anonymous
- Happiness
I once read a meme that said: "Read books! When you're old you're not going to think to yourself, gee, I wish I played more video games when I was younger." But guess what, I'm dyslexic, reading books is tiring for me and playing video games releases endorphins which is what being happy is. When I'm old and my reflexes are slow, and my arthritis won't let me manipulate video game controllers - then I'll read books. I hate when people try to impose on others their own ideas of happiness.
Steven Pinker
- Enlightenment Now
It's remarkable enough to see that by 2008, China and India had the same per capita income as Sweden had in 1950 and 1920, respectively. But more remarkable still when we remember how many capitas this income was per. 1.3 and 1.2 billion people.
Steven Pinker
- Enlightenment Now
Max Roser points out that if news outlets truly reported the changing state of the world, they could have run the headline NUMBER OF PEOPLE IN EXTREME POVERTY FELL BY 137,000 SINCE YESTERDAY every day for the last twenty-five years.
Max Tegmark
- Life 3.0
Without consciousness, there can be no happiness, goodness, beauty, meaning or purpose - just an astronomical waste of space. This implies that when people ask about the meaning of life as if it were the job of our cosmos to give meaning to our existence, they're getting it backward: It's not our Universe giving meaning to conscious beings, but conscious beings giving meaning to our Universe.
