So the Happy Button Poll turned out a lot closer than I really expected.
I asked you guys to consider the hypothetical “happy button” that, once pushed, makes everyone everywhere completely happy forever, no matter what? The button pushers only lost by a narrow margin, with 43% of the vote, while 57% said they would not push the button.
The real questions seems to boil down to how we view happiness. Those who view the emotion in a mechanistic, bio-chemical sort of way tend to favor pushing the button. Those who view happiness as something emanating from the soul, or at any rate something deeper than brain chemistry tended to avoid the button.
There were of course exceptions. One teacher (guess which) didn’t want to push the button he claimed that other people’s happiness was just not that important to him.
Feel free to discuss your reasons for voting the way you did (or didn’t) below. And take a stab at out next poll, currently living on the sidebar, top right, of the page.
When I first read the question, the answer was obvious in my head.
No way!
But then I asked myself why. Why was it that I would rather leave all the frowns and sorrows of the world as they are than grant every person in the world endless happiness.
I tried to look at my own life and what would happen if I was always happy.
I’m the kind of person that if I’m happy with something, I won’t change it.
I imagine that in a world full of happiness, I wouldn’t have cared about that 65 I got in spanish class, and probably wouldn’t have cared to do the makeup work to bring it up to a 90 either. I would have been happy with my science fair project just getting a passing grade and probably would not have pushed myself to make it much better and have it win 1st place in the science fair. Ok, well it was more like 3rd place but it almost the same.
I think I’d much prefer to live in a world where I would be able to feel dissapointments and losses, becauce how would we ever advance or learn anything in a world where we are always happy?
well i would rather not push the button, i couldnt live a life with just happiness. My life wouldnt be so challenging , it would just be perfect with happiness and thats simply not for me. i like a life with obstacles not some boreing life that would just be happiness all the time. life is so many different experiences,with so many different emotions. i couldnt immageing watching a ufc fight and a guy smiling while hes getting his face smashed in..or people smiling at a funeral,that would simply be weird and would kill the sport and so many other things in life. no one would ever try hard for anything,everyone would just be ok with what they have, or with what they have done. i wouldnt be happy becasue i work hard for every thing i have and wouldnt be ok with just any little effort.
I would most definately avoid pressing the button. Everyone being happy? I believe we are meant not to live happy in this life, I’m not saying that we should live miserable but i think that although we can’t attain complete happiness in this life, it is meant for us to live with that purpose. If we all lived happily ever after there would be nothing more. We would become things and not beings. we would become still pictures. We would lose our humanity. I think that we are meant to help others when they are not so happy. Those who are more fortunate should help the unfortunate. Those who can hear should listen. Those who can help should aid…etc.. Pressing the happy button would lead to complacency although we would not know it but why wouldn’t we want to know our reality when we can’t escape it?.. Pressing the happy button would just change our feeling but not the truth. What would we strive for? What would be the purpose of living if from the beginning until the end we would be happy? Would we know ourselves and distinguish others?
Down with the happy button!!!!!! down with it.
i think in an imaginary world it would be great to press the happy button but in real life it wouldnt compare to the hardships and trails you would go through in life if you were always happy you would never experience the ups and down in life and you wouldnt be able to experience true happiness or how to earn things
i would not push the button because we need other emotions to actually call happiness happy, if we couldn’t be sad or mad, happy would not be called happy anymore, it would just be the normal being of everybody all the time and emotions would no longer exist
The reason why I wouldn’t push the happy button is because there are different things that make people “happy”. What about the rapists and murders out there? They get a thrill from destroying people’s lives.
What I think is that if someone had pushed the happy button that chaos will break out. People will lose homes, money, family members, but wouldn’t feel any sort of pain nor remorse about it. They’ll just accept what has happened, and feel happy about it.
Then again, there are people who are unhappy now and use drugs to escape that feeling. If everyone was happy, there will be people who would eventually try to make something to get rid of that happiness to have some kind of different emotion.
