Successor site to the Philosophy of Happiness blog (http://philoshap.blogspot.com/) that supported PHIL 3160 at MTSU, 2011-2019. The course returns Fall 2025.
PHIL 3160 – Philosophy of Happiness
What is it, how can we best pursue it, why should we? Supporting the study of these and related questions at Middle Tennessee State University and beyond. "Examining the concept of human happiness and its application in everyday living as discussed since antiquity by philosophers, psychologists, writers, spiritual leaders, and contributors to pop culture."
You don’t know me. I am a very old grandfather from South Africa nearing the end of my journey on earth while your journey—on another continent many miles away—is just beginning. We may never meet on earth, so I thought to send you a secret. Well, it’s not really a secret because we should all know it. So I don’t mind if you tell everyone else.
Did you know that all people belong to one family, the human family? That although we may look nothing like each other, live in separate homes, practise our own cultures, subscribe to different religions—and some of us have more money than others—we are all sisters and brothers of God’s family?
You and I, and everyone else, were born with the same purpose. For love, for goodness and for one another.
He showed that while a healthy lifestyle won't help us live much longer, it can stave off chronic disease and disability until our final years.
James F. Fries majored in philosophy as an undergraduate, so it's no surprise that as a medical researcher he was obsessed with how to lead a good life, even though his interest was more about physical than moral well-being.
His focus, starting in the mid-1970s, was on what Dr. Fries (pronounced freeze) and other scientists called the failure of success. They noted that one great achievement of the 20th century was the rapid increase in life expectancy, thanks to improvements in vaccinations and sanitation that dramatically reduced deaths from acute, transmissible disease.
But that increase in life span did not mean an accompanying increase in "healthspan," or the duration of one's life free from chronic conditions like hypertension, diabetes and heart disease.
Dr. Fries, who trained as a rheumatologist and spent his entire teaching career at Stanford University, was a data guy, long before large data sets became a common tool in medical research. He was among the first to create an international database of patients that tracked their health over time, an enormous effort that began in 1975 with a grant from the National Institutes of Health...
Ah, would you look at that—another beautiful morning, with the sun’s first rays casting a warm glow on my bedsheets. As I wake from restful slumber, I peer out my window and—yes, it’s looking like another perfect day! Time to ruin it by immediately opening my phone and reading about everything that’s happening and everything that everyone is saying.
What’s that smell? It’s coffee! Brewed fresh, it’s here to bring me back, to ground me. I sip slowly, appreciating the still moments in life. Then I open Twitter and my day is over...
Watcha think, Gary?
"There are some things you can only do if you live in a small town. Including how you bury someone at Christmas. What they did in Hohenwald for a firefighter was absolutely perfect." f'bk
How do you measure happiness? According to
one adage, money cannot buy it. Perhaps it is tied to health or a good family
life. A good job should be mixed in. So should the environment where people
live.
NiceRx
tried to measure the happiest and unhappiest states with
its own methodology. Its metrics included poverty, mental illness, life
expectancy, median household income, a safety score and homicide levels. Data
on life expectancy and homicide rate in each state came from the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention. Data on the mean household income and safety
rating for each state were from World Population Review, and data on each
state’s rates of mental illness and poverty came from Data USA. According to
NiceRx, “These factors cover a range of different topics, from health and social
affairs to economic matters. This provided us with a good overview of the
different stresses and strains that people living in these states might
experience.”
What
did the research leave out? Certainly environmental factors like air and water
pollution. Another measure left out was good schools and colleges. Yet another
is the presence of parks and retail amenities. However, its yardsticks are as
good as most others.
Once
all factors were taken into account, each state was given a composite happiness
score. The rating ran from 10 to zero, with the best state for happiness
receiving the highest score.
At the top of
the list was Hawaii, which had a score of 9.02. Its mean household income was
high at $103,780, and the poverty rate was low at 9.44%. Connecticut ranked
second with a score of 8.82. A number of the top states were in the northeast.
The
lowest rated state was Mississippi at 2.06. It was followed by Louisiana,
Arkansas and Alabama, as southern states dominated the bottom of the list.
It's been a pleasure meeting and talking with you all this semester. Be happy in 2022 and beyond, keep enjoyment in balance with satisfaction and purpose. Don't miss the joy. Hope to see some of you in class again soon.
If you didn't or can't post your final report, email it directly to me: phil.oliver@mtsu.edu.
(Tom, I had to revert your post to draft, it wouldn't format correctly. Maybe you can fix that and re-post.)
This course is scheduled to return in the Fall of 2023. Meanwhile, feel free to revisit this site and post whatever you'd care to share.
One more thing...
More good words from Monty Python:
“You know, one day, when I was a little boy, my mother she took me on her knee and she said: 'Gaston, my son. The world is a beautiful place. You must go into it, and love everyone, not hate people. You must try and make everyone happy, and bring peace and contentment everywhere you go.' And so... I became a waiter...” ― Monty Python, The Meaning of Life
A friend writes: “I’m having a heavy desire to simplify, to need and want less, to have less, and to try and do some good, to help out my neighbor along the way. Try and make it matter that I was ever here in the first place. ‘Cause there has to be a reason or what’s the point? So I’m wondering where I’m bound, what it matters and what’s the point.
”Well, it’s nothing very special. Uh, try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations."
