Intelligent People tend to be Unhappy

[Solaris]

I think, the more you reveal the secret about the universe, the less you become happy. Because there are many pre-assumed (beliefs) things which on proved wrong, really hurts. Take example of famous philosophers and scientists like Socrates, and Einstein - they were most of the time thinking and so ending up not praising the things and instead of that, just questioning. For eg, when they saw a flower instead of praising its beauty, they end up asking 'why is this thing having structure like this?'

[Referos]

Quoting one of my favourite citations from Heroes: "Do you want a life of happiness or a life of meaning? You can't have both."

Edited October 6, 2008 by Referos

[doesntmatterwhy]

omg, yes. i love that quote.

As someone mentioned way earlier in the thread, intelligence making people happy.

That would be true if intelligent people were able to express their thoughts and ideas with other intelligent people. Perhaps, intelligent people tend to be more unhappy is because they are not able to express their thoughts out loud. This too, could be for a couple of reasons. Lack of social skills, or lack of friends who think that way.

I personally think that intelligence can have everything and nothing to do with happiness. There can be no conclusion to the statement because each person is different, and people can be optimistic, and intelligent and see the world completely differently compared to a person who is intelligent but cynical. It's all a matter of perspectives, and usually.. intelligent people have a greater spectrum of perspectives. More perspectives in the sense that, both good, bad and rational truths are taken into account..whereas someone else may just look at the positive truths in life.

[DarthCherry]

i think i do agree with it.. i tend to experience my happiest moments when i switch my thinking and worries off.. i also tend to get hurt then

i also like an example with a dog that i've heard a long time ago. when you come home and see your dog, he seems to be the happiest dog in the world, just for seeing you. so i think the more intelligent you become, the harder it becomes to enjoy simple things

i'd say that the more intelligent you become, the easier it is to enjoy simple things.

http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html

[Wanda(Not Alvin)]

I think an intelligent, introspective person can have a happy life if they try to create a balance, and have people in their life who have different perspectives and ways of thinking and living.

I often find myself "overthinking" stuff, but that's central to my life, and I get great pleasure out of simple things like walks on crisp, autumnal days, food, music... And long, involved conversations with friends.

[saori]

I get the point but i wouldnt completely agree. At least in my case.

I was really depressed because i was aware of being...well..stupid?

And being aware of this made me very sad.

But know, since i know everyday mor and more, and im working on that... I feel happier and happier as i know more.

To sum up.

As long as people are not aware that they are stupid they can be happier than those intelligent one.

[mane]

a truly intelligent person would know how to bring about their own happiness... being a book-worm who gets good grades doesnt mean ur intelligent, its how u control ur life overall that determines whether or not u truly are intelligent

intelligence is both educational AND social

[017631]

Well said mane~~

I agree with your point 100%~~!

There are such things as being intelligent book-wise and socially, but to be truly an intelligent person one must posses both kinds of intelligence ><

[Paul]

a truly intelligent person would know how to bring about their own happiness...

Sounds more like "wisdom" to me.

When having a debate about a subject like this it's very important to define the terms. To me, "intelligence" is the raw brain power, the ability to respond quickly and reason well (whereas "wisdom" is mostly common sense, being "smart" is being able to adapt, and "clever" being able to adapt in a creative way).

I have merely scratched the surface of psychology during my life, but sometimes I think that it's possible that intelligence is born out of problems. That it's the nature's reaction to having troubles in one's life - a more intelligent person is more likely to survive through those troubled times. Any ideas?

[SharkSpider]

So far I've seen three things discussed here as far as a definition goes. Raw deductive brain power, knowledge, and wisdom, which are all different, and all related to how "intelligent" I would call someone. Anyways, I think the concept that ignorance is bliss is untrue and destructive in its nature. This is because the belief that ignorance is bliss can only be detrimental to our society by allowing us to believe that the less human are greater than the more human.

First thing I would do is take a look at Mazlow's hierarchy of needs. Since the only factor that makes humans different from animals is our ability to achieve higher brain function, then in a literal sense, ignorance, stupidity and the lack of wisdom are characteristics of a person who is closer to an animal than someone who is intelligent, knowledgeable and wise. In order to not sound elitist, I would point out that I've seen "unintelligent" people who actually care about the world around them, who have a desire to know things, and who think before they act. So, I'd resolve that to be more human, one needs to strive for knowledge, understanding, and wisdom, instead of just self-propagation and survival.

Anyways, the belief that the opposite is true and that ignorance is the optimal state for a human is destructive because it devalues the characteristics that I would argue are the most human, and would ideally lead to a society where humans are bred and raised like cattle, like in quite a few dystopian novels. It also appears to be contributing the the present day devaluing of education and intelligence, which is seriously inhibiting North American society.

In my opinion, believing that ignorance is bliss is not a good thing.

[Sandwich]

I think it's nothing to do with how you're treated by other people, and more to do with how intelligent people need to find MORE in things than other people do. People who become unhappy do so because they can't find a point any more. The point is easier to find when you're able to accept it without feeling compelled to search yourself.

Although I read this fab book recently about how intelligent people may be likely to become more depressed as they have more clusters of neurons functioning all at once, and more connections between them and how this can lead to an overload in various chemicals within the brain-- the book itself is hypothesising that it is an overload of these chemicals which cause depression (amongst other things, it's a really interesting novel). Who knows if it's right, but it might explain a lot P:

May I never become overly intelligent!

[Torgy]

I'm not sure. I think that there is weariness in knowing too much. For example, we are reading the book Johnny Got His Gun in IB A1 English, and it really has made me realize the horrors of war etc. And learning about existentialism totally changed the way I think about life.

I am a happy person, but I have friends who are unhappy because of intelligence. I guess it is meant to be that way, because only intelligent people can realize all the problems of the world. At least we are unhappy for meaningful reasons, not just you can't find the five dollar bill you left sitting on your dresser.

[filmjolk]

none of this makes any sense... Why do you need to be happy? how do you define happines? does IQ = inteligence? does knowledge = inteligence?

Mensa and many other organizations states that IQ does not measure inteligence. If you get a good score on an IQ test, good for you! then you are perhaps better than other ppl at doing that specific test.

My own definition of inteligence is the ability to perceive things from as many angles as possible. That means that an inteligent person would not give the correct answers to questions more often than a less inteligent person. And i believe that there are many aspects of inteligence which we don't know of.

But apparently you are reffering to the know a lot ppl.

Hmm, and... If you never experienced good moments, then you wont miss them. So... If you don't think a lot you wont have to bother with lots of thoughts. But if you never experienced the thoughts you don't know what it is like.

would you rather experience a lot of good and bad things or not experience anything at all?

I "think", there are some ppl who are never satisfied and there are some who don't really care. And I also "think" that neither of them can be defined as inteligent or less inteligent.

[Sharaleth]

The world is cruel. Those possessing an intellect are the minority. Intelligence is generally accompanied by a lack of social skills, or a lack of balance in their life.

Those are the primary arguments most often cited in response to the question about why intelligent people tend to be unhappy. The problem with that is that I have strong objections to many of them. The world is not cruel. It is a beautiful thing to be admired, explored, and fascinated by. The intellectual are not necessarily the minority. Who says that intelligence is exclusive? With the correct preconditions, the majority could very well become what we consider "intelligent" today. Intelligence combined with unhappiness does not signify a lack of social skills or a lack of balance in the persons life. Many intelligent people who choose to polarize to one specific facet of all the possible aspects of their life are very well off, and more importantly very content and happy with their lives. Furthermore, the intelligent population do not lack social skills. To iterate on that, the intelligent do not lack the ability to learn social skills. What prevents a person who is able to disseminate all the commonly perceived as difficult and challenging academic problems presented before him or her from learning how to communicate fluently? Certainly not their intelligence. Rather, the true source of the obstruction of their ability to bridge any gap in their social abilities is not of their intelligence (which seems to be implied in this discussion), but rather of a lack of acceptance from the world they live in. In actuality, the cause extends not only to social ineptness but is the root of their view of the world as cruel, their ostracization as a minority, and near any common argument you see named. If you are unsatisfied with my rebuttals to the perceived reasons why intelligence seems accompanied with unhappiness, reflect on what I write as the true source of any unhappiness and note that it completely replaces any holes that the deletion of those three trite and shallow arguments may create. A brief explanation of what I consider intelligence as, and why this explanation and theory is coherent, constructivist, and pragmatic at the same time (to the International Bacclaureate folks: I expect you have covered these and remember these theories of truth from the Theory of Knowledge class) may aid in your reflection. As a note, I consider this reason to fit within the Correspondence model as well, and naturally within the Consensual model if explained with enough clarity and skill.

What is intelligence? Many definitions immediately come to mind. The ability to recall facts, the ability to retain a great many of said facts in the brain, the ability to do well and become "successful" (of course, as dictated by societal norms, but that is irrelevant), the rate at which a person can calculate and process ideas in their head... many of them share some similarities, but none of them are complete. I do not expect to find a complete definition. The most accurate, and most persuading definition there is though, seems to me to be "the ability to make connections, patterns, links between multiple ideas". I say this because every other workable definition of intelligence seems to stem from this definition. Being able to connect ideas in different ways, to see things from a different perspective, allows the intelligent to more clearly comprehend an unfamiliar issue and to more rapidly process and solve problems. However, the drawback to this ability in greater quantities (which is what the intelligent possess) is that due to the greater amount of different perspectives the person may look at a situation from, he or she has a greater likelihood of seeing the situation from a completely different perspective from the average person.

This disparity in perspective is what causes the vast majority of society to ridicule and to belittle the intelligent. Unable to see the reasoning, to understand the perspective the intelligent have and how they come up with it, they choose to either attack it or dismiss it as trivial. What is ironic is that in this action they are dismissing the intelligence as trivial, as beneath their own intelligence, of which the inverse is true, lending the actual support for the phrase "Ignorance is bliss". The detriment of intelligence is the elevation of ignorance. In response, the intelligent person does not know what to do. How is a society where the intelligent, the people that can serve to advance society the most degraded make any sense? This diminishing of the importance of their views often occurs early on in their life as it is so pervasive, which is the cause I attribute to the introversion often seen in the highly intelligent.