There are different things that make people “happy”. if anyone would push that happy button there would be no point on continuing with life it would just be one steady, boring, happy world with no obstacles to overcome, no challenges, no feelings, or emotions. i cant imaging being happy if one of my famly members would pass away. the point is being happy feels good and it just makes my day everytime, but we need to feel and go through other feelings.
Tempting, but I wouldn’t push the button. Everyone has different opinions over what happiness truly is. My opinion of happiness is having everyone that I love and care about, as well as having many of my dreams and goals accomplished. But as much as you may hate it, the world is not perfect. Theirs wars, battles, abuse, drugs, and so many other things happening that it will be easy to want to press that button. Pressing the button means not having to deal with the problems and emotions. It would be like having a world full of robots. No expressions just pure dullness. You can be the wealthiest person on earth and still be miserable.
I think as long as your happy with what you have, and you learn to deal and except thing then you can be happy.
I stand by my decicion of not pushing the “happy” button because like i said before in class we trully dont know the meaning of happyness if we dont go thru some pain at first. there has been many times were i tought i was happy and it turned out i wastn i was just acting like it because other people around wer happy which made me happy in a way and i tought thats was happyness until i started to branch out and did other things whne i realixed that i was happy i was kinda depressed in a way because i couldnt do tose things i did with the people i were with. Also i agree with what jose rodriguez said how we wouldnt get anywhere in in life and end up in corruption. if someone would try and take over the world wed be happy with it eventough we know that isnt right. and if we were to be happy all the time we probably wouldnt be as successful since wed be satisfied in school with whatevr grade wed get.
i have come to the conclusion that i rather not push the happy button so that all humans would feel no other emotions but “happiness”. By pushing the button, the value of “happiness” would become devalued. it wouldnt give a person the pleasure of accomplishment but more of a state of being. by pushing the happy button, humans would live misery spiritually, by living feeling happy even though still live with desires. they would simply live with satisfaction without a true reason. they would have a purpose in striving to better themselves because they are content all the time.
I say yes. Push the happy button. I’ve never heard that being happy was a bad thing. I don’t know about you guys, but i like being happy.
It does sound nice to just think that everyone can be happy with just a push of a button.. but happiness can’t be defined as one thing for everyone, and I agree with Mayra and Maria Velazquez. A happy beginning lasts but what about later on when a constant smile appears with no indulgence with the proper effect. You want to be happy with what truly gives you that deep feeling of happiness, but if the button is pushed you’ll seem happy but you won’t really know what it means if you’ve never experienced it. A smile, a laugh.. you’ll do both because you’re happy.. so what does being happy mean if you don’t know what is happiness?.. We’ll all soon corrupt, not care for what used to matter and we’ll all lose it and just be insanely happy. LOSE HUMANITY;most likely the result. Some struggle for happiness right now.. so I’m glad someone doesn’t secretly have control over a button like that.
The “Happy Button” would be a great/fantastic idea. People would be so fasinated if this creation was real. We wouldn’t have to do much especially when were in the position that everything is going on wrong all we would have to do is press a button and everything would be as we wanted. But really think about it there wouldn’t be a point of living life without mistakes thats how we learn from what we do in life. What is right and what is wrong. How would the world be without people not making mistakes or doing stupid things. I mean there would be people who would love to see the world without no mistakes, but hey thats no fun. The Happy Button is a fifty/fifty it has its good and its bad..
DOWN WITH THE HAPPY BUTTON
I think back to my choice which was pressing the “happy button” but now I would have probably chose not pushing the happy button. The world would be to perfect with no mistakes so ever. How would everybody feel with everybody just happy I think not so good. We live in a society where things happen unexpectedly you have to do what comes to you no matter how good or bad the situation is at the time. The world would not be so fun with everything so perfect how would each persons life be with no mistakes ever or people not learning there mistake.
I made a movie about this, would you consider looking at it and maybe leaving a message on what you think about it? (I left the url in the “website” box) thank you!