Numbers and Happiness

Why does this value system conflict need to be framed as a crisis?

More than 10 years ago, I conceived of the value crisis—a predicament humanity finds itself in where number-based value systems take constant and undue precedence over our innate qualitative values.

One small branch of feedback I get from people questions why I see this as a crisis, instead of simply a step in evolution. “Okay, so we used to be more emotional and superstitious. Now we have science and pursue monetary wealth and have longer lives and lots of cool technology. The incompatibility you speak of will pass. What’s the problem?”

In other words, even acknowledging the disconnect between number-based values and our animal brains, what about the possibility that this is a temporary misalignment in evolution. After all, humans are unlike any other animals—perhaps we just have to evolve past this, right?

I counter this wishful thinking in a few different ways.

Firstly, there is no way that life (as we know it) can exist without non-linear values. Every process of nature and of our physiological existence moves in cycles and feedback loops. That is the only way that the complexity of nature (which we all too often cannot even begin to grasp) could function and last as long as it has.

While small pieces of this complexity might be reproduced with reductionist, number-based thinking, ample experience shows that every time we attempt to apply such strategies to our environment, we blow it—big time. So long as there is a planet Earth, qualitative values are not going anywhere. And seeing humans as completely separate from nature—um, don’t go there.

In terms of being something new, I do believe that number-based value systems are a human invention (if you believe numbers are a human invention—otherwise quantitative values are a human discovery if you believe that we discovered numbers!) I also believe that it’s useful to consider the two value systems as a polarity, with attributes that are polar opposites, that we navigate in modern society. We like experiencing the benefits of one until we feel the downside, at which time we cross over to get the benefits of the other.

(I find the Polarity Management model, written up by Barry Johnson in his 1992 book of that name, to be a very useful tool. He often uses polarities to describe and navigate problems that have no right or wrong answer. We need both poles to manage those problems. More on polarities in a future essay, I hope.)

This brings me to my second point. If quantitative and qualitative values don’t mix, but they both have their ups and downs, why don’t we just choose one system (numbers are easier) and go with that? We would get all the benefits and just try to minimize the ugly bits. Applying Johnson’s polarity model, he predicts that when you attempt just staying at one pole, you don’t even get a good return on the positive aspects of that pole. Instead you get the negatives of BOTH poles. To quote my second book (Our Second Chance):

“Think of anyone you might know who seems completely fixated on money and the maximization of virtual wealth. They will never know happiness because they are not only missing out on simple pleasures, they will also never earn/save/have enough. Numerically, they can never be successful, nor will they ever know qualitative joy. At the opposite end, think of someone who cares nothing for how much anything costs or numeric rationality, and is focused obsessively on their feelings and pleasure. That person will regularly make irrational decisions, be likely unable to afford their heart’s desire, and will eventually rue their lack of savings—once again, numerically unsuccessful and living with regret. Single-mindedness, of any kind, does not lead to human well-being. So how could we ever think an entire society obsessed with economic growth will fare any better? It won’t.”

Note that the downside of both scenarios described is unhappiness. I think it safe to assume that happiness, of some form, is the ultimate goal of any sentient life form. (It doesn’t matter if you believe money will make you happy or not. Anyone given the choice between being happy or being rich could soon be convinced that if they choose the second, they are really choosing the wealth because they believe it would make them happy.)

An exploration of happiness brings us back to some core logical principles of the value crisis. By definition, within a number-based value system, More is ALWAYS Better, and there is no concept of peak sufficiency. I suggest that this principle can be applied to ANY number-based value. Surely key aspects of any definition of happiness are satisfaction and sufficiency. If you are not satisfied, if you don’t have sufficiency, how can you be happy? Applying this to money, we know it absolutely to be true. No matter how much money you have; since more is better, lives based on quantitative values will always be seeking that more—unsatisfied, insufficient.

Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. There is nothing in its nature to produce happiness. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one. If it satisfies one want, it doubles and trebles that want another way. – Benjamin Franklin

Research seems to bear this out. An oft-quoted 2010 study by Daniel Kahneman and Angus Deaton concluded that money could boost happiness up to a point. However, above an annual income of about $75,000 USD, the additional wealth had negligible consistent impacts on well-being. That study was disputed, and subsequent trials showed that the number could actually be $100K or even $500K, but it still has a limit.

(I suspect that the context of changing social inequities and hedonic adaptation has a lot to do with the differences. It also matters how the money is earned and how it is used. Attempting to correlate numeric values with human ones is fraught with pitfalls.) Elon Musk might be the world’s richest man. Does anyone believe that he is truly happy? Certainly his obsessions suggest that he does not feel he has enough.

What then, IS the secret to happiness? Two powerful studies come to mind.

The first was a really cool experiment conducted by Canadian psychologist Bruce Alexander in the late ’70s. It had already been shown that a rat in a cage with two water bottles, one of which was laced with an opiate drug, would invariably choose the drug-infused concoction over the normal water and kill itself within weeks, and that behaviour was being used to model addiction in humans.

Alexander said: “Hang on! The poor rat is alone, bored, and miserable. Of course it will choose the euphoric suicide.” To counter this model, he set up “Rat Park” – a place where a community of rats had companions, toys, sex partners, problems to solve, and the same two water bottles to choose from. Sure enough, the rats in Rat Park preferred the non-drugged water, and lived happy lives. What does THAT tell you about the causes of drug-dependence?

The second study, called the Grant Study, was started at Harvard University in 1938 and followed 268 male sophomores for almost 80 years. In the 1970s, a related study, called the Glueck Study, enlisted 456 Boston inner-city residents. Both were later expanded to include wives, etc. The purpose was to learn if there was a number one predictor of healthy aging. And there was. It wasn’t income or education or diet or genetics or even drinking/smoking. The number one predictor of well-being was how many social connections you had. Having twice as many at age 45 would statistically add 20 (happy) years to your life.

Human (or even rat) connection is based on qualitative values. These results should not surprise us. How many people consciously identify acquiring multiple friends and nurturing meaningful relationships as their number one priority, and how many line up for lottery tickets?

Want to read another fascinating take on happiness? Check out this recent post by Charles Hugh Smith called What Makes Us Happier / Unhappier?

[I should remind the reader that the Value Crisis impacts a lot more than human happiness. The existential threat is what really makes it a crisis.]

Now, here’s the surprise twist…

“Andrew - can money make people happy?”

YES! Yes, I truly believe it can, absolutely.

Money does not have to be maximized as a goal. Money can also be a powerful tool—one which might even mitigate the destructive effects of our obsessive pursuit of quantitative values, when used in a very particular way…

It takes a bit of build up, but, at some point in these essays, I’m going to propose a way of using money which just might make it the most unexpected first-step key to solving the Value Crisis!

Stay tuned.

(Better yet, please Like or Subscribe so that I’m motivated to keep going. I NEED that connection!)