Let us examine the question of future happiness. Fifty years from
now, are people likely to be more happy than they are now, or less
happy?
One rather naïve idea is that people will be much happier in a few decades, because
they will have more material goods. Some will list a series of cool
gadgets that people will have in the future, and suggest that people
will be happier because they will have all of these hi-tech wonders.
However, while material goods may make life easier or more
pleasurable, material comforts seem to have surprisingly little
effect on the happiness level of human beings.
Richard A. Easterlin wrote a paper entitled “Will Raising theIncome of All Increase the Happiness of All?” Citing numerous
surveys in different countries, Easterlin concludes that increasing
the income of all does not increase the general happiness level.
Easterlin points out, for example, that between 1958 and 1987 real
per-capita income in Japan multiplied five-fold, and most Japanese
acquired a host of consumer goods such as television for the first
time. However, during this period the happiness level of the
Japanese did not increase, judging from surveys in which people were
asked how happy they are. Similar results have been found for
Western Europe. During a post-war period in which income rose very
sharply, the percentage of people who identified themselves as “very
happy” did not significantly increase.
There are various possible explanations for these findings. One is
that many people currently judge their own well-being in relation to
what their friends have; and if everyone's income goes up, an
individual won't necessarily regard himself as being better off. The
same type of person who may have felt unhappy in 1950 because he
didn't have a color television set may be unhappy in 2030 because he
doesn't have the latest virtual reality goggles. Others say that
longing for (and struggling to get) the latest consumer goods is a
kind of unending “hedonic treadmill” which doesn't really get you
anywhere in terms of increased happiness.
If this is the case, it may have an upside in relation to future
happiness: if resource depletion or environmental problems or
economic problems cause our national GDP to decrease in the future,
and the average personal income of a US citizen decreases, it may
have relatively little negative effect on our happiness. If getting
all that shiny new stuff really didn't make us much happier, then we
won't get significantly unhappier if we have less of that shiny new
stuff in the future.
But what type of future developments might have a large positive
effect on our happiness? I can think of two general things: (1)
automation advances that give us much more time for social,
intellectual, and spiritual pursuits; (2) drugs, genetic tweaks or
brain enhancements that might produce an elevation in human mood or
an increase in the human ability to appreciate and enjoy that which
is good, sublime, or beautiful.
More Happiness
Through Less Work?
Currently there is some evidence that being unemployed can make you
unhappy, but that is to be expected in a society in which most have
to work to pay the rent. But let us imagine a future age that is
enjoying the fruits of robotic automation, so that most people do not
need to work more than 20 or 30 hours a week. Imagine the same
society had adjusted to such a situation, so that people thought it
was good and natural to be spending a lot more of their lives doing
what makes them happy rather than doing what makes some corporation
happy. In such a society there would be much more time for people to
enjoy great books, enjoy spiritual pursuits, socialize with friends,
follow intellectual interests, enjoy hobbies, and do other things
that tend to have a higher effect on happiness than the materialistic
pursuit to acquire the latest shiny consumer goods. That could well
lead to a significant increase in human happiness.
Chemical,
Electronic, or Genetic Shortcuts to Happiness?
David
Pearce is a rather interesting philosopher who has posted the online
book-length manifesto The Hedonistic Imperative. This work is
summarized as follows by the wikipedia article on Pearce:
“His
book-length internet manifesto The Hedonistic Imperative outlines how
technologies such as genetic engineering, nanotechnology,
pharmacology, and neurosurgery could potentially converge to eliminate
all forms of unpleasant experience among human and non-human animals, replacing
suffering with gradients of well-being, a project he refers to as
paradise engineering."
I
find parts of this manifesto to be utopian, impractical and
overblown, particularly when Pearce speaks in grandiose terms about
the abolition of "all suffering in sentient life.” But there
are some fascinating technical proposals in this work which may be
very achievable, and which could have a very significant beneficial
effect on human happiness.
Pearce notes that a person's mood is a function of brain chemicals
such as serotonin. He imagines how we might make genetic tweaks that
result in elevated levels of brain chemicals that are the key to good
mood, as well as esthetic enjoyment and appreciation.
He imagines the birth of future children who are genetically
engineered to be happier. This idea may make sense. When we think of
parents consulting with a genetic engineer who might enhance their
offspring, we usually think of people concentrating on having a child
who is stronger or smarter or more beautiful. But wouldn't the best
genetic enhancement be one that resulted in a happier child?
Pearce imagines genetically engineered humans with a heightened sense
of wonder and appreciation. As the poet Wordsworth lamented, children
feel a sense of wonder of nature that they may lose as adults:
What though the radiance which was once so bright Be now for ever taken from my sight, Though nothing can bring back the hour Of splendour in the grass, Of glory in the flower
But what if there was a genetic tweak we could make (or a pill we
could take without side-effects) so that every person felt a kind of
hyper-enjoyment at all that is good and beautiful, which would not
diminish as we age? That might be the ticket to a far, far happier
human race.
Compare two different approaches. If we move heaven and earth to give
billions of more people a lot more big shiny things for them to own
and treasure, we might end up trashing the planet. But if we were to
make a genetic tweak to make a future generation feel happier than
today's Powerball winner just by looking at the stars and the clouds
and the trees and the grass and the flowers, that would have no
environmental cost, and might result in even more human happiness.
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