Also, remember that you’re standing on a planet that's evolving…
"Keep your health, your splendid health. It's worth all the truths in the firmament." WJ
Remember when old December's darkness is everywhere about you, that the world is really in every minutest point as full of life as in the most joyous morning you ever lived through; that the sun is whanging down, and the waves dancing, and the gulls skimming down at the mouth of the Amazon, for instance, as freshly as in the first morning of creation; and the hour is just as fit as any hour that ever was for a new gospel of cheer to be preached. I am sure that one can, by merely thinking of these matters of fact, limit the power of one's evil moods over one's way of looking at the Kosmos.
William James, Letters I To Thomas W. Ward. BERLIN, Jan., 1868.
Going off my midterm report, I mentioned the psychoanalytic theory of psychology, more so recognized with Sigmund Freud. I talked about how the superego, ego, and id could play part in habits in the way they are formed. The id desires full pleasure. This can be seen in some habits such as smoking or drug use. However, there is another psychological theory that focuses on habits and that is the behavioral theory. According to the behavioral theory, we do certain things because we may be conditioned to do them, which can lead to a habit. Some of these habits may be bad or good, it really is up to opinion of others.
For instance, you may grow up with narcissistic parents so you fall in the habit of constantly saying "I'm sorry". This technically is not a bad habit, but it can be toxic. I personally believe that the psychoanalytic theory and the behavioral theory can go hand in hand. This is not a common belief, or so I would think, since most people relate behavior with cognitive dysfunctions.
It is easy to succumb to habits, especially in early childhood. What you grow up around can strongly influence who you may be and what you may do. In watching what other people do as you grow up, you can most likely pick those habits up with ease since you have seen it so much. For example, I grew up around a lot of people who were users of nicotine products, so at the first chance I got, I decided to try one to. On the other hand, I have friends who have never touched anything nicotine related because they never saw anyone use the products as they grew up. Really it is a choice though and we could get into the topic of free will and all but this is not the time for that.
You can also be conditioned into habits during your childhood. Think of certain things you may say or do. You must have picked it up from somewhere. You learn fast about the consequences or rewards from your actions and what kind of responses may come from those viewing your actions. Now it is a habit for you to say or do those things, but you may not even realize it because you have been doing it for so long.
Basically, what I am trying to say is that it is hard to escape habit. We as humans are habitual creatures and we need habits to stay sane most of the time. Habits start from the moment we are born till the day that we die. But even then our habits may not die because there is always a chance that someone else picked it up from you.
Continuing on the note of online pornography, addiction, digital representation
In regards to online porn particularly we are having less of what we are representing. This is a loss of realizable potential. The perfect example of substituting the desire to directly experience what we actually want and finding counterfeit or making counterfeit versions of it. There is a perfect example of this in play in an example found in a baby boomer trend. The increasingly industrialized, suburbanized baby boomers’ had a generational obsession with the old west. They want what they can’t have, the freedom, the simplicity, and the ruggedness the cowboy archetype embodies. He is everything they want to be and can’t be.
Actual, real, direct, attainable, and sustainable, meaningful, pleasure is cut off, isolated, replaced, and substituted for a phony simulacrum of this pleasure which actually retards and handicaps the brain circuitry which regulates and produces this pleasure response. And our actual sex lives if we have any, are regulated by this simulacrum, or better yet existentially downgraded, since the act itself becomes identified with its representation, rather than its direct expression. We can only find a home in the counterfeit of our desires.
Porn addicts do experience brain damage. The neurochemical reason for this is due to overstimulation and eventually degrading of certain areas of the brain. This can and does result in loss of willpower-executive function. And perhaps a relevant anecdote: a materialization, depersonalization of women, which is a fissure between you and the other half of the species. It widens an interpersonal wall between you and the other sex.
Really distorting perception and blocking off normal inter-sexual relations.
An academic article on internet pornography addiction reads, “Many recognize that several behaviors potentially affecting the reward circuitry in human brains lead to a loss of control and other symptoms of addiction in at least some individuals. Regarding Internet addiction, neuroscientific research supports the assumption that underlying neural processes are similar to substance addiction”. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4600144/
The level of dopamine secretion in the brain engaged by pornography has no rival or parallel in nature whatsoever. Porn’s effects on the brain can be described as acting like that of a super drug. The user actually is damaging the dopamine reward system which is the single mediator between our bodies and the pleasure which can be gained or accessed normally/naturally. They are crippled by these effects. They are handicapped by this dopamine feedback loop which closes the possible attainable pleasure in life or pleasure from life. As well as closing the very real sense of acting on one’s own will.
The reason why this is so relevant philosophically is we take for granted our own ability to filter what we want out of us, through our power of will, our self-control. But this is nonsense, the chemical balance that makes people who they are if thrown off just a hair can change their whole emotional state, their personality, their relationship to others. Being you is being in a perfectly balanced chemical equilibrium. “We” are finely tuned systems that can be set off-kilter very easily. Also, the very will itself is altered and replaced by this very same dopamine feedback loop, damaging our very necessary and very important neural reward system.
This online trend of internet pornography is just a reflection of our collective masochism, self-loathing, self-destruction disguised as hedonism. When in fact the person is able to literally attain less pleasure than the normal person, his equipment for doing so is damaged. Pleasure is just a neural circuit and it can be damaged.
Real hedonism should be concerned with sustaining, attainable, pleasure, and doing so in a way that allows its continued consumption, and access. This online porn literally fits the definition of masochism: gaining pleasure from one’s pain. Or for our purposes, one’s neural destruction.
This is also just the neuroscientific effects of this digital masochism. This does not account for the ontological degradation and alienation which is taking place in more pronounced ways and at higher levels. Pornography is just a microcosm, and it does more damage to the person than mere bodily harm; it damages the person’s comprehension of the most meaningful activity for many they will engage in their lives.
