Objective List Theory is the only one encompassing enough to account for human complexity, because rarely do we have the experience to know what will truely make ourselves happy and healthy. But this list is something that psychology will have to devise taking into account all the diversity of individual preferences. It would include some of the other theories since no one is truly comprehensive. We often need a non selfish sense of self-worth, as contributors to the common good. But most important is that our sense of what is good for us changes as we mature socially and personally - all things in their own time - so no one approach is appropriate throughout out our whole life. Circumstances change our sense of happiness as well. As Abraham Maslow shows in his hierarchy of needs, being a successful artist will not make us happy if we are cold and hungry. Happiness is malleable and conditional, and an adequate philosophy (or psychology) will have to take that into account.
Nice video. I would say a happy life is taking as priority the 4 Cardinal Virtues. And preferably (despite the fact it’s left aside in this secular world) adding to them the 3 Theological Virtues
These opinions on well being leave out an important component. Well being in the face of what? The term suppressive, as in "you are a suppressive person", from Scientology, is instructive. In the face of opposition to one's desires or objectives, in the face of being suppressed or oppressed, what then is well being? What is the "ought" in this situation? To oppose this suppression or oppression? Why should my desires or objectives override another's? A universal ought as well as beauty and truth is a tricky thing to navigate. Especially with help or advice; for how should anyone else, who is not me, know what is best for me? What instincts and drives we possess are affected by our own natural "intelligence", and this intelligence affects our judgement of others as well as our judgement of beauty, truth and ought. Should we abandon our own intelligence in pursuit of another's? I have a feeling there are some of us who can. An extraordinary kind of being who needs merely a suggestion. For most of us however our natural inclinations, selfishness and prejudice, make it hard to trade our souls, the price must be high indeed. A universal ought must let us keep our soul while pursuing our goal, otherwise it is larceny for the devil 🤘.
A simple procedure for sustaining productivity and wellbeing, while reducing rumination, worry, and distraction, quickly refutable with a good swift kick. The ideal for any scientist with a great idea is to be able to explain it in a minute, and to confirm or falsify it as quickly. The world record for this arguably goes to the English philosopher Samuel Johnson, who rejected Archbishop Berkeley’s argument that material things only exist in one’s mind by striking his foot against a large stone while proclaiming, “I refute it thusly!” Here is a similarly novel and useful idea that can be confirmed or refuted with a proverbial swift kick, and can also be easily explained through affective neuroscience (links below). Summary Endogenous opioids are induced when we eat, drink, have sex, and relax, and are responsible for our pleasures. Opioid activity however is not static, but labile, or changeable. Opioid release is always modulated by concurrently perceived novel act-outcome expectancies which may be negative or positive. If they are negative (e.g. a spate of bad news or bad implications of our behavior), opioid activity is suppressed and our pleasures are reduced (anhedonia), but if they are positive, then opioid activity is enhanced and our pleasures are accentuated as well (peak experience, ‘flow’). This is due to dopamine-opioid interactions, or the fact that act-outcome discrepancy, or positive or negative surprises, can induce or suppress dopaminergic activity, which in turn can enhance or suppress opioid release. This can be demonstrated procedurally, and if correct, can provide a therapeutic tool to increase arousal and pleasure, or positive wellbeing. Basic Facts Endogenous opioids are induced when we eat, drink, have sex, and relax. Their affective correlate, or how it ‘feels’, is a sense of pleasure. Fun Fact When we are concurrently perceiving some activity that has a variable and unexpected rate of reward while consuming something pleasurable, opioid activity increases and with it a higher sense of pleasure. In other words, popcorn tastes better when we are watching an exciting movie than when we are watching paint dry. The same effect occurs when we are performing highly variable rewarding or meaningful activity (creating art, doing good deeds, doing productive work) while in a pleasurable relaxed state. (Meaning would be defined as behavior that has branching novel positive implications). This is commonly referred to as ‘flow’ or ‘peak’ experience. The same phenomenon underscores the placebo effect, which describes how expectancies can increase dopamine and opioid activity, such as when a meal is tastier or a sugar pill reduces pain when we are led to believe they will. (Linked references below) So why does this occur? Dopamine-Opioid interactions: or the fact that dopamine activity (elicited by positive novel events, and responsible for a state of arousal, but not pleasure) interacts with our pleasures (as reflected by mid brain opioid systems), and can actually stimulate opioid release, which is reflected in self-reports of greater pleasure. Proof (or kicking the stone) Just get relaxed using a relaxation protocol such as progressive muscle relaxation, eyes closed rest, or mindfulness, and then follow it by exclusively attending to or performing meaningful activity, and avoiding all meaningless activity or ‘distraction’. Keep it up and you will not only stay relaxed, but continue so with a greater sense of wellbeing or pleasure. In addition, the attribution of affective value to meaningful behavior makes the latter