Comment by throwaway_7274
2 hours ago
Maybe happiness is a different kind of thing from the pleasure/pain axis. Maybe it’s a different thing that’s tragically easy to mistake for the same thing.
I notice a lot of resistance and discomfort whenever someone says anything like this (“are you suggesting my pain doesn’t matter? How about the starving kids in xyz?”), and I get that. But it feels like there might be something to it.
Everyone should read this about "happiness": https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...
> "It would seem that human beings are not able to describe, nor perhaps to imagine, happiness except in terms of contrast."