In quiet, dull isolated post-industrial lives, sex is on an island, one of the few remaining avenues or arenas where immense and intense sensory stimulation is still in reach. It is the only activity in life where direct stimulation of the organs is possible. Food being of course a poor substitute for this. The pleasure from this is simply not available in any other area of life. Simulacrum, or pornography which I have identified as digital machoism, is the philosophy of the internet. It replaces the actual act of sex and sexuality with a simulacrum a phony, to quote Jean Badudrllad we are dealing with hyperreality. “Hyperreality is the inability of consciousness to distinguish reality from a simulation of reality, especially in technologically advanced societies.[8]”https://www.mlsu.ac.in/econtents/2289_hyper%20reality%20boudrilard.pdf
Or in other words when the simulation of sex replaced the act then sex is over. Sex is a power that can generate life-changing pleasure which brings a person up in the stratosphere above the petty, arduous and banal, pain, and bore of the culture we are all trapped in, the pleasure which cuts through the miasma of his or her entire nihilistic era. An act which is the condition for sustaining the final remaining remnant of our nature, the “couple” more than a sociological unit, it is a living organism. The final vestige of our former paleolithic tribal nature. Real, actual, romantic relationships, with someone you care for, supply us with enough wholeness to make industrial pressures and stresses endurable, or more endurable.
And the only thing, which can make such stresses endurable, if not the fulfillment of love, then hope, the aim, the pursuit of love, which is the only real aim or dream that can bring lasting happiness for many of us, in my view anyway. This is all lost when we masochistically botch off the real for the hyperreal.
These are the effects of the imposture of hedonism we are talking about. This is only one example, social media itself is a dopamine feedback loop that harvests and mines your pleasure response. The drive and expansion of these technologies are predicated entirely on advertising, and the point of course is to waste your time. Your time is a resource to be mined, and your dopamine is a drug to be exploited to keep you coming back for more. Social media could as well be the face of this new masochism. Micro-identities spawned by the internet seem to replace real living communities with counterfeits.
Online relationships are not possible. This is another example of the masochistic decline in our culture. Real face-to-face interaction is not possible to replace. All human communication is predicated on micro cues, which are removed in indirect, online, or technological contact. This is a sort of emotional genocide or war on our species nature. Intelligence is threefold: mathematical, linguistic, and emotional, we have cut out a whole aspect of ourselves, the emotional is forgotten. The cold screen of cell phones will never replace warm direct interpersonal contact. There is no personality, no tactile feedback, no humanity to carbon replacements for human contact which constitutes almost the entire internet and its subsequent micro identities. And almost our entire media, and our entire technological culture predicated on fulfilling the bottom line, expanding progress, efficiency at the expense of us. This is a deep self-hatred of species-wide scale, we are talking about, it can’t be anything else to do to each other so wrong.
My Own Philosophy of Happiness[posted for Nick Cook]
So, for my final report blogpost, I would like to further develop my midterm report. I would also like to further delve into my own general view of life and my own idea of happiness.
I would firstly like to talk a little about mental illness before jumping into what might make me happy since it does direct my thoughts and opinions about the world we live in and the world I would like to exist to be happy. I’ve struggled for as long as I can remember with some sort of mental illness. I actually haven’t seen a psychiatrist since I was 10 and for the longest time just thought that my brain was normal and the experience I was living was just how it's supposed to be. I guess my first point should be that I struggle with self-awareness a lot. To best explain the feeling, I’d say that it’s hard for me to exist inside my mind. I struggle with inspiration and drive. It's like I’m constantly in a rut. I’ve always wanted to learn to play the guitar and make music. However, for some reason when I sit down to learn I get overwhelmed. I think that maybe I put myself down about things so much that I no longer want to do the things that I set my mind to. This is all so normal to me that I think a lot of it happens subconsciously without my control or even knowledge. I just simply will stop doing it. I then usually try and seek out playing video games or doing something that truly stimulates my brain. I must struggle with some sort of dopamine regulation.
My idea of happiness circulates around doing the things that I truly want to do, but obviously, to live in the world we do you have to have a steady income. I think constantly being worried about money is my biggest stress. If I could just have a steady source of income, I could spend my other time doing the things I want to do. Being in college has been a huge stress on me
too. My lack of steady income and dealing with constant schoolwork often leaves me burnt out. Then when I want to do other things, I simply am searching for hobbies that produce the maximum amount of dopamine in the shortest amount of time. I.e., playing overwatch or browsing on my phone. To be honest, I also have a theory that it's simply the society that we live in. Our brains are constantly being stimulated. I touched a little on this in my midterm report however id like to give more details of what I mean. We are constantly seeing bright stimulating advertisements that send our minds into a frenzy. Like, “Oh! Zaxby’s! I’d love to have some chicken strips right about now!” then you notice you’re hungry and start thinking about the taste of Zaxby's chicken strips and this has to be draining to the mind when it’s happening every 5 minutes. Especially your phone is like a portable ad generator. We are quite literally constantly stimulating our brains. When you think about how fast technology has developed and how slowly evolution takes its like, holy crap, we used to stimulate our brains by doing things rather than just sitting on our butts and looking at Instagram. I often think there’s a stigma that older generations place on younger generations that we’re lazy, but our brains are just constantly overworked/burnt out. I wish that I could separate from the overstimulation and live a simple life.
I want to build my own house out in the wilderness on hopefully hundreds of acres of land. I would like it to be sustainable and with self-generated electricity so that I don’t have to worry about as many bills and obviously for the smaller eco imprint. I would like to grow my own food (since our food is so full of antibiotics and who knows what
else https://www.whatthehealthfilm.com ). I want a space where I can be fully myself and just simply be freer from stress. Obviously growing your own food and maintaining a farm is stress,
however like I discussed in my midterm report when you feel that you are progressing and you’re passionate about the work you’re doing it feels less like stress.
