The Future for Humans and Emotions.

[Des-Rez]

What is Happiness? What is Hate? What is love?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsCXZczTQXo

I have developed the belief that emotions are nothing more than chemical reactions in the Limbic System of the brain. They transpire into something we perceive regardless of reality or their origin. If emotions are the result of substance then it is possible to synthesize such chemicals to mimic feelings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpViKXu36z0

Psychoactive drugs such as anti-depressants, lithium, and anxiolytics are currently in use medically in order to alter a patient’s state of mind. These are necessary for the survival and comfort of the patient but do very little to change life as we know it for the entire healthy human race.

The entire reason for our existence is for the pursuit of happiness. You work for money. With your money you buy your desires. With your desires you work for more money to buy more desires. “Whatever makes you happy.” Music, movies, memories, love and sex all make many people happy and is what makes life worth living.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67Fb8XbpWMM

The main question I am trying to ask you is: Would there ever be a drug/chemical used to achieve the same state of euphoria we all strive for? It would be a total life of ecstasy. However, if you are familiar with the films: The Matrix, Serenity, or even one episode of Star Trek, all illustrated a situation where a group of humans locked in such delusions did not succeed. The Matrix was not perfect because the “crops” rejected the idea of a perfect society. In Serenity the colony was so blissful the inhabitants merely lay down and wasted away without a care in the world.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EuTA4jlpWA

Do you believe such reactions would happen in real life? Would people become lethargic and brainless? Would the drug cause addiction or would the human body reject it like pain killers?

Thank you.

Edited May 17, 2009 by Des-Rez

[GDG]

What is Happiness? What is Hate? What is love?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsCXZczTQXo

I have developed the belief that emotions are nothing more than chemical reactions in the Limbic System of the brain. They transpire into something we perceive regardless of reality or their origin. If emotions are the result of substance then it is possible to synthesize such chemicals to mimic feelings.

 

I don't think anyone here would disagree that emotions are brain states. However, you may also need to account for input from the body: it is an integrated system...

 

 

Psychoactive drugs such as anti-depressants, lithium, and anxiolytics are currently in use medically in order to alter a patient’s state of mind. These are necessary for the survival and comfort of the patient but do very little to change life as we know it for the entire healthy human race.

 

Unless you live next door to such a patient...

 

The entire reason for our existence is for the pursuit of happiness. You work for money. With your money you buy your desires. With your desires you work for more money to buy more desires. “Whatever makes you happy.” Music, movies, memories, love and sex all make many people happy and is what makes life worth living.

 

I think you'll find a wide variety of opinion on that one. The pursuit of happiness, as stated above, looks more like the capitalist/materialist business model -- the vicious cycle of consumerism that at the end does not in fact bring happiness. Neurologically, it is the pursuit itself that brings reward, and this disappears as soon as the goal is achieved. What makes people actually happy (once the basic needs are satisfied) is family & friends, meaningful work & esteem, accomplishment, and contact with Nature.

 

 

The main question I am trying to ask you is: Would there ever be a drug/chemical used to achieve the same state of euphoria we all strive for? It would be a total life of ecstasy. *** Do you believe such reactions would happen in real life? Would people become lethargic and brainless? Would the drug cause addiction or would the human body reject it like pain killers?

Thank you.

 

Euphoria and happiness are two quite different things. You can buy euphorics on the street today: they often lead to addiction and bankruptcy. When one is euphoric, one does not pay much attention to one's surroundings -- it is not a good survival strategy I think what you're looking for is more like Flow, which one can achieve without drugs.

[changizi]

The main question I am trying to ask you is: Would there ever be a drug/chemical used to achieve the same state of euphoria we all strive for?

 

I always reject this premise. Most people do not strive for euphoria. They strive to achieve specific things in life (whatever they may be), and satisfaction/euphoria comes via having those things achieved. To get the euphoria without the actual achievement of those goals would be missing the point.

[iNow]

You seem to have the cart before the horse. The only reason we do those things is because of the positive reinforcement (euphoria) it brings. Much like sex. We don't have sex for the purpose of having children. That's a tangential effect... byproduct. We have sex because it feels good, and it feels good because through evolution those who enjoyed sex more had more of it, and hence reproduced more...

 

Same with just about anything else.

 

 

We don't eat plates full of cake and tator tots for the achievement it brings, but because it feels good. We know eating buckets of candy is bad for us, but it feels good. The list is practically endless.

 

 

Sure... it's more shallow and less meaningful, but it's the positive feelings which motivate the behavior, not the other way around.

[changizi]

True, and I agree with the sentiment in general. ...for sex, food, and loads of other things for which we were evolutionarily designed to have motivators, so that we were led to do what was needed to reproduce.

 

But most of us *now* have goals in life that are quite abstract, and post-biological. I, for example, want to answer science questions, something evolution doesn't care about, and so I have no innate euphoria-motivations to do science. If offered the chance to enter a machine designed to give me the euphoria I'd get from satisfying my science aims, I'd refuse.

