Be Good. Be Orange.

Happiness Assignment

By Terrence Gleason

The Science of Happiness video was really interesting and I agree with a lot of what he says about how we create our own happiness instead of gain it through material things. There is no recipe for what happiness is regardless of what everybody thinks it is determined and synthesized from what each individual person makes it out to be. The point where Mr. Gilbert talked about the paintings was particularly interesting to me, but it was the people with the short term memories that surprised me. That even without knowing which painting they had the subconscious literally took control and made “their” painting more liked than before it was theirs. That blew my mind and I would not have seen that coming. This really proves that humans make their own happiness and that it is not at the jurisdiction of material objects to define our happiness.

I believe his theory on happiness does require ethics, but there is a very fine line between the two that has to be reached. Take psychopaths for instance say that they synthesize happiness from doing harm to others or destruction of property, ethically we have to say that behavior is wrong when we speak from an outsider’s perspective. If you are the psychopath however this makes you happy and if someone tells you that it is not okay to do these things then they are then denying you happiness. Granted this is a very extreme example, yet I still think it is relevant. It is relevant because it brings up an important point as to where do we draw the line between what makes someone happy and what is destructive to themselves/ others?  Most would suggest it is a case by case basis, but other people might say well do whatever makes you happy.