Everything is Amazing. Nobody is Happy.

For those who have been wondering why I haven’t put up any new posts in a while or have been displeased with my inactivity, here is my explanation:  I didn’t feel like it.  Also, I’ve been busy.

My inspiration for today is the Louis C.K.'s (I’m going to abbreviate as LCK going forward) interview on Conan that has been circulating around the Internet.  I put the link below.  I thought it was funny.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jETv3NURwLc

Basically, the premise of his speech is that everything in this world is “amazing”, but nobody is happy about it.

An example from the interview – humans can now fly on airplanes.  A couple hundred years ago, people had to walk around to get anywhere.  You could never travel across the country before, but now it takes a couple of hours.  Instead of rejoicing in the fact that they can fly, people are not satisfied and they complain about every little thing about this world:  they get angry that their flights are delayed; their Wi-Fi isn’t working on the plane, the food wasn't good enough, etc.   He goes on to call our generation of complainers “spoiled idiots” and “non-contributing zeros”.

So after watching this interview, I am trying to figure out why people aren’t happy with “human/technological progress”, what the cause of complaint is, and how complaint affects our society.  Is our generation any different from prior generations?  Are we more self-centered?  Are we “contributing” (whatever that means) nothing to society?

Amazing doesn’t equal happy

I don’t really care about airplanes or any other human inventions, but I will say that life itself is amazing.  The fact that you, I, every human and every other life form exists is incredible.  It’s a miracle.  I have no idea how this complex world was created and how everything has weaved together so perfectly.  God?  Nature is mind-boggling to me.  Outerspace is amazing.  The biological composition of the human body is amazing.   The human capacity to think, love, and communicate is amazing.

But, as LCK points out in his interview, no one is happy.   Although LCK might purport to be happy about human progress, LCK clearly is not happy.  He is spending his time on national TV (time that most people will never have the opportunity to have) complaining and whining about people who complain about Wi-Fi not working on an airplane.

Nature of Humans

The fact that humans even exist at all is amazing, but we don’t care.  That's human nature.  

There are a couple of problems with humans.  At our core, there is a major disconnect between what we want and what we can ever get.

If we think about our desires - knowledge of all things, power and ability to control and understand others, selfishness, purpose, love, immortality, invincibility, etc. – we realize that (i) we can never get what we want and (ii) we don’t know why we want these things.  We might even ask ourselves if we would be better off if we were just satisfied with the way we are.

The world around us seems to have been around forever, but we are temporary beings.  We are going to die.  No matter what impact we have or what achievements we are recognized for, we will be dead and ultimately forgotten.  When we die, who knows what happens?

We have no clue why we exist, who made us, what our purpose is, and why we even want to have a purpose.

Human interaction can make us happy

Humans are naturally self-centered.  People (including me) constantly complain about everything imaginable.   People want to have everything their way. 

Deep down I think humans know that they shouldn’t be selfish (there is a massive world around us, and as soon as we interact with another human, we know we aren’t “special”).  Once we realize that our selfish desires can't be achieved alone and that we shouldn't be selfish, we need to find another way to make us happy.

This is what draws us to other humans.  Communication with other humans can make us happy.  The fact that an airplane exists isn’t going to make us happy, but the fact that we can share an airplane ride and discuss it with another human might.  If we see a movie that we disliked, we want to be able to talk to someone else about it.  It’s not actually seeing the movie that makes us happy.  Knowing that someone else agrees with our viewpoint satisfies our ego.

Life is a selfish struggle for all of us, but we revel in the fact that other humans are struggling too.  We complain and someone else says “me too”, and we are temporarily satisfied.  Helping someone else with their struggles also gives us satisfaction.

In addition, the capacity to love and be loved is something that seems a little different than our other desires – it seems attainable.

I have been a little bit all over the place but I am going to try to summarize my thoughts succinctly here: 

Complaint

Complaint is a result of the flawed nature of humans.  We want things and we can’t have them so we complain.  We complain because we want to have our say and we want others to sympathize with us. 

Complaint is a driver for human invention.  If no one complained about the original airplanes being too slow, we wouldn’t have the airplanes we have today.  LCK complains about people complaining, but all of the complaining that he is angry about has created all of the things he thinks are amazing.  If people didn’t complain about prior forms of transportation or communication and humans were satisfied with everything that existed at that point in time, we would never have planes, the Internet, cell phones, etc.

Generations

Our generation is no different from any other generation.  Our surroundings may be different and the number of things we have to complain about may be different; however, people will always be the same.  People will always be unhappy and unable to comprehend human nature and the world around them.  People will always be self-centered.

Humans have been around for thousands of years (if you believe in history), and no one has figured out the answer to basic questions:

How can people be happy?

Why do humans exist?  Who made us?

What should I and other humans be doing?

Is life worth living if we are going to die?

Criticize our generation all you want for being “spoiled” and not “contributing”, but you and I don’t even know what anyone should be contributing to.

Happiness

Life is a never ending struggle.  Love and interaction with other humans can comfort us and make life worth living.  So can religion and the idea of an afterlife (if you believe in it).  Without those two things (other humans and possibility of something more), life is meaningless.