Understanding happiness (Murphy's Nemesis)

The subject of happiness is one that has received a lot of research attention over the past few years, and many of these ground breaking discoveries have been covered right here on Tripping to Reality. Whereas science and research usually try to keep away for subjects that cannot be scientifically defined, surveys have shown that the level of happiness as measured across a wide range of variables has stayed pretty miserable ever since we started measuring it.


The fact that global happiness is is showing such very unsportsmanlike behaviour in an age where technology is finally able to deliver the much advertised benefits of more free time, less hard labor and a general improvement in living conditions, all of them considered to increase our levels of happiness considerably, is probably one of the big factors driving the high level of interest, but it is by no means the only one.

While many people believe that happiness is as easy to find as winning the lottery, experience has shown that happiness is notoriously elusive. So much so that until recently, the only tried and tested way of ensuring happiness was in secular or monastic pursuits, but the usual entry condition that you must give away most of the stuff that you find of value to a charitable cause is not something that has inspired crowds to sign up. The whole idea of attaining happiness though discipline, frugality, meditation, chastity and eternal poverty is not a very tantalizing journey.

Most people argue that such living conditions only work for the zealots who become so pathetic or complacent in this lifestyle of sacrifice that they adopt the role of the one eyed monster in the land of the blind. A good ploy, and guaranteed to lead to some happiness perks, but not nearly the happiness you would expect considering how much you have to sacrifice.

So far, so good, but after all of that we still do not have a formula to take or a pill to drink that is beneficial and work without side effects. Fortunately the scientists observed our pathetic attempts to make a happy life, and with the aid of the latest in technology they started a meticulous investigation, that up to now may not have provided us with the happiness elixir, but quite a good collection of strategies that are almost guaranteed to get you happier at least.

A recent article by the little dumb man actually provide an excellent overview of all these discoveries, and ends by breaking down the various components that make up the happiness of the avarage man in the street. According to Dumb Little Man our total happiness coefficient is made up of roughly 50 percent as a set point determined by our genes, 10 percent by life circumstances—our marital status, our jobs, where we live, and so on--, and the remaining 40 percent by what we do and how we think. That is, 40% of our happiness is determined by our intentional activities and strategies.

A quick calculation of your own spurious success stories will reveal pretty much the same percentages, but even though every single one of us believe that happiness is primarily the result of our environment, the actual influence is a meager 10%! Once again the human ability to make informed decisions prove to be less than helpful.

Lets face it, as a collective we are terrible at calculating odds, and even though history abounds with the failures that result from such calculations, the majority of the decisions that we make is still based on trying to weigh the odds.

I think some of the hesitance to put to practice these easy happiness boosters is that we have given up on ever finding it, and besides, we know that things like meditation work, but its not as easy to do as you were made to believe. And take for instance the old adage count your blessings. That one is so old it has become part of legend and lore and fairy tales, and it doesn't really fit in to a reality that must balance the pressing matters of survival of the fittest, keeping up with the Johns-es, peer pressure and breadline income.

Truth is, most people come up with a dozen or so excuses why they wouldn't give any of the solutions the time of day, and then turn around mumbling about how hard, and how pointless, and how frustrating their lives are.

It behooves me to witness such a large scale of self inflicted misery, but my previous efforts to get friends and family involved in increasing their happiness has resulted in rebound apathy and woe of yet another failure.

Anybody want to help me establish a "Happy Farm", please e-mail me asap.

The conscience of criminals?

It seems that some of the most recent research findings promise much more than improvement of brain function alone, although some people would argue that lying is a skill just like any other.

A recent article in the RD Blog that report on psychology research states:

The researchers can't be sure, but stated crudely, one possibility is that the stimulation puts the conscience to sleep, freeing the mind to lie without the usual inconvenience of moral conflict.

All of which may be cause of alarm for those who think that having a conscience in the first place is a good thing, but didn't I read somewhere that criminals didn't have any?

Right handedness and survival

The whole issue of handedness has always interested me, perhaps because I am lefthanded. The findings of a recent article combine a large number of studies and propose that handedness is a common occurance in various species.

A recent article in Science Daily explore the issue of handedness and conclude that right handedness provide animals the ability to multitask specific feeding activities with predator monitoring. Chicks who have developed in the dark lose this brain lateralising behaviour and are quite good at picking seeds from pebbles until they have to monitor for predators. Then they do a poor job of both.

Non-racial global distribution patterns

I have recently been reminded that the global distribution of domesticated animals during the time of the Spanish Conquistadors was responsible for the presence of smallpox among their invasion of the America's. It made me look up the global distribution of blood groups, and the following information:

Modern Human Variation: Distribution of Blood Types

The majority of the people in the world have the Rh+ blood type. However, it is more common in some regions. Native Americans and Australian Aborigines were very likely 100% Rh+ before they began interbreeding with people from other parts of the world. This does not imply that Native Americans and Australian Aborigines are historically closely related to each other. Most African populations are around 75% Rh+. Europeans have the lowest frequency of this blood type for any continent. They are 60% Rh+. The lowest known frequency is found among the Basques of the Pyrenees Mountains between France and Spain. They are only 47% Rh+.

Strange gene switching patterns in cocaine users

In an article by TIME, scientists studying the effect of cocaine on epigenisis:

"Though we think about our genes mostly in terms of the traits we pass on to our children, they are actually very active in our lives every day, regulating how various cells in our bodies behave. In the brain this can be especially powerful. Any significant experience triggers changes in brain genes that produce proteins — those necessary to help memories form, for example. But, says the study's lead author, Ian Maze, a doctoral student at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, 'when you give an animal a single dose of cocaine, you start to have genes aberrantly turn on and off in a strange pattern that we are still trying to figure out.'"

Which confirms previous fears that even a single line could change your life forever, or at the very least expose your brain to a virtually foreign protein diet!

Putting pi in a different perspective

Perspective is a wonderful thing.

It makes us aware of new possibilities.

Whats up with that?

Whats up with that?: "If there is a single observation that seem to remain a popular feature of the change associated with growth and development it would probably have to do something with popular belief. It never cease to amaze me how often popular belief contain some of the most recent scientific discoveries as part and parcel of allegory, myth and mysticism, or how wrong popular belief can sometimes be.

Take for instance the saying, "Happy people are short sighted." Not only is it true that happy people are like that, but it is true in reality. Grumpy people are better at observing the distant features, and their logical thinking ability is better than their happy counterparts. But then I suppose we have to remember that happiness is what happiness does, and the whole business of business does not really feature in the happy world, which for some or another lack of reason seem to bother those that are grumpy. And lack of reason would be a perfect description of happiness, which provide the perfect reason not to be. Because it is.

And now science can prove it!

Contrary to popular belief...

If there is a single observation that seem to remain a popular feature of the change associated with growth and development it would probably have to do something with popular belief. It never cease to amaze me how often popular belief contain some of the most recent scientific discoveries as part and parcel of allegory, myth and mysticism, or how wrong popular belief can sometimes be. Take for instance our recently discovered knowledge with regard to awareness.


Over the past few years we have discovered some amazing new facts about how our minds synthesize reality from the sensory information that it receives from the brain. I have previously written various articles that focus on how sensory information is utilised to establish patterns, and how the brain then switches to auto-pilot. This allows the brain to free a substantial amount of processing power, with sensory input being limited to the detection of unexpected events.


In a report on Auditory illusion: How our brains can fill in the gaps to create continuous sound, Science Daily discusses research that propose our auditory sensory system have a similar ability that allow us to reconstruct fragmented sounds in to a coherent stream of information, all in aid of achieving a representation of reality that make sense. According to Science daily: "It is relatively common for listeners to 'hear' sounds that are not really there. In fact, it is the brain's ability to reconstruct fragmented sounds that allows us to successfully carry on a conversation in a noisy room."


Not only does it confirm something that we have observed with visual sensory information, but the research go further to help explain what happens in the brain that allows us to perceive a physically interrupted sound as being continuous. The research, published by Cell Press in the November 25 issue of Neuron provides fascinating insight into the constructive nature of human hearing, and could provide us with clues as to how our visual sense is translated to awareness.


It would seem that we are slowly but surely starting to make sense of our senses, and with that we are starting to understand how we make sense of the world around us.

Do the feathers make the bird?

Not if you listen to the song….