Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why aren't smart people happier?

experimentalhistory.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 515 posts

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#201

Post by em-bee »

wonderwonder wrote: post #160
Apreche wrote: post #40

The smarter people see the truth of the world and the universe. If the truth was good, that we lived in a wonderful society with wonderful people in a universe that cares about us, smart people would be so happy. But being smart just means you know the awful reality of things. Congrats, you learned about all these awful things you can’t do much to fix, and the reward is you get to experience existential dread. Congra…

I very much disagree with this, just look at politics; everyone sees / imagines the "awful reality of things". Whenever the other side is in power the out of power side thinks everything is terrible and the world is ending. Even though objectively everything is pretty much the same. Objectively the world is only getting better over time. Generally the loudest people on each side screaming that its the end of all thin…

i am not sure if this makes sense, but when i read your comment i wondered if part of the difficulty of finding friends is that smart people find it difficult to associate with people who are not as smart as them or do not have the same interests as them, and thus the problem becomes one of selection.

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#202

Post by donkeyd »

lostmsu wrote: post #191
donkeyd wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> smarter people are better at answering all of the questions you listed Define 'better'. For example: > “How do I get my child to stop crying?” Lots of 'dumb' parents are very good at solving this question, they give the kid what they want and put them in front of the TV or give them a bunch of candy. Smart parents might overthink the question, read a book on parenting, try a naughty chair, fail and get stressed. Th…

There's no indication that smart parents don't get their child to cry less than dumb parents either shorter or longer term, so the entire argument is baseless.

How about an indication of the opposite? Since you stated that smart people "are better at answering all of the questions you listed".

You seem to have completely missed the point of my comment though, which is that the questions are not well-defined and therefore it's not obvious what 'the better answer' is.

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#203

Post by 4ggr0 »

ben_w wrote: post #176

"Happy" and "intelligent" are just different axes. Being intelligent[0], I can see more solutions to my problems than most, but I can also see more problems that need solving. And I choose to work on the hardest problems I can manage. Dogs are not known for their intellect, and can be made incredibly happy just by the appearance of their favourite person (who may be a human or another dog). Anyone who expects dogs to…

> Being intelligent[0], I can see more solutions to my problems than most, but I can also see more problems that need solving. And I choose to work on the hardest problems I can manage.

So what description would fit me then: "I can see more solutions to my problems than most, but I can also see more problems that need solving. I still don't act on it lots of times."

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#204

Post by dasil003 »

Happiness has to do with brain chemistry and disposition. It has nothing to do with intelligence or problem solving. Achieving goals and rewards gives a dopamine hit but it doesn’t produce happiness in any lasting sense.

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#205

Post by lostmsu »

donkeyd wrote: post #202
lostmsu wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no indication that smart parents don't get their child to cry less than dumb parents either shorter or longer term, so the entire argument is baseless.

How about an indication of the opposite? Since you stated that smart people "are better at answering all of the questions you listed". You seem to have completely missed the point of my comment though, which is that the questions are not well-defined and therefore it's not obvious what 'the better answer' is.

I don't see then how that can explain why smarter people are less happy.

In fact if you believe this article, unhappiest people have avg. IQ. Low and high IQ are happy, with >120 being the happiest: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-19659985

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#206

Post by meremortals »

Apreche wrote: post #40

The smarter people see the truth of the world and the universe. If the truth was good, that we lived in a wonderful society with wonderful people in a universe that cares about us, smart people would be so happy. But being smart just means you know the awful reality of things. Congrats, you learned about all these awful things you can’t do much to fix, and the reward is you get to experience existential dread. Congra…

Naval Ravikant asks, "If you're so smart, why aren't you happy?".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIht5-FwZUI

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#207

Post by ipython »

jrochkind1 wrote: post #79
Apreche wrote: post #40

The smarter people see the truth of the world and the universe. If the truth was good, that we lived in a wonderful society with wonderful people in a universe that cares about us, smart people would be so happy. But being smart just means you know the awful reality of things. Congrats, you learned about all these awful things you can’t do much to fix, and the reward is you get to experience existential dread. Congra…

I was expecting the OP to say that smarter people were less likely to be happy, because that is the sense a lot of us who believe ourselves to be "smart" have. But that's not what OP is about, and it suggests that's not really what the research says either, there's maybe a bit of hint of a small negative correlation like that, but mostly it says: no correlation. Rather than making the argument you are making, which I…

I came here to make the same points that you made so eloquently. The only thing I’ll add is that I wonder if there is some correlation between the traits that make someone so good at solving “well defined” problems and mental illnesses. You can’t be “happy” if you’re paranoid (as one of the OP examples- a 9/11 conspiracy where his own theory- Cognitive Theoretical Model of the Universe, or CTMU- is under attack.

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#208

Post by Jensson »

disantlor wrote: post #185
Jensson wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me it is mostly that life is boring. At some point you have seen everything interesting and anything you see hence are just fitting into the same basic patterns. Discussions, tv shows, books etc. Living is still better than not living, but every time you experience something new the things left to experience becomes smaller. A few romance movies and you have seen all of them, a few action movies etc, or even psych…

you may be too deep into your grindset to appreciate the unquantifiable value of creating art only for creation's sake

Not sure. I've done original contributions to math, physics and did some significant work as a software engineer. It was fun, but then the void hit where you look back and realize the end result wasn't really interesting. And then you go look for that feeling again, but it gets harder to find every time, just like everything else. Not sure how art would make a difference here, it isn't like art is more interesting than those things, will likely just meet a void again.

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#209

Post by em-bee »

nickd2001 wrote: post #157
dusted wrote: post #34

I'm not especially smart, or happy, but, personally, I don't know how to be it, or what it feels like. I know pleasure, but being in a constant pleasurable state is not what is meant by happiness as far as I know. Slavoj Žižek (someone who does seem to be especially smart): “Happiness was never important. The problem is that we don't know what we really want. What makes us happy is not to get what we want. But to dre…

I can guarantee, that trying to make someone else happy, will never ever fail to make you happy :). Even in the unlikely event you fail to make that person happy, the effort of trying is fulfilling. Now the problem is, most of us , myself included, forget to direct our efforts to making others happy. I imagine God up there like an exasperated parent : "If only you guys would actually listen to what I suggested, you k…

which is one reason why loneliness is so bad. because there is noone that you can make happy.

Re: Why aren't smart people happier?

#210

Post by trebbble »

klik99 wrote: post #62
Apreche wrote: post #40

The smarter people see the truth of the world and the universe. If the truth was good, that we lived in a wonderful society with wonderful people in a universe that cares about us, smart people would be so happy. But being smart just means you know the awful reality of things. Congrats, you learned about all these awful things you can’t do much to fix, and the reward is you get to experience existential dread. Congra…

Serious question - how old are you? Anecdotally I’ve noticed smart people tend to have this attitude until their late 20s when it starts mellowing out. Now I’m a bit older I see my smarter friends happier than anyone and the less smart just about the same as always

I've definitely gotten better at consciously adding things the list of shit I try not to to think about. Which is pretty long at this point.

I finally tried weed well into my 30s and discovered it's great at making sure I don't think about those things when I'm trying to go to sleep, which is really nice.

In general I'm pretty sure I've got a fair amount of derealization going on all the time now, which... helps?

I suppose that all adds up to some kind of mellowing out.

Post reply on HN