'Happiness & Money' - Interesting Site

Saturday January 11, 2003 11:26

by Anonymous - Left Wing / Humanitarian

http://homepage.tinet.ie/~earrings/happiness.html An interesting site giving a brief study/collection on the relationship between happiness and money, and the resulting consequence this has for the ideal formation of society.

Some extractions:-

"GNP measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to country. It measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile." Robert F Kennedy ...

Article by David Korten

Sample "The problem is this: a predatory global financial system, driven by the single imperative of making ever more money for those who already have lots of it, is rapidly depleting the real capital - the human, social, natural, and even physical capital on which our well-being depends. The truly troubling part is that so many of us have become willing accomplices to what is best described as a war of money against life."

"...the truth is that market fundamentalism is itself naive and illogical. Even if we put aside the bigger moral and ethical questions and concentrate solely on the economic arena, the ideology of market fundamentalism is profoundly and irredeemably flawed. To put the matter simply, market forces, if they are given complete authority even in the purely economic and financial arenas, produce chaos and could ultimately lead to the downfall of the global capitalist system." George Soros (1998) (Yes, THAT George Soros !)

"Chinese economist Yew-Kwang Ng argues that once the basics of life are provided for, further consumption can actually make us worse off. 'Our ways to increase happiness further then take on the largely competitive forms, like attempting to keep up with the Joneses,' he says. 'From a social viewpoint, such competition is pure waste. On top of this, production and consumption to sustain the competition continue to impose substantial environmental costs, making economic growth quite possibly happiness-decreasing.'"....full article
more

"The bottom line is this. For a person, the evidence is that money does buy happiness (though not very much). For a society that is already rich, it may not.

"One day this sort of evidence will revolutionise government policy in the western democracies. It is my firm belief that surveys of happiness and well-being are here to stay."

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Comments (7 of 7)

studies of happiness began in 1952.

by iosaf - el dinero gratis.

Sat Jan 11, 2003 16:27

barcelona

with the identification of Seratonin as the hormone that causes feelings of well being and happyness.
Aldous Huxley in his 1962 essay "Brave New World" revisted pointed to seratonin as a possible future type of his "soma" envisioned in his dystopic novel.
Ecastasy and Prozac belong to the SSRI selective seratonin receptor inhibitor drug family.
there are also other variations.
Happyness is big patent money.
patents are immoral especially in healthcare which is why anarchists call for their abolition.

Drugs may make you feel happy but they won´t change the global destruction carried out by the same shareholders actions.

Money is stupid and nothing more than a computer game.
El Dinero Gratis clearly showed in 2001 in response to the scheduled World BAnk Meeting in Barcelona that money is stupid.
the World gross domestic product of 39.1 trillion dollars is lots of money.
but not all.
There is lots more unaccounted for.
Coke Herion Ecstasy money that is untaxed.
The cash for happyness or misery?

Ya Basta.
there is enough "money"to feed the poor.
treat the sick. ¿where is the 100million for AIDS?
open the borders.

They close your money be it $ or € behind borders that are immoral telling you the fortress protects you from the billion poor africans south americans and asians.

Just let them have enough to live on.
and your own neighbours.
and you will probably see they don´t want to come here because it´s shite anyway.

http://www.ecstasy.org
http://www.eldinerogratis.or
http://www.yomango.org
http://www.noborders.org
http://www.wombles.org

we are the enemies of capital
because
we are the friends of the poor.

Anthrax, Sarin, flu and the common cold
Aids war and death can cross their fortress borders.

Success in anything is through happiness

by Raymond McInerney

Sat Jan 11, 2003 16:33

Enjoy your life and be happy. Being happy is of the utmost importance. Success in anything is through happiness. More support of nature comes from being happy. Under all circumstances be happy, even if you have to force it a bit to change some long standing habits.
Just think of any negativity that comes at you as a raindrop falling into the ocean of your bliss. You may not always have an ocean of bliss, but think that way anyway and it will help it come. Doubting is not blissful and does not create happiness. Be happy, healthy and let all that love flow through your heart.

Happiness radiates like.

Sat Jan 11, 2003 16:36

the fragrance from a flower, and draws all good things toward you. Allow your love to nourish yourself as well as others. Do not strain after the needs of life. It is sufficient to be quietly alert and aware of them. In this way life proceeds more naturally and effortlessly. Life is here to Enjoy!

In the words of Bill Hicks

Sat Jan 11, 2003 16:38

"You know all that money we spend on the military ever year - trillions of dollars? Instead, if we use this money to feed and clothe the poor of this world, which it would do many times over, then we can explore space, inner and outer, together, as one race."

Wealth

Sat Jan 11, 2003 16:48

Look at me--I am poor and naked, but I am the chief of the nation. We do not want riches, but we do want to train our children right.... We do not want riches. We want peace and love."
-- Red Cloud, Sioux tribe

indeed Raymond.

by iosaf

Sat Jan 11, 2003 19:29

and many anarchist collectives have found that happyness is best encourged by co-operative activity.
IF you actually got rid of your cars stopped your materialism and had to talk to your newighbours again for a cup of sugar, if you had vegatables growing on your streets and parks you might just feel happier.
But don´t take the lunatic fringe´s word for it.
look at the figures from the World Health Organisation for Hungary before capitalism and after.
The "healthiest population became in two years the unhealthiest. Not becuase losing centralised state communism makes you sick, no losing the sense of being alike and communal.
Examine troops of animals like chimpanzees.
just like you. 99.99%of genes.
They are happy when allowed to be social tribal animals collectively working, add "civilised" authority structures and their seratonin levels drop. unhappy little monkeys.
Do you think Bertie leader of the Irish oligarchy is any happier than the poorest Irish citizen?
Do you think the 500 billionaires who own over 75% of the planet´s resources can get any happier?
no they can´t.
But they can make us a lot unhappier.
Older readers will perhaps know what is meant by that. IN london many older cockneys remembered the excellent health noted during the War period, when they were engaged in collective food production and recycling activity.
Now we anarchists don´t suggest primitive luddite turning the clock back. No.
But ;-) we know that adopting the wisdom of our genetically designed natures often present in the past will with our present technology and scientific advances afford a happier and more prosperous world for all.
NOt just the 500 billionaires.
not just Bertie and his pals.
all of us.
all six and half billion of us.
and the strangest thing is it will be fun.

water and oil

by David Arthur Johnston - you

Sun Jan 12, 2003 00:29

Hatrackman at Yahoo dot com

the only good that comes from money is that we can know we don't need it.

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'Happiness & Money' - Interesting Site

Comments (7 of 7)