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Can Technology Make Us Happy?

Ethics, Spectator’s Happiness and the Value of Achievement

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Well-Being in Contemporary Society

Part of the book series: Happiness Studies Book Series ((HAPS))

Abstract

The chapter introduces a distinction between a person-related and a circumstance directed type of happiness in order to investigate in which way modern technology can contribute to human happiness. This distinction is elaborated as the difference between ‘achiever’s happiness’ and ‘spectator’s happiness’. Looking at the ethical tradition, it is argued that moral philosophers have certain expectations about what should count as true happiness for human beings, who can act in accordance with moral values. The essay presents three arguments for the superiority of achiever’s happiness from a moral point of view. Looking at modern technology it is argued that we find both in an optimistic and a pessimistic evaluation of modern technology valuable insights into the role that technology can (and can not) play for the human striving for happiness. Finally persuasive technologies are presented as one type of recent technologies that promises to contribute to achiever’s happiness if developed while taking ethical requirements into account.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Therefore there is some wisdom in the old saying: Give me the strength to change those things that I can change, the patience to endure the things that I can not change and the wisdom to distinguish the former from the latter.

  2. 2.

    In psychological literature this difference is sometimes discussed along the lines of hedonic enjoyment and person- or character related eudemonia. I differ from this distinction insofar as I want to focus not on different qualities of happiness, but on the objects (circumstance or the subject) that these are directed to. It is plausible that there is still a close relation between hedonic pleasures and external circumstances and eudaimic pleasures and person related experience. See (Deci and Ryan 2008; Huta and Ryan 2010; Waterman et al. 2008). Dualistic typologies are of course in most cases oversimplifications, but they are justified in that they serve the purpose of this chapter. One does not need to be a Hegelian to come up with a third type—and in fact even more categories—e.g. a type of happiness that lies in the expression of personality in the outside world, as e.g. in the case of expressing you creativity in art.

  3. 3.

    For an overview about the scientific evidence for the various elements that contribute to enduring happiness (see Dolan et al. 2008). For a recent study that focuses on the circumstances that contribute most to enduring happiness in the UK (see Sebnem and Salah 2013).

  4. 4.

    In the Christian tradition the emphasis on external fate (or fortuna) is even further diminished in the interpretation of the Priamos passage in St. Thomas (Leonhardt 1998, 143).

  5. 5.

    The idea of three different life forms devoted to the quest of happiness is also discussed by Seligman in his distinction between the pleasant life, the good life (of virtuous engagement) and the meaningful life (in which one tries to serve something larger than oneself, e.g. an institution dedicated to moral or otherwise meaningful goals) (Seligman 2004, 260f.).

  6. 6.

    The relation between Kant and Aristotle with regard to happiness is discussed in detail by (Fischer 1983). See also Kant’s discussion of the notion of the highest good in his Critique of Practical Reason (KpV A 198ff.). Many Kant scholar’s focus on Kant’s sharp rejection of happiness and eudemonism in his Groundwork, but tend to neglect the more balanced passages in his Metaphysics of Ethics and the Critique of Practical Reason.

  7. 7.

    I am aware that it is difficult to get philosophers to agree on a claim, or to find agreement amongst different philosophers from different traditions such as virtue ethics, deontology and utilitarianism on the notion of ‘true happiness’. Indeed in a insightful review an external anonymous referee disagreed with my statement about alleged agreement to prefer achiever’s happiness in different traditions. I cannot settle the issue in this chapter. The question of the similarities and differences between different strands of ethical theories and their likely vote on spectator’s or achiever’s happiness certainly merits a closer investigation that cannot be given in detail in this chapter.

  8. 8.

    This argument motivates also much of Plato’s critique on poetry: it should not depict the Gods to do immoral things and evil people to end up being happy. This might be referred to as the famous Plato-Hollywood-Ending-Defense Argument.

  9. 9.

    In positive psychology this philosophical insight is most famously reproduced in the attempts to systematically compare exercises of fun and of gratitude, as in the gratitude days during his teaching duties, that Seligman reports (Seligman 2004, 72f.).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Philosophy and Ethics of Technology, IE&IS, Eindhoven University of Technology, Postbus 513, 5600 MB, Eindhoven, The Netherlands

    Andreas Spahn

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Correspondence to Andreas Spahn .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Johnny H. Søraker

  2. Department of Philosophy and Economics, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany

    Jan-Willem Van der Rijt

  3. Department of Philosophy, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands

    Jelle de Boer

  4. Institute for Science, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom

    Pak-Hang Wong

  5. Department of Philosophy, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Philip Brey

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Spahn, A. (2015). Can Technology Make Us Happy?. In: Søraker, J., Van der Rijt, JW., de Boer, J., Wong, PH., Brey, P. (eds) Well-Being in Contemporary Society. Happiness Studies Book Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-06459-8_6

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