The Principle of Appropriateness

[hectorm]

I can't recall a single happy nostalgist...

When it comes to (acceptance) and many modern mores, I think that can also mutate into something unfortunate: Panglossianism.

Luckily the majority of us are not nostalgists focused on the better past, nor Panglossists focused on the better present, but humans focused on a better future. It´s our nature and what makes us survive and endeavor.

[Costi]

So, Luca - Voltaire held Leibniz in contempt...

Hectorm, this reminds about what one of my favourite authors (little known outside homeland) calls "the engine of illusion". It is what sets us in motion, even if it's just to pick up a glass of water: the illusion that we will be happy once our thirst is quenched.
We all rely on the engine: Candide to travel on, Pangloss to keep teaching, Voltaire to write. We look into the future and project our happiness there, then plan actions to take us there. On the road, we discover (in Gertrude Stein's words) that "there is no there there".
Perhaps Pascal was right: “All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”. And here I am, living proof...

[Luca]

Kahneman (Thinking Fast and Slow, etc.) touches on this, as others have, in illustrating how, given the stats on new businesses, it's slightly mad to start one but thank god people ignore the stats.

I disagree slightly with the premise that what people seek is the sort of 'happiness' that the surveys used as data in much of the research can measure (or, as they say in my profession, a fairly stable utility function) and that therefore 'rational' behaviour has to pass the happiness test.

I think people seek 'meaning', very broadly, and that the attraction of logically debatable belief systems or endeavours with poor risk-adjusted return distributions is that they supply such meaning, somehow.

[davidhuh]

(in Gertrude Stein's words) that "there is no there there".

Dear Costi,

Dorothy Parker, not Getrude Stein

Nice to see you back, missed your writing!

Cheers, David

[hectorm]

people seek 'meaning', very broadly, and the attraction of logically debatable belief systems or endeavours with poor risk-adjusted return distributions is that they supply such meaning, somehow.

I`ll chew on that one tonight.

[Costi]

Perhaps the issue is the utility function itself and trying to associate happiness to it (so you can measure it - because, if my guess about your profession is right, it doesn't exist otherwise).
One doesn't look for much meaning in drinking a glass of water when thirsty - but one does act on the illusion that, once the glass is emptied, it will feel better. In fact, that's precisely what gives it utility - an illusion of happiness. Beyond that, so much of what we do (or I do...?!) is gratuitous. Let's admit it is meaning that we are looking for - and, when (we think) we found it, what do we do with it? It simply makes us feel better - about the world, about ourselves. That's the fleeting and unstable, poor relative of happiness. We will soon be thirsty again. That's the "illusion" that the "engine" is about: happiness as a function of time, with a tendency to decrease as soon as we stop doing something to keep it up to increase it.

But what if happiness were a fundamental state, rather than what is measured in terms of relative preference with the help of a utility function (created because happiness could not be measured directly)? And what if being happy makes one see meaning clearly all around? And what if, in absence of this fundamental state happiness, one is denied access to meaning, being limited to inventing one's own or do without? Then, perhaps, one begins to fit the description which hectorm has long finished chewing And if so, I think I'd rather be a happy idiot with a bit of faith in something. I might grow into one some day soon. Who knows, I might even start a business

[hectorm]

I think I'd rather be a happy idiot with a bit of faith in something. I might grow into one some day soon.

I'm sorry but I think that is not a choice for those of us burdened under "the curse of awareness". And if it were a choice, I'm not sure I'd choose to be the happy idiot instead of the sad one that sometimes I think I am.

[Costi]

[hectorm]

I think I have this devil under control. The problem is that -on the other hand- too much control hampers my creative inspirations.

[Luca]

You guys sort of lost me...

But I certainly agree that trying to measure happiness as if it were a length of pipe is a fool's errand.

[hectorm]

You guys sort of lost me...

It`s an honor to be lost in such a good company.
Here`s a very good reading I found on the way.
http://library.brown.edu/cds/melancholy/literary.html

[Costi]

You guys sort of lost me...

That is only because you might choose to do so - but I am glad we found each other again

But I certainly agree that trying to measure happiness as if it were a length of pipe is a fool's errand.

Yeeeees, and for a good reason: