More Aristotle

Aristotle must be in the air:

Initial results with the interventions have been promising, but sustaining them is tough. Months after a study is over, the people who have stopped the exercises show a drop in happiness. Like a drug or a diet, the exercises work only if you stick with them. Instilling habits is crucial. Another key: "fit," or how well the exercise matches the person. If sitting down to imagine your best possible self (an optimism exercise) feels contrived, you will be less likely to do it.

The biggest factor may be getting over the idea that happiness is fixed--and realizing that sustained effort can boost it. "A lot of people don't apply the notion of effort to their emotional lives," Lyubomirsky declares, "but the effort it takes is enormous."

Read the rest here.

Finally.

It took awhile, but perhaps the world is finally ready for Aristotle (again):

Biologists argue that these and other social behaviors are the precursors of human morality. They further believe that if morality grew out of behavioral rules shaped by evolution, it is for biologists, not philosophers or theologians, to say what these rules are.

Scientists have already taken the useful parts of metaphysics, the brain, and epistemology. It was only a matter of time before ethics was snatched up. Read the rest here.

What's a philosopher to do these days?
Seriously.

Philosophy Phun: Friendship

Friendship is not a concept that most philosophers spend a lot of time writing about. It's not very surprising when you consider that the typical philosopher spends most of his (or her!) time sitting alone thinking about the world, while knowing he's smarter than everyone else. So who has time for friends?

When I was a wee little philosopher in high school, one of my first philosophical thoughts had to do with friendship. It was at the same time I took my first philosophy class that I had started to develop my first real and true friendships with a few high school chums (including the lovely Fair White). When I took my first philosophy class everything seemed new again and it gave me the opportunity to reexamine my relationship to the world. Now that probably sounds a bit highfalutin, but it really did change the way I looked at things.

So what was the thought I had about friendship? It struck me in high school that the majority of friendships I had were nothing more than hangout buddies--or as I learned much later, Aristotle referred to them as friendships based on utility or friendships based on pleasure. Everyone has these types of friendships and, in fact, most friendships will fall into one of those two categories. I realized that all of those relationships were lacking something--and that something was tension. It becomes clearer if you think of friends as two poles of a dialectic (A dialectic is comprised of: a thesis, an antithesis which negates the thesis, and the tension between the two being resolved by means of a synthesis).

Think of A as friend 1, B as friend 2 and C as the resulting friendship. The synthesis is only possible if A and B pull on one another (tension) to make the relationship taught.

So what does this all mean? My point is that the goal of every friendship should be to improve the other. Too many people settle for boring friends or find friends that are too selfish. Friends need to push one another or as Aristotle puts it, "wish good to each other for each other’s own sake". The friendship cannot be one-sided. So, for example, if you were in a friendship with someone because they were older or cooler, that would not be a friendship that makes you a better person--it would be a utility friendship because it is one-sided. You must act both for your own sake and for the sake of your friend and in that way you will both become better people.

Keep those relationships taught.

Philosophy Phun: Knight of Faith

Knight of Faith--

Soren Kierkegaard is an anti-philosopher. How is he an anti-philosopher?

• He's good looking
• Does not write in the traditional style and by that I mean he stresses experiential evidence and anecdotes
• Logic and reason are present, but not essential
• Did I mention he's good looking?

One of Kierkegaard's most interesting concepts is his knight of faith. Kierkegaard believes that there are 3 main levels of existence: the Aesthetic (slaves), the Ethical (Knights of Infinite Resignation), and the Religious (Knights of Faith). To illustrate the differences Kierkegaard tells a little love story (of course!):

A young lad falls in love with a princess, the content of his whole life lies in this love, and yet the relationships is one that cannot possibly be brought to fruition, be translated from ideality to reality.

I should mention that Soren had a great love with a woman named Regina and they were engaged to be married. Shortly after the engagement, though they were still deeply in love, Soren broke it off on account of melancholy. She ended up marrying someone else and they never saw each other again, but Soren and Regina remained in love with one another. So now I'll give a quick rundown of how each level of existence deals with this love story.

Aesthetic/Slaves (or, as Kierkegaard calls them: "the frogs in life's swamp") - Kierkegaard gives their response as, "'such love is foolishness; the rich brewer's widow is just as good and sound a match'". He then adds: "Let them croak away undisturbed in their swamp". I'm pretty sure he's referring to the basic plot of every hip-hop video.

Knight of Infinite Resignation (KIR) - The KIR "does not renounce the love...he first makes sure that this really is the content of his life". He continues (sorry for the long quotes, it's just too beautiful):

Having thus imbibed all the love and absorbed himself in it, he does not lack the courage to attempt and risk everything. He reflects over his life's circumstances, he summons the swift thoughts that like trained doves obey his every signal, he waves his rod over them, and they rush off in all directions. But now when they all return as messengers of sorrow and explain to him that it is an impossibility, he becomes quiet, he dismisses them, he remains alone, and he performs the movement.

His love for her has become the substance of his life and the substance has filled him entirely. He knows that it is impossible for the love to be fully realized and it's at this point that he makes "the movement". This movement is the movement of infinite resignation and all that means is that he infinitely renounces her love and reconciles himself with that pain. He does not let her go completely, however, but instead holds on to her memory--a memory that is independent and unaffected by the real live girl. And in this way "he keeps this love young and it grows with him in years and beauty". The finite, temporal girl has been replaced by the infinite.

Knight of Faith (KoF) - The KoF follows the same trajectory up to the reconciling of pain, but then makes one more movement: the movement of faith (also referred to as a leap of faith). This movement is different from the movement of infinite resignation in that it is completely personal--it is only understandable to the person making the movement because it is beyond reason and understanding. The KoF says: "Nevertheless I have faith that I will get her--that is, by virtue of the absurd, by virtue of the fact that for God all things are possible." The KoF knows that the love is an impossibility, but he has faith that it will happen anyway. Or as Kierkegaard puts it:

By my own strength I can give up the princess, and I shall be no sulker but find joy and peace and repose in my pain, but with my own strength I cannot get her back again, for all that strength is precisely what I use to renounce my claim on her. But by faith, says that marvellous knight, by faith you will get her on the strength of the absurd.

That quotation has a footnote that reads: 'If I had had faith I would have stayed with Regina'.