say that. My experinces with both therapies have been far less than I expected - particularly the cognitive shit. All they want to do is tell you how to be a sheep. And I'm not a sheep.

BUT! After 4 months of that, the shrink started trying to get me to take meds. Again. I refused. 4 months later, she told me that she couldn't make anymore inroads, and that I should really try them. By this point, I was having daily paralyzing anxiety attacks that would take me out of commission for 4-6 hours. So I went. I had an honest frank discussion with the Psychiatrist, and told him, I've been down this road before, nothing worked, the last jerk OD'd me on Zoloft, and then DOUBLED my dosage when I complained. That resulted in me having a permanent tick. :( But I decided to trust Herr Doktor, and accepted his prescription for a different drug, that would affect a different chemical - dopamine - rather than seratonin. Turns out, that was the key.

The first four months I was on it, I lost 15 pounds, couldn't eat. But at the 5 month point, everything started shifting to normal. My anxiety started subsiding, I could eat, I could talk to other people, my attacks were less pronounced. Over the course of the year that I've been on this medication, both my physical and emotional body has completely changed. But the medication was just the key, as you say.

Just because the meds were clearing up the fog of 30 years of depression, anxiety, anguish, and hatred, does NOT mean that it took care of all of those underlying issues. In fact, it means quite the opposite, and I've only just now been realizing it. It has helped me to quell the symptoms, while allowing my responses to remain the same, making it my responsibility to manage those responses. And this is why the cognitive therapy is important, even if you only do it yourself at home with some great self-help books or something (just not the 5th of Makers Mark!), because you have to start managing and learning to change those ingrained behaviours and reactions.

I don't think that happiness can be found anywhere outside of the human mind. And the mind is such a complex creature in and of itself, that we are only just beginning to understand. But I know that this course of medications, for 2 years only - after that they begin the reduction and redaction process over six months - has changed my life, and helped me to change my world. It is up to each of us to find our own path to happiness, but the medications only help to brighten the path.

Just my $2.00.

Jho

Re:happiness is overrated

[tabrnaker]

So were they really cured? Or were they people who sold there souls to become mindless machines? If we avoid learning our lessons in life we become stagnant.

A deviation from happiness means you are doing something wrong. Western medicine allows people to live with their sins and not eliminate them.

Note, sin in the original sense and not the stupidness that the catholic church has turned it into.

Re:happiness is overrated

[tabrnaker]

happy? MOre like bliss, after all thc hooks up to our bliss receptors.

Re:happiness is overrated

[tabrnaker]

Where do you live? Remember, western society is all about denying the divine feminine. hahaha, got to through in the religious stuff every once in a while. We're a science culture, objectivity and division is the name of the game. Nobody cares about the whole or subjectivity. If we can't measure it, it's useless. Come on, you see this on slashdot all the time. People are frozen.

Re:happiness is overrated

[aminorex]

Alcohol does degrade performance at effective doses, but at therapeutic doses for depression, heroin does not degrade performance of dexterity or cognition tasks.

Re:happiness is overrated

[Bent Mind]

So true happiness must not be physiological and must reside somewhere other than the body/brain?

I've thought about this from time to time. Personaly, I think drugs can help. However, I don't think they are the solution for everything. Being the geek I am, when thinking about how the brain functions, I use a computer as an analogy. There are two parts to a computer: hardware and software. There are two parts of the brain that equate: neurochemicals and consciousness.

Now, if I have a bad memory chip in the computer that is causing problems, I replace it. If I have a gland in my head that's defective, I'd replace it. Or given that brain surgery is rather primitive, I might take a medicine that compensates. If I have a computer program that's randomly deleting bits from the hard drive, I remove it. If I'm depressed because my dog died, I morn the dog and move on with my life.

With the right tools, maybe I could break a couple links in my head to make the memory of the dog more distant. With the right drugs, maybe I could increase the levels of happiness hormones in my head and stop caring about the dog. However, on the conscience level, I can learn to accept the death without harming the memory.

With the computer program, If I could watch the hard drive while it operates, I might be able to detect when the head started to randomly delete bits. I could then see where the head was just before this action and delete the bits in that area. This isn't really that different from the old days when you had to peek and poke memory. However, by analysing the logs, learning which program is causing problems and how it got there, I can actually fix the problem. This isn't something I'd want to do on the hardware level.

I agree that the brain is pure chemistry, just like a computer is pure hardware. That doesn't mean that all repairs should be done at that level.

Re:happiness is overrated

[mrselfdestrukt]

Whatever worked for you man. I'm glad.
For some people (like you) it works and they can continue living normal lives.
For some people it works partially, but you still have to live the rest of your live with this gaping raw wound in your mind.

Re:happiness is overrated

[runderwo]

I think you've confused "psychedelics" with "MDMA". The natural psychedelics (cannabis, mushrooms, peyote/mescaline, salvia, DMT) and even LSD do not have such serotonin rebound effects. And the happiness does not come from the intoxicated state itself. Psychedelic use is a gateway to learning about oneself, breaking down the barriers that we put up in our own minds.

You do not have to trip that often to clear out the congestion in your mind and dig yourself out of a rut. In fact, tripping too often is detrimental to one's connection with reality. But it is a legitimate form of soul searching, as legitimate as any other.

Re:happiness is overrated

[Afrosheen]

Personally I've never liked MDMA though I've tried it twice. I've logged literally hundreds of hours with LSD though, and know that path very well. You DO have a rebound problem with serotonin no matter what. Any psychedelic usually does the same thing chemically; blocks serotonin receptors to prevent re-uptake leading to elevated levels and, since your brain knows it has too much, it stops producing it for a short time. There is always a crash after any type of serotonin-related high. How hard you crash and how long that lasts depends on many factors but it happens regardless.

  Oh and I don't doubt the legitimacy of chemically induced 'soul searching'. The issue is, sometimes what you find there isn't pleasant. Most of the time it is.

Happiness is against human nature..

[brxndxn]

No matter where you are or what you acheive, one is never truly happy. To be happy is to be content.. and to be content is to lack the craving to better oneself. And to lack that craving is to lack a fundamental part of 'survival of the fittest.'

Yes.. It's human nature to be discontent.. and that separates some of us from the apes.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[BishonenAngstMagnet]

You can be truly happy without being fully happy. I am truly happy about many things in life. But I'm not fully happy, as there are aspects of my life (as with everyone else) that are not perfect.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Anonymous Coward]

Another thing that seperates us from the Apes is our ability to overcome our nature.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[brxndxn]

Then I could argue that lack of perfection keeps you from being truly happy. And, further, no matter what you manage to achieve, your idea of happiness will also change.

There will always be many aspects in your life that are not perfect. And, perfect those aspects and there will be new aspects.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[nathan s]

I'm not exactly sure that "bettering oneself" necessarily has any relation to "survival of the fittest" - many people's idea of "bettering" themselves have led them to early deaths, like some of the great explorers. In terms of sheer survival of the fittest, the person who doesn't stick his neck out too far and manages to safely pass on his genes to the next generation the most times is often [but not always] the fittest, and that has little to do with bettering himself.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Profane MuthaFucka]

Or, we can completely indulge our nature. For example, I would like to have sex with two chicks at once, in space, on the way to a moon vacation paid for by my billions earned through my aerospace/Linux company that I sold to Bill Gates. If that's not a fantasy that no chimp ever dreamed of, I don't know what is. Yet, it's completely giving in to our self-indulgent nature, but still distinct from a chimp's fantasy.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[UserGoogol]

Bah. You can be content while simultaneously desiring more. Contentment is not to lack the craving to better oneself, but merely the sense that things as they currently are are "okay." Contentment, as I see it, is not a lack of desire for improvement, (which as you say is a somewhat morally dubious state) but merely a lack of discomfort about your current position. Those are distinct entities, as I see it.

Thus, you can be content with your current state in life while at the same time desire more. I admit it's not neccesarily the most logically consistant position one can hold, but emotions aren't logical. (Although one may apply logic to the proccess of acquiring a maximum emotional state.)

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[AstrumPreliator]

Yes.. It's human nature to be discontent.. and that separates some of us from the apes.
 
I always thought it was the fact that some of us don't fling poo at eachother that seperated us from the apes... I guess I was mistaken.
 
;)

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Alpha27]

Who's to say that the apes themselves do not exhibit this trait? They compete with each other, and competition is an effect of dissatisifaction and a wanting to prove something in order to be satisfied. If they were satisfied, do you think they would fight?

Just my 2 bananas on the subject.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[grogdamighty]

From a pure natural selection standpoint, bettering oneself has nothing to do with selection - all that matters is that you reproduce.

The whole point of natural selection is that you are already the best - that's why you've survived long enough to procreate.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Parafilmus]

It may not serve survival-interest to be happy at rest, but it DOES serve survival-interest to be happy while engaged in useful activity. "Happy" is a reward mechanism. You should feel it while hunting or building or mating or teaching children, or whatever activity benefits self and family.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[JazzTao]

I disagree. Why must you be discontent in order to strive for betterment, or cultivation of oneself? It is the human ability to change perception (discriminate), and persevere the illusions which your ego has burried to your false idea of the self. Discrimination is a double edged sword. What you need, is hope, dedication and confidence. You must love yourself to find the true nature of the self, from which there is no substitution for happiness. I think it is your ignorance of the true nature of reality/yourself, attachment, and/or aversion, that keep you from satisfaction and happiness. Remember, resistance is futile. It's too close so we overlook it. It seems too good to be true so we can't believe it. It's too profound so we can't fathom it. It's not outside ourselves so we can't obtain it anew.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Brock Lee]

To be happy is to be content.. and to be content is to lack the craving to better oneself.

The logic here is flawed. Some people are happy bettering themselves -- learning something new, learning something to greater depth, perfecting a skill, exploring a new place.

By playing the "A is the same as B is the same as C" game, you've cleverly pulled the wool over your own eyes. Happy now?

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[dcarey]

Bah. You can be content while simultaneously desiring more.

Absolutely. In fact, I remember most of my happiest time periods to have been when I was working to attain a goal, small or large. Being in school and finishing my degree. Driving to New Orleans for the first time. Working on my first album.

I'd be quite uncontent without goals. Most of the time I've achieved them a few months afterwards when I didn't have a major goal I got depressed.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[rtaylor]

You can be truly happy without being fully happy. I am truly happy about many things in life. But I'm not fully happy, as there are aspects of my life (as with everyone else) that are not perfect.
You had better hope you are happy that you are a perfectionist.

Nothing is worse than a perfectionist purposfully making mistakes in an attempt to be less perfect because less than perfect is better than perfect.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Citizen of Earth]

Homer: Mr. Burns, you're the richest man I know.
Mr. Burns: But I'd give it all up for a little more.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[ppanon]

Unless of course you learn to find happiness in the ability to pursue perfection, in the journey to perfection rather than in perfection itself. Learn to enjoy the moment, even as you pursue your ultimate goals.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Rob the Bold]

Nothing is worse than a perfectionist purposfully making mistakes in an attempt to be less perfect because less than perfect is better than perfect.

I couldn't argee more.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[arose]

There is no point in natural selection it just happens.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[beheaderaswp]

Hmmm...

Seems to me we fling things at each other that are far more destructive.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[sobeks_eye]

No matter where you are or what you acheive, one is never truly happy.

Yes, but no matter where you go, there you are.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[indifferent children]

Perhaps it is the fact that we don't fling poo at each other that causes our discontentment, so both answers are correct. {No, I'm not looking for volunteers to test this hypothesis.}

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[PhraudulentOne]

No matter where you are or what you acheive, one is never truly happy.

You can be fully and truly happy in any given moment. Happiness is inside you, it's not something you "get." Happy is to accept and love everyting (yourself, your life situation, etc), even if you don't "prefer" or "agree" with certain things. You can recognize that your situation could be "better" in some way, but that doesn't mean you have to be unhappy with the way it is now. You can make the act of changing situations ("improving" yourself, etc) a "happy" thing to do. This way, finding things that you don't enjoy in your life, with the goal of changing them, will also make you happy.

To be happy is to be content.. and to be content is to lack the craving to better oneself. And to lack that craving is to lack a fundamental part of 'survival of the fittest.'

Being content is not the lack of wanting to better yourself. I don't know who told you that. You can be content WHILE you better yourself. In fact, the act of bettering yourself could be what makes you content.

Happiness is not looking at your life situation and saying "well, I don't like this or that, so until I do like this or that, I'm not going to be happy." Happiness is about accepting those things, embracing them, recognizing that you can change them (or are changing them) at any given time if you like, but that your fine with everyting just the way it is. It is to be fully satisfied with yourself and your situation. You choose this emotion whenever you like - it doesn't "happen" to you.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Dogtanian]

There is no point in natural selection it just happens.

Amen. Even people who are 'experts' on evolution seem to forget this; my 'purpose' is not necessarily to reproduce- it *just so happens* that the process that gave rise to me will make me more likely to carry it on.

To ascribe a 'purpose' to this may be a useful (and arguably valid) shortcut when discussing evolution (otherwise discussion may become verbose); but *only* if those using it are conscious of its literal incorrectness.

Of course, evolution may be directed by 'external' forces (e.g. domestication of animals), but this is just superimposing one pseudo-'purpose' onto another, and doesn't change the root issue.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Dogtanian]

> > Yes.. It's human nature to be discontent.. and that separates some of us from the apes.

> I always thought it was the fact that some of us don't fling poo at eachother that seperated us from the apes...
> I guess I was mistaken.

Someone on Slashdot had a very 'bash.org'-ish quote in their sig along the lines of...

"What is it that separates us from the animals?"
"A condom, hopefully."

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Cobralisk]

Ignorance is bliss?

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[rizole]

Survival of the fittest isn't about being the best. You only have to be good enough.

It should be renamed survival of the fit enough.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[uacheesehead]

to be content is to lack the craving to better oneself Self improvement is masturbation

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[PantsWearer]

Actually, if you take a broader view, bettering yourself has a lot to do with natural selection. Since those who better themselves generally will be more interesting to mate with and thus will have children (who will be prone to better themselves, through both biology and upbringing, etc.).

Remember, natural selection isn't just about you; it's about your children and their children, etc.

Also, natural selection isn't about being the best, it's about being just good enough. In fact, being the best can sometimes be a negative value if your environment changes rapidly on you. You can toss the best carnivore on the planet into a vegetable-only environment and it'll starve. The human brain from a purely biological perspective is actually a hinderance; it uses a ton of resources unnecessary to survival. What makes the brain so special is that it allows us to be "good enough" in a number of environments where our biology would count us out. For example, as hunters, we basically suck: we're not fast enough, we've got no natural weapons good enough to harm prey, etc. But give us some tools and strategies and we can eat just about anything that moves.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[tabrnaker]

Silly humans. Happiness is a state of mind that exists in the present. When we exist in the present we are happy. If we exist elsewhere (our heads, the past, the future) then we are not happy.

It's all rather simple, i'm guessing another 10-15 years for science to finally say it, and probably 50-100 for it to become common knowledge.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[tabrnaker]

Procreation is what it's all about.

What is beauty? Humans interpret beauty as a proper functioning machine. THe looser and more flexible and relaxed you are the more attractive you are.

Since lots of people here are male, lets take pron for an example. Examine the flexability of all the famous pron stars. We find beauty in a body that moves properly.

Being 'shallow' isn't. You're just looking for the fittest person.

At the most fundamental level it just makes sense. There has to be a mechanism for humans to perceive healthiness in other humans. Beauty just makes sense, probably more from an ID perspective but still in science..

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[tabrnaker]

YOu got that the wrong way around. Humans always sling crap at each other. Apes are much more civilized.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[tabrnaker]

Posts like this give me hope. Not every one is frozen.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[GuyWithLag]

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. -- Lazarus Long (Robert A. Heinlein, Time Enough for Love, 1973)

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[Harinezumi]

However, focusing on being happy in the present tends to lead to being unhappy in the future, which will become the present all too soon.

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[rtaylor]

I couldn't argee more.
My spelling and grammer mistakes are natural incompetence!

Re:Happiness is against human nature..

[sjames]

Happiness and contentment are two different things. For example, happiness can come from the satisfaction of striving for betterment. Significantly, couch potatoism tends to lead to depression. The thing that gets people down isn't striving itself, it's failure to strive for what they really want. That can be from vegging out or from being too busy striving for basic needs to pursue betterment.

Twins

[mysqlrocks]

For happiness levels are probably genetic: identical twins are usually equally bubbly or grumpy.

This doesn't mean it's genetic. Twins most likely grew up together, right? Couldn't it have something to do with the environment/family instead of genes?

Re:Twins

[deadlygandhi]

Ahh, but what you indirectly propose has been tested. Twins were seperated at birth. They found eachother when they were in their 40's. They are equally happy, to the point that the psychologist(?) who interviewed them nicknamed them the "Giggle twins". granted, two subjects are not nearly enough for a serious experiment in psychiatry(sp). I think I saw this on dateline so don't forget your salt.

Re:Twins

[Lars83]

A twin study uses the fact that some twins (identical genetic blueprints) are raised in different environments (dissimiliar nurture factors) to reveal a surprisingly high heritability coefficient for things like happiness. It's not all genetic, but a large part certainly is.

Re:Twins

[tabrnaker]

of course, reading some of the appalling methodology in any twin study is enough to run to the hills.

I think that what most people forget is that sure genetics play a part in your original setup when you're born. The part that people forget is that gene expression can and does change and can change under conscious effort. Unfortunately this is a concept that's going to take a while for the west to digest. haha, after all, it's so much easier to just swallow a pill than to swallow the fact that YOU are the cause of ALL your unhappiness.

Religion?

[Programmerangel]

I'm surprised the article doesn't explore Religion and it's affect on people's happiness.

Re:Religion?

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking as a recovering Catholic, your happiness is whatever Rome says it is. That having been said, I feel the moment you postulate the soul (as it is understood in most Judeo-Christian religions), your Earthly happiness is moot for this world is a place of banishment and your only duty is to work/earn/bribe your way back to the Heavenly Host. That's why Christians find it as easy to torture people as do the non-Christians: What does it matter, the few hours it took him to die compared to an eternity at the side of our Heavenly father...

Thanks, but no thanks.

Re:Religion?

[agm]

Religion may make "the self" happy, but in a lot of cases it makes people around them unhappy - especially with too much proselytisng and trying to hamper peoples' freedoms (which is quite often the case with religionists).

Re:Religion?

[Overdrive_SS]

Actually Christianity says there is no way to earn your way into heaven. Everyone has sinned and that sin has earned you eternal seperation from God. However, Christ came to earth, lived a perfect life, and then died in your place. He took the punishment instead of making you try to pay for it, which you can't. And now He offers forgiveness for those sins and a relationship with Him if you believe and ask. It is a free gift. You'll still have problems in life, but you'll always have God to take care of them and the hope that one day you'll be with Him forever in heaven.

As an aside, people have used all kinds of excuses to do horrible things and just because they tried to justify it by saying God said to do it, doesn't mean that God actually said to do it.

Re:Religion?

[ecumenical_40oz]

Actually, I was quite pleased that they avoided religion. Making people happy is just as much the realm of psychology as curing depression, but many people have the attitude that happiness is only possible through devotion to a religion. Tell people that you want to make them happy, and they will most likely assume that you are about to tell them about your God (or coming on to them).

Re:Religion?

[JanneM]

I'm surprised the article doesn't explore Religion and it's affect on people's happiness.

Probably because religion - just like many other things - are somewhat orthogonal to happiness. Being religious does not make you more or less likely to be happy.

I dare say it's not what you take an interest in that matters, but that you do take an interest in something that is the important thing. Whether you crusade for an old testament-based judicial system with mandatory stoning for wearing mixed fibers; or campaign for the right to gay sex with donkeys dressed up as nuns in public while smoking pot from a cross-shaped bong really doesn't matter for your happiness just as long as you are passionate about it.

Re:Religion?

[Eil]

Religion doesn't make people happy, it makes people feel safe. (The happiness comes more from the social aspects of religion than from faith itself.)

Re:Religion?

[endoplasmicMessenger]

Many saints lived lives of incredible suffering. The mystery is that somewhere in that suffering is joy. The joy comes from uniting oneself with Christ, who lived in poverty and offered his suffering and death to "take away" the sins of the world. Happines is incompatible with suffering, but joy is not. On can joyfully offer one's sufferings for poor sinners.

Re:Religion?

[nEoN nOoDlE]

I'm surprised the article doesn't explore Religion and it's affect on people's happiness.

it's true... religion truly depresses me.

Re:Religion?

[ankarbass]

I also offer a free relationship for anyone that wants one. I bet you'll get more email from me than that sandal guy. Furthermore, this relationship is like right here right now and if for some crazy reason you think that's not enough, IN ADDITION, I offer a FREE gift with purchase.

BTW: Your happiness with each purchase is GUARANTEED or your money will be cheerfully refunded.

Sheesh you want happiness? I'll give ya happiness, just get out your credit card!!!

Re:Religion?

[TubeSteak]

As an aside, people have used all kinds of excuses to do horrible things and just because they tried to justify it by saying God said to do it, doesn't mean that God actually said to do it.

Pope Urban II launched the First Crusade in 1095 by saying "Deus le volt!" (God wills it!) as a rallying cry for the people.

Don't take my word for it http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Crusade

I don't know if he was sitting on the Throne of Peter when he made that statement,
but since he was the Pope, I think we can take his word for it.

Re:Religion?

[IamLarryboy]

A post on slashdot which accuratly portrays the gospel!!!! I do believe I have now seen everything.

Re:Religion?

[Lady Jazzica]

There's nothing wrong with the Crusades as such. Don't Christians have the right to defend themselves when Muslims attack them?

Not that there weren't certain war crimes committed during the Crusades (against Church teaching), but that's a separate issue from the morality of a call to defend Christians. In the same way, the various war crimes committed by Allied forces in World War II doesn't mean that there was anything wrong with fighting the Germans and Japanese.

Re:Religion?

[Lady Jazzica]

First of all, the Muslims invaded Christian lands. All the lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea used to be Christian. And at the time of the Crusades, the Holy Land was probably still majority Christian.

Anyway, the event that triggered the first Crusade was that the Turks started attacking Christian pilgrims.

Re:Religion?

[Kadmos]

I'm surprised the article doesn't explore Religion and it's affect on people's happiness.

