1. Philosophy of Happiness
Dr Caroline West
University of Sydney

2. Two lives
Life 1
A person is, over a period of time, depressed, despondent, beset with anxiety, "stressed out”, seething with rage, overwhelmed by fear, worried sick, heartbroken, grief-stricken, lonely, in low spirits, burdened with shame, overcome with boredom, deeply dissatisfied with life, haunted by a sense of dread or feelings of emptiness, or simply melancholy.
Life 2
A person is, over a period of time, in high spirits, joyful, exhilarated, elated, jubilant, carefree, deeply contented, at peace, delighted with his or her life, or filled with a profound sense of fulfillment or well-being.
Life 1 is a paradigmatically happy life; life 2 is paradigmatically unhappy. Which life would you prefer, at least other things being equal. (Crucially, other things are often not equal – trade-offs between happiness and other values)

3. What is happiness?
Psychological “happiness”: A non-evaluative term that denotes a particular state of mind—otherwise known as ‘subjective well-being’ (SWB):
(i) positive affect–the presence of ‘positive’ emotions such as joy, contentment, and affection;
(ii) negative affect– the relative absence of ‘negative’ emotions such as fear, anger, and sadness; and
(iii) personal judgments about satisfaction (i.e. comparing what you have to a baseline, what you “expected yourself to have”).
Taken together, a happy person is someone who is frequently cheerful, only occasionally sad, and generally satisfied with his or her life.
I assume that happiness is at least one of the things we value and want in our own lives, and in the lives of those we care about: When we wish for our kids to be happy, something like this seems to be what we want. All other things being equal, most of us would prefer to live a life that contains more of the postive emotions - joy, contentment, etc - to one which contains more of the negatives- anxiety, despair, anger etc.

4. An older eudaimonic sense of ‘happiness’
Etymology: From the Middle English ‘hap’ - meaning ‘fortunate’ or ‘lucky’
Happiness = the good life
Aristotle thought that there is more to happiness than subjective well-being
Happiness = faring well. Living a life that measures up to a certain standard of value.

5. What Makes Us Happy?: What the studies say…
Not youth, beauty, intelligence, education or more money (once basic needs are met)
Comparison – However rich you are, there’s almost always someone else who’s richer!
Adaptation - the ‘hedonic treadmill’
What we now know about happiness is that you can’t just ask what will make you happy. You have to be more fine-grained, and look at what is associated with more specific kinds of happiness. For very often what brings happiness of one kind does not bring happiness of another. Happiness is a much more fragmented phenonemon than many people are inclined to suppose.

6. What Makes Us Happy?: What the studies say…
Genes, which seem to account for 40-60% of happiness level (setpoint theory)
The company of friends; (friends better than family-variety). This is true, regardless of gender and temperament.
A good marriage
Rewarding work (but not overwork)
Leisure activities and projects—even better when they contribute to a greater good
Decent amounts of sleep and exercise
Active religious belief
Meditation (ideally TM)
Gratitude and performing acts of selfless kindness boost happiness (significantly, but temporarily)
But just as a person can lower their weight or cholestoral level through diet and exrecise, so there are things we can do as individuals and societies to increase our joy and satisfaction in our life.
& the absence of these things diminishes well-being

7. Is happiness a cause of success in love and life or a product of it?
Cause or correlation?
Is happiness a cause of success in love and life or a product of it?
Descriptive or prescriptive?
Optimists are happier, but deluded. Is it better to be a deluded optimist or an unhappy realist?
Probably both.

8. Studies also show… Conservative voters are much happier
Racially homogenous societies are happier
Married couples without children are astronomically happier than those with
Contrary to popular belief, children do not bring joy to our lives. Children actually make happiness statistics drop to oblivion, never to return to their previous levels again. Veenhoven's analysis is sober: "Children have a constant negative effect on human happiness and the quality of marriage.” Professor Ruut Veenhoven, Erasmus University Rotterdam, World Database of Happiness
are other values in life—truth, justice, parenthood, for instance—that we may not, and perhaps should not, be willing to trade off for greater happiness.
World Database of Happiness:

9. Children and Hedons
As the four separate studies in this graph show, marital satisfaction decreases dramatically after the birth of the first child and increases only when the last child leaves home.
C. Walker, “Some Variations in Marital Satisfaction,” in Equalities and Inequalities in Family Life, ed. R. Chester and J. Peel (London: Academic Press, 1997),

10. Kahneman, D., Krueger, A. B., Schkade, D. A. Schwarz, N., & Stone, A. A. (2004). A survey method for characterizing daily life experience: The day reconstruction method. Science, 306,

11. Net Hedonic Value (6-point scale)
Activities
Net Hedonic Value (6-point scale)
Intimate relations
4.7
Socializing
4.2
Relaxing
3.91
Exercising
3.81
Pray/worship/meditate
3.76
Eating
3.75
Watching TV
3.61
Napping
3.27
Preparing Food
3.24
Shopping
3.21
On the Phone
3.10
Computer/ /internet
3.01
Housework
2.96
Taking care of my children
2.95
Working
2.65
Commuting
2.56

12. Studies also show…
In fact, the happiest people in the world are conservative, church-going, middle-aged male narcissists in Northern Europe.
What should we make of this!?
It’s a superficial kind of happiness that’s being measured
There’s more to life than happiness
Contrary to popular belief, children do not bring joy to our lives. Children actually make happiness statistics drop to oblivion, never to return to their previous levels again. Veenhoven's analysis is sober: "Children have a constant negative effect on human happiness and the quality of marriage.” Professor Ruut Veenhoven, Erasmus University Rotterdam, World Database of Happiness
are other values in life—truth, justice, parenthood, for instance—that we may not, and perhaps should not, be willing to trade off for greater happiness.
World Database of Happiness:

13. Brave New World
The controller, Mustapha Mond, to the Savage: “The world’s stable now. People are happy; they get what they want, and they never want what they can’t get. They’re well off; they’re safe; they’re never ill; they’re not afraid of death; they’re blissfully ignorant of passion and old age; they’re plagued with no mothers or fathers; they’ve got no wives or children, or loves to feel strongly about; they’re so conditioned they practically can’t help behaving as they ought to behave. And if anything should go wrong, there’s soma. Which you go and chuck out the window in the name of liberty, Mr Savage. Liberty!… The Savage: But I don’t want comfort…I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin. Mustapha Mond: In fact, you’re claiming the right to be unhappy…Not to mention the right to grow old and ugly and impotent; the right to have syphilis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to be lousy; the right to live in constant apprehension of what may happen tomorrow;…the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind. The Savage (after a long silence): I claim them all. Mustapha Mond (shrugs shoulders): You’re welcome.
A certain amount of hedonistic- and life-satisfaction may be necessary components of a good life, but they are not the only, nor necessarily the most important, components.
e.g., People in Brave New World score as high as you could on these counts, but are (arguably) not living the ultimately good life.

14. Happiness, a dangerous concept?
A dangerous fusion
‘Positive’ emotions are what you ought to pursue
Not necessarily true!
Negative emotions are bad for you
If we employ this concept, we risk basing our choices primarily on what will make us feel good; but as the Savage suggests, this may not make for the best kind of life.