Societal disapproval is what I see as the ultimate cause of unhappy, intelligent people. The irony is rich. Smarter people should be more happy than not, being smarter and able to find more happiness, correct? Despite the logic of that statement, it is evidently not true. They are restricted from doing so by the masses of the ignorant, who could in actuality themselves transcend their own ignorance and become "intelligent". I propose a solution, by changing the mantra from "Ignorance is bliss", to one of "Intelligence is bliss". The world is an amazing, awe-inspiring place if you take your time to look at it. Just, in doing so, allow others to look at it from their own, different perspectives toi and do not shield the light away from them, blocking it and casting them into darkness, and unhappiness.

(And as an afterword: I am an IB student, but a rather unorthodox one even by those standards. Perhaps some of that can be seen in what I wrote. And, to preemptively defuse a possible logical fallacy against this argument, I realize that it may come across as fairly arrogant or insistent. To that, I can only reply that it should be unnecessary to add "I think" and to politically correct myself on every aspect of the argument given the nature of the topic. As well as that, I am averse to using those phrases. It is unlikely I will follow this up, unless I see something that draws the eye. I think that intelligent people should be happy most of the time, and I myself am happy moreso than nearly all of my IB colleagues (whether I am intelligent or not is not something I will judge). So, there is my view on the subject.)

Edit: Also, as I want to clarify, this is an identification of the root of the unhappiness, not the direct cause (which would be the discrimination and other such pleasant activities). I feel that too often the direct causes are mistaken for the true cause. And, of course, if you wanted you could trace the cause far back, way beyond the relevant causes to the subject, but I chose what I consider the most important and relevant root (as opposed to tracing it all the way back and saying the cause of the unhappiness was the birth of the universe).

Edited November 13, 2008 by Sharaleth

[soph_1791]

I don't know if anyone has ever read "Flowers For Algernon" by Daniel Keyes but it is this book about a mentally retarded man who has a lobotomy, which in effect makes him really intelligent and he ends up losing all his friends and believes that he is extremely happy with his new found intelligence, he regresses and deteriorates so that at then end of the novel he is worse than before and ends up happy unaware of his lack of intelligence.

The problem in society is that higher IQ does not equal a higher amount of happiness, this stereotype that you need intelligence to be happy, i think we all believe it has some truth to it, I mean generally intelligence can earn you a lot of money, which turns to does money make us happy? For most people who obtain a higher IQ they are unable to converse with someone that challenges them. I guess you just cannot turn off your intelligence and take back your knowledge. As stated by someone earlier; is ignorance really bliss?

[JAYT]

It is undoubtedly true that intelligent people tend to overthink alot and be a little too caculating. The more a person thinks the more a person knows and realises the things that are happening around us.

An important thing that leads to unhappiness in intelligent people is not having other people who they can befriend and relate to.

I personally feel happy because i 'see' more things than other people and i feel unhappy that there are others who 'see' much more than me.

A person who is intelligent can be unhappy depending on his experience and personality, what they've seen (people starving), won a poker game, or maybe whether the person's carefree or a crazed perfectionist. We all have small pieces of the effects of being intelligent but no one person can actually tell us everything as that person couldn't possibly have experienced everything.

This topic has a little too much TOK for me.

There sure are alot of intelligent people on this thread.

By the way I've read Flowers for Algernon, but its not in my top ten list of books.

Edited December 5, 2008 by JAYT

[SharkSpider]

There is happiness, and there is meaning.

The paradigm that we must pursue happiness is flawed because happiness is the "drug" of existence. Meaning is something that exists on a higher level, that becomes part the being, and that does not go away when bad things happen. Meaning is by far a more faithful friend than happiness.

[Mr. Shiver]

Meaning is as fleeting a friend as happiness, I've found. You can pursue either, but either way you're chasing a mirage, and if you think you've found it permanently chances are you're probably shutting your mind down to other possibilities.

Edited December 3, 2008 by Mr. Shiver

[eblake]

Meaning is as fleeting a friend as happiness, I've found. You can pursue either, but either way you're chasing a mirage, and if you think you've found it permanently chances are you're probably shutting your mind down to other possibilities.

What if..

Belief, if you can sustain it, can keep afloat meaning or happiness, or cure the side effects of intelligence or knowledge.

[Mr. Shiver]

It absolutely can, and that's why it's important to still search for meaning. But when belief is no longer either on a conditional basis or respectful of differing beliefs, then I'd say it becomes problematic for a variety of different reasons.

Of course sometimes you can't question certain established truths because that might be a dangerous thing to do. So not everything is in your own control. But you'd be doing yourself a great disservice if you didn't stop and listen to yourself every now and then, since consciousness is probably the greatest gift that nature has given us.

Edited December 5, 2008 by Mr. Shiver