Origins of Pleasure

Watch this great lecture by Paul Bloom on the reason why certain things give us pleasure and identical things don't.

Money Buys Happiness

A previous post noted that spending on others generates happiness. Another study finds that money spent on experiences made people happier than buying things if those experiences are enjoyable and enhance the individual's life in non-material ways.

In the study, half of the participants wrote a paragraph about a recent experience they purchased (e.g. dining out or going to the movies). The other half wrote a paragraph about something they bought. Both groups wrote down their feelings about what they purchased. Those who bought experiences were significantly happier and said it was money well-spent.

These feelings might come from feeling connected to friends. Also we don’t get tired of happy memories, but we can get tired of a purchase.

Sore Losers, Don't Bid

Research finds that people overbid at auctions to avoid defeat more than to experience victory.

Half the subjects started the auction with a $15 bonus, which they would keep if they won. The other half were told that after the auction, if they won, they’d get an extra $15. Either way, the winners would get the same bonus.

But people bid more when they were afraid they might lose the money they already had.

Workers Who Help Are Happy

One study reveals that for a satisfying career and happy life, do something that helps others.

Scratching Really Helps

Brain scans show that scratching decreases unpleasantness - but it doesn't stimulate pleasure centers. Instead, scratching decreased the activity of brain regions associated with unpleasant sensory experiences.

Money CAN Buy Happiness

Money can buy happiness, but only if you spend it on someone else.

In one experiment, volunteers rated their happiness and were then given $5 or $20. Half were told to spend on themselves, half to give it away. Those who gave away the money were the happiness, even if it was only $5.

The finding supports another famous study on happiness.

Take A Good Deal

Research shows that a fair deal feels good because it activates the brain’s reward centers (ventral striatum, ventromedial prefrontal cortex), just like cocaine.

Participants were given offers to split a sum of money, and almost always accepted 50/50 or 40/60 deals, activating the brain’s reward centers. Bad offers activated the insula - the region associated with disgust.

Thinking About Buying

Brain activity during simulated shopping shows that thinking about buying a good is itself an enjoyable activity.

When presented with products, participant's nucleus accumbens (subcortal brain region) - associated with the anticipation of pleasure - was activated. When presented with excessive prices: insula (another brain region) activated and medial prefrontal cortex - associated with balancing gains versus losses deactivated.

The study challenges conventional economic understanding of consumer purchases - consumers decide b/w immediate pleasure of a purchase and delayed pleasures of alternative things. Instead, the study suggests that consumers trade off immediate pleasure of a purchase VS. immediate pain of spending money. This may explain why overspending when using credit cards instead of cash.

Why Do We Eat Chili's?

Chili's get their heat from capsaicin, an organic compound that fights off a fungus that attacks chili seeds. More capsaicin is produced in chili's where the fungus is more likely to grow, and little where the fungus is not a danger. Aside from humans, no other mammal eats these beasts. But if they're so spicy, why do we eat chili's?

Some push the health card b/c chili's: help lower blood pressure, may have antimicrobial effects, and the pain of chilies can neutralize other pain. Dr. Paul Rozin argues that the beneficial effects are too small to explain why. What's his proposition?

Benign masochism.

Dr. Rozin tested chili eaters by gradually increasing the pain (pungency) of the food. Participants all preferred the level closest to unbearable. He says we eat chili's for the same reason we ride roller coasters - for the thrill. He says only humans enjoy events that produce feelings we are programmed to avoid.

Whatever the case, it still doesn't explain this woman who eats jolokia peppers (hottest in the world) like candy, even rubbing it in her eyes.

"Nature never desires sex as an ultimate object."

Following up on the posting about in vitro fertilization, Hadhrat Khalifatul Masih IV (rh) has also discussed pleasure seeking activities in relation to sex within his book Islam’s Response to Contemporary Issues. What’s interesting is how the biological basis of hedonic pleasure associated with sex is ultimately linked to social practices that deviate from moral behavior. I quote the following passage from pages 62-63:

“When societies begin to degenerate or become top-heavy and lopsided with over-sophistication, they begin to topple down and return to the same crude animal answer to their urges. This may not be visible in every social and cultural activity, but it is almost always pronounced in human relation and style in the pursuit of pleasure. A brief study of man in his responses to sex will demonstrate the case in point.