seem ‘autotelic’, or reinforcing in itself, and the resultant persistent attention to meaning crowds out the occasions we might have spent dwelling on other unmeaningful worries and concerns. A Likely Explanation, as if you need one! A more formal explanation from a neurologically based learning theory of this technique is provided on pp. 44-51 in a little open-source book on the psychology of rest linked below. (The flow experience discussed on pp. 81-86.) The book is based on the work of the distinguished affective neuroscientist Kent Berridge, who was kind to review for accuracy and endorse the work. Implications for psychotherapy from the neuroscience of incentives Affect in rest is labile, or changeable, and rest (i.e. the general deactivation of the covert musculature) is not an inert state, but modulates affective systems in the brain. In addition, the degree of the modulation of pleasurable affect induced by rest is ‘schedule dependent’, and correlates with the variability of schedules or contingencies of reward and the discriminative aspects of incentives (i.e. their cognitive implications). In other words, sustained meaningful activity or the anticipation of acting meaningfully during resting states increases the affective ‘tone’ or value of that behavior, thus making productive work ‘autotelic’, or rewarding in itself. This provides an entirely complementary procedure for all psychotherapeutic perspectives that although derived from affective neuroscience does not demand a departure from any research or philosophical commitment. References: Rauwolf, P., et al. (2021) Reward uncertainty - as a 'psychological salt'- can alter the sensory experience and consumption of high-value rewards in young healthy adults. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General (prepub) doi.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fxge0001029 Benedetti, F., et al(2011). How placebos change the patient's brain. Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, 36(1), 339-354. www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3055515/ The Psychology of Rest www.scribd.com/doc/284056765/The-Book-of-Rest-The-Odd-Psychology-of-Doing-Nothing The Psychology of Incentive Motivation and Affect www.scribd.com/document/495438436/A-Mouse-s-Tale-a-practical-explanation-and-handbook-of-motivation-from-the-perspective-of-a-humble-creature The Psychology of Rest, from International Journal of Stress Management, by this author www.scribd.com/doc/121345732/Relaxation-and-Muscular-Tension-A-bio-behavioristic-explanation Berridge Lab, University of Michigan sites.lsa.umich.edu/berridge-lab/ History and Development of Motivation Theory - Berridge lsa.umich.edu/psych/research&labs/berridge/publications/Berridge2001Rewardlearningchapter.pdf
I think you’ve just given me the key I needed to unlock and begin to address my CPTSD (Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). How incredibly serendipitous. I came to get a feel for philosophical theories (as opposed to scientific ones) because of the recent lunatic conspiracies surrounding Critical Race Theory and ended up with the most useful, insightful, actionable - and frankly embarrassingly obvious - process for infiltrating my own defenses. It may not provide all of the materiel necessary to conquer CPTSD, but I knew intuitively the moment I read your comment that I had discovered the “secret plans” to the defenses currently protecting me from my own trauma. It’s like a form of emotional autoimmune malfunction. When triggered, the host is attacked by a litany of physical and emotional symptoms intended to “protect” sufferers from perceived dangers. Only the dangers can, over time, close in on victims until the necessary, life-sustaining activities like work, social engagement, even chores, hobbies, and intimacy all become perceived triggers and the victim (me) is left staring out of his own skull at the world longingly, but powerless to engage on virtually any level. What’s most promising here is that I know I’ll be able to infiltrate those defenses (because they’ve been exceptionally good at repelling my frontal assaults, as if tampering with the core trauma in some way represents a direct assault on my sympathetic nervous system, itself. CBT practitioners and EMDR, among other protocols, have varying degrees of success addressing the trauma of CPTSD because it is complex and so one cannot simply charge into the POW camp where the traumatic events are stored and have very strong bonds with one another and just start carrying them off for interrogation without facing serious, violent backlash from the other prisoners. Exposure Therapy ordinarily very effective in the treatment of PTSD, can be retraumatizing to victims of CPTSD for this reason. The PTSD sufferer faces the infiltration of a single cell, holding just one prisoner to be extracted. Aside from the guards who are clearly the enemy, the psyche of the PTSD victim feels not a sense of impending doom from a commando attack at the gates, but a sense of joyful liberation. I’m not saying it’s easy, just that it’s easier. Sorry for the long winded response, but it’s been several months since I found anything to give me hope of recovery and I babble when I’m excited. Thank you for posting this response! I don’t know who you are or what you do, but I recognize great insight and smart reasoning when I see it - unfortunately not nearly as often as I’d like - and covet those moments because they help me learn. I hope, whoever you are, that you’re teaching and writing or practicing the gift you clearly have. Thanks, again!
Objective List Theory is the only one encompassing enough to account for human complexity, because rarely do we have the experience to know what will truely make ourselves happy and healthy. But this list is something that psychology will have to devise taking into account all the diversity of individual preferences. It would include some of the other theories since no one is truly comprehensive.
