technology

15 May 2012 No Comments

Alone Together (Part One)

Recently I was reading again Sherry Turkle’s book “Alone Together” and would like to share some thoughts about the first part of the book: “The robotic moment: In solitude, new intimacies”.

Sherry describes several robots including those available on the market as social companions. They are, to name a few, Aibo, My Real Baby, Seal Paro, GOV, Kismet, Doll Madison, etc.

I was surprised to learn how critical Sherry is of robots: tech evil that will corrupt humanity.

Let’s look at the simple tech solution called Eliza. It is a program that chats with people, and very often in their conversation with Eliza people open up about their problems and seek advice from an application that can’t really think for them. The author says:

“The idea that simple act of expressing feelings constitutes therapy is widespread both in the popular culture and among therapists (way to blow off steam) and is very helpful”. However, “in psychoanalytic tradition – The motor for cure is the relationship with the therapist. The term transference is used to describe the patient’s way of imagining the therapist, whose relative neutrality makes it possible for patients to bring the baggage of past relationships into this new one. In this relationship, treatment is not about the simple act of telling secrets or receiving advice. It may begin with projection but offers push back, and insistence that therapist and patient together take account of what is going on in their relationship.

When we talk to robots, we share thoughts with machines that can offer no such resistance. Our stories fall literally, on deaf ears. If there is meaning, it is because the person with the robots has heard him or herself talk aloud”.

I shall argue that exactly the talking aloud sometimes is very important.  Once in a while we need to hear ourselves and to listen to the voice of consciousness that we often suppress, but when we let ourselves talk it out, we learn more about ourselves… especially what our beliefs and priorities are. Now, I’m not saying we should stop here… This is not enough. And I agree with vicious circle, the author mentions.

“We may talk ourselves into a bad decision…” I get that, lest correct it.  First, lets create robots or tools that do give push back with knowledge me may lack and act as therapists.

What if Eliza is just a hint of a new generation of smart machines that incorporate knowledge of the universe and give us support in difficult moments… and instruct us to consider all possible options (even the ones we don’t know about yet), and calm us down in the moments of despair… Or make people check-in with human mentors, who can arbitrate and give useful tips.

Everyone can use knowledge from people, enlightened and normal people who struggled through same issues themselves, that is knowledge of the human mind or the Universe… to become more humane and compassionate… If for now robots are just a recording machine, lets record the best we can and constantly make updates… Why isn’t it possible to create what inspires human to do the best, not the worst…

Currently, people use Eliza because they don’t get judged but feel safe to express their feelings freely, because humans may not understand them or will not listen to them for free. They have to pay… No one is completely substituting humans with programs, technology should enhance our decision-making and mitigate problems, and be therapeutic. The best of both worlds.

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

10 Apr 2012 No Comments

Fun Ride to Health and Pride

Several weeks ago I interviewed Greg Rublev, the founder of LeanWagon: “fun ride to health and pride”.

Marina: What is LeanWagon about?

Greg: LeanWagon is about helping dieters eat better and lose weight. It’s about being happier and healthier.

Marina: How does it work? What do users need to do?

Greg: First of all, users need to already have some motivation to make a change of some sort in order to lose weight.  The wellness movement is the new green movement, so the number of people that want to make a change is growing.  They are both inspired by publicized stories of famous people losing weight, as well scared by stories about the growing diabetes epidemic.

Greg: Second, when users come to the site, it will usually be through a recommendation of a friend.   They will immediately become a part of a team and have access to a professional coach.  They simply need to agree to make gradual changes in their diet – in every day choices they make, and they need to share their progress with their team and their coach.  LeanWagon guides the process that can take 6-12 months.

Marina: Who are the coaches?

Greg: The coaches are nutrition and fitness professionals, with an interest in helping people lose weight.

Marina: How do you find coaches? Do you hire them or is there  another benefit for coaches?

Greg: Yes, we recruit coaches to work for LeanWagon.  In addition to getting paid, LeanWagon provides them with an opportunity to improve their professional reputations.

Marina: How are you different from WeightWatchers? What is your secret source?

Greg: The weight loss industry is very crowded, however despite 40B spent annually, the obesity problem is getting worse every year.  WeightWatchers is one of the bright spots.  It is the one solution that works, primarily because it provides a support system that enables people to stick to the change they have committed to make.  However, WeightWatchers is both expensive and inconvenient, since members have to attend physical meetings.  Also, most people are unwilling to keep track of what they eat every day.

Marina: So your customers don’t need to go to real time meetings, but just follow recommendations based on trust system? Is there any tracking involved?

Greg: There will be some real time meetings via chat and phone conferences.   Members will track whether they are sticking to their commitments, as well as how their weight changed over time.

Marina: Do they get any rewards or incentives besides losing weight?

Greg: Most active members will get recognition on the site, and some prizes are forthcoming as well.

Marina: How did you come up with this idea? Did you experience weight problem yourself?

Greg: Definitely.

Greg: I was about 40-50lbs overweight for about 5 years.  I often felt powerless to change that and it caused depression and anxiety for me.  One day, a friend of mine told me about a simple change I could make in what I eat – avoid bread, pasta and sugar 6 days per week – and that got me started on this journey.  What really caused me to get started creating LeanWagon was the incredible feedback I got from my friends and relatives, when I talked to them about making a change, and seeing how many of them actually tried it themselves with quite a lot of success.

Marina: That is great!

Marina: Who are your main competitors today?

Greg: Our main competitor is WeightWatchers.  There are many startups taking various approaches to wellness, but none have the traction that even remotely resembles WeightWatchers.

Marina: What do you think about Healthrageous?

Greg: They sell to companies, so their growth is limited due to competition in that segment.  Their solution promotes walking through awareness via a GPS tracker, and there is a lot of competition there from companies like Nike+, Fitbit and Runkeeper to name a few.  Ultimately, nutrition is what makes a much bigger impact on weight, so that is where our focus is.

Marina: Can you describe your customer archetype? Age, gender, income, etc.?

Greg: Our target right now is someone who has tried to diet once or twice, but is still overweight.

Greg: It’s going to be someone in the 25-65 range, knows how to use “the google” and facebook.

Marina: When did you start and what stage are you at? Beta? Are you doing fundraising?

Greg: We started in September 2011 and we conducted a beta to validate some of our assumptions.  We are rapidly improving the product now and are planning to raise seed financing later this year.

Marina: Who is on your team and what PR have you done? I know that you participated in a business plan competition recently.

Greg: Our team consists of three full-time founders, each covering biz dev, technology and UI.  We also have 2 part-time developers helping build the product.  We pitched at Ultra Light Startup  recently, and actually got 2nd place :)  It was our first pitch and  it was very good practice and a lot of fun.  

Marina: What is the most important element in the process of losing weight?

Greg: Being open minded and trying things that may not be in your comfort zone, foods you are not used to and habits you don’t have yet.  These new ideas will become second nature, if you only give them a chance.

Marina: You mentioned happiness in the beginning. Do you think there is a direct relationship between good health and happiness? Can’t an overweight person feel happy?

Greg: Absolutely, they can.  I certainly did when I was overweight.  However, happiness is not a constant state, it is a feeling that you possess some of the time as you go about your life.  Being overweight definitely caused me in particular to feel unhappy very frequently, and I know many people who would agree with me.  So, perhaps a better way to say it is that LeanWagon is about being “happier”, perhaps “much happier”.

Marina: Are you planning to list your site in the Quantified Self directory? http://quantifiedself.com/guide/tag/health

Greg: Definitely, we are planning a PR campaign which will kick off after the next version of the product is up and running.

Marina: Final words to the readers? What are you looking for: users, investors, coaches?

Greg: All of the above!   We love interacting with users and coaches, as that is informing our product development.  We interact with a lot of potential investors, and we like to develop long term relationships with the right investors for us, and that starts with early conversations, feedback and ongoing updates.

