What is it, how can we best pursue it, why should we? Supporting the study of these and related questions at Middle Tennessee State University and beyond. PHIL 3160 – Philosophy of Happiness - "Examining the concept of human happiness and its application in everyday living as discussed since antiquity by philosophers, psychologists, writers, spiritual leaders, and contributors to pop culture."
Jonathan Haidt's latest book, The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure By Greg Lukianoff, Jonathan Haidt
The Haidt lecture was like being at at TED talk live. The facility at Lipscomb is brand new and beautiful. The large auditorium was filled; the hosts were gratuitous, the vegetable-infused water refreshing. I thoroughly enjoyed the evening, but for me, in the end, it was kind of like Chinese food - enjoyable while eating, but still hungry after. He did not talk about his new book, but about moral foundations theory and the need for us to all learn to talk to - and listen to - each other if we are to preserve our democracy. So if you'd read his book a couple of times and watched his TED talks, there was not much new. The one thing new to me was his discussion of James Madison's Federalist Paper #10 (a really excellent piece which I'd never read till now) and how Madison's concept of how injurious factions in society will be controlled has been rendered ineffective by social media. He seemed really pessimistic about our ability to come together. He was very aware that he was at the heart of the Church of Christ in the bible belt, and was warmly received when he introduced himself as a Jew and non-believer, and later an atheist. He stressed the importance of religion historically in creating cooperative communities. One of my favorite moments was in a discussion at the end when he was discussing the fact that most of us are wrong about things most of the time, and we just don't know it. We only feel bad when we discover we are wrong. He stressed the need for humility when we try to understand the "others." Then he asked the Church of Christ lady what they were doing to educate their flock about humility, and her answer had about as much coherence as a Trump apologist. He wouldn't accept it as an answer. She then asked "what about forgiveness?" He politely gave some non-responsive response. I may be wrong, but I saw the interchange as highlighting just what he was trying to say, and that she had missed the point. The point being that if we want to heal our divisions we need to appreciate that we are often wrong in our thinking and we need to be humble about our own views and open to others we seemingly disagree with. She seemed to be suggesting that we need to forgive others for their wrongness in disagreeing with our righteous minds.
What a world it would be, if most of us accepted that "most of us are wrong about things most of the time"!
"Father forgive us for what we must do You forgive us and we'll forgive you We'll forgive each other 'til we both turn blue And we'll whistle and go fishing in the heavens" -John Prine
The Haidt lecture was like being at at TED talk live. The facility at Lipscomb is brand new and beautiful. The large auditorium was filled; the hosts were gratuitous, the vegetable-infused water refreshing. I thoroughly enjoyed the evening, but for me, in the end, it was kind of like Chinese food - enjoyable while eating, but still hungry after. He did not talk about his new book, but about moral foundations theory and the need for us to all learn to talk to - and listen to - each other if we are to preserve our democracy. So if you'd read his book a couple of times and watched his TED talks, there was not much new. The one thing new to me was his discussion of James Madison's Federalist Paper #10 (a really excellent piece which I'd never read till now) and how Madison's concept of how injurious factions in society will be controlled has been rendered ineffective by social media. He seemed really pessimistic about our ability to come together. He was very aware that he was at the heart of the Church of Christ in the bible belt, and was warmly received when he introduced himself as a Jew and non-believer, and later an atheist. He stressed the importance of religion historically in creating cooperative communities. One of my favorite moments was in a discussion at the end when he was discussing the fact that most of us are wrong about things most of the time, and we just don't know it. We only feel bad when we discover we are wrong. He stressed the need for humility when we try to understand the "others." Then he asked the Church of Christ lady what they were doing to educate their flock about humility, and her answer had about as much coherence as a Trump apologist. He wouldn't accept it as an answer. She then asked "what about forgiveness?" He politely gave some non-responsive response. I may be wrong, but I saw the interchange as highlighting just what he was trying to say, and that she had missed the point. The point being that if we want to heal our divisions we need to appreciate that we are often wrong in our thinking and we need to be humble about our own views and open to others we seemingly disagree with. She seemed to be suggesting that we need to forgive others for their wrongness in disagreeing with our righteous minds.
ReplyDeleteWhat a world it would be, if most of us accepted that "most of us are wrong about things most of the time"!
ReplyDelete"Father forgive us for what we must do
You forgive us and we'll forgive you
We'll forgive each other 'til we both turn blue
And we'll whistle and go fishing in the heavens"
-John Prine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNuuBfWFYvQ