e.g. Video games, Movies, TV, Anime, etc…
Happiness is literally the result of chemical reactions in the brain. If you’re feeling happy, it’s real.
You’re running into problems because you’re conflating the feeling of happiness with the things that make you feel happy.
There’s no such thing as “true happiness” or “false happiness”.
The things that make people happy rarely have objective value, and everything comes with some kind of cost, even if it’s just time.
The happiness drug users feel is real, but the cost (money/time/health) can be significant. The happiness that you feel from playing games or reading books is real, and the cost (money/time) is less, but still there.
Happiness is always real - just be mindful of the cost!
So we’re just using NoStupidQuestions to insult large swathes of people now, I see.
Get off your high horse by insulting literally the entirety of fiction readers because you believe their happiness to be a “delusion” whatever batshit insane meaning you think that has.
?
I was just enjoying a game, then my conservative parents tell me its wasting time.
Then they proceeded to watch propaganda on social media.
I’m not sure who ruined your day to be making negative inferences about a question, but I guess that’s just the average conservative mindset being negative about everything.
Being happy is never a waste of time.
Ah, so you’re one of the idiots who throw words they don’t understand around thinking the spray and pray will work at some point.
I feel bad for your parents.
Yes, happiness generated by relaxing, by engaging the imagination, by solving puzzles that don’t apply to real life, and by empathizing with fictional characters is still happiness. But being happy isn’t the same as being healthy, and you need more than media for that.
It’s not even necessarily a delusion. You can be aware that something is fiction and still enjoy it.
Agreed - that’s why many people love, say, the Mona Lisa, or Starry Night.
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Usually people regard using drugs as false happiness. Or like having a parasocial relationship with a famous person.
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I think the concept of “false happiness” is given by the ends result of such behavior. Doing fruits gives you a high, but also addiction, so in the long run it’s bad for you. Having a fake relationship does not allow you to develop a real one, thus being a negative over time. True happiness is something that should make you happy in the moment and in the long run.
For this reason, media is true happiness.
I wad happy reading the lord of the rings and I’m happy I read it. The happiness reading produced has kept being a source of additional happiness. I remember Bilbo’s songs, and think about them when I take a walk. I remember small little details, or big plot points, and I’m happy to remember them. Same can be said about films and video games (I am just less passionate about them, but that’s just me)
True happiness is something that should make you happy in the moment and in the long run.
I’m not sure I agree - why is a long term aspect necessarily for something to constitute true happiness?
If I can’t remember something, does that mean it didn’t make me “truly happy”?
If so, that would mean that a child given a toy they play with for years but eventually lose interest in and forget as they grow older, didn’t experience “true happiness” from that toy, which doesn’t seem right to me.
I don’t think permanence or longevity are factors in whether ones happiness is true or not.
If our feelings are formed by chemicals and waves in the brain, then what would be false about happiness from those sources? Is it actually false happiness, or is it possibly just happiness derived from stigmatized/alternative sources?
imo, false happiness is something that takes more than it gives. So drugs is good example, maybe they make you feel good but eventually they stop doing that and start taking from you.
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with mtg cards, they drain your money so that kind of works too. But rescuing animals or learning something doesnt apply here because it doesnt take anything from you (unless you are kind of insane). Or rather they dont cost too much in terms of invaluable resources like your mental or physical health, just your time which you have to give to everything anyway. Stuff like drugs diminish you being able to enjoy other things and drain your health and relationships. Even if you keep those under control, it still takes something from you, just a bit less.
Though anything can become an addiction too, but if positive things become that then you might have other underlying issues rather than those things themselves causing it.
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again this does not apply to what i was saying, loving someone doesnt cost you. Frankly i cant tell how you are interpreting me, so i dont know how to clarify what i mean.
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now i’m even more confused
Does fake happiness even exist?
If you are happy you are happy.
It would be different to discuss if it would be long term sustainable.
Are you truly happy? Then that’s true happiness, however you got there…
Are you not? Then it’s not, however you got there…
the happiness is real. how you got happy may not be real and sometimes, may not matter in the long run.
I would think that delusion and happiness are not mutually exclusive. Even if that happiness you’re asking about is a delusion, the persons happiness is still happiness
Happiness is a release of chemicals to receptors in your brain. If doing something makes you happy, then it makes you happy.
Does using drugs count as true happiness then? Why doesn’t everyone just use drugs to be happy forever?
Why else would people use drugs? The problem is that the side effects from drugs tend to increase unhappiness when you’re not on them.
Why doesn’t everyone just use drugs to be happy forever?
I know this is c/nostupidquestions, but surely you can come up with an answer for that one yourself. Why are you not shooting up heroin right now?
Why are you not shooting up heroin right now?
You make a good point. I now know what I’m doing today!
drugs only make you feel happy when you first start, eventually you use them to not feel bad
also when you have a heart attack and almost die and are crippled for life: that’s sad
basically, they only work temporarily and overall makes shit worseYes, all happiness is a release of chemicals in our brain. Dopamine from memes, oxytocin from petting a dog or a good hug, tryptophan from a good meal, endorphins from an intense workout, all are not much different from heroine and are addictive, just not as intense and without extreme physical side effects.
Well yes, that’s why people do drugs.
Usually doing it forever runs up against other problems like paying for it, holding down a job or health problems
It’s delusional to be happy because you believe the story is real. It’s not delusional to be happy because the story is happy.
Example: ”We’re so lucky the super heroes saved the world. Imagine what would happen to us if they didn’t”
If you dig too deep into reality, you will discover that effectively 100% of the population is delusional on no less than 2000 subjects. They just have yet to be bitten on the ass for it.
And people take it very poorly when you start pointing it out; just like you and I will when someone else shows up to do the same thing to us. Historically speaking we lock people up for shouting things that have not yet been accepted by enough people. Like the earth is going to be eaten by the sun (true in a few billion years) or the sky is falling (it is more acceptable when you call it rain).
It’s obviously not a delusion if you know it’s fantasy, it’s only a delusion if it’s fictional, but you strongly believe it to be true. Like believing there is life after death.
Fantasy is a part of our imagination, that enable us to speculate on things that may happen in the future, and prepare for them.
We can do that for fun, and speculate on things we very well know will not likely happen. That is entertainment.Delusion is to believe things that are very unlikely to have either already happened or will happen, but believe them despite being contrary to logic and the evidence. Like for instance religions or believing Santa Clause is real.
If a delusion is fixed, and no degree of evidence it is a delusion will persuade the person. It can become much like a psychosis:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delusion
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PsychosisTherefore strongly held beliefs in religion can reasonably be considered a mental illness. Which most today will not be willing to acknowledge, but I think maybe in 50 years will become more accepted.
Belief in God is a delusion, a strong belief in God can be borderline psychosis.Well we hallucinate an experience made from nerve bursts so everything is sort of an illusion for us IMO.
Whilst i think happiness derived from fiction is real, I would refrain from letting it be my only source of happiness.
I could think of a million things in the world that i would like to do if I hade the resources to do them. None of them are fictional. But i can experience a glimpse of them through fiction.
I agree on the first part, I am unsure about the meaning of the second one. Reading a book is for me a great source of happiness, and I wouldn’t completely replace it even given infinite resources.