Marina: Thank you so much for your time, Greg. And best of luck to LeanWagon, it is a great idea and cool website! :)

Greg Rublev: Thanks, it was a pleasure!!!!

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

02 Mar 2012 No Comments

Mood Panda and Happiness (Part Two)

Q: What impact has it had? What have you heard from users?

Larter: Since the iPhone app has gone live it is growing quickly with many thousands of new user every month, over 60% now come from the Apple app store. We’re seeing about 1000 active user ratings a day. Hugs are a very popular feature. Panda users give out hundreds a day.

One thing we’ve learned is that there seems to be a strong demand for a place online where people can share their feelings with others who don’t know them in “real life”, people who won’t judge them. We see this in the data: only about 35% of mood ratings are passed through to Facebook and only 2% to Twitter. And we’ve heard this directly from users who have posted that its nice to talk to people that are interested in mood and wellbeing and don’t judge them.

Feedback from users has been fantastic, and in some cases very heartwarming. We’ve even had users tell us that they’ve “lived with years of hurt until they discovered MoodPanda”.

We’ve now got so many users in the UK that our mood map is pretty representative. Our UK live mood map was quite similar to the UK Government official one from last year. We also put together a nice infographic of all of our data from 2011.

We are always trying out new ideas, and some have not been well received. We had done some complicated graphs and visualization in the past, and we’ve learned that keeping it simple is the key to moodpanda.

I also never quite realised how much time is needed after all the technical work is done. I spend a ton of time talking on the radio, public speaking, blogging, twittering, etc. about MoodPanda.

Q: What makes it different, sets it apart?

Larter: What makes MoodPanda stand apart are its simplicity and community. Other mood tracking apps are very clinical and can often be intimidating to people first trying to track their mood. We keep it simple: rate your happiness from 0-10 and, if you want, say a few words about what is influencing your mood. The design and ethos of MoodPanda has been carefully cultivated to create a friendly, open and easy first step into happiness tracking.

The large community of “moody pandas” is the other major feature, as other mood tracking apps (like our first 2 versions) are private. We of course have users who want to remain private, but 92% of our users are posting as part of of the community. We have people giving “panda hugs” and commenting with help and advice constantly in the site and genuine caring friendships are being formed constantly. We’re working hard to understand what helps this community aspect of MoodPanda and build on it.

Q: What are you doing next? How do you see MoodPanda evolving?

Larter: We recently started tracking hashtags so we could do stats on the sentiment of people’s comments that linked to the mood ratings. We’ve found that #coffee, #friends, and #food are associated with more happiness, and #sick and #work with less. We’re wondering whether we will learn whether some brands are strongly associated with mood (for example whether new #coke is good or bad) in ways that you can’t learn from normal brand sentiment tools.

We are working on the android app, and we’ve got a lot of ideas in the development pipeline involving more community features and technologies like an API.

Jake and I still have to go to work at our day jobs, but MoodPanda is a project that we both care deeply about. We’ve set a budget of $100 a month to spend on MoodPanda, so we do everything ourselves and get as creative as we can.

Q: Anything else you’d like to say?

Larter: Just a big thanks to you guys and girls at quantified self, its nice to talk to others that are as excited and interested in QS, if people continue to use moodpanda it to make themselves happier, we know we have done a good job!

Product: MoodPanda, Platform: web, iPhone, Price: free

Re-posted from QS Blog.

Also see my post Quantified Self on Happiness from last year on six happiness apps; Live Happy mobile app, New Illuum happiness mobile app and French article on Mappiness mobile app.

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , ,

29 Feb 2012 No Comments

Mood Panda and Happiness (Part One)

About three years ago, Gary Wolf wrote a detailed post on Measuring Mood — some tools are complicated enough to get you grouchy! Gallup goes through a lot of trouble to gauge the US happiness level on a daily basis. Others take a simple approach, such as Eric Kennedy’s recent talk at the Seattle QS meetup on Tracking Happiness.

