Because the mad axe wielding British bloke ate it?

When I was young, my default state of being, when nothing in particular was going on, was happiness. I was never really bored, I could entertain myself with just anything anywhere, or just kick back and relax.

Also, when a crisis or disaster happened, I would tend to shut down emotionally and just focus on doing whatever needed to be done to fix the problem. Even that was a weirdly positive kind of feeling, a kind of peaceful sense of purpose.

Of course at other times I felt despair about certain things that seemed hopeless in life, if something reminded me of those things. And at other times I would feel rage when I felt like I was personally under attack.

The kind of person I would like to be is someone like me when I was younger, minus the rage and despair, which were useless and did no good. I wish that by default, so long as nothing bad was happening, I was just happy, for no reason, though of course I would find things to be happy about. And when bad things happened, sure I wouldn't be happy happy anymore, but just have that calm productive focus on making them better again, so I could go back to being happy again.

Surprisingly, Jesus does not say how happy are the lottery winners, those whose wives give great head, popular politicians, and receivers of honours, emmys, baftas, Nobel laureates, etc or people who are well tranquillised. — unenlightened

I don't see how this follows. If happiness were a choice, then eventually some people might grow tired of being happy all the time, and indulge in some boredom or apathy before deciding that they'd rather be happy again.

While we are at it, why isn't fruit a bicycle? — Banno

Is the question ill formulated? Why is it?

I feel like it has more to do with deeper unfulfilled feelings or issues at play, like addiction or depression.

If one could choose to feel loved, secure, and safe, those two issues might stay (hopefully not) or go away?

What do you think?

　、僕た

I don't see how this follows. — Wallows

Nothing follows. Not I, nor Jesus are making any argument. However, here is a suggestion from some psyche expert whose name I forget. There are two types of happiness; there is the immediate momentary thing - the chocolate melting in the mouth or whatever, and then there is the happiness of recollection. There's not much happiness in the recollection of the chocolate, but there may be much happiness in recollection of the smile on the face of your friend as you shared it.

And the message is that if you are chasing happiness, all you will get is momentary, and it will never amount to anything. It is the happiness that you give that will stay with you.

Can anyone elaborate as to why isn't happiness a choice?

I mean we all want it, and even it seems some need it; but, very recently I view it as a choice between competing interests. At the moment I have no competing interests or wants and kinda feel happy.

What would you do? — Wallows

Let's suppose we agree, and for good reason, that happiness means the presence of pleasure and the absence of suffering. I've always struggled with the idea of hedonism. In one way, it seems to have cut a path through the complex philosophical jungle to arrive at a very basic fact of life and living viz. that we, as all animals do, prefer laughter over tears. If an alien could observe our behavior or even read our minds they would immediately notice without the slightest difficulty that we prefer and make an objective of :rofl: and avoiding :sad:

However, despite not meeting anyone who really cares about the meaning of life, philosophers have made it some kind of a holy grail of sorts and indeed if one studies people they all seem to seek some fulfillment in life, whether in terms of success or some other form of achievement, failing which they become increasingly ill, both mentally and sometimes physically too. Ergo, it may be safe to say that our highest pleasure is to be found in discovering the meaning of life and living accordingly. Yet all searches in that department have returned null and there's an entire philosophy, that of absurdism, which simply claims that there is no meaning to be found at all. What I want to highlight here is the obvious clash between happiness gained through knowing the meaning of life and something else. What is this something else? To me this something else is truth and here we're put in the uncomfortable position of making a choice between truth on one hand and happiness on the other but not both: the bitter truth is that there's no meaning to life but the sweet lie is that there is meaning to life. We value truth don't we? We value happiness don't we? However the situation is such that to know the truth (lack of meaning to life) means we'll be unhappy and being happy in this case involves believing a falsehood. Some have chosen to opt for truth and forego happiness which indicates that it's not a given that we automatically choose brightly colored artificial roses; sometimes we go for the real, dull green flowerless fern. In short, there are some things, like truth, we value in and of itself and sometimes, just sometime, more than happiness.

Perhaps happiness is a choice...sometimes.

our highest pleasure is to be found in discovering the meaning of life and living accordingly — TheMadFool

I would instead say that the highest pleasure is for life to feel meaningful, the feeling I call ontophilia or love of being; and the meaning of life is to bring pleasure, to oneself and to others. The meaning of life is thus to make life seem meaningful. And there is nothing more to meaningfulness than the seeming of it: seeming meaningful is being meaningful.

All that’s left is to ask what, generally, seems meaningful, and I answer that is is learning, teaching, loving, and being loved: having both goods and truths flow through you, from the world into you and from you into the world.

I would instead say that the highest pleasure is for life to feel meaningful, the feeling I call ontophilia or love of being; and the meaning of life is to bring pleasure, to oneself and to others. The meaning of life is thus to make life seem meaningful. And there is nothing more to meaningfulness than the seeming of it: seeming meaningful is being meaningful.

All that’s left is to ask what, generally, seems meaningful, and I answer that is is learning, teaching, loving, and being loved: having both goods and truths flow through you, from the world into you and from you into the world. — Pfhorrest

Hedonism has this ability to subsume everything. There is no way to refute it because, the most frequently presented "counter-examples" to it can easily be reworked into a form that is in its favor, just like you have. If I must say anything at this point is that a theory that explains everything explains nothing.

hedonism — TheMadFool

Hedonism has this ability to subsume everything. There is no way to refute it because, the most frequently presented "counter-examples" to it can easily be reworked into a form that is in its favor, just like you have. If I must say anything at this point is that a theory that explains everything explains nothing. — TheMadFool

:up:

I would instead say that the highest pleasure is for life to feel meaningful, the feeling I call ontophilia or love of being; and the meaning of life is to bring pleasure, to oneself and to others. — Pfhorrest

Aren't those quite high expectations? Maybe some can get by with less?

If I must say anything at this point is that a theory that explains everything explains nothing. — TheMadFool

You could say the same thing about empiricism with equal(ly little) justification. Hedonism is just the empiricism of ethics: judging assessments of goodness based on the experience of them seeming good. It's not a statement about what people do value, meant to predict people's behavior, but about what is valuable, meant to adjudicate normative claims.

Anyway, I was agreeing with you (that meaningfulness is the highest pleasure), just with slight adjustments and elaboration.

Aren't those quite high expectations? Maybe some can get by with less? — Wallows

They're ideals, the furthest endpoints to aim for. Anything in that direction is on the right path; you don't have to go all the way.

I believe it is, to a degree - at least that one can react positively or negatively to the circumstances around them, even though the circumstances can't magically be changed; my honest view is that some people simply do better or worse within whatever circumstances they are born into or fall into.

You could say the same thing about empiricism with equal(ly little) justification. Hedonism is just the empiricism of ethics: judging assessments of goodness based on the experience of them seeming good. It's not a statement about what people do value, meant to predict people's behavior, but about what is valuable, meant to adjudicate normative claims.

Anyway, I was agreeing with you (that meaningfulness is the highest pleasure), just with slight adjustments and elaboration. — Pfhorrest

:up: