Happy?

Unexpectedly, I got confused and reconsidered my happiness while listening to his lecture. On the stage of “TED Talks”, Prof. Daniel Kahneman talked under the title of ” The Riddle of Experience vs. Memory,” which was very interesting to me because I had been thinking recently that I felt the happiest at the present in my life.

He says that there are two selves in terms of perception of happiness: “experiencing self” and “remembering self”. Between the two, “remembering self” is much more dominant when people feel happy. We keep what we are experiencing only for three seconds, and forget one after another; we can’t keep in mind every detail in the end. On the other hand, we remember a few things that are impressive in our experience. Therefore, when we consider whether or how we are happy, it depends only on what we have remembered. What is happiness? It varies from person to person; however, there are, at least, some basic conditions required from economic or public point of view, for people to feel happy as a whole. His idea of two selves would be useful to improve policies along with the development of polls such as Gallup.  

In my case, I said that I felt happiest now, which means that only my “remembering self” was judging so. In the end, he said happiness couldn’t be measured because people feel very differently concerning to how they feel happy.

I wrote a memoir of nineteen pages at the previous session. On that process, I reflected my life leading to the present situation. A memoir is a typical work of remembering self! A few months later, I noticed that I had written about the poverty of my family and of my life without using a word “poor”. Afterwards, I had chances to talk with my wife and my children while  travelling in Canada in August about moving to the apartment near UBC in September in order to completely change my way of life. I have spent time much freer than before. I have enjoyed doing my favorite things much more than before. I think I am living the happiest life now!

"2001: A Space Odyssey" : The Power of Symbolism

We have been learning some pieces of the stories that have based Western literature.

Without having the least basic knowledge, I would pretend to understand it only by touching

 the fragments of European culture. All I can do is nothing but to stand still in front of the

huge high mountains of the cultural works.

The power of symbolism! This is what I have been overwhelmed when reading some pieces

of Western literature here in North America. (Canadians look happy when they use this word

 instead of saying ‘Canada’.) They have the Bibles (New and Old), it’s preceded stories such as

the Epic of Gilgamesh, Ancient Greek Myths, and many classical works descended from them

 such as “Beowulf”. We can’t be momentarily careless even when reading titles of a piece of

poem. We recently read a long poem titled “David”. Here is Dr. David Bowman again, who was

also very brave.

This time, we watched “2001: A Space Odyssey” directed by Stanley Kubrick, I was at a loss

again in front of the black giant “monolith” on the moon, where the six men posed smiling to

take memorial photos. The bone thrown by one of apes, the origin of the mankind is also

symbolized, maybe, as the origin of the tools, which made human apart from other animals

distinctively, which also meant machines, computers, HAL 9000’s.

I remembered the picture of the fetus, the baby in the uterus, taken by Lennar Nilsson,

I had shown the pictures in his book when I taught my students at sex education. I had never

 thought I met him here again on the screen.

 I should have brought the book about Nietzsche from my bookshelf to Canada, which I

started to read just before I left Japan, when got interested in his philosophy saying “God

died” I had been looking for the firm theory of nonviolence which doesn’t rely on religions;

the theory without using the words of religions! I think humankind has not succeeded in

constructing the theory of nonviolence yet, except for some great religious people. On that

way, I met Nietzsche, who I heard criticized Christianity. Though I didn’t have to criticize

Christianity, I had been seeking for how we should deny violence completely in this society

and in this world.

Hal was not a complete machine after all: he read their lips in the dialogue between David and

 Frank; killed Frank; and rejected to let David into the station. In the battle between David and

Hal, I thought man defeated the machine for a moment, where I felt a hope. I thought human

beings still rely much on a small number of people who have been continuing individual efforts

 for the truth, or justice we have called. The movie showed us a lot of symbols in Western culture.

The more we learn, the deeper we would understand this movie.