There are many cognitive traps that obstruct us to think right about happiness. The first trap is that the word happiness is used to refer too many notions; the second is the confusion between experience and memory, and these are both lumped in the notion of happiness; (and I don't understand what the third one meant.)
He focuses on explaining the notions we think are the same, but actually they are very different. Exeperience and memory are indeed two different entities, but we tend to consider them as the same thing. To clarify the difference between experience and memory, the division between the experiencing self and the remembering self is necessary. The experiencing self is the one that lives in present, the very moment we are doing something; on the other hand, the remembering self is the one that remains and maintains, and it is the one that plays much more vital role among two. Lots of things differ in terms of which point of view (self) you use to explain. The purpose of his lecture was to give people some kind of sense how much it is difficult to think straight about well being.
I think it's very difficult to balance the remembering self with the experiencing self.
ReplyDeleteKia, this is a fantastic summary--well done! Now: what did you think of the talk?
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