What, you mean the average religious person (who doesn't go to church) or the nut jobs who blow people to bits?

Re:Religion?

[Citizen of Earth]

“I think I'll go for the life of sin followed by the presto-chango deathbed repentance.”—Bart Simpson

Re:Religion?

[Rob the Bold]

The article really doesn't explore the "causes" of happiness at all. It offers no real suggestions to the unhappy except to 'get happy' cause you'll live longer and have a better immune system, or maybe that having a better immune system will make you happier. At any rate, there's precious little suggestions for any controllable factors.

Re:Religion?

[StikyPad]

Being religious does not make you more or less likely to be happy.

The article (and my experiences) would suggest otherwise.

Craig believes that the dark, forbidding nature of Calvinist religion is responsible for the dour Scottish psyche. "We're a culture that encourages feelings of lack of self-worth. We're a culture that goes out of its way to make sure people don't feel good about themselves," says Craig.

Re:Religion?

[StikyPad]

On that note, I'll go ahead and start forgiving people who sin. Big or small, white lie or capital offense, just call me at 1-900-4GIVE-ME. If you call in the next 30 minutes, you'll lock in our special rate of $4.95 for the first sin, and only $2.99 each additional sin. Why feel guilty when you can get it all off your chest? That's 1-900-4GIVE-ME.

Offer not valid in CA, ME, or where prohibited by law. This is not an offer of redemption or salvation, but merely personal forgiveness on the part of the operator(s) who take(s) your call. Best before 2/16/2008.

Re:Religion?

[Bastian]

I remember reading somewhere that Buddhism is the only major religion that has been positively correlated with happiness. Possibly it has something to do with Buddhism being the only major religion (that I can think of) whose sole stated purpose is to make people happier.

Re:Religion?

[Dinjay]

>There's nothing wrong with the Crusades as such. Don't Christians have the right to defend themselves
>when Muslims attack them?

How about No 6 of the Ten commandments: "Thou Shalt Not Kill"?

If not, what about
"..for all who take the sword will perish by the sword. (Matthew 26.51-52)
and
"Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." (Matthew 5:44 RSV)
and
"..whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also." (Matthew 5:39)

But then again, I'm sure that the people in charge back then would've argued that the crusades not only had God's blessing, but also that the crusades will go to heaven. There's nothing like the promise of eternal bliss to convince people to kill others.

Re:Religion?

[arose]

Don't Christians have the right to defend themselves when Muslims attack them?

Depends, but either way not all crusades are alike.

Re:Religion?

[StandardDeviant]

They weren't Christian so much as they were ex-Roman, with all the polyglot of faiths that implies. The Franks hardly had a lock-hold on the region. There were attacks by Islamic nations into the region, but they were attacks of territorial ambition rather than faith-based aggression, and occured several hundred years before Urban's 1095 crusade kick-off, which evidence suggests was intended more to unite the bickering Europeans than to do much of anything for the faith as a whole. (So as a result everybody ran around and killed everybody else (even Christian crusaders ... killing other Christians!) for a few hundred years and sweet fuck all got done. Yay for papal infallibility!)

Re:Religion?

[merdark]

Perhaps if people were more concerned with helping each other and less time worrying about pleasing God, the world would be a better place.

Re:Religion?

[Silvrmane]

How did this get moderated as "insightful"?

Fictional mumbo-jumbo "solutions" to real life problems are patently irrational, and have no place in civilized society.

Re:Religion?

[shutdown -p now]

You know there were crusades to the Eastern Europe too? Prussia, Baltic countries... Mostly against slavonic tribes there, who were pagan at the time, to bring them the One True Faith, by the sword if needed (and capture more slaves while they were at it - ever wondered why 'slav' and 'slave' sound so similar?).

Re:Religion?

[clickety6]

I do believe I have now seen everything.

Bet you ain't seen an elephant fly!

Re:Religion?

[dancingmad]

Wow, you don't know history.

The Crusades were an offensive war AGAINST the Muslims. The Christians wanted to retake the Holy Lands (supposedly, there are a lot of other issues mixed in, including various popes wanting to flex their authority).

Furthermore, the Japanese in World War II were doing exactly what you're saying: after China fell to the British, Japan was quite scared of being the next country on the chopping block. Perry and company were the worst thing that could have happened. I'm not trying to defend the country's actions during the war, but the only non-biased judges during the Tokyo Trials (from India and the Phillipines) agree with this assesment of the war.

Re:Religion?

[cerberusss]

just because they tried to justify it by saying God said to do it, doesn't mean that God actually said to do it

After 9/11, The Onion put out a terrific item on this. It's for subscribers only, but here's a copy.

Re:Religion?

[phision]

As an aside, people have used all kinds of excuses to do horrible things and just because they tried to justify it by saying God said to do it, doesn't mean that God actually said to do it.

But God is in us (as the bible also does say), so what we do is actually what He does through us.

Re:Religion?

[CuteAlien]

The article does not mention all research which was done. I suppose religion was not completly ignored. For example a buddhist monk is mentioned and a group of nuns. Also the following sentence seems to hint that they did not ignore spirituality:
"There are things that we really like and tire of less quickly - having good friends, the beauty of the natural world, spirituality". But you're right that it doesn't mention if organized spirituality (that's religion for me) increases our happyness.

Re:Religion?

[aug24]

However, Christ came to earth, lived a perfect life

Tell that to the fig tree!

Justin.

Re:Religion?

[aug24]

Actually Popes weren't officially infallible till the late 1800s when it was decided by a vote... of fallible men!

Madness ;-)

Justin.

Re:Religion?

[sobeks_eye]

I remember reading somewhere that Buddhism is the only major religion that has been positively correlated with happiness.

Funny and ironic, isn't that? As stated by two previous ACs, one of the main observations of the Buddha is that all life is suffering. Perhaps Buddhists accept that life is going to be a drag, and stop trying to fix everything and just go on living, hence being happier.

On the other hand, I've always said that the problem in life is other people. If they would quit bugging me, things would be better. Perhaps Buddhists spend enough time trying to reach enlightenment through meditating, hence isolating themselves. Getting away from other people regularly might make them happier.

Re:Religion?

[caudron]

I'm surprised the article doesn't explore Religion and it's affect on people's happiness.

Most religions do not consider happiness a goal. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, for instance, make no promises for personal happiness. Moses, Christ, and Mohammad didn't promise their followers that they'd have a great time. Regarding the eastern religions, Nirvana and Moksha are hardly "happy" end goals. Remember that the Buddha said that life == suffering.

It's also worth noting that, all too often, people fail to distinguish between Joy and Happiness. I can be happy alone in my room with no help from others. Question for the class: Can I be joyous alone? Don't answer, just spend a few years thinking about it.

My disclaimers: My degree is in religious studies. I'm a Christian, though I see great value in studying the teachings of other faiths. Also, I'm both happy and joyous more often than not, but happiness isn't really much of a goal of mine. I've just been fortunate enough to get it anyway.

Re:Religion?

[JavaLord]

Not quite. I believe the Buddha said "All life is pain".



Doesn't it go something like,

We all attach to things

Those things eventually Pass causing us pain" so the only way to avoid pain is to lose our attachments.

Re:Religion?

[Dogtanian]

As stated by two previous ACs, one of the main observations of the Buddha is that all life is suffering.

That's not necessarily true; I believe the word 'suffering' is a possibly misleading translation of the word 'dukkha'. This is hard to translate, but could possibly be phrased as 'unsatisfactoriness'.

(I am not a linguistics scholar, nor a Buddhist, so no-one reading this should quote the above in their PhD thesis).

Re:Religion?

[mccrew]

I'm surprised the article doesn't explore Religion and it's affect on people's happiness.

Religion can make certain people happy, but tends to make everyone else around them miserable.

Re:Religion?

[mahmud]

So how do you explain the sacking of Constantinople by the crusaders?

Re:Religion?

[mahmud]

In Russian, at least, word "slava" means honor. And that's the word people in that country tend to associate with "Slav"... Feel free to enlighten me on the ethymology of the word "Slav", though.

Re:Religion?

[Bastian]

Yah, but I'm a practising Buddhist with some (amateur) scholarly interest in Buddhist texts, and I'll back you up on that.

I've met very few Buddhists who ever use the word 'suffering' when they mean 'dukkha.' The ones that do are usually folks whose experience with Buddhism has sadly been limited to semi-pop-culture books and syncretic New-Age Pseudobuddhism.

Re:Religion?

[t1m0r4n]

Probably because religion - just like many other things - are somewhat orthogonal to happiness. Being religious does not make you more or less likely to be happy.

The article mentioned that people who are more social tend to be more happy. Many religious groups are very socially active. If one is a loner, who has a hard time making new friends, the right religious group is just the ticket. (I'm an atheist myself, so I can't play :P)

But I've noticed that some of the churches around me, in addition to bible study classes, maintain a a very active social calendar for all ages. These churches get it. You are getting people involved, making friends, and keeping the group all together to hinder outside influences from evil people like me.

So, in summary, I think religion can make a person more happy.

Re:Religion?

[glsunder]

Take a look at christianity without the blinders of organized religion on. Many of the teachings apply to happiness here on earth. Throw away the BS that others have added -- the rituals, the idea that people should suffer, that only bad people are poor, that only bad people are rich, that we should hate certain people, that the world is 6,000 years old, etc.

What you're left with is basically: forgive people, be kind others, don't dwell on the negative, and enjoy the good things you have. Every one of those increases happiness for both the individual and others around them. Christianity isn't as bad as christians make it.

Re:Religion?

[aminorex]

> Don't Christians have the right to defend themselves when Muslims attack them?

Not according to Jesus. (Matthew 5:38)

Re:Religion?

[Eli Gottlieb]

as it is understood in most Judeo-Christian religions

Please do not include "Judeo" there. In Judaism the Happy Afterlife is a TIME, not a place, and is directly brought about by the doing of mitzvot (commandments). Everyone is considered responsible for doing these mitzvot because 1. They're often the Right Thing to do anyway and 2. Our Covenant with G-d.

When we die we supposedly wake up and it's the afterlife, yes, but WHEN exactly this happens is squarely in our own hands, and thus life has more to it than trying to be happy.

Kind of a loose explanation, but it'll have to do.

Re:Religion?

[Eli Gottlieb]

:Sigh:

The obligatory Buddhism Praising Hour...

Look, people. The Buddhists are smart, but that's really all they have going for them. Do you really know what all that meditation is? It's THINKING! Nothing more than sitting still and calming the varying stimuli that affect your mind for long enough to apply the existential (Multiple Intelligence's word for philosophical/religious intelligence) intelligence you were born with.

Siddartha Guatama really was just fortunate to be in a situation (a prince, I remember from History class) where he could take time off from constantly striving for what he THOUGHT would make him happy and think for a good long time (many years) about what REALLY would make him happy. He came up with Buddhism, what are your thoughts?

You may now stop worshipping the fat Indian guy. It really doesn't matter what religion you are if you want to be happy, just THINK!

As a starting hint, I've found that the key to happiness in anything is knowing when one's circumstances are GOOD ENOUGH rather than when they are perfect.

Re:Religion?

[shutdown -p now]

You're mostly correct, though "honour" is perhaps not the best translation (cf. "Chest' i slava" - "Honour and fame"). However, in English (and some other languages, in fact), "slav" turned into "slave", because that's what the pagan population of the conquered lands of Eastern Europe was to the crusaders.

Re:Religion?

[sobeks_eye]

Yeah, my bad. It was actually Yoda, not Buddha who talked about suffering.

Re:Religion?

[BandwidthHog]

I'm an atheist myself, so I can't play

Look for a Freethought group in your area. Meetup.com is a good starting point, but far from the only one. We meet one Sunday morning a month to worship coffee beans and one Wednesday evening each month for a more casual get-together.

Money?

[knightinshiningarmor]

Money always seems to make me happy.

Re:Money?

[Himring]

It doesn't buy everything in life, but what it don't buy I don't like....

Slashdot MOTD

[puppetman]

Saw a message of the day at the bottom of the slashdot page a few weeks ago:

"Men don't know what happiness is until they are married, but by then it's too late".

Good for wedding toasts...

Re:Slashdot MOTD

[The Amazing Fish Boy]

Saw a message of the day at the bottom of the slashdot page a few weeks ago: "Men don't know what happiness is until they are married, but by then it's too late". Good for wedding toasts...

I feel today's is equally (if not more) relevant:
"Beam me up, Scotty! It ate my phaser!"

Nothing quite like watching William Shatner be bullied by a giant noodly space monster. Weeping with full stops between the sobs, and the like.

Re:Slashdot MOTD

[Citizen of Earth]

"Men don't know what happiness is until they are married, but by then it's too late"

“Happiness isn't something you experience; it's something you remember.”—Oscar Levant

Re:Slashdot MOTD

[LS]

"Happiness isn't something you experience; it's something you remember."--Oscar Levant

But sometimes you become fully self-aware, and your memory center is completely in synch with your seat of consciousness, at which point a wonderful thing occurs...

Re:Slashdot MOTD

[Citizen of Earth]

But sometimes you become fully self-aware, and your memory center is completely in synch with your seat of consciousness, at which point a wonderful thing occurs...

You wake up?

As The Beatles would say

[ZakuSage]

Happiness is a warm gun.

Re:As The Beatles would say

[eraserewind]

Happiness is a warm bum.

Happiness is individualised perception

[drijen]

For many of my co-workers here in the bible belt, hapiness is letting their worries be "god's" worries. IF thats so for most religious people, i would cynically say that hapiness is letting someone else have repsonsibilty. The article seems to concretrate heavily on the religous "values".

I look it a different way:

When i die, i want to fly, sliding on my side at 100 MPH into the pearly gates, wearing a huge smile smile, yelling "WOW! What a ride!".

I hate for my life to be dull and unispiring - that for me is happiness.

I wonder if they did a case study on Adrenaline junkies, priests, and people like Linus Torvalds. Only then could i trust the science of happiness :(

Re:Happiness is individualised perception

[aaza]

"WOW! What a ride!"

"I wanna do it again!"
*Runs off to find the end of the queue*

Re:Happiness is individualised perception

[Yehooti]

Happiness only comes to me after much strife and unhappiness. It seems that in order to attain the goal of all, happiness, we have much to pay in advance. Once we overcome the many causes of our unhappiness, we can then relish the results of our efforts. Happiness does not come for free and it isn't even cheap. We pay dearly for it. To obtain it we need to set realistic goals then fight the battles necessary to reach them. The satisfaction we have once they are reached should bring happiness. If not, we continue with new goals and struggles. If we never reach there then our goals were probably not realistic.

Re:Happiness is individualised perception

[argStyopa]

First, let me just mention that's PJ O'Rourke's line.

Second, I think you (like so many who are too 'sophisticated' for religion) deeply misunderstand what religion is and does for people.

A major cause of unhappiness today is anxiety, and I daresay it's been that way with humans for years. As far as we can tell, dolphins don't lie awake at night, worried about global warming; squirrels don't deeply regret the and inability to achieve rodent/feline cooperation; birds don't need counseling because they feel like bad parents because one of their chicks can't fly. Humans DO worry about big, non immediate things. We're sentient, self-aware creatures that see further than the next meal, the next mating (well, some of us), and the next predator. IMO it's concomitant with cognizance that we lot a lot of things concern us which we have NO POWER TO CHANGE. Humans naturally seek explanation and order - the sheer randomness of our environment and events therein can leave people feeling adrift.

Religion addresses this directly and at an emotional level. It's not that "their worries are God's worries" exactly. It's more that it helps people accept the things that they cannot control and thus be intrinsically happier because they don't feel powerless. Or, more accurately they are still powerless, but are more accepting of the limits of what they can control.

Religion - contrary to some modern media versions - is about humility, acceptance, and happiness. I'd say that history illustrates it's about as essential to "humanness" as is language.

Re:Happiness is individualised perception

[ultranova]

I hate for my life to be dull and unispiring - that for me is happiness.

Happiness for you is hating how dull and uninspiring your life is ? Well, whatever works for you, I guess...

I wonder if they did a case study on Adrenaline junkies, priests, and people like Linus Torvalds. Only then could i trust the science of happiness :(

So that's why you're posting to Slashdot: you're just an adrenaline junkie !-)

Happiness is a serious problem

[cold fjord]

Anyone concerned with happiness might want to consider reading Happiness is a Serious Problem by Dennis Prager.

He devotes an hour a week (called the "Happiness Hour") on his radio program to the question of happiness.

Agree or disagree, he is thought provoking. His approach is also interesting in that he values clarity over agreement and has callers and guests from across the ideological / political spectrum.

Re:Happiness is a serious problem

[LS]

I might have checked this out, but first there are no excerpts to base a judgement on, and second this guy is a neo-con tool. These guys are responsible for making the world UNHAPPY in a lot of ways, so why would I trust his advice? Check out this column. He proceeds to write off all kinds of valid points by labeling them "hysteria", ignoring the fact that the whole war was based on neo-con hysteria. He lists some clearly fucked up statistics on the Patriot Act, and then through some magic hand-waving somehow spins this as a positive thing! I have no reason to trust this guy's judgement. And what's up with the silly fucking pipe he uses to show off his wedding ring?

LS

Re:Happiness is a serious problem

[LS]

Well, Mr. "Anonymous" (it's not to hard to guess who you really are, jeezus), I think that people lying to themselves and broadcasting these lies and distortions to the public, and having disregard for other humans will likely have issues with happiness, so NO I don't think politics should be separated from happiness in this case. Also, I never claimed to have a solution for happiness, so I don't know exactly what program you not putting stock into.

LS

Re:Happiness is a serious problem

[LS]

Also, did you ever consider that I or others might not be in the US? I'm in China right now, so listening to the radio or streams is not such an easy proposition. It's this kind of narrowmindedness that is what gets me upset about neo-cons.

LS

Re:Happiness is a serious problem

[ChrisMaple]

Prager's claims are fairly well delimited and seem to be accurate. He also acknowledges that there is hysteria on the right and gives examples. I oppose a lot of what he stands for, but your claims are unjustified.

Re:Happiness is a serious problem

[cold fjord]

I think that you exhibit remarkable candor. Many people sharing your disposition feel the need to wear a mask of open-mindedness, professing a willingness to be persuaded by argument & evidence. You, on the other hand, freely dismiss the possibility of learning something about happiness, learning to enjoy more from life, from someone because you disagree with his views about such things as the effect of anti-terrorism legislation, and no doubt, trade policy. And yet, you apparently have no meaningful ideas on how to be happier yourself.

Have fun in China. (The PRC?) For the sake of your health I wouldn't ask around about how many tens of millions of people were killed as part of the "Great Leap Forward" and the "Cultural Revolution" under Chairman Mao, or how many Chinese soldiers were killed when the PRC tried to invade Communist Viet Nam (they were repulsed) to stop the Viet Namese invasion of Cambodia after the Khmer Rouge (Cambodian Communists) killed about 1/4 of their own countrymen. The secret police in Communist China might not take kindly to it and pronounce you a spy. You will be much better off protesting the "Neo Cons" in the US. Assuming you make it to the US any time soon, Prager will still be around to either protest or for listening. (That assumes you don't partake of the growing strain of anti-Semitism on the Left, some of which use "Neo Con" as a code word for Jew.)

Re:Happiness is a serious problem

[LS]

Ok, I have no idea where to begin with this one. Man oh man. Let's just make a list and knock them down:

1. I said I was in China. I never said I had any sympathy or support for what they do here. You make stupid assumptions.
2. I have no idea whether Prager is a jew, and it doesn't matter. And I don't think you believe that Bush and Cheney are jews, do you? I'm having a hard time not being insulting here, because I don't understand how anyone could confuse this fact. Were they wearing yarmulkas in some photo shoot?
3. If it weren't for the hysterics of people like me pushing back against the current administration and it's ilk, martial law, censorship, and prison camps would be a regular features of American society.
4. Posting anonymously is cowardly

And by the way, I do have ideas on happiness. Let's start with a few simple ones:
1. The Golden Rule - treat others how you wish to be treated. Don't try to censor them, tell them how they should have sex or who they can have sex with, force them to pray to a god they don't believe in, bomb them, steal their money in corrupt corporate scandals, etc. This is my number one beef with modern "conservatives"
2. Be kind to others - don't bomb them
3. Don't be obsessed with material objects - don't bomb people so you can filter money to weapons manufacturers and take over oil fields.

Look, it boils down to this. I do believe that I am relatively open minded. But I know people like Prager, and I know that his thought processes are not isolated to various aspects of his life. I used to follow down every path for the sake of open-mindedness, but after a while, I started to make inductive conclusions because my life is short, considering there are INFINITE paths to follow. There are millions of pages of "argument & evidence", but I don't have time to read them all. I think I'll look for cues on happiness from people who don't support murdering and subjigating thousands of people in other parts of the world based on lies and fears about weapons and terror. It's not as if there's a small selection of people who have ideas on Happiness. I could read books, listen to shows, and talk to people every second of my life and not finish everything available, so why waste my time with a prick like Prager?

LS

Nice Guy

[mysqlrocks]

Dogs who experience electric shocks that they cannot avoid by their actions simply give up trying. They will passively endure later shocks that they could easily escape.

Wow, sounds like a really nice guy. Isn't this cruelty to animals? Oh wait, it's for science so it's OK.

Re:Nice Guy

[The Amazing Fish Boy]

Dogs who experience electric shocks that they cannot avoid by their actions simply give up trying. They will passively endure later shocks that they could easily escape.

Ah, shit... they're on to me! This bird's gonna fly!



SPLAT!

Re:Nice Guy

[ecumenical_40oz]

Probably wouldn't happen nowadays. The ethical requirements in psych experiments have changed a lot since the 70s, just look at the Stanford Prison Experiments.

Can't be sure, since the article doesn't say...

[nathan s]

...but usually twin studies take this into account, including identical twins who were for one reason or another raised in different families (often as a result of adoption). Researchers are not all stupid; they tend to take these things into account when designing the study.

Re:Can't be sure, since the article doesn't say...

[grogdamighty]

Actually, the usual method is to compare identical twins to fraternal twins and compare the relative frequencies. The logic behind this is that environment is the same in either case, but genetics are either the same (identical) or different (fraternal).