Obviously, this lifestyle isn’t for everyone. I think that my passions combined make this a good option for me, but obviously, there are plenty of people who are happy with capitalism and don’t mind being stimulated. That’s fine. I think it’s up to us individually to truly find what will make us happy, this class has helped me sit down and think, to truly reflect and focus on my self-awareness, and to find my own philosophy of happiness.
Hello all, my goal here today is to briefly discuss and compare the perspectives that some of the most popular religions maintain regarding happiness. One thing worth mentioning is the difficulty in categorizing/defining religions on a global scale. There are two factors that prevent religious studies from being a simple endeavor, and they go hand in hand: Doctrine and Adherence Rules.
Abrahamic religions provide us with neat and tidy frameworks for easily identification and analysis. They have holy books, which contain most of their "truth," and they have very clear in-group and out-group parameters, so its easier to tell who is a follower of said religion. We are all familiar with Christianity's endless branches- one can identify the differing perspectives of Christian beliefs based on what the followers call themselves (e.g. Calvinist, Baptist, Lutheran, Orthodox, etc.). However, other religions, such as Buddhism, have spiritual texts, but no belief in one book or a series of texts being the universal repository of truth. A Buddhist who disagrees with their master (or a famous Buddhist text) on how to achieve enlightenment does not split off and create "Buddhism 2™" but is encouraged instead to follow their own personal path. Buddhism does have differing sects based on ideological differences, however, but the individual follower is at the same time encouraged to adopt only as much Buddhist teachings as they deem necessary, leading to individuals claiming to be Buddhist and Christian, or Buddhist and Hindu, for example. Still, looking further into the countless folk religions around the world, they have an even more fluid relationship with their doctrines. Folk beliefs can change from one village to the next, and determining the population of adherents to a folk religion may be impossible to define due to lack of formal organization and syncretism with other belief-systems.
So, now that you are aware that religious categorization is fluid, and no list of definitions can accurately capture the breadth of human religious experience, let's continue on to my arbitrary list anyway! The following post will touch on the significance of and path towards happiness, as interpreted by members of 4 of the most popular religions of the world.
Number 1: Christianity
To include all branches and splinters of Christianity under one umbrella makes it, firstly, the most populous religion by a landslide, with more than 2.8 billion followers, and secondly, makes it hard to examine in detail, as the only thing left, after grouping such diverse belief systems under one name, are the broad similarities that they share. Of course, they mostly share the same bible and the same Holy Trinity (though there are tiny exceptions for both), but go deeper than that and it becomes difficult to discuss accurately.
For most Christians, the happiness concept is broken into two terms- Happiness, and Joy. Happiness is just one of the many emotions. When one is happy, they should sing the Lord's praise. But belief in Jesus Christ won't make someone happy all the time. It is also expected that one will find hardship. Christians believe that they all have a 'cross to bear'- referencing the final moments of Jesus's time on Earth. Jesus was not, by the way, very happy about enduring the cross, nor being crucified. In fact, the savior has multiple times been depicted as angry in the Bible. Even the Son of God, who is also God (Read: Explaining the Holy Trinity) experiences all the emotions that God gave us.
Joy, however, is seen as a state of being attained by selfless devotion to God, and to help others in the name of God. In fact, some Christians teach Joy as an acronym- Jesus, Others, Yourself. Jesus wasn't happy about the suffering, but he did find Joy knowing that his sacrifice will please God. Joy comes from selflessness, belief in God, and doing God's work.
The Path to Happiness: The Christian Prescription.
Christians find happiness by working for God's Mission. Christians view themselves as God's handiwork and His servants, and many Christians go on to become Missionaries and do "The Lord's Work." Practically, there is a lot to like in this path to Happiness. One can pour themselves into a selfless and communal goal no matter how their personal life is going, and derive happiness from achieving practical results and from positive community interaction as a result. As the focus is on becoming happy by pleasing God, which is a spiritual, otherworldly matter, it can help Christians come to terms with any sadness or dissatisfaction in their personal life in the material world. The material world may make you happy, but it will not last. Eternal happiness is available to you, however, if you believe and serve God.
Number 2: Islam
Similar to Christianity, Islam has different branches, and when combined, constitute a large portion of the world. Islam has a main holy book, the Quran, although it recognizes other Abrahamic scriptures as well, to varying degrees.
As a monotheistic religion, the oneness of God is a central tenet to Islam. Knowing and submitting to one's creator brings peace and solace. Moreover, happiness as an emotion, which is born of the material world, is impermanent like all things on Earth. So, Islam believes that true happiness can not come from temporal, material things. In contrast, deriving contentment and well being from God's contentment, is the key to paradise on Earth, according to Islamic teachings.
The Path to Happiness: The Islamic Tonic
Islam says Similarly to Christianity, submitting to God, often a phrase given as a simplified, concise definition of Islam, is the way to salvation in this life and the next. Islam teaches that happiness is something that most take for granted, and that in this fickle material world, nothing is guaranteed, nothing can be expected. That is why God as a constant brings peace and, ultimately, happiness, to the Muslim believer.
Here is a short video on Youtube by Emory University about Islam and Happiness.
Number 3: Hinduism
Hinduism, with an gargantuan 1.1 billion followers, is considered by many to be the oldest living religion. With its massive breadth of history, it is no surprise that it has a plethora of scriptures, traditions, and beliefs, and the religion itself can vary greatly. With that aside, here is my attempt to decipher Happiness through a Hindu lens.
