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Michael Moore

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Are the latest gadgets taking out the uncertainy in life? Does happiness depend on taking chances?

With gadgets we are becoming more and more efficient and optimised. I feel they are perhaps taking out a lot of the uncertainy in life by not really allowing us to take as many chances.

They have allowed us to get stuck in routines and take our work home with us after already working all day. Perhaps being too connected is hindering our lives rather than making them easier, and what about happiness? Does happiness lie within routine or when you take a chance and break that routine?

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Topics: happines society technology
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    edward long 100+

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    Oct 25 2012: Compare the Amish to the metrotech gadget addict waiting anxiously for the next I-phone to come out. My guess is gadgets introduce uncertainty into our lives. A good crosscut saw does not become obsolete or need to be updated, rebooted, backed-up or protected from viruses and power outages. Happiness does not come solely from taking chances. Happiness comes from knowing how to manage the things that make you unhappy.

    • Michael Moore

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      Oct 25 2012: But uncertainty is perhaps one of the ingredients in happiness as we respond more emotionally to things that happen out the blue, I do not think managing the things that make you unhappy is the way to make yourself happy it just makes you less unhappy.
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        edward long 100+

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        Oct 25 2012: 1) As I said, happiness may come from dealing with uncertainty, but uncertainty is not the sole cause of happiness. Ask anyone in prison for life without possibility of parole, a life free of uncertainty is not necessarily a happy life.
        2) If you manage to reduce unhappiness to zero you will be happy. It is more efficient linguistically, to say "I am happy to debate with you!" than to say, "I am less unhappy to debate with you!"
        PS: Are you the fat guy with glasses and a baseball cap who makes a good living by bashing the American way of capitalism?

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