Man's highest purpose and man's happiness

[idealist]

I was watching a video of a presentation given by monk Matthieu Ricard and I began to wonder to myself; What is the nature of happiness and is there a duty to act in the greater good? The video is about 20 minutes long:


http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/191


The maintenance of life and the pursuit of happiness are not two separate issues. To hold one's own life as one's ultimate value, and one's own happiness as one's highest purpose are two aspects of the same achievement. Existentially, the activity of pursuing rational goals is the activity of maintaining one's life; psychologically, its result, reward and concomitant is an emotional state of happiness. It is by experiencing happiness that one lives one's life, in any hour, year or the whole of it. And when one experiences the kind of pure happiness that is an end in itself—the kind that makes one think: "This is worth living for"—what one is greeting and affirming in emotional terms is the metaphysical fact that life is an end in itself.

But the relationship of cause to effect cannot be reversed. It is only by accepting "man's life" as one's primary and by pursuing the rational values it requires that one can achieve happiness—not by taking "happiness" as some undefined, irreducible primary and then attempting to live by its guidance. If you achieve that which is the good by a rational standard of value, it will necessarily make you happy; but that which makes you happy, by some undefined emotional standard, is not necessarily the good. To take "whatever makes one happy" as a guide to action means: to be guided by nothing but one's emotional whims. Emotions are not tools of cognition; to be guided by whims—by desires whose source, nature and meaning one does not know—is to turn oneself into a blind robot, operated by unknowable demons (by one's stale evasions), a robot knocking its stagnant brains out against the walls of reality which it refuses to see.
- The Objectivist Ethics, Ayn Rand

[Taeguk]

I'm at work so I didn't watch the video. I would, however like to comment on the Rand quote you've provided, idealist:

To take "whatever makes one happy" as a guide to action means: to be guided by nothing but one's emotional whims. Emotions are not tools of cognition; to be guided by whims—by desires whose source, nature and meaning one does not know—is to turn oneself into a blind robot, operated by unknowable demons (by one's stale evasions), a robot knocking its stagnant brains out against the walls of reality which it refuses to see.

- The Objectivist Ethics, Ayn Rand

Certainly, I agree with Rand that just following one's desires is not necessarily a path to happiness. It is, as she suggests, mindless---stimulii trigger a pre-programmed reaction.

However, I would question her seperation of "cognition" from those desires. Like Hume, I think that all too often reason is simply the slave of the passions. What appear to be "rational values" may in fact simply disguise the will to power. We may not know the origion of our desires, but often reason is simply the instrument of those desires.

[Zofia]

Excellent observation, Taeguk. Rationalization can be powerful and insidious. That's why self honesty and self appraisal is so extremely difficult without an outside, non-objective observer.

[idealist]

Thanks Taeguk for the reference to Hume, which I had not considered. When I think of Hume I think of Ronald Dworkin's thoughts on morality, and more recently, of the discussion here of the embedded mind concept.

However, my interest in the original post is in the nature of happiness and what that means. Can we simultaneously suffer and yet be happy? Is there a more profound happiness in fulfillment (giving in the name of a higher cause, say) than in achievement (building a company, for example)? Is happiness a neo-cortex function or could it be ancient (stem) or originate in the limbic system?

Was Adolph Eichmann happy - he was horribly successful? Was Ghandi happy?

[Taeguk]

Thanks Taeguk for the reference to Hume, which I had not considered. When I think of Hume I think of Ronald Dworkin's thoughts on morality, and more recently, of the discussion here of the embedded mind concept.

Glad you found it helpful, I'm actually not too familiar with Dworkin, aside from the fact that he's done a lot with philosophy of law. :mellow:

However, my interest in the original post is in the nature of happiness and what that means. Can we simultaneously suffer and yet be happy? Is there a more profound happiness in fulfillment (giving in the name of a higher cause, say) than in achievement (building a company, for example)? Is happiness a neo-cortex function or could it be ancient (stem) or originate in the limbic system?

All good questions and 0nes that will probably always be asked. But first we may need to define our terms---what do we mean by "happiness"? Rand seems to think it's just an emotional response. Aristotle, on the other hand, informs us that "happiness" (eudaimonia, literally "good spirit/demon/fate") is The Good, that at which all things aim. More concretely, he's talking about human flourishing. But in any case, he's not talking about an emotion in the Nichomachean Ethics.

I would also suggest your last two questions are somewhat misplaced---I submit that whatever may be, happiness is not reducible to a brain function or a set of physical systems.

Was Adolph Eichmann happy - he was horribly successful? Was Ghandi happy?

This in turn suggests another question---can we ever really know if another person is happy?

[Flux]

I was assigned to read a bit of Dworkin's book on euthanasia and abortion las semester, and it was his arguments that changed my mind on the abortion issue. Great author. :)

As to happieness, first of all, I don't draw a distinction between reason and passion--I believe that each is to inextricably tied to the other for any to operate with complete independence. Even the dreamiest of poets are bound to make deductions on a day to day basis, and "rationalists" can get quite passionate about rationalism.

I believe that happieness is a good thing, and that we are often in a better position to spread happieness to others when we are happier ourselves. Purposefully making ourselves miserable as a sort of martyredom isn't likely to do much good to others. That's not to say that those who endure hardships for others are in the wrong though--rather, I admire those who willingly bear burdens that they never asked for, rather than grasping at opportunities to prove how altruistic they are.

Pursuit of happieness does have it's limits though--it's very easy to get carried away with pleasure seeking of any sort. I also don't think that emotions always fall into a neat scale of "more" or "less" happy. Rather, emotions are incredibly nuanced, and a single emotion can indeed have facets of happyness and suffering. As for pain, I think it's a good and natural thing that we feel anxiety, distress, and sadness from time to time. Again, it's not that such pain should be sought, or that an abundance of it does anyone good. Rather, I think of a certain amount of distress as being a bit like having to camp in a leaky tent on a rainy night--it's very uncomfortable, but doesn't cause any lasting damage, and might turn out to be a worthwhile experience in retrospect.