Happiness is clearly enunciated in Hindu scripture. Physical happiness is the lowest type of happiness and arises from sensual enjoyment and the comforts of life. Next up is Mental happiness, which comes from freedom from worries and afflictions. The highest type of happiness is Spiritual happiness, which is freedom from the cycle of birth and death and "union with the Self." To understand this last type, we'll enlist the help of Swami Nikhilanand Ji, who explains that true happiness, spiritual happiness, is infinite in amount and duration, as well as ever-increasing (which means the happiness never loses its quality). The opposite of this is happiness derived from the material world, which as we all experience, is limited in amount, temporary, and diminishing in quality.
So, thanks to the scholastic prudence of Hinduism, happiness is rigidly defined. That's all well and good- but how do we go about attaining it?
The Path to Happiness: The Hindu Mantra
Hinduism understands that when one chases happiness, they are looking for a moment of pleasure. In Hinduism, happiness is not something to search for outside of us, but something found within. Understanding the cyclical reality, and the chain of cause and effect, allows us to see the bliss within us and everyone else. So for Hinduism, knowledge of reality and of self can bring happiness.
Here is a very popular Hindu self-help speaker by the name of Sadhguru who has some metaphors for us to ponder about happiness:
Buddhism is the next most popular religion, and it shares a great deal with Hinduism. In fact, the degree of people who follow a mix of Hindu and Buddhism, or rather, claim that Hinduism and Buddhism are compatible with each other, is more than we usually give credit for. Since my mid-term presentation gave an overview of Buddhism already, I will skip to the following most popular religion, and one that isn't talked about very much...
Number 4: Sikhism
Sikhism is not heard of often in the Western World, despite its interesting historical origin. Sikhism as a new religious movement sprang up in Northwestern India during a period of Muslim rule. It has considerable influence from Hinduism, which we have previously discussed, and is the third most popular Dharmic faith. Sikhism is famous for its stances of social and gender equality and for its taboo around cutting hair, which together make for a very unique religion.
Sikhism begins with a basic premise about the universe. Naam, or connection to the divine, is the ultimate truth, and the wordly illusion (maya) is false. You may be able to see the similarities with Buddhism and Hinduism here. For a Sikh, happiness must be something that one can feel even if one has absolutely nothing. False happiness, deriving from the material world, brings with it an anxiety- a worry that eventually the happiness will diminish, as the material things one's happiness derived from falls apart. For Sikhism, happiness, stillness, and contentment, come from a feeling that one is prepared for anything in life, a ceasing of the anxiety of life.
The Path to Happiness: The Sikh Solution
The path to happiness comes from connecting oneself to the one constant, which
is how the Sikh followers refer to God, and releasing oneself from
worries about the material world. Happiness cannot be put off until tomorrow, and it cannot be dependent upon anything outside of you. Even by following religion, happiness can be jeopardized if it is dependent on religious ritual or put off until some future day. This is why Sikhism advocates for a simplification of religious rituals, and says it is necessary only to love God and connect with Him.
Here is a great video of a Sikh speaker, Satpal Singh, because out of all the religions on this list, the Sikh faith does not have as many online resources available to the outside learner:
Conclusion
These were some of the most popular religions and their perspectives on happiness. Religion is as much a social as it is a personal phenomenon, so individual philosophies of happiness can vary from village to village, sect to sect, and person to person, but by and large, this is what most of the world has to say about happiness.
My discussion questions for you all are thus:
1) Do you see any similarities or differences between the perspectives of happiness of the major religions?
2) Do any of these perspectives speak to you more than the others, or resonate more with your own personal philosophy?
3) And, if I didn't describe your religion, or if you are a part of a specific branch of any of these religions which has a more nuanced perspective on happiness, feel free to share your philosophy of happiness in the comments!
I decided I wanted to continue on my midterm topic of the philosophical approaches to anxiety, because it was by far the most interesting thing that stuck out to me throughout the duration of the course. In my previous report I mainly covered the book "How to Live" by Sarah Bakewell, focusing primarily on Chapter 6, the "tips and tricks" for how to live. This chapter scratches the surface of a few different approaches that Montaigne suggests to combat the fears and anxieties of human life. For this continuation of the presentation, I wanted to continue the same way I did previously, so I will be attaching a PowerPoint as well as a few links rather than a completely typed out presentation.
The absurdity
of life is that the wise man dies just like the fool. We can work as hard as we
can, live for the current pleasures, and still not feel satisfied or come to a meaning
that truly lasts. These were the thoughts of King Solomon. In his life, he
searched for meaning and concluded that “all is vanity.” (Ecclesiastes 1:2)
Later, he would say, “What gain has the worker from his toil? I have seen the
business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. He has made
everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart,
yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.
I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do
good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take
pleasure in all his toil—this is God’s gift to man. I perceived that whatever
God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from
it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. That which is, already has
been; that which is to be, already has been; and God seeks what has been driven
away.” (Ecclesiastes 3:9-15) In this life, Solomon teaches us that work has
been given to us for our happiness. Yet even in this good gift, we are left
wanting more. This desire is healthy, in fact, the Bible teaches us that our
hearts should long for more. We were created to know God, and because sin has corrupted
our state, we are left without Him. We can certainly experience happiness by
many avenues, but we are missing the joy of intimacy with God. This joy is
transcendent, and it can only be experienced through a personal relationship
with Jesus.