Ross Larter believes an emphasis on simplicity and community (especially of people who you don’t know elsewhere) has been key to broad acceptance of his happiness-tracking MoodPanda.

Q: How do you describe MoodPanda? What is it?

Larter: MoodPanda.com is a mood tracking website and iphone app. Tracking is very simple: you rate your happiness on a 0-10 scale, and optionally add a brief twitter-like comment on what’s influencing your mood.

MoodPanda is also a large community of friendly people, sharing their moods, celebrating each others’ happiness, and supporting each other when they’re down.

People post many times a day – some tracking their mood from the moment they wake to the point their head hits the pillow at night! We organize people’s posts into their personal mood diary where they can view it many different ways: graphically, as a mood feed, broken down by metrics and even location based on a map.

Q: What’s the back story? What led to it?

Larter: MoodPanda got started in a pub in Bristol, England. A friend was asking people round the table how their day was and somebody replied with a 10/10.  My response was if today was the best day ever what happens if tomorrow is the same as today but then something else amazing happens (I think it included the “pussy cat dolls”), and we chatted for a while on this. The next day I started thinking about the question and told Jake (Co-Founder) about the idea and it went from there. We both work in software development so building the site was not an issue.

We are on MoodPanda version 3 at the moment. For the first 2 versions of the site we built it to track just your own mood. It was only once we added commenting and “hugs” to the current version that we realised that people wanted the interaction with each other. This is when our user based really started to grow. (To be continued).

Re-posted from QS Blog.

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , ,

18 Jan 2012 No Comments

The Power of Virtual Self-Expression

Yesterday I stumbled on this letter in my inbox from … 11 years ago. I never met this dude, so I’ll never know what was really true or not, but he clearly expressed himself through Love@AOL:

“If you haven’t seen “Shallow Hal”, you must certainly have seen the preview…let’s be honest, it would be great if we could all just see the “Inner Beauty” in one another but the cold hard reality is that Men AND Women want that animal attraction. Body/face and looks are key. The cool thing about chicks is they tend to be a little more forgiving, which is great because I weigh 17000LBS and have a thumb growing out of my eyebrow! No, in all seriousness I am an average looking guy, in decent enough shape but I also know what women CLAIM to be looking for and what the REALLY want are often 2 different things, so let me clear up the facts first: I am average looking, not too bad as I said, 31 years old, I am 6′ tall, 205lbs, blue eyes, auburn hair, smell good, like to keep clean (Bonus, eh?), get along with Mom & Pop, shower daily, don’t sell crack to kids, have not been in prison, enjoy all movies, have cried at some but I’m not a tree hugging sappy whiner either.

I am not an overly aggressive person but I won’t back down from a fight, especially if it’s to protect my lady. I love most sports, but I am not a “junkie”. I am fairly funny but not intimidated by a woman who is also. I make great money and will spend it on the significant other but I WON’T pay your cell phone bill and buy your groceries just because you have a great ass(unless it’s REALLY great). I have been told I have a great smile, I think I can be quite a charmer, I like to make people laugh but I’m not an obnoxious pick on everyone type. I drink socially from time to time but I am not an alki and I don’t plan on becoming one. I like outdoor activities and beaches and all that summer fun stuff but I tan only mildly so if you’re like leatherface you better find a guido stud instead of me sweetie.

I think kissing is the best one to express emotion between two lovers and I could kiss for 9 hours with the right woman. I love reading, I CAN read which is always good and I love to cook as well. However, this last statement doesn’t make me gay and although I find nothing wrong with that and love to watch “Will & Grace”, I am 100% into women, although not many at the moment or I wouldn’t be typing this letter at 12:21am in my underwear with my dog staring at me with a “Please take me out you loser” look on his face. Finally, I am only sending this letter to about 4-5 people I think sound cool so don’t assume this went out to every woman with a pulse in NY, it didn’t. Should you be flattered I sent you one? Hell no, I’m not that great, but hey, I do have a BMW, a job and a clean close shave! Anyway, hope to hear from you, and have a good nite-  Steve”

Will I be able to publish this in different times?