Re:Can't be sure, since the article doesn't say...

[tool462]

There are a couple experimental techniques useful to try to isolate behavior variation due to genetics and environment.

1) Identical twins raised together and apart. Identical genes, but variation in environment. Acts to isolate variation in behavior due to genetics.

2) Adoptive siblings raised together and apart. Genes are completely uncorrelated to other siblings, which acts to isolate variation in behavior due to environment.

Genetically speaking, fraternal twins are the same as non-twin siblings. Environment may play more of a role with non-twin siblings if there is a systematic change in how a child is treated based on age. This still yields useful information, but not as useful as the two extremes listed above. The problem with any kind of study that uses twin studies is getting a large enough sample set to be statistically meaningful. The second item above in particular requires a very large sample size, because while we know identical twins have 100% identical genes, we can't say for sure that kids raised in the same household will have 100% identical environments.

Re:Can't be sure, since the article doesn't say...

[grogdamighty]

Sorry - I did not mean to discount the idea of identical twins raised in separate households. It is merely the case that far more studies compare identical to fraternal twins because such are far more common. As well, this method indicates whether genetics are the reason for similarity or not, as I mentioned.

While sibling studies are not uncommon, identical/fraternal twins have greater specificity because, as you said, age leaves the equation - environments are generally kept much more regular between twins than siblings of dissimilar ages, even by so small a margin as a year.

Soma

[Misanthrope]

Soma

Re:Soma

[Eli Gottlieb]

Thank you for showing us exactly what Aldous Huxley was terrified of us becoming, and with very good reason.

Socialising

[dorkygeek]

From the article:

When two American psychologists studied hundreds of students and focused on the top 10% "very happy" people, they found they spent the least time alone and the most time socialising. Psychologists know that increasing the number of social contacts a miserable person has is the best way of cheering them up. When Jean-Paul Sartre wrote "hell is other people", the arch-pessimist of existentialist angst was wrong.

Hurraaaay for that next students party. Make sure you wear a necklace with your home address (or whereever you want to get dragged when you can't walk for yourself anymore).

--
Windows is like decaf - it tastes like the real thing, but it won't get you through the day.

Re:Socialising

[Eli Gottlieb]

Foodservice workers and "customer service" "representatives" speak and act from scripts that they were trained in, hence their sheer inhuman stupidity combined with a resentment for everyone they serve. However, they're probably perfectly nice people when they can act like their own selves.

Happiness comes from within

[The Amazing Fish Boy]

Warning: Wishy-washy bullshit approaching. Proceed with caution.

Learn that you do not need anything except the biological neccessities for survival. Appreciate the present, but don't be considered with the future. Give up all attachments. Take only what you need to live.

The fact is, the more you have, the more you want. Do you ever see anyone without a TV lusting after a big screen plasma TV? Do you ever see someone without a computer lusting after the latest AMD processor? They spend time with those they care about, they read things, they think, they learn. Not only can you not buy happiness, buying actively makes you unhappy.

Re:Happiness comes from within

[qbwiz]

Mod points are unnecessary; you don't need them. In fact, you should be happy that you don't have them.

Re:Happiness comes from within

[Thing 1]

I watched the mayoral debates tonight. Some stupid bitch (candidate) said "people should turn off their TVs." (She had many other negative things to say which formed my opinion of her.)

Now, I'm all for constructive criticism. If I'm doing something wrong, tell me how to do right! But her comment, and yours as well, was completely negative -- it said what not to do, but it didn't say what to do.

It's easy to say "Don't drink arsenic!"

We make up Silly things to get angry about.

[jellomizer]

Think about all the things that get us angry and upset. How many of them are really justified? People get angry at things that don't matter much at all. Like getting your old posts that are not read any more modded down, or the annoyance a person gets when they see a mistake in spelling or grammar. When the read an article basing Linux, Mac OS, or GNU. Even if every linux distribution company went out of business or just stopped and the Supreme Court declared that Microsoft is the only software distribution company in the US. Why should this stuff boil our blood? While it may effect us it is no major reason to get angry about it. If every program has to be made by Microsoft you get a job with Microsoft. If you can't get a job programming get an other job, if it pays less the make due with less. Most of the things that makes us unhappy doesn't effect our ability to survive comfortable. When you realize that things are not as bad as they seem and you know that life will never be perfect, you usually live a happier life. Don't strive for a Perfect life just a manageable one.

Happiness versus Contentment

[GillBates0]

This article opens up new insight into the common perceptions of what makes us happy, such as having more friends and more money.

Interesting article...especially given my recent reading on the Hindu/Buddhistic concept of "detachment". These traditions prescribe detachment from wordly/materialistic desires in order to achieve contentment in life.

In short, anything that you're sufficiently attached to, that can give you enough happiness, can cause you as much pain when taken away. The solution therefore, is to follow a middle path practising detachment from all wordly desires, so as to walk along the middle path - neither be swayed emotionally toward too much towards happiness, nor being overly susceptible to sadness.

Happiness is a short lived emotion, (often accompanied by a potentially negative emotion of sadness) while contentment with what you have is usually a longer lived state of mind.

/Not overly religious...just a philosophy I like subscribing to...especially after a recent -ve swing in the state of affairs.

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[mattjb0010]

In short, anything that you're sufficiently attached to, that can give you enough happiness, can cause you as much pain when taken away. The solution therefore, is to follow a middle path practising detachment from all wordly desires, so as to walk along the middle path - neither be swayed emotionally toward too much towards happiness, nor being overly susceptible to sadness.

The four noble truths:
1. Life means suffering.
2. The origin of suffering is attachment.
3. The cessation of suffering is attainable.
4. The path to the cessation of suffering (aka the eightfold way).

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[beesquee]

National Geographic had an article about measuring happiness in cultures using MRI's. They found out of all the people scanned Tibetan monks were by far the happiest people in the world despite living in subpoverty conditions. Make you think those buddhist's are onto something.

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[agibbs]

That sounds just like the philosophy or Epicurious, or if you prefer Latin to Greek then Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (Latin | English) parroted it pretty well. Note that epicurianism (contrary to modern stereotype) is not hedonism, true it advocates the maximization of pleasure, but it advises that the best way to do that is to live a life of moderation and to avoid all pain. Pleasure is the abscence of pain. Or something like that. I don't know that I agree with it, but it is interesting to thinka bout.

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[powerlinekid]

Yoda?

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[srid]

1. Life means suffering.

And that is well said in the book The Road Less Travelled by Scott Peck. Like me, it has changed the life of many readers.

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[renjipanicker]

Nice observation, and very apt. I would like to add to your comments that the Hindu/Buddhist concept of detachment does not mean giving up material necessities altogether. It only means mental and emotional detachment from the consequent pain/pleasure derived from them.

Here's wishing you the strength to come out of your current situation, if you haven't already.

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[etherelithic]

I've always figured that happiness and pain are just two sides to the same coin, and while great happiness can subsequently bring you great pain, this pain can never take away that happiness that you had experienced. Does the pain that you experience mean that the happiness you had was not worth it? If you loved someone, married him/her, lived happily for 10 years, but then that person suddenly died, would you wish that person never walked into your life in the first place? I feel that such a happiness is worth whatever pain I may or may not feel as a result, because I cannot make decisions in constant fear of what the future may hold. I cannot agree to living the life of moderation that you speak of, because I believe that a life worth living is a life worth suffering for.

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[node 3]

The solution therefore, is to follow a middle path practising detachment from all wordly desires, so as to walk along the middle path - neither be swayed emotionally toward too much towards happiness, nor being overly susceptible to sadness.

Sounds like a living death to me.

That's why I hate Taoism. It states (correctly) that you must understand the "way" of things, but then it says you must subject yourself to them (go with the flow, bend like a reed).

Here's the truth of the world: we all have will, and the universe doesn't really care one way or the other about it. Happiness is achieving our will (or making progress), and suffering is to have our will frustrated.

Hinduism exists in the form it does because the Persians wanted a docile populace in India, and telling people to be happy with their station in life is one way to keep some frustrated lower-classmember from challenging your status over them.

The "no attachments" philosophies are only suitable, IMO, for people who will never attain any sort of lasting happiness in life. For example, slaves would feel better with such a philosophy since, it's assumed, they'll never be truly happy (not being free to persue happiness). In other words, they have little chance of having their will fullfilled, so they will have to (sadly) shrink their ambitions dramatically.

But if you have the means to assert your will over the universe, then why give up all that potential happiness?

The truth of those philosophies is not to give up materialism, but to sync your desires with your ability to attain them. Don't believe the myth, for example, that just because you are born in America, that all you have to do is work hard and you too can be a millionaire. But don't go to the opposite extreme and give up the potential of owning an iPod, a nice TV, and a quality car (or whatever material object are within your means). Such things are not only possible for a large number of Americans (for example), but can also bring very real happiness.

So what should a rational philosophy be? I think something along the lines of, "live within your means, but don't be afraid to take the opportunity to increase your means if you can."

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[node 3]

The four noble(sic) truths:
1. Life means suffering.
2. The origin of suffering is attachment.
3. The cessation of suffering is attainable.
4. The path to the cessation of suffering (aka the eightfold way).

If item 1 is true, then not suffering means not life. Item 3 states that the cessation of suffering is attainable. In other words, it states that not living is attainable. What a morbid "truth"!

I disagree with item 1. Life includes suffering, but it does not mean suffering.

Item 2 ignores the fact that "the origin" of happiness is also attachment.

Item 3 implies the equivalent of being dead.

Item 4 is an incomplete sentence, but I think you mean the "eightfold way" is... not suffering. Is not being alive?

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[mattjb0010]

Item 2 ignores the fact that "the origin" of happiness is also attachment.

The origin of happiness is love, love != attachment, in fact attachment gets in the way of love. As stated clearly in another post, the English formulation I quoted above doesn't capture the true meaning. It's not about dying, but about not being attached. Item three is not about being dead, but about being passive to change, to not being attached to things which are ever-changing, but being true to yourself, and more important, to love all others.

Re:Happiness versus Contentment

[ultranova]

The origin of happiness is love, love != attachment, in fact attachment gets in the way of love.

I have to disagree with this. Being attached to something, in the context of human relationships, means, essentially, that that something matters to you, that you care about it. Loving something but not being attached to it would therefore mean loving something but not caring about it, which is a self-contradictory statement./p

:-( I am never happy :-(

[Zweideutig]

I have a Mac Mini, a fast server, a SUV. I am still always regarded as a jerk, and I am never happy. I am always in a bad mood. The only that makes me mildly happy is Big Mac sandwiches, donuts, and Mountain Dew. But it is temporary. Happiness is not an adult emotion, it is a child's ignorant emotion. Adults are all angry and demoralized like me. :|

A stable ...

[SpaceLifeForm]

... kernel.

Yep, that's the ticket!

Re:A stable ...

[kclittle]

How 'bout *any* piece of stable software? *Any* ...

Re:A stable ...

[dgatwood]

As a general rule, I can't ever fully trust any piece of software that I didn't at least partially write myself. Even then, my degree of trust tends to be proportional to my level of involvement. It's not that software I write is so much better than software that other people write. It's that if there's something wrong, I (a.) know why it is wrong, (b.) instinctively know how to fix it, often being able to find the line of code in mere seconds, and (c.) have only myself to blame for it.

For me, happiness is being self-reliant---a feeling of being in control of my own destiny, even if that control is illusory. Happiness is knowing that I'll do my best to get something right because if I care enough to do it at all, I care enough to do it right. Happiness is never having to put up with someone else doing a half-assed job of something causing me to have to either redo it or pay someone else to redo it. It's wiring my own audio cables because half the commercial XLR cables are wired wrong. It's taking things apart and fixing them instead of throwing them away even when it takes a while---even if the only benefit is knowing why they failed so you can avoid such products in the future. Happiness is knowing that whatever happens, you're prepared for it---that you'll make it through it---not because life can't throw you curves, but because in your mind, you already mapped out those curves a week before.

Maybe it's just me.

Wanting what you have

[antiquark]

Happiness isn't having what you want, it's wanting what you have.

Happiness != Pleasure

[PoignardSanglant]

The question "what do you have to do to find happiness?" is a Philosophy question, not something that can be answered through Science.

Drugs don't really make people happy. Happiness must come from within.

The Happy life is thought to be one of excellence; now an excellent life requires exertion, and does not consist in amusement. If Eudaimonia, or happiness, is activity in accordance with excellence, it is reasonable that it should be in accordance with the highest excellence; and this will be that of the best thing in us.

-- Aristotle, "Nichomachean Ethics"

What I get out of that, is that people are happy when they have a sense of purpose and feel like they're doing "what they need to do". Of course, sometimes that is very bad for everyone else. But think about what happened to that guy from Fight Club, who was working at the convenience store but wanted to be a veterinarian.

Re:Happiness != Pleasure

[Omestes]

Drugs don't really make people happy. Happiness must come from within.

Looks like happiness, smells like happiness, must be happiness. I really don't buy that, it smells to much like the grounding of Kants ethics, where source matters more than ends/means. I don't like or buy the distinction. If it leads to happiness, it must lead to happiness, because how can something be indistinguishable from the real thing, but not the thing itself?

Not that I advocate drugs. But I got to run, got a wine tasting.

Re:Happiness != Pleasure

[cameldrv]

From what I remember from college, Eudaimonia doesn't really translate as happiness, rather, it's more like "Flourishing."

Re:Happiness != Pleasure

[gl4ss]

if drugs didn't make people happy they wouldn't be so addictive and leave your live feeling empty after you stop taking them, as short term they are wonderful for making you feel happy, powerful and on top of the world(even if you were the lowliest scum on earth and knew it).

look, you could be drugged to feel happy and you wouldn't know it and you wouldn't care(maybe not with drugs we got now, though, but eventually). however, a westerner would feel bad about being a junkie probably, because the culture imprints that on us, but still, high on morphine he would feel like million bucks for a short while.

you can ponder all you want about it but your brain still is just that, a brain.

not having anything to do is wonderful sometimes too, nobody relying on you to do anything, no responsibilities to carry, no pressure.

oh and people often lie about being happy.

Re:Happiness != Pleasure

[heptapod]

Coercion, even done in love, only serves to breed resentment.

Re:Happiness != Pleasure

[benjamindees]

Any idiot can see that "eudaimonia" means "good spirits".

Of course, I also have no doubt that your philosophy prof. spent an entire classperiod trying to convince you of his own pet interpretation. Probably a Republican too, I bet, huh? They tend to equate wealth with happiness...

Re:Happiness != Pleasure

[Robotron23]

Drugs don't really make people happy. Happiness must come from within.

Absolutely. If we look back through the postings on this topic, you can see a lot of people think that happiness works on two levels, basically : True Happiness - Ie. a general feeling of contentment, well being. And False Happiness - Ie. a general feeling of contentment, well being, but with overtones of guilt, fear etc.

This, in my view as a practicing Buddhist, is wrong. Generally, when one is attached to something, that is where unhappiness and suffering- even for a split second - arises. A person may feel more or less content while using Prozac for instance - but they are in essence attached to said drug. Okay you could layer on a few emotions and call it "false" happiness (some even cite stigmas alone as warrant for this), or even go so far as to call it temporary, but one must cast ones gaze to attachment to fully appreciate a de-layered, simple and generally mindful view.

In this way, one could infer that SSRI's are no different than say...some material goods such as a fast car or a CD collection! One may be attached to material items such as these, too.

Re:Happiness != Pleasure

[aminorex]

Literally, "good spirits".

But again, that's a broad semantic field.

Money

[dfn5]

They say money can't buy happiness. However true this may be having the bill collectors call day in and day out certainly doesn't contribute to happiness either.

Re:Money

[dgatwood]

One of my coworkers told me about a quote (of unknown origin). It was something to the effect of "The expression that money can't buy happiness is a lie perpetuated by the rich to keep the poor from killing them."

I'm not sure that's entirely true, but I will say this: While money can't buy happiness, below a certain point, a lack thereof will assuredly buy misery.

Re:Money

[2nd Post!]

Totally irrelevant. If you pay off all your bills, you avoid bill collectors. If you avoid having large unpayable bills, you also avoid bill collectors.

If you don't have enough money to buy happiness, spend less and be happier with what you have, right?

Re:Money

[StikyPad]

"Money may not buy happiness, but try being happy without it," is how I've always heard it phrased.

Re:Money

[Bootard]

Money can't buy happiness, true, but I'd rather be unhappy watching my big screen tv on my awesome round-the-world yacht than be unhappy while living in the poorhouse. Some nice courtside basketball tickets and a porche that goes 250mph may not ultimately make me happy, but I wouldn't mind give them a try.

Re:Money

[Krimszon]

But when you have more mony, you just buy more things, since you keep wanting to 'improve' your life. The article states that winners of a lottery are back to normal happiness levels in a year. And if you follow the news, rich people also get calls from bill collectors. The only way to not have bill collectors call you, is not to buy stuff. So as said before in thecomments, you should detach from material things. This would mean money can not make you happier. As a great philisopher once said: "mo' money, mo' problems."

Re:Money

[halleluja]

Money; always the problem, never the solution.

Re:Money

[jaclu]

Money is mostley an issue when its missing. In those cases money is most definately a way to happiness, or perhaps a way out of panic and depression at least.

When you are at a level where you have unpaid bills, and collectors contacting you, that could depress anyone.

Once you get economically over a minimum, where you have housing, food and ability to pay your basic costs of living arranged. Further increases in income doesnt scale to happiness in a direct way

And as money increases it becomes more an issue of greed rather than basic happiness in your life.

Re:Money

[smyle]

...or as I'm fond of saying (and I've used it for so long, I don't even remember where I originally heard it):

Money can't buy everything. Poverty can't buy anything.

Re:Money

[BandwidthHog]

yet another variant:

“The trouble with being poor is that it takes up so damn much of your time.”

So that explains it

[CaroKann]

We are designed to focus when we are under duress, and coast when things are going good. No wonder I work so much better when the boss is mad at me.

Krusty the Clown Sez

[Ranger]

"Kids, we're going to the happiest place on earth - Tijuana, Mexico!" 8F24

I'm so happy...

[piecewise]

Because Slash has finally started working on its HTML/CSS. I thought it would never happen. Now if it could only catch up to other CMSs and similar platforms.........

Happyness or Pleasure?

[Erioll]

Happyness or Pleasure? Which is really being pursued by most? How many even know the difference?

Re:Happyness or Pleasure?

[v01d]

How many even know the difference?

From what I've seen, only religious nuts and other non-introspective types.

I can't figure out happiness but with enough pleasure who cares?

Stroke my ego

[Anonymous Coward]

+5 Funny makes me happy!

Oh yeah, also food, sex, and money.

Not necessarily in that order, though.

There's a big difference between temporary happiness and true satisfaction.

Can I get a little +1 Insightful too? Thanks!

Hapiness is simple

[Locke2005]

Getting laid on a regular basis sure doesn't hurt... and if that doesn't work, try Prozac!

Re:Hapiness is simple

[mooingyak]

I have 4 mod points and I was planning on spending one on the first comment that read something like "It's all about the blowjobs", but I couldn't find that so yours will just get a comment added instead :)

Re:Hapiness is simple

[Dogtanian]

If getting laid isn't working you should be trying Viagra.

No, you'll just be an ugly, out-of-shape, smelly, uncharismatic slob with a permanent hardon.

Bugger Prozac.

On the other hand, trying to have sex with a small pill isn't going to make you feel any better either.

I don't have the solution for happiness but...

[at_slashdot]

I have the solution for unhappiness: ask yourself as often as you can if you are happy.

(ok someone smarter than me said that, don't remember the name and maybe is not even relevant)

"Happiness" != Pleasure.

[Captain Scurvy]

I think a lot of us tend to equate happiness with "pleasure" of some kind, which might be the wrong way to look at it. Think of drug addiction: eventually, you need the drug not to feel good, but to feel "normal." The "good feeling" always goes away, and the more you keep looking for it, the harder it gets to hold onto it. I think it might be fair to say that this idea of happiness is really a species of suffering.

Serenity, on the other hand, stays with you. When you stop looking for happiness, you'll have it. :)

Re:"Happiness" != Pleasure.

[mattjb0010]

Serenity, on the other hand, stays with you.

Yes, I'm sure there will be a DVD release.

Re:"Happiness" != Pleasure.

[WormholeFiend]

But in the meantime, there's always the bittorrent pirated version.

Just because I download it now doesnt mean I wont buy the DVD :P

Old stuff.

[Marko DeBeeste]

Been a Journal of Hedonics since 2001. "Happiness: The science behind your smile," ISBN: 0192805584 Among others. Please try to keep up.

Happiness is as elusive

[Anna Merikin]

as remembering our lives before about three years old.

Why is it we consider it normal to have "blacked out" our entire childhoods, when such a blackout is considered a symptom of psychosis?

Could our culture itself be psychotic? If so, what would be the symptoms of a psychotic culture? Frequent wars, famines, early sickness and death, personalized unhappiness, generalized misery, systematic abuse and periodic "ethnic cleansings"?

We are bigger than the culture that tries to confine and contain us, so we become folded, stapled and twisted when forced to "fit in."

Happiness is remembering our childhoods entire.

It is possible; I have done it.

We are not humans in search of a spritual experience, we are spirits out to find the human -- and happiness is nothing more or less than knowing this.

Re:Happiness is as elusive

[Eli Gottlieb]

I've only really forgotten some parts of my childhood, but all the really good and bad moments stay with me, as well as the flashes and memories that come back from (for some reason) reading "Ender's Game" ;-).

Of course, I only really have maybe 13 years of life since I started remembering things, but I always have wondered why the hell adults never seem to remember what it was like to be a kid.

Whoever said...

[Zweideutig]

Whoever said money couldn't buy happiness... didn't know where to shop.

Re:Whoever said...

[joel_archer]

They say "You can't buy happiness." What they don't mention is you can rent it by the hour.

Re:Whoever said...

[MagicDude]

"For those who said money can't buy happiness forgot about puppies." -Gene Hill

eh

[Anonymous Coward]

Sarcams is a bloody joy and irony is jolly good too =)

no one is happy until they are dead- Solon

[bubbaD]

According to the historian Herodotus of Halicarnassus, in Lydia Solon offended Croesus when he was asked "Who is the happiest man you have ever seen?", instead of complimenting the king he said "I can speak of no one as happy until they are dead". It was recalling this story which, again according to Herodotus, saved Croesus from execution when his kingdom was overcome by Cyrus's invading Persians.

From wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solon

Why are prescriptive arguments moded up on /.?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad to see platitudes are being modded up on /. these days. All it shows are /.'s groupthink values more than any objective analysis of happiness.

"Learn that you do not need anything except the biological neccessities for survival."

Why are you posting on /. and engaging in higher thought processes and abstract conversation then? What has that to do with biological necessities?

"Appreciate the present, but don't be considered with the future."

Really? You don't care about the future? I'm glad you value your present so much as to not be concerned with the future. Strictly speaking as going by your first comment, survival machines worry about the future. Their biological necessity for survival as you put it is very much concerned with the future. Looks like you have a value conflict here eh?

"Not only can you not buy happiness, buying actively makes you unhappy."

Says who? Do you have any scientific evidence that states that the brain state is unhappy when buying products? Or are you just playing to the /. groupthink so you get modded up?

Attitude

[Bullfish]

Really, happiness is subjective, but it like so many emotions is largely controlled by your attitude. If you're a cynic and prone to expect the worst, you can expect that to colour your outlook. If you think about it (at least here in the western world), most of our problems are transitory in nature. Things you sweated bricks about 10 years ago have little impact to how you feel today. Things that seemed insurmountable change with perspective and distance. It's the in-the-moment gut wrenching that take a lot of us down. If you can keep things in perspective, even your worst problems will not drag you down to the mud. If you can stand your ground and hold your attitude, your sense of self respect will keep you above water.

Simple perhaps, but the saying goes that you are only as happy as you decide to be

Emotions by their very nature are transitory.

Re:Attitude

[swordgeek]

You're right of course, but part of the real question at hand is, "where does your attitude come from?" On those days when you wake up on the wrong side of the bed, it's really bloody difficult to keep a positive attitude, even when you know you're being irrational. A few years back, I made a correlation between my sleep and my attitude--after a night of insufficient sleep, I'm almost invariably in a lousy mood, and the tiniest things PISS ME OFF!!!!!

The question is, why? What is it about sleep deprivation that makes me irritable? Why doesn't being exhausted make me happier? That's a question I'd be interested in seeing answered.

Re:Attitude

[Bullfish]

Sleep deprivation is not attitude. When you sleep your body re-adjusts its seratonin levels. Get lousy sleep - you feel lousy. Exhausted - go to sleep, your body has work to do.

Re:Attitude

[Shotgun]

I'm the most cynical person I know. I always assume the worst is going to happen. I'm a crochety old bastard.

But I'm completely content. When things actually go bad, I just say, "WTF, we knew it was going to happen." and then I deal with it. Example. Ice storm. Power's gone. Wife wakes up..."What're we going to do? What're we going to do? We need help." I wake up, roll the grill around into the garage so that I don't have to stand on the ice, and fry up some bacon and eggs. I couldn't cut any steel for the airplane, but there were some welds to run and I needed to carve a few handles, so there was plenty of work to keep me going till the electricity comes back on.

If you want to be happy, truly happy, forever, repeat this to yourself every time something doesn't go your way: "50 yrs ago, I wouldn't have air-conditioning. 100 yrs ago, I wouldn't have electricity or running water. 200 yrs ago, I wouldn't have medicine. 400yrs ago, things were really bad. Yet somehow people lived long enough for me to get here. The problems I'm facing are insignificant."

Shit never seems very deep after I remind myself of that.

Re:Attitude

[Bullfish]

Actually I'm kind of the same, though I am not cranky. I tend to do what I have to do when required and then move on. I believe all cycles good and bad end. You just need a little patience and perspective. Mind you, I didn't grow up expecting instant gratification which I think is a big part of a lot of people's unhappiness.

Re:Attitude

[Cally]

Wow. I came across your post in metamod & had to see it in context... what you've summed up in three or four sentences has taken me the last thirty years to learn by trial and error...

[ObPython]You lucky, lucky bastard! ;)

Which reminds me of the other thing I think I've worked out in that time... when you find yourself enjoying something (say, Monty Python's Life of Brian for example) - really, really enjoy it, whilst you can. Easier said than done, of course...

Re:Attitude

[Bullfish]

Thank you. I've had my share of scars, but scars heal if you let them.

Blessed are the cheesemakers!

Stay away from scientists!

[FishandChips]

Happiness is what happens when we're doing something else.

Re:Stay away from scientists!

[Hogwash McFly]

Happiness is what happens when we're doing someone else.

Fixed. ;)

Monkeys too, you insensitive clod

[bubbaD]

I always thought it was the fact that some of us don't fling poo at eachother that seperated us from the apes...

You must be new here!

Re:Monkeys too, you insensitive clod

[Thing 1]

It helps to end a

with a

and not another

-- otherwise it looks like you're quoting the PP and the GP (parent post and grandparent post, for the others who are new here).

Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in God

[heldlikesound]

God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.

C.S. Lewis

Paradox

[Wazukkithemaster]

Science of Happiness is a paradox. Happiness is often defined as contentment, the end of a journey with a satisfactory outcome often inspires 'happiness' and thus i will answer with a pursuit of truth philosophy. From Pascal's Penses:

If we seek truth through reason we cannot avoid one of these three sects. You cannot be a sceptic or a Platonist without stifling nature, you cannot be a dogmatist without turning your back on reason. Nature confounds the sceptics and Platonists, and reason confounds the dogmatists. What then will become of you, man, seeking to discover your true condition through natural reason? You cannot avoid one of these three sects nor survive in any of them. Know then, proud man, what a paradox you are to yourself. Be humble, impotent reason! Be silent, feeble nature! Learn that man infinitely transcends man, hear from your master your true condition, which is unknown to you.
Listen to God

Happiness itself is a philisophical question as to whether or not it exists/is attainable. I saw somebody post something about the 4 noble truth's, hey thats a good start. Pascal uses God but really you can use any silly old thing you decide to but faith in. Whether it be your friends and loved ones or a favorite toy or blanket. Anything you trust enough can be a source of happiness (IMHappyOpinion).

Re:Paradox

[mattjb0010]

I saw somebody post something about the 4 noble truth's, hey thats a good start. Pascal uses God but really you can use any silly old thing you decide to but faith in. Whether it be your friends and loved ones or a favorite toy or blanket. Anything you trust enough can be a source of happiness

Actually, putting ones faith in material things is what the 4 noble truths warn against; since these are impermanent. A Buddhist approach is to (until one reaches nirvana, which is a state of being, or rather non-being) put one's faith in the Buddha (the concept, obviously he is dead), the Dharma (his teachings) and the Sangha (spritual community, in the broad sense a group of people who support you).

Re:Paradox

[Wazukkithemaster]

I dont necessarily support the 4 noble truths, (didnt mean to imply that I did, whoops) but it is a way of thinking that I respect. But from my own experiences I've come to my own conclusions, that's all really.

Re:Paradox

[gstoddart]

Happiness itself is a philisophical question as to whether or not it exists/is attainable. I saw somebody post something about the 4 noble truth's, hey thats a good start. Pascal uses God but really you can use any silly old thing you decide to but faith in. Whether it be your friends and loved ones or a favorite toy or blanket. Anything you trust enough can be a source of happiness (IMHappyOpinion).

Well, in many ways, the Four Noble Truths aren't really something you are supposed to have faith in. Faith, fundamentally, is secondary to logically reasoning and deciding for yourself the teachings are accurate.

I guess the only article of 'faith' in Buddhism is that you agree with the observations about suffering and its causes, and think the solutions make sense. It's a moral and metaphysical outlook, but it's not something you take on faith.

At its simplest, Buddhism is about compassion and quelling the noisy mind. Either it resonates with you and makes sense, or you're free to pick or ignore anything that works for you -- or, choose to ignore it altogether.

As for Pascal ...

You cannot be a sceptic or a Platonist without stifling nature, you cannot be a dogmatist without turning your back on reason.

Buddhism offers a middle path. Rational exploration of the world around you, as well as a guides for behaviour in order not to increase suffering and to reach enlightenment. It also completely incorporates gods and ghosts and everything else in between -- to the best of my knowledge, skepticism about those is a personal choice.

Unlike fundamentalist Christians, for example, who dogmatically insist the world was created exactly according to the bible, Buddhists accept that some of the body of literature is intended to be metaphorical in nature. And believe that whatever the science tells you is what really happened.

Now, yes, an eager new monk is going to have a religious aspect, but practising Buddhism doesn't actually require faith or dogma.

If you're more interested, read some Pema Chodron, Thicht Nhat Han, or something from the Dalai Lama. It's quite accessible -- not full of formal/religious Buddhism, just useful life stuff.

At least, that's one Westerner's limited perspective. =)

Cheers

The Answer to The Question....

[Ratso Baggins]

Simply, "Follow your Bliss."

Poster on Oxycontin

[bubbaD]

Neo-Darwinist 'survival of the fittest' would suggest that the people who leave the most offspring are the happiest. "Fittest" turns out to means leaving genetic decendents (this means bothers, sisters, nephews and nieces count as well as children and grandchildren.)

Of course, if 'craving to better oneself' means screwing your brains out as often as possible, that would be entirely consistant.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selfish_gene

The senses of course

[Twinbee]

To find a complete science of happiness, we'd need to find out a master formula to create/rate good music, a formula for art, one for thought and games (sport, console or otherwise), and the various other senses (touch, smell, taste).

Those are the fundamentals.

Re:The senses of course

[gl4ss]

you know...
you could just skip all that crap and make the things happen in your brain that would happen from listening to good music, from achieving a victory, from falling in love etc..

mood altering drugs. or just shitloads of chocolate(which amounts to the same thing anyhow).

Re:The senses of course

[Twinbee]

Drugs can only do so much. I'm guessing there's a difference between 'craving' and true happiness.

Take music for example. The happiness gained through some of the best music, could never be 'emulated' via drugs and so forth.

obBob Dylan

[Asprin]

"The question is not happy or unhappy, it's blessed or unblessed."

- Bob Dylan

Exercise!

[dentar]

Plenty of exercise works. Seriously. Exercise cures depression. It's really that simple!

(This doesn't apply to people with screwed-up brain chemistry.)

I remember

[Dog135]

Happiness is remembering our childhoods entire.
It is possible; I have done it.

I never forgot my childhood. I remember crawling around, I remember breast feeding, (somethings I wish I could forget) and I even remember being born. (as well as an undeterminable duration of being inside my mom)

The reason, I'm sure, has part to do with the fact I was born a full month late, and part to do with the fact that I'm both autistic (I clearly remember visual things very well) and I have ADD. (I tend to repeat things in my mind over and over)

I must say, the memories themselves have never brought me happiness. What makes me happy is improving myself by learning new things and new skills. And there will always be an abundance of things for me to learn. If I didn't have to worry about money, I'd be happy my whole life. This past year on paid leave, then unemployment has been wonderful, not counting the occasional meeting I had to go to.

Work, and by association, money, are the root of unhappiness. (esp. working at a state job)

Re:I remember

[Anna Merikin]

"I never forgot my childhood."

Thanks for helping me, however unwittingly, to make my point. If one never forgets, one cannot enter the culture at large in an intimate way.

I am sorry I did not add to the recipe that we first be in perfect physical and mental health. I do not believe happiness can be achieved without good health first and foremost.

One must forget one's childhood, take on the cloak of civilization, and, then shed it and be re-born as a baby. Or, as Lao-Tzu said, "one must unlearn everything one has learned." He did not say one must never learn anything at all.

Re:I remember

[Anonymous Coward]

You have dozens of things wrong with you that you don't know about, and won't until they manifest themselves as symptoms. Which is to say that you aren't in perfect health, and really no one is. Frankly no one cares what you think, and the content of your posts reads like pseudo-intellectual babble.

Relevant Comic Strip

[Parafilmus]

http://www.tmcm.com/comics/webcomics/186_thinkhapp y

RFTP

[The Amazing Fish Boy]

Why are you posting on /. and engaging in higher thought processes and abstract conversation then? What has that to do with biological necessities?

I didn't say be concerned only with biological requirements. I said learn that that is all that you need. Anything else is nice, but not required.

Really? You don't care about the future? I'm glad you value your present so much as to not be concerned with the future. Strictly speaking as going by your first comment, survival machines worry about the future. Their biological necessity for survival as you put it is very much concerned with the future. Looks like you have a value conflict here eh?

If you are only concerned with biological survival, it is a lot easier not to be overly concerned with the future. Of course you still have to worry about having biological needs fulfilled. You still have to be concerned with the future, but many people are too concerned. Too many people stress about the future. The first point makes the second a lot easier to acheive.

Says who? Do you have any scientific evidence that states that the brain state is unhappy when buying products? Or are you just playing to the /. groupthink so you get modded up?

It's all my own experience. I never suggested it was anything other than that. I see how buying things makes me feel, and how those with fewer things are generally happier. It could be because they don't want more things, but it seems entirely consistent to me to say that when you have one thing you want more. Witness all the people who hold off buying computers until the next thing comes out. It shouldn't matter if a better one comes out: if the current one does the job it is worth the price.

I'm glad to see platitudes are being modded up on /. these days. All it shows are /.'s groupthink values more than any objective analysis of happiness.

I was just saying what works for me. I think that is the point of the comment system, no? Or can we not have anecdotes? Is this a scientific journal? I even put a disclaimer at the top.

*tokes*

[Headcase88]

Oh man, this is deep stuff... I'm think I'm going to have to sit down for a minute.

Cause and effect

[ewg]

Serious question: how do they sort out cause and effect? They observed a correlation between happiness and social interaction; but which is which?

Getting it Backwards

[logicnazi]

No wonder modern society hasn't gotten much happier when we tacitly accept attitudes like this (quoted from the article):

  But ordinary people believe they are happier than average (an obvious impossibility) and that they'll be even happier in 10 years' time. If true, it would be good news because research shows that happier people are healthier, more successful, harder-working, caring and more socially engaged. Misery makes people self-obsessed and inactive.

Happiness is supposed to be good because it makes us more succesfull, harder working and engaged? What the hell? That is totally backwards. IWe should only be working harders, and being socially engaged if it makes us happy not the other way around! What the hell is the point of turning out widgets for their own sake?

If only we could get over this puritanical ethic that tells us it is wrong to aim for enjoyment, in general not just selfishly for ourselves, I think we would be alot happier. For instance by focusing government programs on what made people the most satisfied rather than work the hardest and produce the most we could probably make this country alot more of a pleasent place to live but as long as the goal is just making more crap we will likely acheive that goal while making ourselves more miserable.

Find Happiness?

[nurb432]

Ya right, it is just a marketing tool to get you to buy stuff, it really doesnt exist.

Never has.

Mama says...

[modecx]

Mama says that happiness comes from little rays of sunshine that shine down when your feeling blue, not from selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.

Re:Mama says...

[tabrnaker]

And amazingly enough, it's true!

There's a reason why cultures have worshipped the sun. It makes you happy. The sun helps you relax. happiness is all about being relaxed. Bliss is all about being relaxed and balanced.

Unfortunately, if you have tension and consume toxins, then you're basically just cooking those toxins out in the sun if you don't relax. Cancer anyone?

Life?

[Matey-O]

Don't talk to me about life...here I am, Brain the size of a planet...

A post that begins "Actually Christianity says..."

[Errandboy of Doom]

...is bound to be wrong.

Catholicism on Happiness:

"Man has one ultimate purpose of existence: eternal happiness in a future life. But man also has a twofold proximate purpose: to earn his title to eternal happiness, and to attain to a measure of temporal happiness consistent with the prior proximate purpose."

This is from "State and Church," in New Advent's Catholic Encyclopedia.

Re:happiness is Psychobabble and serotonin

[bubbaD]

I'm sure you're convinced of this yourself and want to help. This theory makes a lot of sense intuitively, and its sound advice, clinically. But there's philosophical, etymological problems here about what constitutes "happiness." In a strictly materialistic philosophy, perhaps proper Serotonin levels in the brain IS happiness. Kurt Vonnegut has explored in fiction some of the issues about the consequences of happiness= mental health hygeine. Long term maintainence of healthy brain chemistry might be good advice, but does it really lead to "happiness?"
In other words, "what's it all about, Alfie?"

Be Ignorant!!! Slack!!! Trust in Bob!

[bubbaD]

No further analysis is necessary, and is in fact counterproductive!!

Join the Church of the SubGenius
http://www.subgenius.com/

Make up your mind people.

[955301]

Is this guy the son of your god, or is he your god in human flesh? Did your prophets write the bible, or did some unnamed people write about your prophets?

My kingdom for some consistency! If evangelising is your job, at least all of you can have a meeting first and agree on what you're going to say.

Re:Make up your mind people.

[benjamindees]

They had that meeting. Half of them decided to try for consistency and the other half decided to go for completeness. The completeness half is doing great, but makes absolutely no sense. And the consistency half gave up and became atheists.

Re:Make up your mind people.

[955301]

Yeah, silly me, the holy trinity is a naturally obvious phenomenon, how could I have missed it. Nevermind that you can't explain it, but to repeat what you yourself have been told. And then you wave your hand when it gets complicated. ugh.

I wonder if you would ever be compelled to seriously research it and try to comprehend it. What would you do if you found out the whole concept was just something put forth by a bunch of old men to justify their position that Jesus was God incarnate when the previous message was that he was the son of God? And that referring to the founder of their religion as God simply reinforced their position of authority.

One of these days, I look forward to you all standing up and admitting you have no idea what's really going on with life and the universe and that there is a good chance your religion may actually be wrong and just something that some guys made up. It may have been for good or noble reasons, but made up nonetheless.

Maslow's Pyramid

[Spy der Mann]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_Pyramid

Physiological, Safety, Love/Belonging, Esteem, Actualization.

Fulfill these needs and you'll find happiness. (An interesting thought is that this view does not oppose christianity at all, they seem to fit very well)

A personal observation upon myself is that the darkest times of my life were the ones where none (or only one) of these needs were fulfilled. If I didn't believe in God, i would surely have killed myself - so maybe Maslow's pyramid could also be used as an indicator for potential suicides. Just a thought.

Re:Maslow's Pyramid

[Rob the Bold]

One important thing I'll add for those who don't want to read up on Maslow: As the title "Pyramid" implies, each stage (or level) of satisfaction depends on the levels below it being fulfullied. At any given time, your behavior will be shaped by the desire to fulfil the most basic (lowest) of these needs that is currently unfulfilled.

Mosts texts on management and supervision mention the Maslow Pyramid and how it applies to workplace satisfaction. Yet I've never met a manager who seems to be even vaguely familiar with the concept.

Re:Maslow's Pyramid

[Spy der Mann]

Actually I learned about Maslow because of this webcomic. Who'd have thought?

Re:Maslow's Pyramid

[Bent Mind]

I remember basicly going over the idea in college, but it's been a log time. I read the Wikipedia article to refamiliarize myself with the concept. I can see how the idea might apply to the average person. However, for me and my wife at least, the levels seem in the wrong order.

Me, I'll take love over food or sleep any day. Her, she fits most of the model, with the exception of safety. When safety is missing, she looks for love.

We've both been called freaks from time to time, something we're happy being. Maybe we really are as messed up as some people think...

Re:A post that begins "Actually Christianity says.

[Lady Jazzica]

Note that this doesn't say "earn eternal happiness", but rather "earn title" to it. Christ did earn our salvation for us, and we could never have earned it for ourselves. However, Jesus did explicitly say that we are rewarded for the good we do once we are saved; with the help of God's grace, we do earn a reward for ourselves. See the Catholic Encyclopedia article on merit.

Understanding poetry

[aaza]

John Keating: Gentlemen, open your texts to page 21 of this introduction. Mr. Perry, will you read the opening paragraph of the preface entitled "Understanding Poetry"?
Neil: [reading] "Understanding Poetry," by Dr. J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D. "To fully understand poetry, we must first be fluent with its meter, rhyme and figures of speech, then ask two questions: One, how artfully has the objective of the poem been rendered and two, How important is that objective? Question 1 rates the poem's perfection; question 2 rates its importance. And once these questions have been answered, determining the poem's greatness becomes a relatively simple matter. If the poem's score for perfection is plotted on the horizontal of a graph and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the poem yields the measure of its greatness. A sonnet by Byron might score high on the vertical but only average on the horizontal. A Shakespearean sonnet, on the other hand, would score high both horizontally and vertically, yielding a massive total area, thereby revealing the poem to be truly great. As you proceed through the poetry in this book, practice this rating method. As your ability to evaluate poems in this matter grows, so will, so will your enjoyment and understanding of poetry."
John Keating: Excrement. That's what I think of Mr. J. Evans Pritchard! We're not lighting a pipe! We're talking about poetry. How can you describe poetry like American Bandstand? "I like Byron, I give him a 42 but I can't dance to it!"

Stolen shamelessly from IMDB

I have to say, though, that I agree with John Keating - you can't describe poetry like this. The other quote about this sort of thing is this:
"Talking about music is like dancing about architecture" -- Laurie Anderson (I think)

Slightly innacurate

[Prien715]

As a somewhat practicing Buddhist, I always cringe when someone says "life means suffering (dukkha)" when Sanskrit word "dukkha" means so much more. The translation "life is unsatisfactory" is perhaps more accurate. Dissatisfaction is not just caused by suffering (i.e. the personal experience of loss) but also by the failures of expectations to be met and the innate mature of our mind -- especially knowledge of our own mortality.

Re:Slightly innacurate

[dancingmad]

I can't speak for the original Sanskrit but Bengali has the same word and the nuance is quite deep. It can mean suffering, though that's probably one of the worst translations. Dis-ease (the Buddhist scholar Thich Nhat Hanh uses this term, I believe) or shame are two other aspects of the word.

Re:Slightly innacurate

[raile]

Yes! I like to compare dukkha to what a child (hovering between the ages of innocence and maturity) experiences after he or she repeatedly sees a slick, fast-cut, animated commercial between their cartoons for a toy with a "kung-fu death grip" and "laser pistols" and "turbo power" -- finally receives this toy that they've been coveting -- and finds out that the "kung-fu death grip" is a lever that moves the guy's arm up and down, the "laser pistols" are flashing LEDs, and the "turbo power" is a button that releases a spring that lifts the toy a few inches off of the ground.

