Owen J. Flanagan
Autor(a) de The Problem of the Soul: Two Visions of Mind and How to Reconcile Them
About the Author
Owen Flanagan is James B. Duke Professor of Philosophy, and Co-Director of the Center for Comparative Philosophy, Duke University.
Obras por Owen J. Flanagan
Neuroexistentialism: Meaning, Morals, and Purpose in the Age of Neuroscience (2017) — Editor — 20 exemplares
How to Do Things with Emotions: The Morality of Anger and Shame across Cultures (2021) 12 exemplares
Moral sprouts and natural teleologies : 21st century moral psychology meets classical Chinese philosophy (2014) 6 exemplares
Associated Works
How to Live a Good Life: A Guide to Choosing Your Personal Philosophy (2020) — Contribuidor — 111 exemplares
Blues - Philosophy for Everyone: Thinking Deep About Feeling Low (2011) — Contribuidor — 16 exemplares
What Happened in and to Moral Philosophy in the Twentieth Century?: Philosophical Essays in Honor of Alasdair MacIntyre (2013) — Contribuidor — 11 exemplares
Etiquetado
Conhecimento Comum
- Data de nascimento
- 1949-01-30
- Sexo
- male
- Nacionalidade
- USA
- Educação
- Boston University (PhD, Philosophy, 1978)
Fordham University (BA, Philosophy, 1970) - Ocupações
- Professor of Philosophy, Duke University
- Organizações
- Society for Philosophy and Psychology
Center for Comparative Philosophy
Membros
Críticas
Prémios
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Estatísticas
- Obras
- 17
- Also by
- 5
- Membros
- 1,198
- Popularidade
- #21,436
- Avaliação
- 3.6
- Críticas
- 14
- ISBN
- 72
- Línguas
- 1
- Marcado como favorito
- 2
First of all, the happiness agenda is a movement that places happiness as the supreme and most important goal in life. Yes, that is a slight simplification but not a misrepresentation. This volume is addressing the current version of this way of thinking, but the concept is not new.
The writers aren't claiming that happiness is not a worthwhile goal, just not THE worthwhile goal. It can be a part of a good life, probably a part of everyone's idea of what a good life, for them, would be. I'm not going to try to paraphrase every argument against the happiness agenda, the writers in the book do a much better job than either I or any other reviewer I've seen could do, and I just don't get off on writing just to make this long appear, well, whatever it appears.
Basically, happiness is not the same from person to person, let alone from culture to culture, so having a universal and objective measurement is impossible. This speaks to both various definitions and understandings of what it is. It also speaks to how some cultures explicitly place happiness, particularly individualistic happiness, well below other important and virtuous goals or states of being.
Measurement is another problem as well. Kinda like when a healthcare professional asks you to rate your pain on a scale from one to ten. My five may be your three or your seven. Or I may answer higher or lower based on what I want the person to do. Same idea with self-determined assessments of happiness.
In some ways, I think of happiness as a less harmful version of the popularized positive mental attitude (PMA) craze. Having a PMA certainly can help one achieve one's goals, but overemphasizing it can lead people to think that it alone leads to success. To paraphrase Napoleon Hill: whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe it can achieve. If one conceives and believes, then works toward achieving it, then it can be achieved. But many just take the basic phrase as the entire guide to success. The happiness agenda does something similar with happiness. Happiness equals good life.
Because the happiness agenda people are working to have policy focus on it, everyone needs to be aware of where these ideas fall short. So I would recommend this to anyone who cares about society as a whole. If self-reported happiness can influence policy to a large degree, then many social justice issues could be trampled because those who hold the power can both define happiness for their purposes then enact policy to maintain their own entitlements, which would equal their own happiness, which would keep many people in poverty, with limited or nonexistent rights. This ain't a solid gold movement, more like gold-plated.
Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.… (mais)