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

11 Dec 2011 No Comments

Quantified Self Boston

I already wrote about Quantified Self Community that was started in the Bay area by Gary Wolf and Kevin Kelly several years ago.  QS Boston chapter appeared on Meetup two years ago under the leadership of Michael Nagle. This past year I attended two QS events in Boston:

Aug 3, at Sprout: #6 Data of Our Lives — novel solutions to chronic problems.

The event featured speakers who are working on novel approaches to chronic health problems. They gave short presentations followed up by a panel.

1.Dr. Joseph Kvedar, Director of the Center for Connected Health at Partners Healthcare (http://www.connected-health.org)

2.Rick Lee, CEO of Healthrageous, using biometric data to create personalized care (http://www.healthrageous.com/)

3.Jackie Thong, CEO of Ubiqi Health, using mobile tools for migraine management (http://ubiqihealth.com)

Dec 6, at WorkBar: #8 Measurements, Big and Small

This event was hosted by UbiqiHealth at their coworking facility WorkBar in Boston. This meetup focused on different ways of making measurements and analyzing data. It was a mix of a few personal stories about collecting biometrics, as well as a few bigger picture approaches.

1.Max Little (http://www.maxlittle….) from the MIT Media Lab presented some of his work in researching Parkinson’s disease. One of his interests is coming up with new mathematical tools for doing studies that reflect the individual variation in different cases of Parkinson’s. He’s looked at the tools of weather forecasting (!) as a way to find statistical measures that capture more information about variation.

2.Jake Hoppe (http://www.eidosearch…) demoed his work at EidoSearch. EidoSearch is a tool which lets users identify visual patterns in data, and search the dataset for that same pattern. EidoSearch is being used, naturally, in the financial sector, but they’re now reaching out and looking for health data sets to apply their algorithms to.

3.And Gil Blander of InsideTracker (http://www.insidetrac…) talked about his company’s blood analysis system. InsideTracker lets its users do a basic blood panel and get nutritional recommendations based on that analysis.

I was especially impressed by Healthrageous and InsideTracker, as they help create healthy ways of life in more fun and interactrive way.  Another observation I made is that people are interested in learning more about themselves and about how to be healthy without struggle but with social support. I spoke with “quantifiers” from the audience and many of them collect their personal data without even knowing what for, but are very inclined to monitor their activities, behavior patterns and share results… That is something new and very inspiring. People want to improve not only their lives but the lives of others… Simply by sharing. Revolutionary. Truly New Age.

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , ,

14 Oct 2011 No Comments

The Power of Technology

This post starts new series of posts about technology and its impact on humans. Some of the things that sci-fi writers wrote many years ago were indeed invented eventually, like planes, laser surgery, X-ray machines, weapons of mass destruction, etc. Many other inventions are still in works or considered to be totally fictional (time machine, clothes to make us invisible, etc.)

Common belief is that new technological discoveries are good for us and can solve a lot of problems or at least reduce our own limitations (help us live longer, reallocate resources, etc.) The majority of these inventions is to benefit humans, but could also harm us depending on how they are used. We somehow trust our governments to do the job of screening all innovations and deciding what the outcome will be. But do governments really have control over all private labs and research projects in the world? Who stands behind most technological discoveries? Will findings always be used to benefit us?

“With great power, comes great responsibility”. Many governments can’t resolve internal conflicts, never mind international. There is so much controversy about what is right or wrong, true or false, good or bad. There are always cultural nuances in morals interpretations (capital punishment as an example).

Both in literature and cinematography we find examples of how things may go awfully wrong for humans. Just to name a few movies: “I, robot”, “The Island”, “Twelve Monkeys”, “The Matrix”, “A.I. Artificial Intelligence”, “Minority report”, “Blade runner”, etc.