We often need a non selfish sense of self-worth, as contributors to the common good.
But most important is that our sense of what is good for us changes as we mature socially and personally - all things in their own time - so no one approach is appropriate throughout out our whole life. Circumstances change our sense of happiness as well. As Abraham Maslow shows in his hierarchy of needs, being a successful artist will not make us happy if we are cold and hungry.
Happiness is malleable and conditional, and an adequate philosophy (or psychology) will have to take that into account.
This channel is so slept on. I’m just getting educated over here
Nice video. I would say a happy life is taking as priority the 4 Cardinal Virtues. And preferably (despite the fact it’s left aside in this secular world) adding to them the 3 Theological Virtues
Islam says that education and knowledge have a high value in the society.thanks.
Please suggest some books about family well-being.
These opinions on well being leave out an important component. Well being in the face of what? The term suppressive, as in "you are a suppressive person", from Scientology, is instructive.
In the face of opposition to one's desires or objectives, in the face of being suppressed or oppressed, what then is well being? What is the "ought" in this situation?
To oppose this suppression or oppression? Why should my desires or objectives override another's?
A universal ought as well as beauty and truth is a tricky thing to navigate. Especially with help or advice; for how should anyone else, who is not me, know what is best for me?
What instincts and drives we possess are affected by our own natural "intelligence", and this intelligence affects our judgement of others as well as our judgement of beauty, truth and ought.
Should we abandon our own intelligence in pursuit of another's? I have a feeling there are some of us who can. An extraordinary kind of being who needs merely a suggestion. For most of us however our natural inclinations, selfishness and prejudice, make it hard to trade our souls, the price must be high indeed.
A universal ought must let us keep our soul while pursuing our goal, otherwise it is larceny for the devil 🤘.
If I see this man in my dreams, what the fuck-
A simple procedure for sustaining productivity and wellbeing, while reducing rumination, worry, and distraction, quickly refutable with a good swift kick.
The ideal for any scientist with a great idea is to be able to explain it in a minute, and to confirm or falsify it as quickly. The world record for this arguably goes to the English philosopher Samuel Johnson, who rejected Archbishop Berkeley’s argument that material things only exist in one’s mind by striking his foot against a large stone while proclaiming, “I refute it thusly!”
Here is a similarly novel and useful idea that can be confirmed or refuted with a proverbial swift kick, and can also be easily explained through affective neuroscience (links below).
Summary
Endogenous opioids are induced when we eat, drink, have sex, and relax, and are responsible for our pleasures. Opioid activity however is not static, but labile, or changeable. Opioid release is always modulated by concurrently perceived novel act-outcome expectancies which may be negative or positive. If they are negative (e.g. a spate of bad news or bad implications of our behavior), opioid activity is suppressed and our pleasures are reduced (anhedonia), but if they are positive, then opioid activity is enhanced and our pleasures are accentuated as well (peak experience, ‘flow’). This is due to dopamine-opioid interactions, or the fact that act-outcome discrepancy, or positive or negative surprises, can induce or suppress dopaminergic activity, which in turn can enhance or suppress opioid release. This can be demonstrated procedurally, and if correct, can provide a therapeutic tool to increase arousal and pleasure, or positive wellbeing.
Basic Facts
Endogenous opioids are induced when we eat, drink, have sex, and relax. Their affective correlate, or how it ‘feels’, is a sense of pleasure.
Fun Fact
When we are concurrently perceiving some activity that has a variable and unexpected rate of reward while consuming something pleasurable, opioid activity increases and with it a higher sense of pleasure. In other words, popcorn tastes better when we are watching an exciting movie than when we are watching paint dry. The same effect occurs when we are performing highly variable rewarding or meaningful activity (creating art, doing good deeds, doing productive work) while in a pleasurable relaxed state. (Meaning would be defined as behavior that has branching novel positive implications). This is commonly referred to as ‘flow’ or ‘peak’ experience. The same phenomenon underscores the placebo effect, which describes how expectancies can increase dopamine and opioid activity, such as when a meal is tastier or a sugar pill reduces pain when we are led to believe they will. (Linked references below)
So why does this occur?
Dopamine-Opioid interactions: or the fact that dopamine activity (elicited by positive novel events, and responsible for a state of arousal, but not pleasure) interacts with our pleasures (as reflected by mid brain opioid systems), and can actually stimulate opioid release, which is reflected in self-reports of greater pleasure.
Proof (or kicking the stone)
Just get relaxed using a relaxation protocol such as progressive muscle relaxation, eyes closed rest, or mindfulness, and then follow it by exclusively attending to or performing meaningful activity, and avoiding all meaningless activity or ‘distraction’. Keep it up and you will not only stay relaxed, but continue so with a greater sense of wellbeing or pleasure. In addition, the attribution of affective value to meaningful behavior makes the latter seem ‘autotelic’, or reinforcing in itself, and the resultant persistent attention to meaning crowds out the occasions we might have spent dwelling on other unmeaningful worries and concerns.
