Based on my previous post about relativity, the feelings of emotions are based on relativity. Emotions are chemicals that the brain receives and interprets as feelings. Often when we say we feel happy, we are usually comparing the current mood bored or sad.
In a way, we are actually comparing the current state to a state earlier in time, and thus tell a difference. If someone was extremely depressed, he would feel relieved after taking anti-depressant drugs. That change in feeling would be interpreted as happiness, even though the “absolute happiness” after taking those drugs might not be greater than what a normal person feels. It all depends on our previous experience with feelings and emotions.
What we feel can be interpreted as the change in the amount of emotion-inducing chemicals, which is, mathematically speaking, the derivative of the function relating to the amount of those chemicals. We can only feel the change in elevation of moods but never the current state. Thus the feelings we have are relative to previous states. The degree to how much we feel an emotion is noticed as chemical receptors detect incoming chemicals.
According to this theory, the fact that a “happy person” seems joyful all the time could be explained differently under different conditions.
- The person is more sensitive to feelings of happiness (and perhaps other emotions as well), and thus little reinforcement on those chemical receptors could cause great joy.
- The person is outgoing — i.e. likes being around people. The person would feel dull when not around people, and thus not noticed when unhappy. When around others, the person feels much better, and that’s when others notice the person’s positive attitude.
It becomes pretty technical as I get into details. See if you feel change in attidudes or just attitudes alone.
I give you props for digging deeper, this is good stuff. While I agree with you for the most part I feel like you’re only addressing temporary emotions, which are certainly relative to a number of things and not really a true indication of feeling in and of itself. However, general emotions that take place over a longer period of time are less relative and more internally relevant. For instance I could say “march was a happy month for me.” Though this statement is still based on relative events it’s more a judgement of how they felt inside, decreasing it’s relativity. I think there should be a couple different kinds emotions and words for them, based on their time to digest. For example a “gut-reaction” emotion, a “calculated” emotion, and a “long-term” emotion. I guess the long-term one could be a state of mind, but I’m not entirely sure that’s applicable.
Sorry for how all over the place that was, I was just trying to get a couple of thoughts out but just ended up making a nice batch of word soup.
Both this and your thoughts on relativity are really interesting.
The question is though if there is any true definition of happiness. If it’s all relative (back to that again. :P) If someone feels happy, then for them it is happy. This brings in the idea of subjective reality where one person’s reality is not the same as another’s as a result of subjectivity.
For example, I feel sad, but at that level (objectively observed) you feel happy, then for me, reality is sad, but for your reality is happy. Therefore, when considering it relatively like that, then happiness is only for that person and not necessarily an objective comparable thing.
Then the chemical stuff brings in another element, but science isn’t an especially strong area of discussion for me.
Still, this is a very cool thing to consider. Keep looking at it, it’s really fun and very interesting. Keep writing more and let’s get a little dialogue/discussion going. Hehe.
Joshua your batch of word soup makes sense. You are saying emotions over a long term subject a different viewpoint on to the person (as opposed to temporary emotions) since those emotions are relative to time and time changes. In a way you are right, cause emotions eventually become experience/memory. I really wonder how that is related to emotions.
Kris, reality is relative too. One way I can describe your version of relativity would be that one thing is built on another, and everything is interconnected, in different ways since everyone has a different interpretation of reality. I’ve thought about this too, but can’t fully understand it as it seems like a huge word puzzle. One thing I can think of that would be hard to explain with this theory is that there would have to be a starting point for which everything is based on. Mathematically, when you integrate an equation you get that constant C that you’d have to find according to initial conditions. Reality doesn’t give those initial conditions since, again, everything would be perceived through biased perspectives.
You guys are awesome. Sometimes I wonder if I’m the only crazy one in this world, or, relative to me, the only sane one. Guess I’m not :)
“the feelings we have are relative to previous states. The degree to how much we feel an emotion is noticed as chemical receptors detect incoming chemicals.”
If a person is happy on day x, it means he is happier than day x-1 (because every emotion is based on what has been experienced in the past). If he is, like you said, a “happy person”, and he remains happy all the time, then shouldn’t the ‘threshold level’ of emotional chemical get higher and higher each day for that person to be happy too on day x+1 and x+2 and so on? If a graph is plotted between time and ‘level’ (the same threshold level for an emotion to be consdiered happiness), the end result should be a curve looking something like this…
Link to the image: http://img53.imageshack.us/img53/1494/q15q1uz.gif
Haha that is exactly right. But a happy person is only happy when you see him. You will never know what he feels like when he is alone. I’m suggesting that since it’s impossible for a person to become happier every moment of their life, there must be some time when that person feels down. And since when you see the person he’s always happy, he must feel sad when no one is around, and thus he is one of those outgoing people who get excited around people.
Anything subjective is relative because it is abstract. Abstract almost by definition means undefineable…spelling? I think thats pretty basic and everyone has agreed on that. Anyways I agree that for someone to stay happy constantly, new things need to keep happening in order to make them happier. This kinda leads one into the whole realm of infinite “wants” of humans. Gauranteed there isn’t someone on this earth that doesn’t want anything, material or otherwise. The only time someone is truly happy is that time period between getting what one wanted and attaing a new want. Anyways…thats my immature philosophical bullcrap.