This absolute
statement, that there is true happiness to be experienced only in Christ, comes
as a result of the belief in the sacredness of scripture. As Christians, or at
least for me, I do not presuppose that scripture is true and then believe it.
Rather, on the basis of the resurrection of Jesus, the eyewitnesses that
testified to His resurrection (somewhere around 500), and the authority Jesus
gave to the prophets before Him and the apostles after, I believe in the scriptures.
As a result, I can confidently say that whatever the Bible teaches, I must
submit to it. Since the justification for my belief has been established, it is
imperative that we look to the scriptures and some instances where philosophers
looked to the scriptures and found true joy in Jesus.
When talking to His
followers, Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes
to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6) He does not merely say that He is
a way, but the way. This way to the Father is in reference to the way to know
God. In the Bible, God is one being in three distinct persons. This is not a
contradiction, but a paradox. This is important to know simply because Jesus is
God, specifically the Son to the Father. If we want to know the Father, we must
know the Son. Paul tells us in his letter to Rome that if we want to know God,
we submit to Jesus as Lord, stating, “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus
is Lord and believe in your heart that the [Father] raised Him from the dead, you
will be saved.” (Romans 10:9) This is crucial to our happiness simply because
we are under condemnation without a relationship with Jesus. However, if we
know Jesus, “there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ
Jesus.” (Romans 8:1) Earthly philosophies are good since they seek after
wisdom and typically the good of others, but what they fail to do is answer why
are we here in an adequate way. We are here to know God.
Knowing God is the greatest
happiness to be experienced. It is true for me, not because it is an abstract
idea, but because it is a lived truth, as William James would have put it. Saint
Augustine said in his confessions, regarding his happiness, “You stir man to
take pleasure in praising you, because you have made us for yourself, and our
heart is restless until it rests in you.” This idea of restlessness, Augustine gets
at, is that we were designed by God for God. He has every right to seek us in a relationship, and we have every right to know Him and love Him. Because of sin,
we are unable to fully walk with Him, yet He gives us redemption through Jesus
to be totally reconciled. This is the gospel, “that He who knew no sin, because
sin so that in [Jesus], we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Cor.
5:21) In Christianity, there is a different kind of justification, and it is my
belief in God. The philosopher-theologian Saint Augustine knew this, and after
he felt the weight of his own sin, he turned to God, and plead for his
forgiveness before Him. We are made right with God by faith. In another letter
to the church of Ephesus, Paul wrote, “For by grace you have been saved through
faith. And this, not your own doing; it is the gift of God.” (Eph. 2:8) If you
and I want to come into a relationship with God, according to the Bible, it is
by faith alone. Without faith, we would not know God, as seen in Hebrews. When
Saint Thomas Aquinas wrestled with this, he concluded that nothing is better
than knowing God, stating, “The greatest happiness is for the mind to attain
God.”
In the end, the only lasting
happiness found in the scriptures is the joy of knowing God. Sure, you and I
may take deep pleasure in other things, as we should, but our chief end is to glorify
God by enjoying Him forever (namely Christian Hedonism). This definite statement
will not sit well simply because we believe the notion of God, the notion of
sin, and the notion of intimacy with God is far beyond us. Are we above the gospel? I certainly do not believe so, so know God and experience
the joy of knowing Him, for if not there is all to lose, and little reward in
the long run to gain. Let Him be our ultimate treasure for our joy and His
glory.
As humans our very survival, both personally and as a species, are determined by our ability to compromise and form some kind of working contract with people we don’t really understand. We might think of ethics as the study of this problem. In that regard it seems appropriate to consider Montaigne as one of the great ethicists of history not because he designed some grand system like Kant or Bentham neither because of his ability for empathy, although that too was considerable. The crux of Montaigne’s greatness in ethics comes in his fundamental determination not to confuse his own empathy with real knowledge of another person.
Empathy is an incredible tool for understanding others, a tool it often seems the world is in great need of. However, our empathizing with others can never hope to equal a true understanding of their experience. Montaigne in his resolute belief in that Socratic maxim “The only true wisdom is in
knowing you know nothing” understood this, and in his essays his deference to the experiences of others is representative of this humility. This humility is fundamental for the success in any ethical
enterprise.
In the world of law humility is the fundamental necessity for the liberal principals that govern most of the contemporary world. Without an acknowledgment of our own personal limitations freedom is pointless.
If one man knows the experience of another perfectly and knows whats best for them then why should common people be given freedom? In modern times its easy to treat such questions as simply rhetorical and to move past them as the justice of inalienable human rights for all people seems to most, myself included, self-evident. But the questions are worth asking, as the practical answer helps to demonstrate how important this understanding of our own limitations are for the general prosperity of all people.
The simple answer to why give freedom to people at all is that the evidence indicates that individuals are best suited to make their own choices. Take for instance the success of worker owned co-ops, the individual worker’s experience is best suited to guide their work. The education of a corporate manager simply cannot equal the specific experience of an everyday worker. Or for another example the recent research done into the poverty alleviating potential of just giving people money. Experts are made from decades of experience and training no one possesses that for anyone but themselves. The strength of freedom is the acknowledgment of this limitation. Without this acknowledgment every aspect of our life becomes those painful experiences of getting a new micro- managing boss who’s certain they know the best way: unproductive, frustrating, and ultimately unsustainable. We’re happiest when we conform to reality, and the reality is as Montaigne knew all we can know is ourselves, act like it.
A possible detraction 1. If everyone is an expert on what's in their best interest than why do we still often make poor choices? While my report primarily focuses on more or less giving people sovereignty over their own life and not trying to prescribe what's best for them another important part of this acknowledgement of limited human understanding is that even those that know the most on a subject (in this case ourselves) will still inevitably get something wrong by that same human fallibility that makes freedom necessary for any effective way to govern a society.
Discussion Questions: 1. If for the sake of this question we can never know what is best for someone else then what is the role of advice in determining what one should do? Now the answer to this may seem obvious, but I think we often make a mistake of not articulating what we consider to be obvious and letting that ambiguity trip us up later. To put it simply even though every sentient being experiences the world in a different way there are still marked similarities between different sets of experiences. For instance, an older married couple has experienced a great of the same problems and young couple will despite the fact they obviously are different people who have lived in very different times facing very different circumstances.
2. Where are the limits of this freedom? It'd be simple to say when people lack the capacity to pursue their interests effectively, but to me that notion carries with it significant problems. For instance, a child, who I feel most would agree should not be given the same freedoms as an adult effectively persues their own interests. When they cry they're given food or changed or whatever they need, they cry to have that desire met. So it might be said that a better way to determine who should practice this freedom are those who can take care of themselves. This definition is far from perfect, but I feel it is sufficient for a wide array of situations due to the subjectivity implicit in it. What I mean is the skills necessary to take care of one's self are of course radically different from those required to survive in 12th century Holland and the limits of freedom should reflect that different capabilities might be required to act on that freedom.
References:
Montaigne, Michel de. Essays. Dent, 1965.
Plato, and Michael C. Stokes. Apology of Socrates. Aris & Phillips, 1997.
Thanks for the great semester everyone! - Tom Smith
As you all may recall, my midterm presentation discussed contentment through the lens of my late grandfather. For this final post, I hope to expand upon this philosophy a bit, using input from my grandmother. Fortunately for our present project, she is still with us, so I recently interviewed her for the purpose of this post. Moreover, I will be ditching my previous organization method for ease of digestion. Instead, I will try to categorize the philosophy into a few overarching themes. I hope by the end of this, I will give them both the justice that they deserve.
I should also remind everyone that I am using a definition of contentment that more closely aligns with that of Aristotle’s eudaimonia. Therefore, contentment is a relationship with life that has the capacity to be present in even life’s darkest moments. It is merely the ability to assess one’s life and say that it is worth living. And, for nearly every person reading this, your life is worth living. For most, the good will outweigh the bad. But, in the off chance that it does not, I hope you find the good in your life that tips the scale. Maybe, just maybe, these philosophies of an old couple will help just a little.
With that being said, let us get into the post.
Environment
Some of you may recall that my grandfather spent much of his early life during the aftermath of the Great Depression, and my grandmother experienced many of the same hardships. Both spent many of their early years on a farm, picking or planting crops from dusk until dawn. Fortunately for Mamaw, her parents were far more involved. Many days they would help her out on the field, and consequently, they formed a strong relationship. She recalls a few times where her father would pull her to the side after a day’s work and tell her, “With work ethic like that, ain’t nothing can stop you.” And, some-odd-seventy-to-eighty years later, nothing has stopped her. Hell, she still works to this day and shows no signs of stopping.
Another story that she shared involved fireflies that her and her siblings used to catch in the backyard. They would use jars that were recycled from empty jelly containers. “It didn’t take much back then to get us smiling...It was just those simple things.” Those “simple things” shone through even in her later years as well. She describes a story from her teen years where she had become obsessed with baths. Of course, with no running water, this meant that her brother would have to manually pump the water and bring it to the house, and only after heating in the sun for a few hours, would my grandmother finally be able to bathe in an old tub they kept in a closet (They had no bathroom at the time). At one point, she says that her brother, exhausted after fetching a tub-full of water, asked her why she needed to be so clean all the time. She responded, “It just makes me happy.”
Now, the reason that I go into some detail here is because she credits these early years as shaping much of who she would become. She argues that the work that she had to perform for even the smallest of pleasures made her truly appreciate all that life had to offer. Nothing was given, and even less was expected. A tried and true experience of getting everything you want by simply wanting less. Moreover, the relationship that she built with her parents would go on to shape much of the ones that she had with her own children. Perhaps, there may even be some bits that have managed to make it down the line to myself through my father. What I do know is that she was and is an avid supporter of the Nurture Camp as opposed to the Nature Camp. Anything is possible if you put your mind to it, and you have the right people supporting you.
Jean Butler (Mamaw), as a teen
Joe Runions, after a day of work
Community
A second theme that underlines Mamaw’s and Papaw’s philosophy relies on a strong sense of community, something that both of them fear is being lost in today’s world. She began her discussion with another story that revolved around her father and mother getting into a severe car wreck during the harvest season. They were effectively put out of work for the next few months, but the field needed to be reaped and sold to maintain the farm. Neighbors, having heard the bad news, flocked to the farm to lend a hand. Before Mamaw knew it, the field had been picked and was ready for the market. So, from that point forward, she often felt that she owed much of her livelihood to those around her.
The main community-based organization that she gave most of her time to was the church, specifically a small, Presbyterian church in Gadsden, TN. It was located on Salem Road and was called Salem Church. I spent much of my early childhood there as well. For the most part, my grandmother helped the church with the financial issues. She kept the ledger and took in donations from the community. She would then earmark any money brought in for projects that the church needed to complete. While these years did heavily affect her faith, I will touch on that in a later section. For now, I want to hark on how it came to make her love for the community grow even further.