Dukkha or Buddhist "suffering" is not a I-broke-my-leg kind of suffering, nor is it a I-can't-have-any-material-things-at-all kind of suffering. It's a setting-yourself-up-for-disappointment kind of suffering. To extend the analogy I made above to the adult world, it's like when the average looking guy buys that fast, red sports car and finds out that (surprise!) women aren't suddenly flocking to him, and now he's got a huge car payment and it's in the shop all of the time.

Buddhist happiness is not being in a it's-my-birthday kind of emotional high all of the time, it's being content with who you are, where you are, with what you have, and with what's happening in the moment.

Whoops. You forgot to mention Hell...

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't take the "free gift" of "forgiveness" for perceived sins of any magnitude, you get an infinite (all eternity) amount of punishment in God's private dungeon, which is disproportionate to *any* amount of sin one could conceivably commit in a lifetime. This is the definition of coercion.

Re:Whoops. You forgot to mention Hell...

[Dogtanian]

If you don't take the "free gift" of "forgiveness" for perceived sins of any magnitude, you get an infinite (all eternity) amount of punishment in God's private dungeon, which is disproportionate to *any* amount of sin one could conceivably commit in a lifetime. This is the definition of coercion.

Wow! I'm glad I don't live in the US; there's no way He would get away with that sort of thing under EU law...

For me....

[Himring]

For me, you cannot be happy until you have been horribly unhappy first.

I am now approaching the second year of my divorce. My marital breakup was equivalent to the asteroid that ended the dinosaurs. I lost massive weight before working out and putting back on muscle. I learned to jog and became a better father. I read book after book on relationships, divorce, psychology and religion and finally came to the conclusion that most, if not all, of my unhappiness in life came from the fact of trying to control the free will of others. I happened upon a theory I call "reality philosophy." I mainly base this on Robert Ringer who points out in his theory of reality:

Reality isn't what you hope it would be. It isn't what it even appears to be, but with careful investigation it is what it is. You either go with it and benefit from it or fight it and suffer.

I have learned to let go and stop trying to control things. I think Fight Club says it best when Tyler tells the narrator in the car as he's trying to keep it between the lines, "look at you! you're pathetic! just let it go...." Truly, it isn't until we've lost everything that we are free to do anything. I am a living example of this.

Looking back, if anything made me a man it was my divorce. I went through a crash course of the legal system, the hell of financial trauma, work stress, single-fatherhood, on and on. Divorce hits you on every level imaginable. But I was determined to survive and thrive. I now am in the third basketball season as a YMCA children's coach. I have found one of the most therapuetic things is to volunteer my time for something like this. The kids are my doctors, counselors as I watch them grow, learn and each season as I've coached basketball, soccer, etc. I find the practices and the games are the highlights of my life. I am better at my job, my appearance, my relationships, name it. I wouldn't trade my divorce for anything because I never knew that I wasn't even happy before it.

I am now leaner and wiser than ever and am a far better person to be around. I dove into religion and books as I said. Here are some qoutes I carried in my pocket for a solid year and committed to memory. Each chance I got -- if waiting somewhere with nothing to do for example -- I would get them out and go over them:

Attitudes are more important than facts. -Karl Menninger

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your mind in Christ Jesus. -Philippians 4:6-7

Stand up to an obstacle. Just stand up to it, that's all, and don't give way under it, and it will finally break. You will break it. Something has to break, and it won't be you, it will be the obstacle. -Peale

Do not take the attitude that you are in a situation in which nobody has ever been before. There is no such situation. -Peale

People have overcome every conceivable difficult situation. -Peale

A clean engine always delivers power. -Peale

Never tell me the odds. -Hans Solo

A mind free of negatives will always produce positives. -Peale

There is no spoon. -Peale

Do the thing you fear and the death of fear is certain. -Emerson

If you had faith... nothing would be impossible. -Matthew 17:20

Throw your heart over the bar and your body will follow. -Peale

The rough is only mental. -Peale

There is a time when we must decide and act and never look back. -Phillips

If a man will devote his time to securing facts in an impartial, objective way, his worries will usually evaporate in the light of knowledge. -Hawkes

When worrying about something always ask two questions: 1. What am I worrying about? 2. What can I do about it? -Litchfie

Re:For me....

[Himring]

There is no spoon. -Peale

Dunno how that happened there, and dunno why /. doesn't allow you to edit after posting, but, of course, that one comes from the matrix.... That's what you get when banging out memorized quotes....

Re:For me....

[Vitriol Angst]

Not to diminish your "journey" to enlightenment (but this IS Slashdot).

I would think that one very important aspect of achieving happiness you didn't mention is something you're grandpa could have told you; don't marry the first girl that will sleep with you.

And for relationships, you need to realize that nobody can be everything. Get some friends who like science fiction if they girl doesn't like Doctor Who -- you'll only annoy her. And if she has lots of cats and stuffed animals on the bed, avoid at all cost unless you both plan on avoiding reality together.

I'd also add, don't sweat the big stuff you can't control. Some of that "faith gives one power" will just give you expectations and turn you into a door matt. If someone mistreats you, admonish them -- you wouldn't allow someone to kick a dog. Act like you are worthy of more. The faith that will work for you is that you will rise to any challenge. There are a lot of types of faith, and some of them are actually destructive -- they won't tell you this in church. But if you read the New Testament on your own, you'll realize that Jesus didn't care about what others think, he was non-violent but never a doormat, and he valued people based on how they treated others. Simple stuff.

I'm around a lot of sales people ... that Positive Attitude and Power Faith is good programming to a point. I don't know if some of these people are really happy or just fooling themselves. They tend to get a nice mercedes once they have money. Material things can give you a sense of accomplishment -- but focusing on them will never make you happy. It sounds like you're at the "self programming" stage. So when you get depressed again, you will blame yourself for not being Positive enough. Look, you are going to get down again. You may need anti-depressants or just a good date. But don't take discouragement or sadness as a sign of failure. Sometimes you can still enjoy yourself even with a negative attitude and few prospects. Don't take things too seriously. Like I've adopted the belief in Greek Gods -- so when bad things happen to me, I am proud that I could entertain these great beings. Be comic relief or a warning to others. Just have a perspective that it is alright to BE you. Unless of course, Jesus grades on a curve -- then I'm screwed.

And something I learned from the "Tao of Pooh" -- if you want to be something, enjoy what you want, and you will be it (different from self-indulgence). I used to beat myself up for not being as good and enlightened as I could be -- which didn't help. If I wanted to be good, I should just be -- and that allows my good nature to come through. Also in the book is the idea that you need to find value in what you are ... not in what is your ideal. Like if your father stuck in your head that only great football players have value and you are 4 feet tall with lifts. I highly recommend the Tao of Pooh for anyone wanting to attain enlightenment (yes, it talks about eastern philosophy as explained by Winnie the Pooh).

Re:For me....

[Himring]

Good post.

Good love advice you provide too. I was married over a dozen years, and if I could go back in time maybe I would not have married her, then again I would not have my child. Thankfully, we cannot go backwards anyhow. It's taken me many years to learn just a little about women -- with hard knocks along the way. It reminds me of a Chinese proverb, "experience is a comb nature gives us after our hair has fallen out...."

I concur on the positive thinking stuff. Honestly, a lot of what Peale had to say (The Power of Positive Thinking) ground on me, but there were some nuggets in it. I found Carnegie far more appealing. I still read his How To Stop Worrying And Start Living. I was offered "head pills" by a doctor, but didn't take them. Instead I began researching anti-depressant drugs and depression in general to understand what it all meant -- why I felt like living crap. I came across a book entitled, Depression Makeover and decided not to take any drugs. I'm not saying that it's wrong to avoid drugs and maybe I should have taken some (one doctor scolded me for not when he later heard me explain how I had felt back then), but I decided to embrace the depression and learn from it. I truly believe depression is a natural state of mind that has a purpose and we must find what it is and address it if we hope to overcome it. This is the reason for depression. To simply drug it and not address it doesn't help us to grow -- that's my thoughts.

I have nothing against eastern philosophy or religion and think that it meshes with my own faith at certain points. I tend to read broadly and look wide for solutions. I am an analyst by trade, and my divorce made me begin to analyze things I never dreamed I would. I know far more now than ever I could have imagined, and life is deeper to me if not a bit more tragic at the same time. "With much wisdom comes much sorrow," Solomon said, and I think he's right....

Re:For me....

[g0bshiTe]

I agree, I personally live by two simple rules.

Rule #1 Don't sweat the small shit.
Rule #2 Everything is small shit.

Re:For me....

[Vitriol Angst]

Love the chinese proverb about the comb...

I'm glad you took it the right way... some might not see where I was coming from. I remember being very desperate to be accepted by anyone but especially a girl. I would wonder what was wrong with me -- I could see the biggest jerks having no problems and I was smart, looked like Sting, and interesting. Later I discovered that my insecurity and desire to prove myself -- combined with too much forthcoming honesty is definite kryptonite for any girl.

I can respect being cautious about therepy and head drugs. ON the other hand -- I spent a lot of time trying to improve myself. Praying. Doing a million things to "feel right". Even when I was on track with a good job and education -- I never felt "good enough". So, nothing -- nothing worked. And really, when I look back at myself, I would have thought I was a decent person who was a little too self-critical. But worthy...

When I finally got therapy (intensive) it accomplished two things. 1) having been critized and analyzed and put down isn't worth a bucket of spit compared to people just being supportive. 2) If you've been down since you were 10, there may be nothing YOU can do to "get up". Kind of like trying to walk after paralysis; you are going to need someones help to be able to walk again. I took Prozac when it was experimental (results are totally different so there are many other options today). The Doc described my depression as like a stream that had followed a pattern so long, it had worn a deep channel in my mind. So, no matter how much water (happiness) I get, or how much I try to change the thought patters (digging trenches), the next time it rains everything will follow the same channel again.

So what the anti-depressant did was to "level the ground" so that the stream was able to follow new paths. It didn't make me happy. But the change was dramatic and immediate. I just didn't dwell on my shortcomings. I didn't feel like I had to prove things to others. I could actually take a compliment, and appreciate it. Wow. I guess it is like alchoholism in a way -- people who are not addicted (and I haven't been -- just an example) can't understand why people just don't stop. But some people become chemically incapable.

So I think everyone should try the self-discipline angle like you did. And definitely avoid the helplessness route where you always blame a "problem you can't control". But live exists between these extremes. Total self-control and programmability is a delusion brought to us by the fortunate. And don't kid yourself, most people are faking the happiness and self-control. Most people are driven by their urges and then fabricate a story of principles around it.

Sounds like you are doing well without putting blinders on. Personally, I have gotten so self-assured, I don't even think of much of any philosophy anymore. I just think; hey I need to eat better and work out. But, eh... let me make some money. Which I think is pretty healthy. But sometimes I envy the debth and pathos of my early days -- I just don't miss all the frickin' angst.

I'm sort of lucky I didn't find a girl before getting my life together or I would have gone through what you did with the divorce -- nobody can fix anyone else... you just have to follow similar tragectories and have hobbies.

I wish I spent more time giving back to little kids like you do... maybe in the future. I have a 3 year old and a 6 month old (both boys). They are awesome and I also, could not imagine life without them. If you don't screw up being a dad -- you are never a screw up. The rest is small shit. Kids are the only "big thing" in life. No philosophy, cute girl, or high-paying job is worth sacrificing their well-being.

Just don't let yourself fall into the trap that you need to "sacrifice" your own well-being for your kids. You end up being destructive and resentful. You have to be the best person, and happy for THEM. It's a gift. You know that when your kids are sad or acting upset, that it bothers you. It's a two-way street.

Good luck.

Re:For me....

[Himring]

Good stuff.

I'm not against anyone for taking anti-depressants. I did tell my last girlfriend that I would never marry someone on them. She consequently worked with her physician to wean off them. As a later doctor explained to me: they are a temporary solution to a problem. When his patients call him wanting a refill he makes them come in for a re-evaluation in the hopes of getting off of them and moving to further stages. I saw him a year after my marriage broke up. I was still screwed up but far better. I told him I lost 60 pounds (I looked like a skeleton) almost lost my job and wanted to kill myself. He was like, "you know, those are all really good reasons to take something." Made sense to me. But like I said, I read a book that gave me a path.

I've developed a lot of theories since my divorce. One theory I have is that engineer/technical/analyst types simply don't do well with women. I still haven't figured this one out. Basically, smart guys do worse than dumb guys. Sorry, but it's true. Girls like 'em "big and dumb" no matter what they say. Oh, they might say, "sure, but we don't want to marry one." But that's who they chase. They chase big, dumb, attractive guys who are also jerks. Jerks do better with women than "nice guys." If a girl ever says of a man, "he's a nice guy" I think "ouch!" That's a deathnail. But, in a way it makes sense. Who are the successful men in the world? Typically, they are driven, movers and shakers, they don't sit still, they control their worlds and people in them and make things happen. If things don't happen they take charge. They are, essentially, jerks, but if you look at the side-affects of, say, steroid use it is the same. So, I think women are just attracted to natural things that define "maleness." Guys pumped on steroids don't whine about their problems. They do something about it: fight, yell, rage, but they don't whine. Whining is what people on estrogen do. A woman, also, doesn't stay with an unhappy man. A man makes his world happy if it isn't happy and/or he knows that it's going to be happy -- it's going to fall in place. Just like Col. John "Hannibal" Smith on The A Team says: I love it when a plan comes together. Life doesn't get him down cuz he has life figured out. These are generals and not specifics. A guy can't always be uppity or have life figured out or even pretend to, but in general, women want men who are going some where -- that's who they latch on to. In the end, they want a guy with power and money. Basically, they want power. Power gets money. And if you follow the logic to power then everything I said above makes sense. To truly have power you gotta know how to get there. In a way, women are parasetic. I know that sounds bad, but they do want to ride a gravy train being conducted by a man. All equal rights aside and all that, women are still women and men are still men. I'm rambling here.

Reality philosophy: I'm still changing my thoughts on all this, and lately I have begun to realize that reality is what we label anything we don't like. Also, reality is the right now and also the past. It's things in the past that we didn't like that happened and it's the current state that we don't want to accept. It isn't the future. Going forward, reality is shaped by our imagination. This is something new I've been thinking about. We know it will basically take the form it is projected to take -- much like the path of a hurricane -- but we can affect that path to an extent -- maybe even a great extent. When my marriage fell apart I looked in the mirror and realized I was over weight and out of shape. I lost weight, at first, due to the shock and depression, but I began studying, for the first time, fitness. I began eating right, running and working out. I am basically very trim and put on 10 pounds of lean muscle over the past two years -- not an easy feat. You see, I shaped my present reality. I changed the future somewhat. I am still divorced, I'm still struggling here

Re:For me....

[Vitriol Angst]

I am a technical "smart guy" and I know I had problems at first with girls.

I think smart people have a harder time in relationships just because they are at one end of "the curve". You almost have to translate things to the average person. Some people are intimidated, others resentful, in addition to whatever else might cause anyone to disapprove of things. But the major handicap to "brains" is that we tend to rely too much on them. Emotions can't be reasoned with. If you don't get your basic needs met, there is no amount of study or logic that will overcome it. People of less IQ tend to "get on with things more" and not to sit there and ponder. Psychoanalysis -- unless it is combined with action (called "behavior modification" now) -- will almost guarantee someone is stuck in a morass of self-absorbtion, in my opinion, because little of being happy in life or changing what you don't like is based on understanding. Birds don't think how to fly and we don't often think how to breathe. Feelings don't have to be justified -- just responded to. I used to analyze how I felt and what was appropriate about how someone treated me. I wouldn't just say "go away" when someone got me angry. Now I respond to how I feel and perhaps apologize later. It's amazing how much better that seems to work. So if you are cold, wear a coat or if you get angry, yell. Let your feelings guide you and don't wait until you think you are justified -- that doesn't go for everyone. Just us brainy people who don't think we have a license to look out for ourselves.

I've noticed that the people who have less "angst" in life are often big jerks. They think that a girl is hot, and they tell her and then ask for what they want and they often get it. They just do for themselves and don't question if they have a right. They feel worthy. People who always blame others for things rarely ever go to psychiatrists to find out what is wrong with "them" -- they go to church or a golf club and just talk about what is wrong with others. Jerks are well adjusted. That isn't necessarily an IQ issue. It's about being introspective. And you pay the price of being a thoughtful and better person for it. So balance will be attained if you concentrate more on what you like and not what you are worthy of. Nobody deserves anything and all worth is debatable. If you aren't going to stick up for your unfair share someone else is going to take it. So, go out and get the girl you want, and tell here what you want is her. You will be protecting her from "the jerk". Go get more than what you are worthy of. If, after that, you have some left, then give it away to those you think need it. But you have to take it first.

Us smart people also need to learn to shut-up at times. Girls talk to us about feelings but they don't want us to "fix" or figure out anything. They want empathy, not solutions. Also, in our case, don't always try to please. Give and take at the same amount that someone else is giving and taking -- otherwise they won't respect you. Don't offer up information about yourself until someone has earned it from you. Most people don't have the reference to judge correctly about your life -- nor do most people really want to know who "you" are. People want to know what you think of them, and the are uncomfortable with people who act differently from their expectations. It took me a long time to really understand this. So, don't give others permission to judge you, don't ever ask "what is wrong with me", let people know what YOU want from them. Don't give more than others have given you, unless they need charity. Don't offer advice or criticism -- only sell it if people are buying. Only offer encouragement -- that is what most people want and won't disrespect you for.

Stop me before I sound preachy-- these are just things I tell myself. Some of this might fit or it might not. I'm just assuming, that if you came from the brainy, self-critical place I came from it would make sense. Having trouble with girls just reminds me of what I went through. If I wante

Re:For me....

[Himring]

Very good stuff. I've actually read your response more than once and find some quotable material too. I'm not easily impressed either, so kudos (or is it cudos?).

I'm also realizing that, being desperate to be whole I tell myself, and others, that I am whole. In reality, I'm still not. It's much like the nazgul wound Frodo still whences at at the end of LoTR: "it's never quite healed Sam...."

Still, this is what I am -- scars and all. It's what I am....

Re:For me....

[Vitriol Angst]

I remember when I hit bottom. This lady was trying to cheer me up, she said something like; "don't feel bad, things will get better, it isn't something so important to worry about."

I told her off in the harshest way. Which I don't ever remember having done before. I realized later, that part of the reason I was afraid to let go of my depression, was that it was also part of my identity. I thought in terms of my scars and the stories they told. It's no wonder in religion they talk about being re-born. But really, it is like death. Are we the same people that we were as ten? Would we recognize that person? If we are or aren't the same person -- which is the bigger trajedy.

It was like, this lady was calling me stupid. That I would choose to be down. I don't think I chose, anything -- my dad was depressed and hyper-critical (not anything earth-shattering, but still, how does a kid overcome how his parents make him feel?).

The only thing you take with you today, from what was yesterday, is your memories and some chemistry. If you "know" what you should do, and understand and are OK with who you are... ... then the rest isn't a matter to be "figured out".

But, we still have bad habits. If you were your own dad -- would you be proud of you? I think so. Make that kid happy -- he deserves to be. What you may find a flaw, someone else can describe as personality. That's about the best thing I can leave you with.

Re:For me....

[Himring]

Again, I do enjoy these exchanges we're having. If you'd like email me at fatkiddown@hotmail.com so we may continue in email.

I've gotten so much advice: good, bad and ugly. But I have a few people I respected tell me that I would get through this. I respected that because I knew what they had been through. Some days I look back on myself and realize how naive I've been all of my life. What a loud-mouth knowitall I was. I was even so presumptuous as to offer advice to the really-hurting. I watched Mel Gibson's "The Passion" while my divorce was fresh and my emotions felt like a mile-long motorcycle wreck's worth of road rash (and I've had road rash and know what it feels like), and as I watched it I fully appreciated the depiction of pain. Not that I could relate (who could?) but from my own deep pain I said to myself in the theater, "now that's pain -- I can relate."

I've been reading eastern philosophy this weekend and came across some interesting concepts. Such as: it is in not accepting who we are that we accept who we are. It is in fearing we cannot change that we truly begin to change. That inner peace is the ability to stop trying to concentrate and simply concentrating. So much religion is for its own sake, when true religion is actually not being religious at all. It is equivalent to focusing on the finger pointing at the moon rather than looking at the moon itself. I was trying to show my dog, today, something on the ground I thought he'd enjoy, and instead of looking at the object he kept looking at my finger -- this happened after I read this analogy.

So often we are trying so hard to fix ourselves that we are simply not being ourselves. One Taoist said that the boat is meant to get you across the water, and once across you leave it behind. You don't carry it on your back or stay in it. If you carry on your back your journey will be burdoned, and if you refuse to get out of it then you will drift, eventually, into the ocean and never complete your journey.

I've known people who have been in counseling for upwards of a decade. I've always felt it was too much and these people are self-absorbed. I think, now, that they have decided to stay in the boat.

As your sig states: no matter where you are you have to chop wood and carry water -- you have to live life for life's sake and not for the sake of figuring out life....

Grammar Nazi Says...

[Dolda2000]

I'm surprised the article doesn't explore Religion and it's affect on people's happiness.

It's really depressing how that affects my happiness.

You wouldn't by any chance happen to have meant "its effect", would you?

Bah!

[benjamindees]

Everybody knows that Catholics aren't Christian!

Seriously, though, you're right the Catholic church sold golden tickets into heaven for a long time. But it's not like that had anything to do with Jesus or anything.

What do you have to do to achieve happiness?

[the0ther]

coke. duh. easier than wires into your cerebellum, more effective than prozac.

Re:What do you have to do to achieve happiness?

[The MESMERIC]

that was utterly irresponsible saying that
some people use that stuff unblock drains.
now imagine the damage to your esophagus!!

oh, you don't say ...

Re:What do you have to do to achieve happiness?

[aminorex]

dopamine rush is very temporary. therapeutic doses of heroin for depression are much lower than cocaine, making it a sustainable treatment option. one can make a heroin patch with DMSO and bandage tape that's quite effective and discreet. goes well with sustained-release adderall to offset the slight nod.

Try a positive attitude . . .

[Rob the Bold]

I'm not so much disagreeing with your observations as I am commenting on the idea that you can decide to be happy. I really hate to see happiness described as a matter of attitude. I spent several years trying to be happy, trying to have a positive attitude. Although I am historically not a happy person, those years of attempting happiness were the most miserable of my life. I decided to be happy, I used perscription drugs, got professional help, and really tried, but I cannot will myself to be happy any more than I can will myself to become an emu.

I think the worst part of the whole experience was attempting to be something I'm not. Trying to conform to other people's ideas of how I should see things. When you have a "bad" attitude, people feel free to tell you that you shouldn't feel that way. Family, friends and coworkers will tell you to "get help". This is who I am. If I changed, I'd be someone else. I have never had such intense anxiety as I had during my "happiness crusade". I'm talking chest-pain, tingly finger, hiding under the desk anxiety.

It is just not worth it to try to please people by being "happy" for them. Perhaps, as the article suggests, happy people live longer. Good for them -- But honestly, I'm not happy for them. If your creator, who- or what-ever you believe that to be, wanted you to be happy, [he] would have made this world a better place. But it isn't a better place. As it is, I'm not too thrilled with the world. Unlike you happy people, though, I'm not just sitting there wallowing in self-approbation, I'm trying to do something about it. So perhaps there is something worthwhile in being unhappy.

Take a look at all the things that make you happy, that make life more pleasant and less difficult. Were music, art, medicine and technology all created by people who were able to find contentment in the way things were? Or were they possibly the work of the discontented, the dissatisfied, and the unhappy? So I'm sorry if I bring you down, but I'm a lot happier being unhappy.

Re:Try a positive attitude . . .

[Bullfish]

I think you are talking about something out of the ordinary as opposed to most people who haven't had the suffering you describe. I am not a counsellor or a shrink, but that you had to deal with prescription drugs and professional help to me indicates something different. Brain chemistry or extreme trauma can cause profound suffering which you seem to describe.

That said, no one is happy all the time except an idiot. Rather, it is the attitude that unhappiness is transitory and will pass. Have faith. It does work that way. I am not religious at all, and I am no less happy than someone who professes such.

You have to accept these things and ride them, We get in trouble when we try to control the things out of our control and get further into trouble when we fail to control the things we can. Religion helps some with that.

But if the problem is medical, that is a different animal. And, just to note, there is no good attitude or bad attitude, either the attitude serves you or it does not.

Sin and God...

[rmdyer]

Of course your whole statment relies on the fact that both "Sin" and "God" make some rational sense, which they don't. In reality, neither "Sin", nor "God" have justified meaning because the words themselves can't be explained in any manner that will allow __________ (fill in the blank). I might fill the blank with "verification", but others generally accept that "connection" would be a better term. You cannot describe what the word god means without having notions of physical things or emotional experiences. A word "god" does not exist independently of the words used to describe it. Therefore what is "it"? About the only thing close that makes any sentence at all is the simple utterance "I am", which simply recognizes being itself. So, in being, since we are, therefore, we are it, or everything is it. But it is very likely that "it" has no intentions whatsoever, that are at all, in any way, described by most modern religions. There are simply too many possiblities for what the word "god" stands for that we are unlikely to be correct about any of them as they relate to the way things really are.

There is also no such thing as sin. As a child you are "taught" to believe that if you do a bad thing, then you have "sinned". Ok, so what's a bad thing? No one really knows. As for the concept of god, it is also equally tenuous. What are the properties of this thing that is described by such a word? People spout off such things as "infinite" this, or "unlimited" that, as if those remarks make any sense whatsoever.

Life is utterly simpler than any religous teachings. Just be constructive in your day, stay away from "destructive" tendencies, and you might be happy. Of course there are a lot of random elements to everday living that get in the way. Just continue to work "against" the tide and things "should" shape up. In the end, everyone has a different life to live. The final word is that...

          "You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometime, you just might find, you get what you need." The Rolling Stones

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[simonharvey]

Maybe if you knew the truth, you wouldn't waste your time with Christianity (or any religion for that matter):

http://www.taivaansusi.net/historia/mithraism.html

Well, we do know the truth (here is a page that includes real sources):
http://www.tektonics.org/copycat/mithra.html

Kind Regards
Simon Harvey

Happiness and work

[Lord_Dweomer]

So as a recent college grad and new victim of Reality I have to say happiness is in VERY short supply. Long hours, stressful work, and low pay in an industry I thought I loved (advertising).

So what I'm wondering is how some of you more experienced (read: older) members dealt with that and whether your happiness really ever got back to where it was at during your carefree days of college?

I mean, where I'm at now, I want to work as little as possible, make about $40k, and have fun with my life. Its impossible to do that with my current schedule.

Any suggestions? And if you're going to say change jobs...kindly suggest some in line with what I just explained, since the thought's come up more than once but I'm stuck with the problem of being worked so hard that I don't have time/energy to look for a new job. I don't know what to do and I signed a yearlong lease on my apartment!

Re:Happiness and work

[Thing 1]

Happiness is overrated. Work on being happy being content, and you'll find you're much happier. (You sound a lot like my brother, but he's been out of college for a few years now, and is hoping for twice that.)

Re:Happiness and work

[Eli Gottlieb]

You thought you loved advertising, which is exactly what they wanted you to think. Get the holy hell out of advertising.

Re:Happiness and work

[Lord_Dweomer]

I do love advertising (not the evil variety, there's actually good stuff being done there)....just not my particular area of it or my agency.

I have a Hypothesis on being happy.. help test?

[Wescotte]

Just send me a some money via paypal using the url below.
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_xclick& business=wescotte%40earthlink.net&item_name=Make%2 0Wescott%20happy&no_shipping=0&no_note=1&tax=0&cur rency_code=USD&bn=PP-DonationsBF&charset=UTF-8

This is really a blind test on how much disposible income slashdotters really have because Taco is looking for some marketing research on his new slashdot products to compete with google.

I suggest you donate way way to much so Taco had very inaccurate figures and when Slashdot.com finally launches it will be sure to fail right away and uh.. ok I think this has gone to far..

Just send me some damn money.. please

Psychedelic Drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

I am curious as to what people have experienced with psychedelic drugs. I have personally done mushrooms and lsd, and both changed my perspective on life for the better. I wasn't happier, but I was less anxious and more willing to try more things. Going out wasn't such a chore. I've read in many places about shamans as the original psychologists of ancient culture and while their practices were risky, I think they might have had more success than many modern day psychologists. I recommend research into this for anyone who is interested.
I'm currently in therapy and I don't do any drugs any more, but I don't discount what I've "learned" from my drug use. Some day, I'll try mushrooms again and see if I can't open my mind in places where I'm currently repressed. I think that those repressed areas represent a lot of pain for me and I can't get there normally, but with the help of these drugs and a qualified therapist I hope to explore these areas and unlock them for my every day life.
Reply if you have had any experience in this area, I would be very interested in hearing your response.

Re:Psychedelic Drugs

[Anonymous Coward]

Salvia Divinorum.

It is an amazing experience.

I'm non-religious, so I take the experience as a real mind-job as opposed to something spiritual or whatever. However, it permits you enough of a disconnect that you can look at yourself from a different angle when you come back to reality.

Happiness is by its nature transient.

[lpfarris]

First off, even in the article, there is some confusion between happiness and contentment. I believe that happiness per se is that transient state of pleasure we abide in for some time when, one way or another, things are going well. It is transient because if the situation that made us 'happy' maintains for any length of time, that becomes the new baseline. Humans are incredible adaptable emotionally. There is an awfully lot of good situations that people can manage to take for granted, and 'bad' circumstances in which people still find happiness. Happiness cannot be perceived except in contrast to sadness. You can't have one without the other. Why would tragedies and other such drama be so popular, otherwise. ;)

Buddhism seems to have a clue

[anotherzeb]

According to scientific research posted here at the BBC website, the Buddhists faith looks as though it might have something going for it. The research says that brain scans show that Buddhists are the happiest people. There is some stuff on meditation helping to ease the symptoms of depression here

Re:Buddhism seems to have a clue

[PakProtector]

As someone who has been studying Zen and a practicing Buddhist for some time, I would say that this is true, atleast in my case. I really am happier. It's not strictly that I'm bubbly like a cheerleader all day, but it's that everything just seems good. Even when bad things happen, and when I actually am sad, I can't stay that way, because, well, everything is just so good.

I can't put the feeling into words. I've tried, but it can't be explained, you have to experience it for yourself.

I can keep calm and happy during bad events, and I can count on one hand the number of times I've actually gotten angry in the past month.

It's very nice and agreeable.

Re:Buddhism seems to have a clue

[randito]

Check out the book "The Art of Happiness".

"The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living was a groundbreaking collaboration between H.H. the 14th Dalai Lama, and Howard C. Cutler, M.D., a Phoenix-based psychiatrist. Beginning with a small first printing in 1998 the book rapidly spread by word of mouth to become a classic manual on human happiness. The book remained on The New York Times bestseller list for almost two years..."

"Drawing upon 2500 years of Buddhist wisdom, combined with the latest findings of modern science, and mixed with a healthy dose of common sense, these remarkable volumes offer a practical approach to human happiness--a rational approach that can be practiced by individuals from any background, tradition, or religion."

Re:Buddhism seems to have a clue

[anotherzeb]

Thanks for this. I got into Buddhism partly because I have depression and I heard about their good mood. This book looks like it will have more of the stuff I'm after in it

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[CrazyJim1]

Before I knew God I had a fear of death from like when I was 6 years old. Before I knew everyone died, I thought people just got old. I wanted to be content to just live forever playing newer and better video games. When I learned about death, my whole priorities changed. I felt that I had to live more for the moment and get as much in this life as possible so I don't miss anything.

People told me God exists and I went to a Christian Church, but it was hard for me to grasp and I never understood it well. My faith wasn't so good, then in 2003 God spoke to me,"Good News", and I recieved a Good News bible soon after. When I found out God exists for a fact, Jesus is Lord. I also learned that he promises eternal life. I didn't go looking for a way to avoid death and thusly believed in Christianity because it was the only possible answer. I found out God exists for a fact then I realized he promises eternal life!


You can speak for yourself and say that God doesn't make you happy. But for me knowing death isn't the end of things makes me a very happy person.

Amen.

[loqi]

Just beware of that scheming alcohol.

What you are seeking...

[NotQuiteReal]

What you are seeking is blissful non-existence.

However, due to bad karma, you will suffer at least a few more incarnations as a Windows(tm) user.

I may be mixing up my religions here, but hey, when you make stuff up, how can it be wrong?

Happiness is...

[Hosiah]

when you learn to reject the popular crowd's definition of happiness and just do what works for you.

For me, happiness doesn't come from what I can get, only from what I can do.

Happiness = d/dt (well being)

[CraigV]

The article was rather interesting, but didn't discuss my favorite theory:
Happiness is often thought of being connected to one's health or economic well being, but I have considered it more connected with the rate of change of one's well being. A poor or unhealthy person can be happy if things look like they are getting better; a rich or healthy person can be unhappy if things are getting worse.

Everlasting happiness

[microbox]

No matter where you are or what you acheive, one is never truly happy

And then he was enlightened =)

Or you could read something scientific

[bahwi]

Such as the book Destructive Emotions(No, not an affiliate link, you can click on it).

There's thousands of years of research out there, and no, it doesn't have to be a religious change, and hell, you don't even have to call yourself one.

Re:Or you could read something scientific

[Anthony Liguori]

I was going to post something similiar to this. It's a very compelling argument. I'll bastard it here:

Happiness is the most important thing in life. The most effective path to happiness is learning how to eliminate unhappiness. Happiness and unhappiness are states of mind and unhappiness is caused by a series of emotions (fear, anger, attachment). Learning how to eliminate these emotions (and to increase positive emotions like compassion) will ultimately lead to happiness. You can learn to control destructive emotions through mediation and prayer (although it is not the only way, just an effective and reproducisble way).

True road to happiness

[starling]

1. RTFA
2. ???
3. Prof^wHappiness

Non-Prescription drugs!

[ShimmyShimmy]

Happiness = Beer and Pot. They don't make you happy forever, but they make you happy long enough to get more Beer and Pot!

Happiness not in rejection, but acception

[electrosoccertux]

I think that the grandparent's description brings up a deep problem in Eastern religions. Its simply against human nature to want to deny yourself everything. That simply isn't satisfying. But it also isn't satisfying to say "yes" to every urge and desire that comes our way. Instead, given the correct description of the Christian way of life, God invites us not into emptying ourselves of every happiness, but to rejoicing ourselves in the many blessings he's given the world to enjoy. He wants us to enjoy him; thats why he blesses us and has sent his son to die for us, so that we could spend eternity learning the infinite number of cool things that he knows and praising him for how wonderful he is. He doesn't want us to be unhappy, he wants us to be fulfilled. Problem is, most of us think the mediocrity he explains in the Bible deprives life of its pleasures (sex, drugs, getting drunk, "owning" ourselves). Instead he shows us that sex is only best when its in the confines of marriage (thats where it means the most to us and can thus satisfy us most); that drugs, while they feel good for a time, inevitably lead to death like all other sin; that getting drunk, while it may be fun at the time, hurts later, has physical consequences, and simply isn't going to satisfy us like he can; and lastly (and by no means the least, more likely the greatest and best), willingly submitting our consciousness to him is infinitely more satisfying than controlling our life could ever be. I can't hold on to my life, nor can I ever value it enough; but God can keep it for me and love it and fill it with so many more joys than I could have possibly imagined.

Owning one's self is so much more boring.

Re:Happiness not in rejection, but acception

[mattjb0010]

I think that the grandparent's description brings up a deep problem in Eastern religions. Its simply against human nature to want to deny yourself everything.

Which is why Buddhism promotes a "middle way". Re your points on owning one's self: God (if he exists) presumably gives us free will, which does give some degree of ownership too. If you feel the need to denigrate others for: owning themselves, taking responsibility for their actions, and realising that others too want to feel joy and actively working to bring joy to their lives, to "do unto others as they would have them do unto you" -- well, what does that tell you about yourself?

Not True

[pdamoc]

Problem is that most people misunderstand religion. For example, once a Christian "get's it" it becomes a source of happiness for the people around him. However... most Christians don't get it, Gandhi was right when he said "I consider western Christianity in its practical working a negation of Christs Christianity." Anyone who reads Tolstoy's The kingdom of God is within you understands that quote perfectly (Gandhi too was a fan of Tolstoy).

We are the only one to blame for our own unhappiness.

Wiki visits topic

[Tablizer]

There is a somewhat related topic on the c2 wiki:

http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki?HappinessIsElusive

Snippet:

Follow-up to WeDontNeedDrugsToBeHappy. I think happiness is elusive. Assuming we take a Darwinian model of human behavior, there is no reproductive advantage in long-term happiness because a happy person just sits there and does nothing. Our brain will simply up the ante when we achieve something that makes us happy. And, I think this fits with observations about human nature in general. The rich gripe almost as much as the poor about something or other.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Maxo-Texas]

Some of the unhappiest people I know are followers of christianity and islam. I'm don't know about other religions.

I think some people are happier after becoming religious while it brings a lifetime of misery to others.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Creepy Crawler]

---Before I knew God I had a fear of death from like when I was 6 years old. Before I knew everyone died, I thought people just got old.

Actually, I remember when my great-grandmother died. I was 2 and 1/2 and a "crazy toddler". Yet, with no pictures and no telling what happened, I can vividly describe her, her clothes, the room, the way leading to her room (in the hospital), and countless other facts. I remember holding her hand, and her skin was like tissue paper. My parents (and grandparent there, her mother) thought I was going to really hurt her. I could speak some, but there was no speaking necessary.

There was compassion. I knew she was going to die, and die she did. She passed the next day, after seeing me. She knew of nobody in the room, but she recognized me as her baby boy.

I never had a fear of death, even being close to those who were near. It's not sad or despairing. It's peaceful, tranquil.. melancholy. I feel sad for those who do think terrible and dredging thoughts with somebody near death.

---I wanted to be content to just live forever playing newer and better video games. When I learned about death, my whole priorities changed. I felt that I had to live more for the moment and get as much in this life as possible so I don't miss anything.

What is there to learn? You die. Maybe now, maybe later, but you WILL die. Nothing your parents/teachers/church leaders can tell you and give you an "informed view". Some believe that you only have 1 chance, and then you go to an absolute good or bad place. I dont like that. I wish to better myself and share compassion to others, but I might take many lives to do that. If, somehow, I attain enlightenment here now, I wont have to live again. Eternal nothingness will be freedom, or is that eternal everythingness?

---People told me God exists and I went to a Christian Church, but it was hard for me to grasp and I never understood it well. My faith wasn't so good, then in 2003 God spoke to me,"Good News", and I recieved a Good News bible soon after. When I found out God exists for a fact, Jesus is Lord.

If you dont mind, what was the fact that God exists (seriously, not from a flaming point of view). I have personally witnessed 'concidences' that fell together all to well. Point in being is thus: After my grandmother died (from cancer), later on came my mothers birthday. She was almost to tears remembering how my grandmother would always send her a card, get her some thoughtful present, and call her. At the store (with my sister), she went and bought a lottery ticket (not 5, 10, or 50, just 1 single ticket). As she scratched it, she won 20$. Looking underneath the ticket, at the local paper, it had the small headline, "grandmother gives after death".

That day was my mothers birthday (when that happened). Take it as you wish.

---I also learned that he promises eternal life. I didn't go looking for a way to avoid death and thusly believed in Christianity because it was the only possible answer. I found out God exists for a fact then I realized he promises eternal life!

Eternal anything sounds like fun after the first 100 million years, but after that sounds like an "amusement park prison". I would rather, for eternity, not exist, or blend my consciousness with the universe. For many people, they want a pretty place to call good (heaven). The other absolute is Hell. Once you in either, you're stuck there for ever. Even the idea of an absolute good or bad seems... bad. Does your sect of Christanity allow do-overs, or are you condemned to wherever you are "judged" to go?

---You can speak for yourself and say that God doesn't make you happy. But for me knowing death isn't the end of things makes me a very happy person.

After reading much of the Bible, and finding I disagree with the very conduct of "God", I determined that he wasnt honorable. Jesus, on the other hand, was honorable. Soddom and Gomorrah could have been easily dealt with, if "God" was to show the evil to each person there. No viol

heal thyself

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know if you spend much money on your medication, or if you have noticed any unwanted side-effects from it at all, but the brunt of what follows is simply a rant about why you really don't need to be taking any such medication. Although this implies that you would have any desire to remove your dependency upon the drugs, and that you're willing to perform the necessary self-experimentation (or, at the very least, research) to discover what the true root cause(s) of your problems is(/are).

The body is an intricate machine. I truly hope that at some point you become aware that your imbalances are due largely to the myriad consequential effects of the various substances you ingest, inhale, absorb, or otherwise take in. Additionally, recent studies (and I have to say I'd arrived at this conclusion just from my own experiences) seem to indicate that your mind-set (whether it feels as though you have control over it or not) will have a large impact on your physical well-being; the more you feel angry/upset/helpless/stressed/afraid or various other sensations, the harder it can be (and seemingly almost always is) for your body to recover from injuries, produce white blood cells, cleanse toxins from the colon/sinuses/lymph glands, and a whole slew of other adverse effects.

Certainly there's a lot more to be known in these areas, but there's one idea which I perceive as blatantly clear: any dependency on any sort of drug is an indicator that something deeper is going wrong to prevent the body from functioning as well as it is capable.

Re:heal thyself

[BKX]

While I agree with you, your argument lacks cohesion. Did you forget a paragraph going from a "myriad [of] consequential effects of the various substances you ... take in" to "any [drug] dependency ... is an indicator that something deeper is going wrong"? NB: I am not trying to be an ass.

These studies to which you refer are probably the myriad of studies showing how bad the crap added to our food is. Drugs have nothing (or little, more often maybe) to do with it. Most people suffering from depression (This is NOT a joke!) can be done with it in about two weeks by eliminated high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) from their diet. This usually means not drinking pop and buying the expensive condiments. Many more will recover by also eliminating white sugar. This is more difficult but possible. If you like candy, you will need to learn to make your own from natural unrefined sweeteners such as honey, maple syrup (the real kind, not "maple-flavored syrup". You'll pay big bucks for it but it is worth every penny), and stevia for those that want it calorie free. The other big cause of depression in our food and beverages is artificial sweeteners, including but not limited to aspartame, saccharin and sucralose. These are actually worse than sugar and HFCS and will cause you to GAIN WEIGHT if you use too much. If you ditch those sweeteners entirely, you WILL lose weight and probably get over depression.

Remember, the only reason you don't know how bad this stuff is is because depressed people will consume more of it. Like the companies that sell this shit want you eating less. That's why they pay megabucks to develop artificial sweeteners that make you fat. You'll buy more of it. NB: HFCS is also artificial. It is a chemical cocktail produced from corn. Sucralose (Splenda) is also a chemical, created from corn using petroleum.

Re:heal thyself

[John Courtland]

I like your post, but I'm pretty sure Sucralose is chlorinated sucrose molecule. At least, that is what the company that produces it says. Here are some links:
http://www.holisticmed.com/splenda/ http://www.mercola.com/2000/dec/3/sucralose_danger s.htm# http://www.ific.org/publications/brochures/sucralo sebroch.cfm http://www.sucralose.org/facts.html

Please note I wasn't specifically looking for pros vs cons of the shit. I personally hate it, I can taste when it's in my food, and I have a sneaking suspicion it wrecked my digestive system. However, I don't know all there is to know about it so I really can't point fingers, but I can stop, and have stopped, eating it.

Re:heal thyself

[Anonymous Coward]

You sir, are a fucking idiot. You've been paying too much attention to the Jim Cunningham's of this world. To claim that the causes of depression are based on our current culture's consumption of certain "foods" is absurd! Take note everyone, a low /. ID does not correllate to a higher learned intelligence level.

Re:heal thyself

[tabrnaker]

um, who modded this insightful?

Science already knows that insufficient diet can cause 'psychological disorders'. Or too much of certain minerals cause them as well.

Whoopdee doo. People need to think for themselves. Your body is a machine, it NEEDS certain inputs. If it doesn't get them it doesn't function properly. People understand you have to give your car the proper fuel but why is it so bloody hard to apply the same logic to your body?

