Abstract:This paper crosses the borders of human geography to bring back two related bodies of work from experimental psychology that investigate, in an unusual and refreshingly precise way, long‐standing human geographical concerns with temporality, place and subject formations, meaning‐making and well‐being. It is argued that the traffic of ideas and empirical findings between human geography and experimental psychology can be mutually profitable if, and only to the extent that, it encompasses a sustained epistemolog… Show more
“…When all is said and done, the hedonic treadmill reminds us that happiness is perishable. At the very same time, it opens our eyes to the temporal games that our cortical space plays [50][51][52]. Most important is "the hammock game": what keeps us striving towards the achievement of a goal is the secret belief that once that goal is achieved, we will be able to relax in the hammock of life, blessed with perpetual happiness [17].…”
Section: The Hedonic Treadmillmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…There is a growing critical engagement of geographers with the literatures on genetics and the biological sciences, more generally. See, for example, [50,52] and chapter 8 in [39] and the references cited therein.…”
This paper provides a critical engagement with state-of-the-art research from positive psychology and behavioral genetics that directly challenges social geographers’ working hypothesis that people’s well-being and happiness can dramatically be improved by suitably modifying unjust social arrangements and exploitative economic relations. It is intended to generate interest in this neglected body of work in general and awareness of its politically regressive implications in particular.
“…When all is said and done, the hedonic treadmill reminds us that happiness is perishable. At the very same time, it opens our eyes to the temporal games that our cortical space plays [50][51][52]. Most important is "the hammock game": what keeps us striving towards the achievement of a goal is the secret belief that once that goal is achieved, we will be able to relax in the hammock of life, blessed with perpetual happiness [17].…”
Section: The Hedonic Treadmillmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…There is a growing critical engagement of geographers with the literatures on genetics and the biological sciences, more generally. See, for example, [50,52] and chapter 8 in [39] and the references cited therein.…”
This paper provides a critical engagement with state-of-the-art research from positive psychology and behavioral genetics that directly challenges social geographers’ working hypothesis that people’s well-being and happiness can dramatically be improved by suitably modifying unjust social arrangements and exploitative economic relations. It is intended to generate interest in this neglected body of work in general and awareness of its politically regressive implications in particular.
“…Philosophers, psychologists and geographers agree that it is in the nature of humans to make sense of things and to extract meaning from dwelling in place (Pierce et al . ; Simandan ; Malpas ; Jones ). Those individuals who feel that they have a mission in life and who see themselves as a part of something larger than themselves tend to rate their satisfaction with life very high (Haidt ; Bering ).…”
Section: Hedonism Virtue and Meaning‐makingmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Oftentimes, we tend to think of geography as some grand project aimed at solving humanity's big problems (e.g. Sheppard ), but this stance might obliterate the more modest, yet more palpable, achievements that this discipline could produce for the happiness of the specific individuals who hide below the grandiosity of the label ‘humanity’ (Simandan ; Olson ). Consider this old African story:One day the animals called a contest to measure their strength.…”
Demonic geography is an approach to practising human geography that operates from the premise that there are no such immaterial entities as ‘souls’, ‘spirits’, ‘minds’, integrated stable ‘selves’ or conscious ‘free will’. This paper elaborates the theoretical framework of demonic geography by spelling out how it is different from non‐representational theory and by articulating it within recent developments in experimental psychology, neuroscience and the philosophy of mind. Counterintuitively, the paper shows that the deflationary, materialistic ontology of human nature espoused by demonic geography need not lead to meaninglessness, unhappiness or the collapse of moral behaviour. Instead, subscribing to demonic geography opens up new ways to find meaning, to pursue happiness and to live the good life.
“…I am grateful to Dr Stephen Hill for the generous and constructive spirit of his commentary on my paper ‘On time, place and happiness’ (Simandan 2011a). As I was reading his insightful observations on the nature of episodic memory, one telling episode that emerged in my consciousness was that of a debate I had with myself at age 11.…”
The first part of the paper develops the argument that geographers should learn to decompose human memory into its constituent parts because then and then alone will we become attuned to the full range of ways in which we incorporate places into our beings. The second part of the paper articulates Stephen Hill's comments on episodic memory with my recent work on wisdom.
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