TR 1070 Lecture Notes - Lecture 20: Neuroscience, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Eudaimonia
5 Jun 2018
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The Age of Experiences: The Promise of Liberation Capitalism
In the early 1970s, Alvin Toffler predicted that soon "we shall become the first
culture in history to employ high technology to manufacture that most
transient, yet lasting of products: the human experience"
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A new "softer" technology is in the offing that will do for intangible human
goods (experiences, relationships, capabilities, and character) what previous
technologies have done for material goods, transportation, and
communication-make more and superior "products" available to more people
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Why so Long? Was Toffler wrong?
The reasons for the long delay has been the absence of some vital
preconditions
A scientific knowledge base
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An emergent social demand-base for its products (cultural change)
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A responsive economy
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The New "Eudemonic Technology"
These prerequisites that have only been recently met by three remarkable 21st
century developments:
A scientific knowledge base
The advent of the new sciences of happiness
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Demand-base for the products of the new technology (cultural change)
The coming of post materialist culture
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A responsive economy
The dawn of the experience economy
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The New Sciences of Happiness--Positive Psychology (1998)
Martin Seligman began his term as president of the American Psychological
Association. For his presidential theme, he challenged his profession to begin
"exploring what makes life worth living and building the enabling conditions of
a life worth living." With this challenge he helped initiate what is now widely
seen as a "tectonic upheaval in psychology"---what has now come to be known
as "positive psychology"
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Before he came along, psychology was seen as what goes wrong with the
human condition
He said what we needed to talk about was what went right
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Seligman pointed out that up until his presidency "my profession was half-
baked." From their beginnings psychologists had focused most of their
attention and research on human ills- neuroses, depression, delusions etc. The
best they had hoped for was therapeutic--restoring some function, some
normalcy.
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Gloomy age…Woody Allen•
Some say we still live in a therapy-culture•
However, Seligman argued "It wasn't enough for us to nullify disabling
conditions and get to zero." A life cured of psychological miseries is no
guarantee of happiness: "We needed to ask, What are the enabling conditions
that make human beings flourish? How do we get from zero to plus five?"
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Several thousand people around the globe investigating "what makes life worth
living" for well over a decade has produced remarkable results. A broad
consensus about the elements, the fundamental components of a human well-
being has emerged. As a consequence of their discoveries and agreement about
fundamentals, psychologists claim to be having considerable success developing
experiences that deliver happiness, helping, as Seligman claims, "you flourish"
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Positive Psychology's Periodic Table:
Elements of human happiness- Things you do (experience types)
Experience Variables most strongly correlated with human happiness
Perma- positive emotion
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pErma- engagement
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peRma- relationships
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perMa- meaning and purpose (belonging)
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permA- accomplishments
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Molecules-Things you are (foreshadow to the transformation economy)
Positive psychology has developed the Character Strengths and Virtues
(CSV) handbook represented the first attempt on the part of the research
community to identify and classify positive psychological traits (character)
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Uses the word "eudaimonia"
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Sort of the reverse of the DSM
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The handbook listed 6 virtues and 24 strengths:
Wisdom and Knowledge--creativity, curiousity, open-mindedness,
love of learning, perspective, innovation
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Courage--bravery, persistence, integrity, vitality
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Humanity--love, kindness, social intelligence
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Justice--citizenship, fairness, leadership
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Temperance--forgiveness and mercy, humility, prudence, self
control
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Transcendence--appreciation of beauty and excellence, gratitude,
hope, humor, spirituality
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The New Sciences of Happiness #2: The Neurobiology of Wellbeing
Coincidentally, early in 1999, the year after Seligman's seminal presidecy,
Daniel Siegel published The Developing Mind.
His book was the culmination of his and others' attempt to define,
and initiate an interdisciplinary approach to understand the mind
and its healthy functioning
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1990s have been called the "decade of the brain"
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The New Sciences of Happiness
Numerous writers see positive psychology and recent advances in the
neurosciences converging in a new Science of Happiness
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The New Sciences of Happiness: The Neurobiology of Wellbeing
Siegel reported the convergence of several scientific disciplines in the first
decades of the 21st century, including psychopathology, emotion
research, neurobiology, psychology, physics, systems theory and
mathematics
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All doing research directly relevant to human happiness (well being,
healthy functioning, flourishing)
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The Neurobiology of Wellbeing
Why "positive"
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Good news
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Regulate--we can choose--not just a civtim
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Neuroplasticity--we can improve
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Siegel: "I've come to believe that integration is the key mechanism
beneath…the prexsence of well-being."
Integration--the linkage of differentiated elements of a system--
illuminates a direct pathway to health…
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Csikszentmihalyi (psychologist) agrees)
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Element Two, necessary for the new "Eudemonic Technology": The Coming of
Postmaterialist Culture
Culture--beliefs and values that show up in behavior
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Slides 32, 33 examples--not necessary
All of us are following the millennials to experiences •
4/10 Lecture
Tuesday, April 10, 2018
2:02 PM
