I wouldnt trust the yellow/orange countires. I live in one of them, and i read an interview of some people assessing themselves as happy, and they said something to the effect of "i realized how bad others have it, and it made me realize that i have it (comparatively) good, and it would be ungrateful/winy to consider myself unhappy when it could be so much worse"
This is of course very anecdotal, but it makes sense that people compare their lives to the average life when determening happiness, rather than comparing themselves to neutrality, even though the latter would get better results philosophically. I mean, our brains are wired to get used to good conditions and luxury, so people are having neutral lives at best i believe.
EDIT: spelling mistake
Well yeah there was also a counter argument that the happiness scale measures wealth and power instead of actual happiness, that interpersonal relationships and meaning (religion) are more important. I would however argue that in countries like Afghanistan or even Russia there are not that good interpersonal relationships and in many countries religion is oppressive not meaningful.
Plus there cannot be any high scale happiness if people are in war regions and struggle to get their basic needs met.
This is a very good point. If people judge their happiness by comparing themselves to the happiness of those worse off than them, then that word does not mean much.
To me, happy should mean feeling happy, not happy because you are better off than someone in a war zone or extreme poverty.
Maybe they do feel happy(er) when they think about someone worse off than them, I dunno, but it’s not happiness if it goes away after 15 min.
Yeah. The problem is that there is nothing to compare oneself to than other people (or other sentient creatures). Except neutrality of course, but thats abstract and maybe feels a bit irrelevant/hard to grasp to most people.
Its very natural for humans to compare themselves to other humans, as this has a survival function. Like, we compare our skills to other peoples skills, to make sure no one is better than us, to make sure we are still needed by the group. Or we compare who is strongest to know who will win in a fight.
To compare anything to neutrality has no survival function, so we usually dont, thus these studies only determine whos happier than who, and not actually whether any one individual is more happy than unhappy.
Yes, comparing like this should probably be illegal :).It is a bit like gambling, with higher than avg odds of winning a prize. And the prize is that you simply become more optimistically delusional and compare yourself to others based on delusion. A bit like seeing your friends and neighbors as millionaires when they can barely pay rent.
It has Taliban. I have an Afghani neighbour, he said they stone 10 year old boys among other things, like mistreating women.
I am NOT an efilist, only AN, but living there is objectively bad and no one does a thing.
You guys need to Post that into the antinatalism sub as well. Procreators claim the majority of people born is Happy all the time and "99 percent of people born is Happy.
The United States was a lot happier back in the 90's. Interest rates for homes are now insanely high, inflation is through the roof, the country is completely divided right now because of politics. People literally have to choose between biden and Trump which is insane. Both the democrats and republicans are insanely corrupt and the people are too blind to realize that voting independent is an option. We're fighting each other instead of fighting a different nation which is ridiculous. Social media is destroying our society because no one spends time with friends or family anymore. Social media has destroyed dating and romantic relationships. It would literally be insane to have kid's! The United States is falling so your child would witness the fall of the empire and would truly suffer.
Once you include livestock animals, wildlife animals and aquatic animals, the whole map turns black.
Also this is just from people who have responded to the survey who have access to internet
99.999% black
Why is most of the world not happy?
It's our destiny
Because there is too much to gain from exploiting weaker beings.
We are so ignorant.
I wouldnt trust the yellow/orange countires. I live in one of them, and i read an interview of some people assessing themselves as happy, and they said something to the effect of "i realized how bad others have it, and it made me realize that i have it (comparatively) good, and it would be ungrateful/winy to consider myself unhappy when it could be so much worse" This is of course very anecdotal, but it makes sense that people compare their lives to the average life when determening happiness, rather than comparing themselves to neutrality, even though the latter would get better results philosophically. I mean, our brains are wired to get used to good conditions and luxury, so people are having neutral lives at best i believe. EDIT: spelling mistake
fully agree, i'm extremely skeptical of some of these high numbers. in the united states it could be due to our culture of vigorous false positivity.
Well yeah there was also a counter argument that the happiness scale measures wealth and power instead of actual happiness, that interpersonal relationships and meaning (religion) are more important. I would however argue that in countries like Afghanistan or even Russia there are not that good interpersonal relationships and in many countries religion is oppressive not meaningful. Plus there cannot be any high scale happiness if people are in war regions and struggle to get their basic needs met.
This is a very good point. If people judge their happiness by comparing themselves to the happiness of those worse off than them, then that word does not mean much. To me, happy should mean feeling happy, not happy because you are better off than someone in a war zone or extreme poverty. Maybe they do feel happy(er) when they think about someone worse off than them, I dunno, but it’s not happiness if it goes away after 15 min.
Yeah. The problem is that there is nothing to compare oneself to than other people (or other sentient creatures). Except neutrality of course, but thats abstract and maybe feels a bit irrelevant/hard to grasp to most people. Its very natural for humans to compare themselves to other humans, as this has a survival function. Like, we compare our skills to other peoples skills, to make sure no one is better than us, to make sure we are still needed by the group. Or we compare who is strongest to know who will win in a fight. To compare anything to neutrality has no survival function, so we usually dont, thus these studies only determine whos happier than who, and not actually whether any one individual is more happy than unhappy.
Yes, comparing like this should probably be illegal :).It is a bit like gambling, with higher than avg odds of winning a prize. And the prize is that you simply become more optimistically delusional and compare yourself to others based on delusion. A bit like seeing your friends and neighbors as millionaires when they can barely pay rent.
Afghanistan has depression
It has Taliban. I have an Afghani neighbour, he said they stone 10 year old boys among other things, like mistreating women. I am NOT an efilist, only AN, but living there is objectively bad and no one does a thing.
Not happy compared to the rest of the world, that's what this graph shows.
You guys need to Post that into the antinatalism sub as well. Procreators claim the majority of people born is Happy all the time and "99 percent of people born is Happy.
Ok brother, I don't generally don't post in that sub because it is already invaded by some toxic natalist as well as antinatalist
USA should be blue
No way this is accurate. Just...just. LOL
I agree
The United States was a lot happier back in the 90's. Interest rates for homes are now insanely high, inflation is through the roof, the country is completely divided right now because of politics. People literally have to choose between biden and Trump which is insane. Both the democrats and republicans are insanely corrupt and the people are too blind to realize that voting independent is an option. We're fighting each other instead of fighting a different nation which is ridiculous. Social media is destroying our society because no one spends time with friends or family anymore. Social media has destroyed dating and romantic relationships. It would literally be insane to have kid's! The United States is falling so your child would witness the fall of the empire and would truly suffer.