I have a sneaking suspicion that it's probably because so many people deny that they are animals. AFter all, all animal functions are pretty taboo in western cultures, you won't find people defecating side by side. Hell, lots of people can't even eliminate if they aren't at home!!!

Re:heal thyself

[Maggott]

To my medical knowledge, what you eat can have a significant effect on your mood, but it's not the only cause, or even necessarily the most common one. Refind sugars can have a depressant effect by leading to low blood sugar. The body shoots out insulin to deal with the sudden sugar spike, but since the spike is very short you're left with a ton of insulin that prevents you from maintaining a sufficient supply until it can be cleared out.

But even if you're just talking physical causes, there are others which can have the same effect--lack of sleep, exercise, and all that other "Health" stuff. Most people don't mentally link their state of mind with their state of body, because it's counterintuitive--most people think of their emotions, their thoughts, and their body as being distinct. They are not. That's why anti-depressants work in the first place. While they may ultimately be a band-aid for the effects of a persistant problem, we wear band-aids for a reason. Often the causes of depression are too difficult to ferret out, so we remove it's effects instead.

So, in short, you're right that sugar can affect mood but sugar isn't the whole story.

Re:heal thyself

[coopex]

You're completely right. Depression isn't caused by poor personal choices with regards to foods and mindset. It is a horrible affliction that can only be cured by expensive drugs and more expensive therapy. The strength of those who struggle though life with such a horrible disease that they have no control over pales such those cowardly cancer patients, who also had absolutely no control over their disease.

Re:heal thyself

[BKX]

Maybe you should stop thinking of yourself as an enlightened intelligent human and realize that you are an animal with certain needs and requirements. Science knows for a fact that a lack of vitamins and minerals will cause specific physiological and psychological disorders. As will too much of certain vitamins and minerals. Why, then, is it so unbeleivable that chemicals artificially made in a lab would also cause these disorders? Especially when you consume pounds a week. Look at Mexico. Very few people use any artificial sweeteners. HFCS is practically illegal (giant taxes make it cost prohibitive). Almost noone in Mexico has depression. Very few are fat. Coincidence? I doubt it. (Even the fat thing. Mexicans consume around 3500 calories per day. We consume roughly 4000 per day. That's not a big enough difference to account for the obesity rates.)

As far as the low Slashdot ID, are you jealous, AC?

Re:heal thyself

[hr raattgift]

Dude, *water* is a chemical. *You* are made up of chemicals.

Corn syrup generally is made by breaking down corn startch, exactly the same way the amylase enzyme in your own saliva would break it down. The decomposition produces glucose in both cases. That's what your cells like to use to make ATP, which is the supplier of energy for most in-cell chemical reactions.

HFCS is high in fructose because a second enzyme, glucose isomerase, converts some of the glucose to fructose. Fructose is a common sugar found in *all* sweet fruits, nectar, and bee honey. It has three useful properties: firstly, it is much sweeter than glucose (so you need less of it for the same sweetness); secondly, it is more readily soluble than glucose at low temperatures, which is useful in e.g. cold drinks; thirdly, it is not as instantly usable by your body as glucose is -- you convert fructose you naturally eat in large amounts (especially in a vegan diet rich in vegetables and fruits!) into glucose, but it takes some energy to do so. In other words, you add less fructose than glucose, and that fructose gives you less net dietary calories. Moreover, the reaction is spread out over time, rather than happening all at once. This moderates the insulin reaction.

Result: *less* calories per drink than if you used glucose syrup (i.e., plain corn syrup). You get less fat drinking HFCS soft drinks. Less glucose rush per drink.

Now, consider drinks sweetened with sucrose -- from cane or beets.

Sucrose is a pair of sugar molecules linked together. The molecules are glucose and fructose. When you eat ordinary sugars directly, or in the tissues of *all* plants, your body first breaks that bond, so you have a fructose molecule to deal with *anyway*, just as if you had consumed it in a tin of HF(50%F)CS-sweetened cola.

Guess what... maple syrup is mostly water and sucrose!

The weight gain you're talking about is a simple energy problem. When calories into your body exceed calories out, you gain weight. Your body stores excess calories very efficiently in fat. When calories out exceed calories in, you lose weight.

Calories in = food energy. Of all sorts. Doesn't matter if it's from sugars (~17 kilojoule/gram), proteins (also ~17 kJ/gram) or fat (~38 kJ/g). The problem with sweet drinks is that it's lots of calories that don't make you feel as full as meats, or ordinary fruits and vegetables.

Substituting low or no calorie sweeteners cuts back on a lot of these unfilling calories, and they are often a considerable fraction of what pushes people over the point where weight gain occurs.

Substituting honey for sucrose, or maple syrup for corn syrup, really makes very little difference. You still are taking in lots of carbohydrates at ~4kcal/gram.

The *plausible* (and even some of the implausible) risks of heavy consumption of artificial sweeteners is *by far* outweighed by the healthy effects of reducing food energy in overweight people.

Unfortunately, even eliminating 140+ kilocalories per can of fizzy drink (times several cans a day, perhaps), most people still eat more than the 2000-2500 kilocalories worth of food energy than they burn off in a day, and so *still* gain weight. Scaring them away from ways of reducing calories by substituting low-calorie reasonably-as-tasty stuff is *harmful* if it ends up adding 300 kilocalories/day (or more!) excess intake, or putting on about a kg (or about two pounds) of fat a month.

Re:heal thyself

[hr raattgift]

Mexicans consume around 3500 calories per day. We consume roughly 4000 per day. That's not a big enough difference to account for the obesity rates.

Even blindly accepting the accuracy of these numbers, at ca. 4500 kcal/lb of fat, given two people who burn the same number of calories in a day, person A consuming 500kcal/day more than person B, will put on one pound of fat more than person B every nine days.

Even if we adjust for the observation that heavier people burn more calories than lighter people, performing the same level of activity (or inactivity), person B will still put on about 2 - 3 lb more weight a month than person A.

That's more than 20lbs a year.

In that case, the source of the relative obesity is obvious, and your assertion that "[t]hat's not a big enough difference" is wrong.

I will even try to help you out a bit... let's say that Mexicans don't actually burn as many calories as Americans, because a bunch of Americans have this season called winter, where they have to burn more calories to keep warm. Let's use a nice deflator of 50% of your 500 calorie/day difference, i.e., 250 calories/day is spent dealing with the temperature difference between Mexico-average and USA-average.

We now have a weight-gain difference of 10 lb/year instead of 20. That *still* would account for a large difference in obesity rates over time.

Now, let's turn on your numbers. The "standard human" is 72kg (~160lb). That's men and women averaged together. A standard human will burn about 2300 kcal/day *in a completely sedentary state* (like in a coma).

Light exercise (walking to the toilet, getting out of bed) will burn no more than 1 kcal/minute more than being completely still. An office worker who doesn't walk around all that much will maybe burn 200-300 kcal/day this way. People who actually *exercise* may burn more... moderate exercise will burn 2 kcal/min extra and heavy exercise will burn about 3 kcal/min extra. An hour-long workout and some cool down and you can make it 400-500 kcal/day beyond base rate.

Smaller humans burn less when being comatose (they have less tissue to supply blood and nutrition to) and when they are being active (they have less mass, so have less inertia to overcome; they also have less surface area, less volume, and smaller cross-sections, which are important when moving quickly, or in water). Larger humans burn more. Moreover, muscle tissues consume more energy than fatty tissues even when they're doing nothing, so a person who is heavy because of musculature rather than fat, will burn more than any lighter person, or a somewhat heavier person who is not as muscular, even being completely still.

Taking all this into account, and cross-checking with actual observations using calorimeters, a standard human in the USA burns about 2500 kcal in a day. An average woman may burn about 2000; an average man may burn about 3000. Any more than that is very efficiently stored as fat. This is thanks to an abundance of calories being a feature of human existance only over the last 100 years -- millions of years of mammalian evolution has taken place under pressure from frequent food shortages.

To make it a bit easier, you come up with a similar number for your vegetative calorie burn rate if you multiply your weight in pounds by 12 (or your mass in kg by 26, for non-Americans). With a desk job and a commute that involves a few flights of stairs, a few minutes from a subway or bus to office (and home), a few minutes walking to and from lunch and the toilet, and so on, with occasional light housework you can multiply that number by *at most* 1.5.

At 180lb, then, it would be (180*12)*1.5 -> 3240. Round down.

If an average American (even just an average big male american) consumes *4000* calories a day when population studies observe only about 3000 a day *or less*, would mean about a pound of weight gain every five days.

The population does *not* ga

Psycological study on Happiness.

[Phoe6]

I remember reading a book by Dr.Paul Hauck on Self Discipline. Its titled How to do what you want to do.. The title itself says that when one does what he wants to do, then he is happy. Depression, Set backs, failures everything accompany in the path, but with Self Discipline and a Hard nosed attitude if one treads along towards what he wants, he finds a sort of needed contentment.
Of various self-help books, I have read, this one turned out true to (atleast) me more than once. Recommended reading for anyone here! :-)
If you get hold of a copy, let me know as well.

You guys just don't get it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Happiness is:

A wonderful woman on your lap,
a lit joint in your lips,
a cold highball in your hand,
a leather wallet full of cash,
and the knowledge that
you don't have to set
the alarm clock for tomorrow.

Gratitude and Happiness

[Anthony]

I was/am going through a bit of rough patch on a number of fronts. I happened to have bought The New Science of Happiness Issue a while before. The key ingredient that jumped out at me was "gratitude". Relearning that was one of the keys to turning my situation around.

Happiness?

[melvo]

Don't talk to me about happiness. Brain the size of a planet, and I spend my day typing meaningless drivel into a Perl script.

finding a new way

[UnahaClosp]

I used to be pretty down all the time in my teens, low self esteem and all of that. Then I found out that I could turn it all around by start to enjoy pain and suffering (my own and others). I dont bring pain and suffering to others and I dont inflict it onto myself but when it does happen I just think that its a part of life and I might as well like it. The feeling of satisfaction comes from feeling that you're pushing your limits and expanding your boundaries.
Because without evil there can be no good right? Therefore you should learn to enjoy both.

the light dawneth

[mbius]

our early ancestors' struggles against adverse weather and predators have led us to instinctually focus on what is wrong or out of place

My mother...is the ubermensch.

Re:Sex

[joss]

If anybody was ever in more need of a little, er, professional help, then I don't know, maybe they would already have gone and got some. Once you've got the mechanical craving taken care of you might be vaguely sane enough to get some real lovin...

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[lisaparratt]

If, somehow, I attain enlightenment here now, I wont have to live again. Eternal nothingness will be freedom, or is that eternal everythingness?

Eternal anything sounds like fun after the first 100 million years, but after that sounds like an "amusement park prison". I would rather, for eternity, not exist, or blend my consciousness with the universe.

It's both! It's the recursive fractal nature of all polar opposites - good/bad, light/dark, one/zero, female/male, yin/yang - all defined in terms of each other. Existence, in all it's glory, is still a zero sum game.

As for enlightenment, I think you're going to be disappointed. Being at one with the universe is realising that because you are the universe, you're eternally trapped within it.

doh.

[rupert0]

Happiness is just a pointer that a lot of people are missing..... *(happiness[0])?

Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[dwalsh]

The above is a convoluted grasp at an alternate explaination of how and why their deity/messiah was executed by the Romans.

It makes little sense. Did the people who died before Jesus all go to hell no matter what they were like? Prior to that, was God so cruel that he would punish you for something Adam did?

It seems strange that the Jews believed you'd go to heaven if good, hell if you were bad, but Christians think that rule was only made possible by the crucifixion.

Now that Jesus took one for the team, does that mean we can sin all we like?

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[crazyphilman]

You know what I find ironic? There's an actual story in the gospels that contradicts this guy's whole script about original sin and redemption. Here we go (I'm paraphrasing):

A rich kid goes up to Jesus and asks, "How does one win entry into the kingdom of heaven?"

Jesus replies "Follow the commandments."

The kid says "Is that all there is to it?"

Jesus says, "Well, if you want to be perfect, give your money to the poor and follow me as a disciple."

The kid went away, saddened at this. Apparently he didn't want to give up his money.

Jesus said as the kid walked away, "It is harder for a rich man to enter heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle."

So, there you have it. If you want to get into heaven, obey the commandments. Nothing about swearing allegiance to Jesus, nothing about original sin, nothing about anything but "be nice to each other". If you want to be "perfect", follow Jesus and preach the Word, but he never said you HAD to.

I think Christians tend to forget that JESUS WAS A JEW, so he believed in Jewish rules. He even said, "I am not the end of the law but the fulfillment of it".

What happened was, over the past couple of thousand years, the Roman Catholic Church rearranged Jesus' principles in their dogma to solidify their power. It's pretty hard to threaten people if all they have to do to get into heaven is be nice to others. If a priest has to utter some magic words over your deathbed, though... Well, there ya go! Instant power.

My .02...

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[Bent Mind]

Did the people who died before Jesus all go to hell no matter what they were like?

It seems strange that the Jews believed you'd go to heaven if good, hell if you were bad...

Wish I had something to link to. I watched a Discovery program a while back. It covered the formation of the modern Bible. One of the interesting parts was the concept of hell. According to the program, the current concept of hell didn't exist until several hundred years after Christ died. The previous concept was that you simply ceased existing at death. Kind of like what most Atheists belive will happen when they die. Heaven was a reward to early Christians. The only punishment was failure to receive the reward.

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[aminorex]

Every apparent contradiction is consistent with a higher synthesis. The same guy who said that also said "I am the way, the truth and the life; no man comes to the Father except through me". In order to understand the intent of that, and simultaneously understand the intent of what he said in dealing with the young rich man, you need to develop a perspective that includes both, as your frame for understanding. There are many available, in the literature, but you if you regard Jesus' teachings as normative, you'll probably need to come up with your own, since the ones in the literature will probably be inconsistent with some dearly held personal tenet or another.

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[swv3752]

So you have never broken any of the commandments. Never felt envious? Never said "Oh, My god"? Never talked back to your parents?

Yeah that's what I thought. You are going to hell. Unless you seek forgiveness.

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[crazyphilman]

I didn't say I believed any of this hooey; I just said I found the contradictions in the Christian bible amusing.

I do not believe in Hell, period.

Consider it from my point of view for a moment. Imagine you're a college-educated, secular, agnostic New Yorker who's only been in church a couple of times in his whole life (outside of boot camp, where they made everyone go). Pretend you've studied physics, chemistry and engineering at the university level and absolutely believe that the universe is fifteen billion years old, the earth is four billion years old, and that all forms of life evolved from lower forms of life, tracing a history back billions of years to complex proteins in a chemical stew.

Ok, ready? PRETEND YOU'RE ME.

Now pretend some religious person is trying to explain God, Hell, eternal damnation, and Jesus to you. You're a logical person, so you create a list of the things he's saying, to see whether they fit together logically:

God, who supposedly created everybody, and loves us all, is supposedly going to send three quarters of the world's population to a horrible, firey doom JUST BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T JOIN ONE SPECIFIC CHURCH.

Among people who DO join that church, anyone who does anything the church "fathers" disapprove of is going to hell too. Jerking off, getting laid, drinking, playing video games, saying things like "Motherfucker" and "Fuck, Shit, Piss!", and so on, all send you straight to the Big Barbecue at the End of the Universe.

The only way God is going to accept you into heaven is if you turn yourself into a dried up, joyless excuse for a person and then, once you're IN heaven, you have to spend all your time ADORING HIM, even though VANITY IS SUPPOSED TO BE A MORTAL SIN.

Oh, and GOD LOVES YOU.

At this point, if you're me, your brain trips the circuit breaker and you say, aloud (without meaning to) "But that's completely ridiculous! None of that shit makes any sense whatsoever!"

Well, there ya go. That's how arguments break out, and why I try not to spend any time in the deep south.

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[crazyphilman]

Well, the truth is, I don't believe in Christianity, the bible, hell, or any of that stuff. I think it's all a little silly. I just like the contradiction I mentioned. I think it's rather funny, and shows how many competing hands were involved in the writing, and rewriting, and editing of the bible over the course of the past two thousand years.

I'd convert to buddhism, but I think they're kind of silly too. Who wants detachment? I like being alive. I hope I'm born again an infinite number of times. I think that would be a swell fate.

But I definitely don't believe in Hell, or a God who would threaten me with it to get me to love him. It reminds me of one of Aesop's fables:

The sun and the wind saw a man walking along in a coat and made a bet to see who could make the man take it off.

So the wind blew and blew, and did everything it could to force the man to remove his coat. But the harder the wind blew, the tighter he wrapped his coat around himself. Finally the wind gave up.

Then the sun let his warm rays soothe the man, and as the fellow warmed up and became comfortable, he took off his coat and smiled.

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[aminorex]

> I definitely don't believe in Hell, or a God who would threaten me with it to get me to love him.

Nor do most Christians, I would guess. But I don't think it matters much what they believe: It either is or isn't, quite regardless of their belief. And quite regardless of yours and mine as well.

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[Eli Gottlieb]

I just love it when Christians horribly mistranslate the original Hebrew to make it say something to justify their view that everyone else is going to hell.

Read The Fucking Talmud

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[crazyphilman]

Well, since we're talking about objective reality, there's never been ANY evidence that there's ANYTHING supernatural going on, ANYWHERE. In every single case where a scientist went in to test some weird thing going on, a rational explanation was found and the supernatural was debunked.

So, if we're talking about pure objective reality, belief in the supernatural (this includes religious belief) is irrational and unsupported by observable fact.

If I had to venture a guess as to what form a god might take, IF such a god existed, I'd suggest that perhaps our universe is actually composed of more than four dimensions (x,y,z,time) and we are the four-dimensional cross-section of some larger form. Spiritual things might be higher-dimensional forms that have no intersection with the four dimensions, and are perceived by us outside of the four dimensions, with the experience somehow percolating down to us subconsciously. As far as God goes, then, perhaps he's something that pervades all higher dimensions as a sort of group life form like coral, so that we're all actually a part of him. If we live on after death, perhaps it's as a component that has lost it's four-dimensional cross section.

That makes a lot more sense to me than "a big bearded guy in the sky".

Re:Insightful no. Swallowing the kool aid - yes.

[crazyphilman]

What I find funny is that Christians never accept the simple fact that JESUS WAS A JEW, so he would have naturally followed the principles of the Talmud. And, didn't he say "I am not the end of the law but the fulfillment of it"? He didn't want to change anything, he wanted to remind people to obey the commandments given to Moses.

I think the problem is that Paul the Gentile and his followers were the only apostles to survive the sacking of Jerusalem by the Romans somewhere around 100AD. Paul had some serious issues, I think. Look at how he pestered the Romans about their sexual practices. Jesus never bothered anyone about that sort of thing... He just wanted us to be nice to each other.

It's hard, because I'm technically a Presbyterian, but I think most Christian philosophy is totally full of shit and geared towards maintaining a state of self-loathing (why, oh why, did they EVER go this route? It's nuts).

I'd change religions, but I don't think any of the others are that much better. They all have their wonky points.

Sigh... Whatta world...

That's what they want you to believe...

[Steeltoe]

...because you always give what you have.

The unhappy people can't stand happy people. So if you're unhappy, you will more likely seek depressing and complaining company, than cheerful, vibrant and active people. That doesn't mean they don't exist, you just shut everything positive away, so you can live what you think you are right now. Depression leads to dullness and stagnation, and is also fueled by it, while the way to come out of it is to become active and seek out good company/do good things for others etc. It's really very simple! Yet, when you're stuck with your unhappiness, it seems so hard. You think that 'you' are unhappy, so you stay there longer. We know what to do, yet, we find so many excuses for not doing it. This is mainly because we have been trained to do so, and have perfected its mastery very well. The mind is pretty sneaky actually!

Don't fall for the truth of unhappy people about what is our true nature. Have you seen a child? It is never depressed. A child cannot be depressed. It learns that behaviour from the environment, which it eagerly emulates, and when put under stress for a long time. The younger the child, the more happiness, creativity, laughter, playfullness, innocense and all the other good qualities.

So we need to get rid of our stress and negative patterns that lets us be stuck with a worldview that dictates we shouldn't be 'too happy'. That is truly an art, and then we will discover WHO WE TRULY ARE.

'Old trite arguments'? There's no such thing. It depends on the listener!

Are you your stress?

Re:That's what they want you to believe...

[Dogtanian]

The unhappy people can't stand happy people.

I'd say I was a relatively depressive git, and I don't find unhappy/depressed people necessarily interesting. On the other hand, there are stupidly/vapidly/selfishly happy people who do nothing for me; yet other 'happy' people can be happy and outgoing and make you feel better.

What I dislike is the stupid minded, over-simplistic assumptions from the some 'selfishly' happy people who figure that because *they* are happy, there is something wrong with those that aren't, or can't think themselves into someone else's mind.

That having been said, I do agree with *some* of the stuff you said in your first (full) paragraph.

Have you seen a child? It is never depressed. A child cannot be depressed. It learns that behaviour from the environment, which it eagerly emulates, and when put under stress for a long time.

On what basis do you come to this conclusion, and how do you define depression?

No offense intended, but this does have the ring of one of those psychological urban myths (or unproven theories that at some stage become accepted 'fact') that get propogated by even 'reputable' people because it sounds good on TV and in help books.

Re:That's what they want you to believe...

[Lynxara]

I don't remember much about being a child other than being depressed a lot.

Re:That's what they want you to believe...

[Steeltoe]

Have you seen a child? It is never depressed. A child cannot be depressed. It learns that behaviour from the environment, which it eagerly emulates, and when put under stress for a long time.

On what basis do you come to this conclusion, and how do you define depression?

Being depressed. I will readily admit I don't know the "official" definition, but I would say it is something holding you back and pulling you down. When you're depressed, you start thinking about yourself more and more, and more. This will make your problems seem bigger and bigger, until they overshadow everything else. The quickest way to become depressed is in fact to only think about yourself! ;-)

I'd say depression is a path which leads to long-lasting feelings of lack, sorrow, guilt, lack of self-esteem, etc. It will pull you down, have bad effects for a healthy body and mind.