A Likely Explanation, as if you need one!
A more formal explanation from a neurologically based learning theory of this technique is provided on pp. 44-51 in a little open-source book on the psychology of rest linked below. (The flow experience discussed on pp. 81-86.) The book is based on the work of the distinguished affective neuroscientist Kent Berridge, who was kind to review for accuracy and endorse the work.
Implications for psychotherapy from the neuroscience of incentives
Affect in rest is labile, or changeable, and rest (i.e. the general deactivation of the covert musculature) is not an inert state, but modulates affective systems in the brain. In addition, the degree of the modulation of pleasurable affect induced by rest is ‘schedule dependent’, and correlates with the variability of schedules or contingencies of reward and the discriminative aspects of incentives (i.e. their cognitive implications). In other words, sustained meaningful activity or the anticipation of acting meaningfully during resting states increases the affective ‘tone’ or value of that behavior, thus making productive work ‘autotelic’, or rewarding in itself. This provides an entirely complementary procedure for all psychotherapeutic perspectives that although derived from affective neuroscience does not demand a departure from any research or philosophical commitment.
References:
Rauwolf, P., et al. (2021) Reward uncertainty - as a 'psychological salt'- can alter the sensory experience and consumption of high-value rewards in young healthy adults. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General (prepub)
doi.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fxge0001029
Benedetti, F., et al(2011). How placebos change the patient's brain. Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, 36(1), 339-354.
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3055515/
The Psychology of Rest
www.scribd.com/doc/284056765/The-Book-of-Rest-The-Odd-Psychology-of-Doing-Nothing
The Psychology of Incentive Motivation and Affect
www.scribd.com/document/495438436/A-Mouse-s-Tale-a-practical-explanation-and-handbook-of-motivation-from-the-perspective-of-a-humble-creature
The Psychology of Rest, from International Journal of Stress Management, by this author
www.scribd.com/doc/121345732/Relaxation-and-Muscular-Tension-A-bio-behavioristic-explanation
Berridge Lab, University of Michigan sites.lsa.umich.edu/berridge-lab/
History and Development of Motivation Theory - Berridge
lsa.umich.edu/psych/research&labs/berridge/publications/Berridge2001Rewardlearningchapter.pdf
I think you’ve just given me the key I needed to unlock and begin to address my CPTSD (Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). How incredibly serendipitous. I came to get a feel for philosophical theories (as opposed to scientific ones) because of the recent lunatic conspiracies surrounding Critical Race Theory and ended up with the most useful, insightful, actionable - and frankly embarrassingly obvious - process for infiltrating my own defenses. It may not provide all of the materiel necessary to conquer CPTSD, but I knew intuitively the moment I read your comment that I had discovered the “secret plans” to the defenses currently protecting me from my own trauma. It’s like a form of emotional autoimmune malfunction. When triggered, the host is attacked by a litany of physical and emotional symptoms intended to “protect” sufferers from perceived dangers. Only the dangers can, over time, close in on victims until the necessary, life-sustaining activities like work, social engagement, even chores, hobbies, and intimacy all become perceived triggers and the victim (me) is left staring out of his own skull at the world longingly, but powerless to engage on virtually any level.
What’s most promising here is that I know I’ll be able to infiltrate those defenses (because they’ve been exceptionally good at repelling my frontal assaults, as if tampering with the core trauma in some way represents a direct assault on my sympathetic nervous system, itself. CBT practitioners and EMDR, among other protocols, have varying degrees of success addressing the trauma of CPTSD because it is complex and so one cannot simply charge into the POW camp where the traumatic events are stored and have very strong bonds with one another and just start carrying them off for interrogation without facing serious, violent backlash from the other prisoners. Exposure Therapy ordinarily very effective in the treatment of PTSD, can be retraumatizing to victims of CPTSD for this reason. The PTSD sufferer faces the infiltration of a single cell, holding just one prisoner to be extracted. Aside from the guards who are clearly the enemy, the psyche of the PTSD victim feels not a sense of impending doom from a commando attack at the gates, but a sense of joyful liberation. I’m not saying it’s easy, just that it’s easier.
Sorry for the long winded response, but it’s been several months since I found anything to give me hope of recovery and I babble when I’m excited.
Thank you for posting this response! I don’t know who you are or what you do, but I recognize great insight and smart reasoning when I see it - unfortunately not nearly as often as I’d like - and covet those moments because they help me learn. I hope, whoever you are, that you’re teaching and writing or practicing the gift you clearly have. Thanks, again!
Wtf. Give a sentence summary cuz aint no way im reading that shit