True Happiness in The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut and Hans Weingartner's The Eduakators A large parcel of the population has as their ultimate goal in life achieving well-being. Unfortunately many try to achieve it through the wrong means. For instance, in The Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut, Malachi Constant thinks he is truly happy, but what he really does is fulfill his hedonism, satisfy his shallow needs, without truly searching for a higher form of well-being. Not only does a life focused on hedonic satisfaction not achieve true happiness, it also leads, along with the urge to accumulate, egocentrism, and greed, to an unethical life. The Sirens of Titans depicts this kind of life, which is also represented throughout The Edukators, directed by Hans Weingartner. Both Malachi Constant and Hardenberg believe that money is the solution to all of their problems while ignoring the problems their own lifestyle is causing to other people and society as a whole. Happiness, our own and other people’s, is achieved by focusing our lives in the right things. Even though hedonic satisfaction is necessary for living a happy life, focusing only on hedonic pleasure will have the opposite effect. If you focus on money and the things it can buy as the source for your well-being, you are excluding a series of factors that are necessary to achieve a true state of well-being. The following passage from the article “On Happiness and Human Potentials: A Review of Research on Hedonic and Eudaimonic Well-Being” clearly details that: Drawing from the eudaimonic view and from SDT, Kasser & Ryan (1993, 1996) related money and materialism to well-being. They predicted that people who place a strong value on wealth... ... middle of paper ... ...se’s life. The only way humanity can achieve true well-being is if abdicates its urge to accumulate and refocus its mostly hedonic ways to a more eudaimonic way of life. Works Cited The Edukators. Dir. Hans Weingartner. IFC Films, 2004. Mill, John Stuart. Utilitarianism. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1979. Nenno, Nancy P. “Postcards from the Edge.” Light Motives: German Popular Film in Perspective. Eds. Halle, Randall and McCarthy, Margaret. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2003. 61-84. Reed, Peter J. "Kurt Vonnegut, Jr." Dictionary of Literary Biography. ed. 1978. Ryan, Richard M., and Edward L. Deci. "On Happiness and Human Potentials: A Review of Research on Hedonic and Eudamonic Well-Being." Annual Review of Psychology 52 (2001): 141-166. Vonnegut, Kurt. The Sirens of Titan. New York: Dell Publishing, 1998.
The society uses one’s happiness to seek their own. Starting with the ancient Adam Smith’s theory of a market economy where commodities are sold and bought in a market freely, where sellers and buyers exchange to achieve profit, and happiness is derived from profit. Thus “happiness is both produced and consumed” (Ahmed 3). Happiness is a matter of research for corporates of big companies. They try to figure out which product makes the buyers feel the happiness they need, so that they can produce more for their own profit. So, they cunningly make commercials with people having a good time. Which when watched by the buyers they get the false sense that their life would be so much better if they bought that small bottle of happiness. Once they buy their “Pandora’s box” they hope that underneath all the unnecessary objects there will be happiness, but they are dispirited at the end. Unknowingly the markets are making the society a more dull and sad place rather than distributing
Fredrickson, Barbara L. and Michael F. Losada. "Positive Affect and the Complex Dynamics of Human Flourishing." American Psychologist 60.7 (2005): 678-686. Web. 10 Jan. 2014.
Its aim is “universal happiness” because if people are happy there’s more likely to be social stability. People must be made to “like their unescapable social destiny”, officials insist. Brave New World, the antihero known as “the Savage” rebels against the happiness agenda, telling his smiley-faced rulers: “I want freedom, I want goodness, I want sin… I’m claiming the right to be unhappy.” I believe that we should claim the same right against prying in our emotional lives today.
The Article “Perfection Anxiety” written by A.A Gill illustrates through his findings, that while the means to have everything you desire is by no means bad , neither is it the best. Throughout the article he talks about the phenomenon of “perfection anxiety”, a condition causing it’s host’s feelings of significant ennui, a circumstance found within the abhorrently wealthy portion of the world’s citizens. This psychological disorder is found to occur when the incomprehensibly rich have realized essentially, that they have run out of things to spend their money on, continuing to spend only to appease the ever imposing expectations and judgments of the wealthy.
Our national happiness peaked in the 1950’s, the same time that this consumption mania exploded” (Leonard). The same idea is developed in Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael, when the Gorilla Ishmael states “The story the takers have been enacting here for the past ten thousand years is not only disastrous for mankind and for the world, it’s fundamentally unhealthy and unsatisfying. It's a megalomaniac’s fantasy and enacting it has given the Takers a culture riddled with greed, cruelty, mental illness, crime and drug addiction” (Quinn 87). Daniel Quinn points out that the state of health and security of the society are greatly diminished as a result of the addiction to materialism. In a study, psychologist Galen Bodenhausen of Northwestern University found out that people who depend on constantly feeding their consumerism, buying expensive cars, electronics, jewellery, luxurious properties and the latest modern fashions, rated themselves higher in depression and anxiety compared to people that invest their time in prosocial activities (like working for a good cause) (Bodenhousen). Anxiety and depression leads people to a never-ending cycle of exhaustive work
All human beings have a common desire. The desire that all humans are striving for is something that is important and vital to every human being. This desire is happiness, which according to Aristotle, “is not something you can feel or experience at a particular moment. It is the quality of a whole life.” Many great philosophers, like Aristotle, have attempted to seek and comprehend what happiness is. Plato believe happiness is a “harmony within the soul-the spiritual well-being of the truly virtuous man.” Immanuel Kant defines “the pursuit of happiness as selfish, setting personal satisfaction above the objective norm of duty and right.” Aristotle believes “Everyone uses the word happiness to name that which he seeks for its own sake and not for the sake of anything else. One wants to be happy because happiness is the ultimate good.” Happiness is a desire all humans want, no one wants to live a dreadful life. Everyone wants to live a good life. Happiness is the total satisfaction of all human desire. In Mortimer Adler’s point of view, there are many components that can lead to happiness. Three important components to attain happiness are bodily, social, and intellectual goods.
