Generously happy

Thassadit Amzwar  "seems immune to anxiety. Her positive energy is amazing. She maintains a continuous state of flow." She seems happy, really happy. But can you be too happy? Is she sick or weird, hyperthymic or hypomanic? Can we get whatever she's got, in a pill or procedure? Should we want to?

We're reading Richard Powers because Generosity strikes yours truly as raising some of the most profoundly meaningful questions we face: questions about the very possibility of meaningful human experience as we move forward into our increasingly engineered, digitized, hive-minded, televised, entertained future, questions about our own authorship of the meanings of our lives, questions about fact and fiction and (sci-) fiction becoming fact. Will our successors even know what we meant by "happiness," let alone how to pursue it effectively?

May I suggest that anyone who's having trouble with the relative density of this novel might consider giving a tandem listen to the excellent audio version available at audible.com...

I've been urging everyone to get started reading Generosity all semester, in anticipation of the time of reckoning to come near semester's end when presumably you'd not want to have postponed the whole thing. Well, here we are. Looking forward to seeing everyone's posted thoughts. 

For those who've not heeded the call, here (for what it's worth) is a small CHEAT SHEET and (ironically) Oprah's guide... my goodreads review... more reviews... "What will happen to life when science identifies the genetic basis of happiness?" Or will it?

Carry the book (or audio recording) with you over Thanksgiving, it just might be your salvation. It might give you something more interesting and constructive to talk about than the Dallas Cowboys or your cousin's reactionary/paranoid politics.

One of my favorite early moments in Richard Powers' Generosity: An Enhancement  comes when the preternaturally, transcendentally happy young Algerian woman Thassadit Amzwar (whose name means "liver") disputes conservative icon Milton Friedman's famous declaration that "there's no free lunch." He was talking market-based economics, her purview is wider:

"My father was an engineer. He always liked the English expression: There's no free lunch. That's crazy! There is only free lunch. We should all be nothing but clouds of frozen dust. This is what science says. All lunch is free. My father was a scientist, but he never understood this one simple scientific fact, poor man."

In the existential economics of personal well-being, Thassa is saying, Richard Dawkins is right: we're lucky to be here. Existence, even the hardest of lives, is a gift. A bonus. And it's over in a flash. We should be happy. Shouldn't we? If we're not, isn't there something wrong with us?

Generosity, luck, & lunch@dawn

P.S. Thanks to our classmate Jon, aka the "Incoherent Rambler" & "Part-time Cynic," for inviting me to share his air yesterday. Happy to do it!