 

(Not sure whether this latter interpretation is what the original poster was getting at anyhow.)

[iNow]

But most of us *now* have goals in life that are quite abstract, and post-biological. I, for example, want to answer science questions, something evolution doesn't care about, and so I have no innate euphoria-motivations to do science.

Ah, but I fear you are wrong again. We DO have an innate motivation to do science, and to achieve our goals. Let me clarify.

 

We innately are curious about our world. We are born as little sponges ready to absorb information. We soak up and learn from our environments the moment we are born... and we keep doing so throughout life. That innate desire has helped us to survive... that innate curiosity... that innate motivation to do science.

 

Also, your goals in life... It wouldn't be too hard for one to demonstrate how closely and directly and profoundly your goals tie into your desire to pass on your genes to the next generation, even if that desire is unconscious and not readily accessible to your conscious mind.

 

 

Either way... none of this is relevant to the thread.

[changizi]

Point taken.

 

...but... would you hook yourself to the euphoria machine?

[iNow]

...

Edited June 9, 2009 by iNow

[Mokele]

Point taken.

 

...but... would you hook yourself to the euphoria machine?

 

Isn't that called cocaine?

[CharonY]

Maybe. I call it espresso machine, though.

[sockyee]

Somehow I have a feeling that artificially induced feeling involving chemical substances will lead to other health effects. Addiction is of course one of them but the impact in the long run have to be studied.

 

On a different note however, we can actually exploit this to treat depression and to heal psychologically sensitive individuals.

[Des-Rez]

I would like to thank all of you that submitted posts.

I apologize for the original post being misleading or nebulous.

 

Arcade Fire: WakeUp

 

To GDG, I know that I projected an image of only physical values and not spiritual or religious- the reason was that the physical properties of life, money, movies, cars, do not rely on an emotional trigger to (they themselves) exist. Correct love and relationships can trigger similar reactions but that in my mind would be like creating emotions out of emotions and not from something unlike.

 

Furthermore I am a bit confused about your difference between euphoria and happiness. If I am wrong my little dictionary states that euphoria is just an unjustifiable happiness but happiness nonetheless. They are the same or am I seeing in black and white?

 

The "flow" idea was very much liked. Don’t know about the hippy crap of accessing it naturally. But the focus and energy achieved is the focus.

 

Hell I broke my hand because I punched my kitchen cabinet when I was eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Not because I was angry but because it was a really good sandwich. It is that emotional interaction out of nothing I believe could be synthesized.

 

Bat For Lashes: Daniel

 

That being said I may have deviated from my original question about a powerful drug, enough to sustain a human body for a long period of time and not be rejected by the body or cause addiction of the kind cocaine causes.

 

I am unsure of the relative "machine" that changizi relates to, I am guessing that is a metaphor or symbol.

 

Utada Hikaru: Simple and Clean

 

I agree with INow in that positive reinforcement and the stimulation of the reward center in our brains drive us to act. Don’t know if I would go for the evolutionary and innate genes underlying our future actions but I don’t know much about that topic.

 

Thank you.

[GDG]

I would like to thank all of you that submitted posts.

I apologize for the original post being misleading or nebulous.

To GDG, I know that I projected an image of only physical values and not spiritual or religious- the reason was that the physical properties of life, money, movies, cars, do not rely on an emotional trigger to (they themselves) exist. Correct love and relationships can trigger similar reactions but that in my mind would be like creating emotions out of emotions and not from something unlike.

 

Furthermore I am a bit confused about your difference between euphoria and happiness. If I am wrong my little dictionary states that euphoria is just an unjustifiable happiness but happiness nonetheless. They are the same or am I seeing in black and white?

 

The "flow" idea was very much liked. Don’t know about the hippy crap of accessing it naturally. But the focus and energy achieved is the focus.

 

Hell I broke my hand because I punched my kitchen cabinet when I was eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Not because I was angry but because it was a really good sandwich. It is that emotional interaction out of nothing I believe could be synthesized.

 

That's the problem with little dictionaries -- not enough room to describe the differences between words with similar meanings In psychology, "happiness" is closer to contentment, satisfaction, lack of suffering, and can be a long-term feeling. "Euphoria" is generally reserved for a more extreme feeling, an intense (but typically brief) joy. If you were euphoric for a week, your family would suspect that you were on drugs or had a neurological problem: if you were happy for a week, you'd just be lucky

 

I did not mean to imply any need for spiritual or religious values or goals. Current research in neuroscience suggests that the dopamine reward system is increasingly activated as you get closer to your goal, but then shuts off once you reach the goal. Think of playing a game that has different levels. You work and work to reach the next level, feeling more rewarded as you get closer and closer. Then you finally reach the level, and feel satisfied ... for a little while. Then you feel dissatisfied, and start to work on the next level to fill the resulting hollowness.

 

I cannot imagine the sandwich that would cause me to break my own hand. What kind of jelly?