H. G. Wells wrote “The War of the Worlds” over 100 years ago (published in 1898). From Wikipedia:

“Human Evolution from the War of the worlds:

The novel suggests a potential future for human evolution and perhaps a warning against overvaluing intelligence against more human qualities. The Narrator describes the Martians as having evolved an overdeveloped brain, which has left them with cumbersome bodies, with increased intelligence, but a diminished ability to use their emotions, something Wells attributes to bodily function. The Narrator refers to an 1893 publication suggesting that the evolution of the human brain might outstrip the development of the body, and organs such as the stomach, nose, teeth and hair would wither, leaving humans as thinking machines, needing mechanical devices much like the Tripod fighting machines, to be able to interact with their environment.”

Not to talk about extremes, but by means of technology we are changing our behavior and ourselves. We are focusing more on developing our brain instead of our heart. To connect to our hearts, Dalai Lama said, we need to unite and focus on our similarities, not our differences.  He joked that it would happen if Martians invaded Earth. There’s a grain of truth in every joke. Why can’t we do it on our own?

Technology that we create creates all kinds of opportunities. We need to make sure that we create not just for the sake of it. Kurt Vonnegut’s wrote about it in his novel ”Cat’s Craddle” (1963).

The book came about after Vonnegut interviewed scientists and found that some were indifferent about the ways their discoveries might be used. The University of Chicago awarded Vonnegut his Master’s degree in anthropology for Cat’s Cradle. In this book humans simply die from their own creation called ice nine. Cat’s Craddle is fiction and lets keep it this way.

Kurt Vonnegut and H.G. Wells are not alone, there are other writers who ask similar questions and challenge unlimited power of technological inventions and humans behind them. One of those writers is Sherry Turkle, who spent over 30 years researching the topic of technology. Her latest book “Alone Together” came out in Jan 2011. She warns us that technology does change us and we need to know its effect on us. Tomorrow, Oct 15, 2011, she will be speaking at the Boston Book Festival in Copley Square. So if you are not ready to read her 300 page book, come and hear what she has to say, and decide whether you agree or disagree… “Either you think, or others have to think for you, and take power from you.” ~F. Scott Fitzgerald.

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , ,

13 Jun 2011 No Comments

Testing the Happiness Calculator

Before all categories in the tool were finalized, I was very curious about my own ratio of happiness and categories in the formula. I predicted about 5 categories in mine, but as I went through the first exercise, that was not the case.

On Day 1 my happiness ratio was 85%, which was higher than I expected. I thought that one category that I’m not satisfied with would outweigh others, but it didn’t because I value several other categories just as high in priority. Even though sometimes I grouch about something, it means that I keep forgetting how blessed I’m with other things in life and I can’t take them for granted.  

I took a moment and imagined some scenarios… I would not be as happy if that one category was high on my satisfaction scale, but low on priority, or if some other categories were low in satisfaction, because I know they are my high priorities, like friends, health, environment, etc. My results varied slightly daily, and I’m sure that they would vary more if I measured my happiness monthly! At the end of the week I got really curious about my feelings on the days of measurements, and I reconstructed my activities that week.

On Day 1, my ratio was 85% and I worked at home all day and didn’t even have time to go out.

On Day 2 , though, I interacted with a lot of people: went rollerblading with a group of friends and had a nice dinner, laughed a lot, but my happiness ratio went down to 82%, and I think mainly because there were moments  of melancholy that day when I thought about that one damn category.

On Day 3, I went to work and after work I wrote a blog post and worked more on promoting the meet-up event in Boston on June 22, contacting some people and … my happiness ratio was at 87% that day. I didn’t work out, I didn’t have good food, I didn’t’ spend time with friends or family,  I just worked on my Project after work and that gave me my boost of happiness.

On Day 4, I played with the tool by building constraints and expanding limits. I decided to only include 5 categories in my formula, so I picked 5 the most important ones.  My happiness ratio plummeted to 69%. I changed importance scale from 0-4 to 0-5, so I had to answer all questions again.

There were some shocking results. (When I answer questions , I hide previous answers, so that I don’t get distracted by my old answers). My happiness changed in just 5 minutes by +1%! Just in minutes my importance of hobbies to my happiness went  down by 66%! It is funny, that I changed my mind about some categories so quickly and I didn’t remember how I rated them only minutes ago.