Around the basic instinct to reproduce through sexual regeneration, pleasures are associated by nature in the entire animal kingdom. What we find different in human society is a gradual departure from the mere satiation of crude desires to a gradually more refined attitude to the fulfillment of animal urges.

Nature never desires sex as an ultimate object. The ultimate object has always been reproduction and propagation of species. Sex was only secondary to it. When societies become decadent , the role is almost reversed.

The gradual development of the institution of marriage , the rites associated with this institution and the taboos regarding the interplay of male and female sexes, may be considered by a sociologist to be a phenomenon resulting from a natural growth of society and unrelated to religion. But, whether the growth is directed from on high, or a random phenomenon moving forward by itself, there is no denying the fact that gradually the responses to satisfy the fundamental urge become more and more sophisticated and involved.

Growing promiscuousness in male and female relationships is again symptomatic of the same malady. It is not just a permissive liberal attitude towards sexual relationship but there is, indeed much more with it to change the entire atmosphere of this extremely important sphere of human interest and activity. Debate about the legitimacy or illicitness of such relationship is looked down upon as a thing of the past. Of course, there are many staunch religious-minded groups which go on discussing this issue. But during their discussions on the media, one cannot fail to observe that such old-fashioned, rigidly religious-minded people are being reduced to a minority of insignificance.

It is becoming much more fashionable in the West to consider sex as a natural urge which should be responded to without any inhibitions. A traditional coyness associated with talk amongst women is becoming a thing of the past. Nakedness, exposure, display, unabashed discussion and confession are considered only as public expression of truth.”

Islamic perspectives on in vitro fertilization

I was on the AskIslam web site (www.askislam.org) recently, and thought it worthwhile to transcribe the following statement made by Hadhrat Khalifatul Masih IV (rh) regarding in vitro fertilization, located on the site (the audio is linked here). Notice that Hazoor’s answer actually generalizes to broader issues concerns the philosophy and purpose of reproductive procedures in general, and also touches upon the evolution of sexual behavior. (Any errors in transcription are my own, and I take responsibility for them).

Transcript:

8 August 1984

The London Mosque

Does Islam permit in vitro fertilization and other laboratory reproductive procedures?

Hadhrat Khalifatul Masih IV^rh answered:

“You know in principle, if a husband’s sperm is conveyed to his wife’s uterus through any means, there shouldn’t be any objection – legal objection – from an Islamic point of view. It is for the sanctity and purity of [the] human race that such orders are made (number one), and also for fixing the responsibility; because sex is not a direct objective of life. Look at it from [a] natural point of view or from [a] religious point of view, the answer would be one and the same: everything which is productive and useful…acquires some sort of taste and some pleasure. So that is why all the most important things for life have acquired some pleasure. But because the objective was important, pleasure ultimately became the objective for some human beings (erroneously) and they forgot that the pleasure was a development – according to scientists, maybe – of billions of years of evolution in some direction, and according to the religious philosophy, a development which was ordained and pre-designed and pre-directed.

But whatever way you look at it, the pleasure attached to human acts [is] in fact directly related to the importance of those acts. If they serve humanity, somehow [and] in some way, then pleasure is added to it, and vice versa. This is the general rule. So in this case, the second important thing is to bring up the future generation with this responsibility, and that responsibility has to be divided among the people. That is one object of sex. So the Holy Qur’an divides that responsibility according to set rules, and the husband has to bear the responsibility of the upbringing of the entire children. If a mother can participate of [her own] volition, there is no objection, but in principle it is [the] father’s responsibility. So anything, any scientific research, which does not violate these two fundamental objectives of reproduction, Islam does not have any objection against them. Whatever way [by which] the experiments take place, if purity of race and [the] sharing of responsibility – these are the two main objectives – if they are not violated in any way by a scientific experiment, Islam will have no objection against it.”