To her, the church was mostly a means to an end: giving back to those around her. While she thought that it was a helpful aid in one’s spirituality, it was not a necessary one. Her fond memories of that small, white church on the hill greatly consisted in sitting around and chatting with the fellow attendees about numerous topics and areas of life, such as childhood, work, parenthood, and more. To her, there is no replacement for those in-person interactions when it comes to developing contentment or happiness. As she describes, “There is a certain self-pride that comes with walking alongside your community. You tend to learn what makes people tick, what makes them happy, but most importantly, you learn so much about yourself just from the responses you get from them.”
Most of her critique of the modern age stems from a severe lack of in-person social interactions. I am sure you have all heard it before, though. “You need to get off that damn phone.” At least I know I have on numerous occasions, but perhaps we should heed the warning. Life cannot be spent with our noses stuck to some screen, as if we are in some “experience machine.” It is important that we put ourselves out into the community and make those concrete connections that will serve us in life. Who knows when you may find yourself in need like my grandmother’s family did that one harvest. Who else but your friends and community members will help you? I sure know it will not be your phone or gaming console.
Family
The second most important thing in life to my grandmother is family, second only to God and her faith. In her life, she mothered or helped to mother seven children in total. Of course, for most of her adult life, she was married to my grandfather. Also, as detailed above, she had a wonderful relationship with her father to which she lends much credit in the shaping of her life. Luckily, these same sentiments have also bled down to her relationship with me and the fellow grandchildren, all of whom she was greatly involved with. Some more than others, but some needed it more than others. We were also all taught to understand that. “Never ask for an equal share. Instead, ask for what is fair.”
In her interview, there was an underlying message that really seemed to appear in her dealings with her children. She wholeheartedly believed that while the children owed their parents respect, the parents owed their children the same (and much more). She explains that there is not a force stronger in this world than the love that she felt for each child as she first held them in her arms. She would often call this her “Motherly Instinct,” another power in her arsenal alongside “Motherly Intuition” and the “Eyes on the Back of Her Head.” Jokes aside, she posited that “the life of a parent is of their child.” They should be the center of your world, for they will be all that is left of you after you leave this earth. They often alone serve as the vessel of your legacy.
It was not a purely self-centered motive, however. As I said, she truly loves her children and her grandchildren. One of the main quotes that I took away from our short interview was this: “Ask yourself if all that fame and glory is worth its weight in love.” I believe I touched upon this a bit in my presentation. We also remember in Haybron’s book where he quoted the statistic that happiness seemed to not increase past a $75k margin. Therefore, we should not place too much focus on materialistic fortunes. As she said, “We’re just passing through.” In lieu, make sure to spend time with your family. She herself sacrificed many professional opportunities in her life to provide for her family and make sure they had the attention they needed, something she wishes this generation was far more willing to do.
Runions Family Easter
Mamaw and Papaw
Religion
“God comes first in all that I do” was how she responded to my inquiry into her value of religion, so it is ironic that I am covering it last. I just thought it best since it was the bow that ties the rest of her philosophy up into a neat package. To my grandmother, it is her faith that gives all things their meaning and what keeps her from breaking down in those darkest hours. She would often tell me that if you listen you can hear God speak to you. He is in the back of your mind, guiding your actions on a daily basis. While most of us would likely refer to this voice as the conscious, I think it is a quite endearing message nonetheless. And, if it keeps her going, perhaps that is all the worth it needs. Kind of like how William James justified his belief in free will.
However, as I noted above, her religious beliefs were not reliant upon the church. In fact, even in the face of having attended her whole life, she believes it to be wholly unnecessary. Faith instead lies within the individual. God speaks directly to each person, albeit not always in the most obvious ways. Additionally, faith alone can provide salvation for the person (Though, righteous action is still valuable). If you want to look at it from another perspective, I believe that these few tenets of her belief are summed up in Martin Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses. (If you have not read them before, I highly recommend you do.)
Now, as I also expressed in my presentation, I know that not everyone will be able to relate to this section, but it had to be mentioned due to its central role in her (and my own) philosophy. She explains that many of those days that she spent working on the farm or wondering where she could get the next meal for her kids involved praying to God. She knew in her heart that in the end, He would provide, so she kept hope. She kept moving forward and fighting the hardships because she knew that He was right there next to her. To be fair, that may also just be her sheer tenacity speaking as well. She always liked to say that she must be God’s strongest warrior because she always got the toughest battles.
Entrance to Salem Church Cemetery, Where Papaw lays
Conclusion
It is true that I have not said all that I could say on this subject, but for sake of brevity, I will stop here. I will also provide the link to my outline for my midterm presentation, so it will be easier to synthesize the two philosophies. You will be quick to notice they have a lot of overlap, and I suppose that was the secret to their successful marriage. Though, there are some nuanced differences. Additionally, I will be monitoring this post for the remainder of next week, so if you have any questions, please feel free to ask, I will give it my best shot to answer. Lord knows that there is plenty of missing context and material I can use to do so.
Also, I hope that these presentations give you all some insight into how a couple of common people have formulated their own philosophies in life. While we study the great minds like Aristotle and Plato within the classroom, remember that everyone you meet has their own story. They have their own little tricks and methods of happiness and contentment. So, if you look to those great minds and find no relief, just know that they are not all that life has to offer. They may not even be the best when it comes to you as an individual. We are all different, and none of us are old white men in ancient Greece. (Well, some here are closer than others).
Before I signed off, my grandmother wished me to add something for you all to hear. She said that if any of you wonder whether she is happy or not, rest assured that she is. She now owns two of her own bathtubs and she is free to take a bath anytime she likes. No need in bothering anyone else. Oh, what a relief it is in life to find your comfort in the simple things, readily within reach. Only then are you a master of your own happiness. With that, I once again leave you with a message you heard once before but I have heard thousands:
