He had an interesting observation: the popular saying "don't spend money on things, but on experiences" only goes so far. Spending on things can bring about experiences: the big house/cabin/cottage per se may not bring you happiness, but if it's a place that you can gather family and friends, that can bring happiness/meaning. His first car didn't bring him happiness because it was a car (and not even fancy), but because of all the road trips he did with his friends in it.
I just finished reading this book while taking a train for a weekend vacation. To your point, he mentions that if spending money doesn't make you happy, it's because you're spending it on the wrong things. You shouldn't spend money to get the respect of others, because it's fleeting, causes envy, and is the fast food of getting respect. You need to spend money in ways that give you new experiences until you discover what kind of spending DOES make you happy.
I'm a huge fan of Positive Psychology and have read dozens of books (by Ph.D researchers of the subject).
My favorite academic summary is The Good Life: Unifying the Philosophy and Psychology of Well-Being by Michael A. Bishop. As a hyper-short summary: psychologists studying well being have used different definitions and approaches, yet what unifies them is positive feedback loops - behaviors and activities that beget more positive affect in the future. Think spending time with good friends, etc.
A classic read is Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert. It shows how humans are systematically bad at predicting to what extent future events will make them happier or sad. His TED talk is a nice 20 minute summary of the book.
Daniel Gilbert (one of the authors of the study linked above) published "Stumbling on Happiness" in 2006. There were happiness psychology books before but it does seem that the popularity of this book primed the pump for more and more in its wake.
Reading the paper I have a repeating puzzlement, wondering if they are trolling or sincere. For example, about the benefits of delaying consumption to happiness:
...
For example, when asked to choose a snack from an
array that included apples, bananas, paprika-flavored crisps, and
Snickers bars, people overwhelmingly selected an unhealthy
snack if it was to be consumed immediately, but drifted toward
the healthier options when selecting a snack to be consumed the
following week (Read & van Leeuwen, 1998). Because the
present seems to be viewed under an emotional magnifying glass,
people gave in to the temptation of salty, sweet satiation when it
was immediately available, but when such satiation receded into
the future, this temptation no longer loomed large, freeing people
to select more virtuous options—and perhaps to appreciate the
abstract health benefits of a banana at least as much as the
more concrete deliciousness of nutty, chocolaty nougat.
...
I would say that delaying the pleasure in this case distances the pleasure anticipation from the decision, just like deciding to start going to the gym next week is much easier decision to do then deciding to start right now. Appreciation of the health benefits of next week's banana combined with the lesser, mediocre pleasure that will be felt eating it, might be better for the individual health then having that Savoy truffle right now, but no, the banana will never bring the same pleasure or happiness. Never.
Whoever posts this monthly, please include the tag in your description. Employers need to know this is an in-demand feature we want. I for one will not be taking any non-4DWW jobs.
Super relevant: Vehicles and Crashes: Why is this Moral Issue Overlooked? by Douglas Husak
One of my favorite philosophy papers. The author argues that because of the high crash incompatibility of SUVs, they are immoral - imposing needless harm on others. It's also ironic that on average, there is no net safety benefit to those who drive them -- because of higher rollover risks!
I have gone full "pocket forest" / Miyawaki Forest - planted 100 trees in my tiny back yard.
Technique developed by the Japanese botanist Akira Miyawaki: planting seedlings close together makes them compete for sunlight, thus growing tall quickly. Get a forest in under a decade!
Huh! Seems quite obvious in retrospect, but the forced competition for limited resources that encourages growth, while fairly dystopian* if applied to humans, is an interesting idea in terms of forests, as long as you don't believe trees can experience qualia such as grief, a fear of death, unhappiness, etc.
[0] I was thinking of this kind of human dystopia: "overpopulation could never be a problem: if people run out of food they'll either invent a better alternative to farms or simply arrange themselves in groups where people who can achieve the highest metric that the head/quorum of their society wants the fastest will be fed and the new growth that can't be supported and can't reach that level will simply "select themselves put of existence", increasing our evolution by >10x"
P.S. ..that being said, if a confirmed traveller from the future tells me that in 100 years we discover that trees have feelings (just like we discovered that plants communicate about threats and exhibit behaviour that is definitely anthropomorphized by a tiny, but loud portion of people as selflessness), I would not be at all surprised. I mean I would be surprised, but about as surprised as I was when I learned that a captive octopus that lived in a tank kept shorting out the electrical system in his room at night. No one had any idea wtf was happening until they put cameras and found out that when it wanted to go to sleep at night, it would turn off the lights by spraying salt water into electrical outlets until the breakers tripped so he could get some nice dark sleep.
It seems to be a trait from the time we became _the_ apex predator that we are way too overconfident about our understanding of our environment, especially the other creatures that share this rock with us. Are we the baddies?
I'd add more but this already went on a huge tangent. Thanks for the link.
https://overreacted.io/a-social-filesystem/
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