Being depressed is not crying. When you cry, you cry. So what? There's no point in feeling good all the time. If you're ALWAYS on the top, the curve is flat. Life consists of variations, mountains and valleys, thankfully! A child, when you look at it, will cry with its whole body. What we as adults have forgotten, the child does naturally. This will free so much stress from the system! When a child cries, it cries, it doesn't think so much, doesn't analyse a whole lot, or focus on the obstacles.

The way out of depression is to care about others, then your own problems will become smaller!

If my words can help someone, that is enough for me.

Re:That's what they want you to believe...

[Dogtanian]

Being depressed is not crying. When you cry, you cry. So what? There's no point in feeling good all the time. If you're ALWAYS on the top, the curve is flat. Life consists of variations, mountains and valleys, thankfully! A child, when you look at it, will cry with its whole body. What we as adults have forgotten, the child does naturally. This will free so much stress from the system! When a child cries, it cries, it doesn't think so much, doesn't analyse a whole lot, or focus on the obstacles.

Trite; you blame the learned behaviour for childrens' depression; well, it's hard to say, and I'm not buying that without a more convincing case.

Basically, I figured out that on some level I've been (to put it crudely) depressed by some degree pretty much as far back as I can remember. This doesn't really tie in well with what you say.

I'm sorry, but your stuff about children just comes across as more inadequately-backed-up and excessively propogated self-help pseudo-science.

The way out of depression is to care about others, then your own problems will become smaller!

On the contrary, that's a pat solution, and not necessarily true. A lot of people get depressed because they have been brought up to care about others, and feel guilty about putting themselves first.

With respect (I noticed your link), I think this is where religious/spiritual "solutions" have conflicting interests; most of them aren't going to put their own communities second to helping someone out of depression.

Some (cults, and some mainstream religions) are positively dangerous, in that they'll suck people with these problems in, and make them feel worse when the person realises that the religion isn't the solution, and tries to leave.

Re:That's what they want you to believe...

[Steeltoe]

What a depressing post.

Happiness is

[The MESMERIC]

... a cigar named Hamlet.

happiness is simple

[sl4shd0rk]

set realistic boundaries with people, and stick to them.
don't involve yourself with unhealthy social behaviour.
set aside time to yourself everyday.
appreciate what you have, not what you have not.

flying muppet yoda would say:
          simple things are they, improve life they will.

Buddhism

[cyanide]

Isn't buddism the science of happiness?

http://www.bswa.org/modules/mydownloads/singlefile .php?cid=4&lid=140

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Scarblac]

Before I knew God I had a fear of death from like when I was 6 years old. Before I knew everyone died, I thought people just got old. I wanted to be content to just live forever playing newer and better video games. [...] I found out God exists for a fact then I realized he promises eternal life!

Yay, back to just playing newer and better video games it is!

Happiness is...

[star_aas]

a C++ compiler and a cup of coffee.

Earworm Alert

[cherokee158]

Oh, great, now I have that song stuck in my head. You know the one
I mean...

sense of life: sustainable future for the children

[free2]

It's difficult to be happy if your life has no sense and if everything you've done cease to exist when you die.
If you help building a sustainable future for the children, then you found a real meaning for your life, one that will survive you.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[node 3]

God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.

I'm happy and I didn't solicit it from god (or satan or any other "non-human" being).

Re:Having a HUGE Dick ...

[Zone-MR]

Whenever life gets you down
Keeps you wearing a frown
And the gravy train has left you behind
And when you're all out of hope
Down at the end of your rope
And nobody's there to throw you a line

If you ever get so low that you don't know which way to go
Come on and take a walk in my shoes
Never worry bout a thing
Got the world on a string
Cus I've got the cure for all of my blues (all of his blues)

I take a look at my enormous penis
And my troubles start a-meltin' away
I take a look at my enormous penis
And the happy times are coming to stay

I got a sing and a dance when I glance in my pants
And the feeling's like a sunshiney day
I take a look at my enormous pe-e-e-nis
And everything is goin' my way

(whistling)

(ad lib solo)

PE-E-NIS

(end ad lib solo)

Everybody
I take a look at my enormous penis
And my troubles start a-meltin' away
I take a look at my enormous penis
And the happy times are coming to stay

I got great big amounts in the place where it counts
And the feeling's like a sunshiney day
I take a look at my enormous penis
And everything is goin' my way (my trouser monster)
Everything is going' my way (my meat is murder)
Everything is goin' my way (size doesn't matter)
Everything is goin' my waaaaaay
yummmm

-- Enormous Penis, Da Vinci's Notebook

Happiness, Logically

[d1zzvifiz]

If you search for happiness in the external world, you'll never find it. Because, logically, happiness comes from the mind itself. If you consider the rich, the famous, and even, the successful, they aren't necessarily happy because happiness doesn't depend on external things. I think if more people realized this truly, there would be less focus on materialism, and *more* peace in the world. As far as finding happiness through drugs... the brain is not the mind. It's related to the mind and it *can* affect the mind. How we feel is determined by what we believe in, not by our current predicament.

Buy my tapes!

Very Simply

[DynaSoar]

1. Avoid fight or flight
2. Satisfy survival needs
All else is rationalization.

What did it say?

[Kris Thalamus]

People told me God exists and I went to a Christian Church, but it was hard for me to grasp and I never understood it well. My faith wasn't so good, then in 2003 God spoke to me,"Good News", and I recieved a Good News bible soon after.

What did this deity say to you?

What is *being in LOVE*?

[scorp1us]

Simple question, anything but simple answer. There is no fundamental love, it is not like a laugh. Love is the most complicated human emotion. Ignoring the hormones involved (the chemical aspect which *is* shared) is love the same for everyone? No. Love is the only human emotion which is grown and cultivated by your past experiences. Your expectations are entirely set by previous relationships - both the ones that worked and the ones that didn't. When you are in love with someone, it has more to do with them mostly falling into your expectations of how they should act. You put in what you expect to, and get out what you expect to. If they don't match, then you'll move on until you find something that is ameable.

Re:Friends, money, a fucking big TV set

[Dogtanian]

Parent comment is a quote from 'Trainspotting', not flamebait.

Cretins.

Flow

[Anonymous Coward]

For me, _Flow: The Psychology Of Optimal Experience_ by Mihaly Csiksczentmihalyi defines happiness. I'm happiest when I'm actively engaged in an activity that is neither so difficult that it's frustrating nor so easy that it's boring. If I'm mentally and psychologically engaged in doing something that's near the limits of my abilities, so that success is possible but not guaranteed, then life is good.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Creepy Crawler]

Oh, thats right. I know most of the things in the bible, but I just got mixed up. ;)

Silly me.

Christianity and Good Works -- not a simple answer

[ianscot]

Actually Christianity says there is no way to earn your way into heaven.

The Bible has many, many things to say about "good works," and it would be fair to say they at least tend in different directions on this point. Here's a nice little Googled synopsis of the many and varied mentions of "good works" and "works" in the Bible.

For the resulting doctrinal ambiguity, one can also see those same google results (for "good works" and "Bible") to read lots of explanations like:

"Doing good works, obeying God, cannot of itself get anyone saved, but it determines very much who will be saved, and when..."
--The Church of God: Daily Bible Study

The expression "necessary but not sufficient" would just about sum that up. How would those works, then, not be "earning" one's way into heaven? The answer provided is all sorts of murky doctrine about how works are not the cause of salvation, but rather a sign of it. All of which seems to almost completely dispense with individual moral will in favor of obedience to divine will -- a point which I would describe as profoundly disturbing to me personally.

Frankly this seems to me like the sort of mess one comes across when trying to reconcile authoritarian ideas about God with any sort of active moral life. And different Christian groups come to quite different balance points for that. My Southern Baptist relations would see that very, very differently from my Northern Baptist ones.

happy drinks; happy pills; happy smokes

[peter303]

Life is too short be chronically unhappy.
Life is too short to drift through it in a haze.

As Long as I am not bored...

[brendanoconnor]

I tend to be either happy or content, both of which are good. When I am bored it is usually because my mind is not engaged in doing something, anything. For instance, when I am at work, I have a great deal of responsibilities and I tend to keep my mind active on putting together a solution to whatever the problem(s) at hand may be. On the flip side, when I have 30 minutes of time but cannot seem to find anything to fill the time with, I get very bored, and tend to get sad or frusterated.

I know lots of people say that if they did not have a job or that if money was of no concern, they would be happy a great deal more often, but I find that if I did not have a job, I'd probably be very bored. Sure there are times, many times in fact, where I wish I could just call in sick and do whatever it is I want to do, including doing absolutely nothing if it so suits me, but generally speaking, my job keeps me engaged in doing something which helps pass the empty time.

I find the best times of my life are when I am hanging out with a couple of people, no more then 3 or 4, who are all interested in the same topics I am and we are engaged in interesting discussions. Even if we completely disagree on the topics, we are communicating and engaging our minds.

So keep your mind engaged on topics of interesting and you will find yourself a much more content or happy person.

roughly plotting Wealth vs Happiness

[Tired_Blood]

In a microeconomics class I took a few years ago, the prof introduced an interesting concept that plotted happiness against wealth following a logarithmic curve. The idea was that with each additional 10k, the happiness associated with the increased wealth decreases with each increment until it becomes almost negligible. The converse also was illustrated in that each 10k of reduced wealth is associated with an ever growing decrease in happiness, which at some personal point assumes a negative value (sadness) and ultimately reaches a final personal fixed point of maximum misery - usually expressed as suicide.

Not everyone behaves this way (some odd people feel accomplishment with the loss of wealth) and the plot requires wealth to be the only influence on an individual's emotional state, but I found it to be an interesting take on the subject in a way similar to Pascal's Wager on the existence of God.

Very strange: the captcha for this post is 'gamble', the example act used by the professor for this very subject.

Conan The Barbarian knew the secret...

[smithmc]

"Conan! What is best in life?"

"To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women!"

Complete Happiness is impossible

[permaculture]

If anyone were completely happy, they immediately have two problems.

1) Feeling guilty for being happy when others are not.
2) Worrying about when this happiness will end.

Wrong angle.

[Shotgun]

Misery makes people self-obsessed and inactive.

My experience is the exact opposite. Self-obsession and inactivity make people miserable. And it IS a positive feedback loop.

Re:A post that begins "Actually Christianity says.

[Slime-dogg]

Catholicism also has heaps of dogma that litter its teaching material, such that many sections of it are remnants of the church, not from the faith. Man's ultimate purpose of existence, from a Christian perspective, would be to serve God, and to serve others. This is exemplified in how Christ lived his life, which was pure.

If it doesn't come from the Bible, it is best to be circumspect of it.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Vitriol Angst]

I think religion can help you when life sucks and there is no way out.

But it made me a miserable doormat when I was Christian. I have often thought that societies where people were less religious were often happier. Either because they had a better life-style or lack of religion leads to a better lifestyle. One thing I can say for sure, is that it makes you take care of your life here on earth a bit better.

Here's a great article with statistics to back up the damage of religion;
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1798944, 00.html

Just look at anywhere in the world with the most religious control, and you'll find more war and suffering.

Re:Happiness is...

[Hosiah]

OK, you asked for it...IIRC:

"She's not a girl who misses much.
She's well acquainted with the touch of a velvet hand like a lizard on a window pane.
The man in the crowd with the multi-colored mirrors on his hobnail boots.
Lying with his eyes while his hands were busy working over time.
A soap impression of his wife which he donated to the national trust.
I need a fix 'cuz I'm goin' down; down to the place that I left up town.
I need a fix 'cuz I'm goin' down.
Mother Superior jumped the gun...(3 times)"

hey, I probably missed a couple licks, but that ain't bad considering I haven't even owned the White Album in 15 years...

Re:Money can't buy happiness

[bitspotter]

some variations:

Money isn't happiness, but poverty is misery. Misery loves company, and companies love misery...

He said that, but also a whole lot more...

[Kiyooka]

Yes, he did. However, quoting like that is problematic because it is decontextualized and so leaves out the sentiment behind the statement. Perhaps it should be something like:

"All life is pain. All life is also happiness. One cannot have one without the other, for the two are inextricably tied to one another. Recognize that life also means death, that happiness also means unhappiness, that joy also means suffering. Our attachment to something/someone causes us joy when it is fulfilled, but pain when it is taken away. Most people go through life alternating between extremes and never achieve balance, like a child who is gleeful for candy but cries when it is taken away. But there is a balance, and in this balance is not indifference but a kind of secret yet overflowing happiness to relish. If you wish to experience this stable, eternal, and enlightened "happiness", and if you want to pierce the illusion of reality, then you can study the Buddhist path if you so wish."

This is why Buddhism and Taoism go together so well. The Yin/Yang symbol is a Taoist symbol, but is also used in Buddhism. Note that I put quote marks around the second "happiness", because it is a higher order of happiness, so much so that it deserves another name. It is happiness and bliss, but also enlightened and unshakable, on a level where there is nothing that can overcome it. I wish there was a name for it. Oh wait, it does:

nirvana

Herbal Happiness...

[Smoke2Joints]

true happiness is only attained through enlightenment, however you want to personally describe that. psychdelic drugs, and i include cannabis in this, are the perfect tool to disassociate yourself from societies ideals and worries, and let you stand back and see things from a different perspective. i would almost use the analogy of seeing the world from a new dimension, it is that profound.

check out http://www.erowid.org/ for more info.

David Lee Roth quote

[Traf-O-Data-Hater]

"Money can't buy you happiness. But it can buy you a yacht big enough to pull up right alongside it."

Re:Happiness or Pleasure?

[Eli Gottlieb]

That, unfortunately, would be me. I'm the moron who has to be conscious of his own attempts to block out his existential intelligence by running on what I believe some call a "hedonic treadmill" but is perhaps more sensibly referred to as "The Wheel of Samsara".

Yup, scientists can tell us what happiness is

[arun_s]

As Steven Pinker convincingly explains in 'How the mind works', happiness, laughter, grief and other emotions are expressed facially thru' involuntarily controlled muscles. Laughter is a way of cementing friendships (you can't fake laughter well if the muscles that control genuine laughter are involuntary).
Or maybe laughter has extra-terrestrial origins and this is all one big experiment for some bugs from mars (read that in an Asimov, I think).

sepeerates us from the apes

[sail4evr]

I thought it was that we used toilet paper. Or most of us anyway.

Christ?

[goldberry]

And here I thought the basics of Christianity was Christ...

Seriously,

>" the rituals, the idea that people should suffer, that only bad people are poor, that only bad people are rich, that we should hate certain people,"

None of that is tought by Christianity; whoever told you so was lieing through their teeth!

Christianity is about Jesus Christ. Plain and simple. Christ--fully God and fully man--loved us so much he died to pay the price for our sins. That's a price that we *can't* pay, folks! It is true that God hates sin; but God does *not* hate the sinner!

"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Romans 5:8

What's more, Jesus calls his followers to love *everyone* just as he loves us. That means loving even those who are hard to *like.* As for being poor and rich, wealth has nothing to do with righteousness. Often bad people do become rich, but their riches won't help them when they die. Often God blesses good people with wealth, as he did after his trial of Job. Often bad people are poor, but they are seldom poor *because* they are bad. And often good people are poor, but I have seen some amazing blessings given to such people through their lack of "stuff."

My point is this: you have been seriously mislead as to the heart of Christianity. If this was done by someone calling themselves a Christian, then I am truly sorry. It breaks my heart every time I hear stories like these; there are so many people out there who just don't get it.

If you have any other objections, or would like me to clarify something for you, please send me an email: essorg_nire@yahoo.com.

Re:Many of us have...

[955301]

Doesn't it worry you just a little bit that your religion shares characteristics of classic brainwashing techniques:

- Make sure the message is unverifiable.
- Control access to alternative messages.
- Repeat the message constantly and at all available opportunities.
- Root the consequences of not following the message in fear.
- Isolate and attack dissenters of the message.
- Group those whom you have convinced in order to reinforce their belief.
- Use positions of authority to send the message.
- Invalidate positions of authority which you cannot control.
- If the message must be changed, do so, repeat the new message, and deny the existence of the previous one.

Atheists don't all profess to believe in the same thing, they simply agree that there are no gods. It's "without gods", not the "religion of godlessness".

It's as if you're saying that people with hair on their heads who claim to not be bald are inconsistent because of the variety of their hair color and that that somehow affects their claim to not be bald.

Re:A post that begins "Actually Christianity says.

[honeypea]

If it doesn't come from the Bible, it is best to be circumspect of it.

... and if it does?

Deuteronomy 21:10-14:
"When you go out to war against your enemies and the LORD, your God, delivers them into your hand, so that you take captives, if you see a comely woman among the captives and become so enamored of her that you wish to have her as wife, you may take her home to your house."

Or does the Old Testament condoning the rape of innocent victims of war not count? You're going to tell me it's a metaphor, or something, or Jesus overruled it? Odd that it's still in the pews.

I'd agree that it's hardly evident the bible's primary aim is universal human happiness. It's ok if you happen to be the side God picks.

I proved it can! (more or less)

[Cybrex]

For my senior project in college (Sociology major), I used a program called SPSS to do a regression analysis using data from the General Social Survey (an enormous and comprehensive survey regularly conducted by the government on the US population) to determine if there was a statistical correlation between wealth, income, & economic status and happiness (using several variables which generally indicate happiness and life satisfaction).

As it turns out, there is a strong positive correlation between the two. Obviously other factors play a role as well, and it doesn't conclusively determine causality, but wealthy people are much more likely to be happy than poor and middle-income people.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Creepy Crawler]

---It's both! It's the recursive fractal nature of all polar opposites - good/bad, light/dark, one/zero, female/male, yin/yang - all defined in terms of each other. Existence, in all it's glory, is still a zero sum game.

Although it is a bit late after this article, so only you'll see this, but you're wrong. Karma is the zero sum game. Even the basic idea of life brings death. All you can do is spread "stuff" to other dying others before you die yourself. Enlightenment is the way out of that zero sum game.

It allows you to "not to play the game". There are some beliefs that you, as a Buddha, can create an infitude of universes or observe any of them. I dont know.

---As for enlightenment, I think you're going to be disappointed. Being at one with the universe is realising that because you are the universe, you're eternally trapped within it.

You think? Are you enlightened? I strive to attain enlightenment. I make no reservations on what "it might feel like", or "what to expect". Those are against the fundamentals of Buddhism. What I do after attaining it, is for me to decide after I am one.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[lisaparratt]

IMHO, the curse of enlightenment is after having become one with the infinite, there is no more. For all the universes you could create and observe, there's no point. True freedom is found in the simple hope that there is something more, and not simply understanding that it's yet another metaphor for the same underlying concepts. Enlightenment is the souls eternal scream of horror at totality.

I found enlightenment, but by the wrong path. A bad decision, my one true regret, that haunts me, to a greater or lesser extent, at every moment, awake or asleep.

I should go to bed, before I'm consumed by my own uncontrollable thoughts.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Creepy Crawler]

---IMHO, the curse of enlightenment is after having become one with the infinite, there is no more. For all the universes you could create and observe, there's no point. True freedom is found in the simple hope that there is something more, and not simply understanding that it's yet another metaphor for the same underlying concepts. Enlightenment is the souls eternal scream of horror at totality.

From what I have read, enlightened individuals were very serene, calm, and at peace with everything. Is what you found surely enlightenment, or something more omnious? I fail to see how I wouldnt be overwhelmed by the absoluteness of everything if I ever attain it..

---I found enlightenment, but by the wrong path. A bad decision, my one true regret, that haunts me, to a greater or lesser extent, at every moment, awake or asleep.

There have been stories of people attaining Buddhahood different and quicker ways than originally noted. Might I ask when you first knew.

Is enlightenment that terrible of a burden on you?

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[lisaparratt]

I'd imagine those who've taken the proper path have mentally prepared themselves over the years, and moved towards their goal a little bit at a time.

For me, it happened when experimenting with things I shouldn't have been. About ten times the amount of things I shouldn't have been. Infinity hit like a sledgehammer. An eternity was spent finding the infinitesimal pieces that used to pass for me, but they don't go back together quite right, and I'll never find them all.

At the time, I was found headbutting a wall, screaming "I exist!". I've been screaming that inside ever since. If I wasn't certain it wouldn't help, I'd have committed suicide long ago.

This is all a bit of an over simplification, but I don't really want to go into the nitty gritty detail of the separation of observers, identities, physical form as metaphor, etc., lest I be stuck here for hours convincing myself that even though nothing exists, I have to accept this metaphorical reality is, for all intents and purposes, real, in order to find any respite.

Re:Having a HUGE Dick ...

[BandwidthHog]

Those guys rock. My girlfriend turned me onto them a few months ago. That and “Title of the Song” just absolutely slay me.

Re:Going to Church != Knowing God != Believing in

[Creepy Crawler]

Still, very interesting. I, if anything, am interested in raising my consciousness to its peak.

Still, I thank you in going into dialogue with me about this. It gives me an insight into one facet of what it might be like for me.

Ill still be around, but thank you.

Mod Parent Up

[judowillreturns]

The time has come, the song is over; thought I'd something more to say.

Re:A post that begins "Actually Christianity says.

[Slime-dogg]

I find it amusing that every argument against Christianity comes from the OT. Were it not for the events in the NT, Christianity would not exist. Those arguments are more against Judaism than they are against Christianity.

Before you say "Christianity *is* Judaism," you should really take into account that the theology of the testaments are very different. The God of Judaism is the conqueror and king, the God of Christianity is the compassionate and forgiving ruler. "This is the new testament of my blood, which is shed for you for the forgiveness of sins." There is nothing in the old testament that even comes close to that face of God.

Re:A post that begins "Actually Christianity says.

[honeypea]

So it's a different god? Wow, do the two get on? Or is it like good-Kirk bad-Kirk in that Star Trek episode?

Someone should mention this to the countless priests and vicars who continue to preach from the old testament, declare Christ's coming as the fulfilment of Old Testament blood-strewn prophecy, and Gideon's, who continue along with every other publisher to include this testament from an alien god in your own bible.

Don't get me started on where the NT clashes and patently disagrees with itself. How many loaves and fishes was it? I've had christians tell me Jeez must have done the trick *twice*, as the bible is infallible, so if the count was wrong in two accounts, it must have been two conjuring tricks not one. And if it's *not* infallible, where exactly do we draw the line?

It's a good yarn, along with Jonah and burping whales.