In the article “Consume Less and Be Happy”, it mentioned on page 7 that “these studies show for example that money can buy happiness only up to a certain point”. Happiness in a life comes from within and the surroundings of an area one sets themselves in. For example, being at the beach or around a lake can fill a person with happiness that money can't necessarily buy. In the article “Stuff Is Not Salvation”, Anna Quindlen comes across a family that mentions having less means more happiness and more meaning behind it all. Sure, happiness could be filled with buying an expensive bag or name brand shoes, but the happiness won't linger long because eventually what's new becomes old. The meaning behind having less is greater than having it all and still feeling empty. Therefore all the consumption of the people around the world is just a great disadvantage to a growing life. All the money in the world wouldn't make the richest man pure and happy. With this as well, problems such as the attitude towards consumption gets caught up in this urge
“Buy like you breathe, only more frequently” is the motto believed by bestselling author Matt Walsh being promoted by today's society. It's evident that as time has gone on, society has become increasingly materialistic, with many of the world’s modern population growing up wealthier than their predecessors. However, it should be noted that in spite of this apparent prosperity, people in today's society are less happy and at a greater risk of developing depression (Myers, 2000, p.55-67). Thus it's evident that life has become a hamster wheel of striving for more possession, resulting in more unhappiness.
In a society where owning cars and designer clothes became the definition of happiness, more and more individuals live with an unrealistic materialistic mindset. From advertisements to social media status supporting this misconception, our society has accepted the idea of a materialistic idea of happiness. Although our media-saturated society has implanted the thought of materialism being the main focus of one pursuing and achieving happiness, studies have shown proof that higher rates of well-being are not linked to the possession of material goods, financial status or even marital status; true happiness and our well-being are connected to our daily positive thoughts and actions and also how well we respond to life events.
Bowman, James. "The Pursuit of Happiness." The American Spectator. N.p., Sept. 2010. Web. 19 Apr. 2014.
Since the beginning of time, humans have spent the majority of their lives, trying to attain the ultimate state of joy, called happiness. This feeling of overall happiness, has a unique and distinct definition depending on a person’s personality, beliefs, and moral values. Since people perceive happiness in their own individual way, the meaning of happiness amongst people has changed tremendously, throughout different generations. Over the last fifty years, it is evident in our society that the newer generations and the older generations certainly have different views on the purpose of life, and on how to achieve happiness. Even though the meaning of happiness, is constantly changing throughout different generations, I believe that the pursuit
..., a person who earns $25,000 is happier than a person who makes $125,000 and an employee who makes $500,000 is only slightly happier than someone who makes $55,000. Lastly, there are more important things in life that and make you happy, for example, friends. They don’t come with a price tag, and if they do, you definitely need new friends. Money won’t make you happy since good times can’t be bought. You don’t need a fancy vacation to have a good time; it’s just a matter of who you spend it with. Over the years, humans have blown the value of money way out of proportion. People make it seem like if you’re not filthy rich, then you won’t live a good life but it’s not true. You can lack money and yet still live a perfect, happy life.
However, that is far from reality as the majority of wealthy people nowadays are depressed and some going as far as committing suicide. Unfortunately, countless of people believe that wealth can buy one's happiness but that is false. It can elevate an individual mood for a limited period of time but it cannot change how one is. In fact, in Taylor article,“ Understanding Money and the Meaning of Life” Taylor learns from Needleman that wealth cannot change one's internal makeup, “ Money truly can not buy happiness, especially if you’re unhappy, to begin with. “If you are worrying about vegetables now, you’ll be worrying about yachts then,” Needleman jokes. “You’re a worrier. It’s in you, not the money. Life, except for the obvious physical needs, is not so much defined by the external situation as by the inner one. Having money won’t change your internal makeup.” Multiple individuals would agree with Needleman statement one cannot expect that once an individual acquires wealth they will be living a blissful life and that all of their problems will be rid
Money and Happiness are two things that we have all given a lot thought. We put lots of effort into these two things either trying to earn them or trying to increase them. The connection we make between money and happiness is strange because they are two very different concepts. Money is tangible, you can quantify it, and know exactly how much of it you have at any given time. Happiness, on the other hand, is subjective, elusive, has different meanings for different people and despite the efforts of behavioral scientist and psychologist alike, there is no definitive way to measure happiness. In other word, counting happiness is much more difficult than counting dollar bills. How can we possibly make this connection? Well, money, specifically in large quantity, allows for the freedom to do and have anything you want. And in simplest term, happiness can be thought of as life satisfaction and enjoyment. So wouldn’t it make sense that the ability to do everything you desire, result in greater satisfaction with your life.
"For many people happiness is a pleasure, but life, wasted for pleasure, is a slavish life worthy of an animal. For others, happiness is honors, glory. However, glory is external, depending on appropriations and recognition. For someone, happiness is the multiplication of wealth, and there is one of the most absurd purposes – life, which is contradicted to nature, because the wealth is a means for something else, and as a goal does not make sense" .