Main lesson learned: try to be as honest as possible when answering questions, because your mind will play games with you, so listen to your heart.

Lastly, I was curious to create graphs for each category, and I did it. On Day 6 I wanted to know why I felt one way or another and wished I wrote down my thoughts on low points and highlights of categories…

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

03 Jun 2011 No Comments

Results of the Happiness Survey

Back in March I crafted a survey to help understand what makes people happy and if technology can help us become happier. Volunteers completed the survey anonymously either online or on paper. There were two groups of respondents: a) middle class, age range of 20-40 y.o., who use technology for social purpose, not particularly religious, mainly employed, b) middle to upper class retired people, i.e. 50 y.o. and above, who are not too fond of technology vs. face-to-face meetings for social purpose, mainly non-religious, but with high priorities on ethics and humanism (representatives from Boston Ethical Society). Thank you to all participants!

The Happiness survey is phase One of The Ultimate Answer project, which is about:

  • ›What makes people happy?
  • ›How open are people to share their ideas about happiness and help each other?
  • ›Are there any “common denominators” of happiness?
  • ›Is it possible to measure happiness and how?
  • ›How can happiness be increased in the world?
  • ›Can technology leverage human potential to increase happiness and how?
  • ›What is the meaning of life and how to find it?

82 people answered the survey: 15 from Boston Ethical Society(BES) and 67 from non-BES.

Here are some highlights:

  • 99% knows what happiness is, but only 72% knows what the meaning of life is. Those 28% who have no clue really need to catch up on Monty Python…
  • People are more likely to give a piece of advice than to receive it.
  • 9 out of 10 said that happiness is not permanent, it changes over time.
  • Answers from BES (more ethical and older) group were different from non-BES respondents.
  • Meaning of life is different from personal happiness.

Please, feel free to check out the results of the survey for yourself Happiness Survey Results.

This presentation took place at the Boston Ethical Society on April 17, 2010.

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , , ,

29 May 2011 No Comments

Losing Meaning: Part One

There are more than six billion of us now, no wonder that each of us is not that valuable anymore, or at least it feels that way. It is almost like being a commodity, when supply is high, but demand is low. Depreciation of our value comes from many factors, including globalization, advanced technology and social norms.

More and more we feel ourselves easily replaceable. Think of restructuring, lay-offs and outsourcing. You don’t like you job or your salary? No worries, we’ll find your replacement in a heartbeat, there are a lot of you out there.  Suddenly you are no longer needed. Now it is called lean, flexible and streamlining.

Even if you have a job, do you really feel it is meaningful? Does your organization bring real value to the world? Are more people happier because of what you do or is it the other way around? Do you feel like your skills and talents are aligned with job responsibilities? How many people hate their jobs, but  think that there is no way out? They have huge bills to pay and  it is hard to find another job. Millions of people are stressed because of all of that, whether they have jobs or they don’t.

The majority of jobs lacks any creativity, does not utilize our talents, gives no freedom and incentives that are structured incorrectly. Then many organizations have vague mission statements, which are useless. Do you ever feel like a small piece of a big mechanical machine that would run perfectly without you? It is mainly because we don’t get appreciated or valued for what we really are – live humans with our own ideas and desire to be useful.

Technology makes things easy, but unfortunately we don’t appreciate what we get without effort. That doesn’t mean we don’t need automated processes and tools, etc. It just means that we can’t apply them to everything in our lives, because then we wouldn’t feel worthy of anything. We can’t eliminate all effort altogether, so that life is super easy. What will be the point of even getting up every day if everything could be automated? If technology does it all for us, imagine The Matrix but according to our own will: we will just stay in beds and our atrophied physical bodies will be connected by tubes and cables to the machines. Our meaning and value will be zero, except for body heat. How good is it for a life with no effort?

by polyachka in Happiness Tags: , , , , , , ,