Shouldn’t the real question be “why aren’t more people happy”.
Lack of happiness isn’t relegated only to “smart people”.
My observation: managing stress related to ever growing amount of responsibilities (as comes with age), finances, and spouse can have a disproportionate impact on one’s happiness. None of which are tied to intelligence.
If you use your smarts to conclude that having a spouse will negatively affect your happiness, don't have one.
A very intelligent person should be able to figure out a way to improve their finances.
The article makes the distinction between well-defined problems (eg. increase my monthly income) and poorly defined problems (eg. find a spouse that matches you for life), and clearly suggests that intelligence helps with one but not the other.
> If you use your smarts to conclude that having a spouse will negatively affect your happiness, don't have one.
You're assuming the negative. Your spouse can be a huge overall help in achieving happiness.
> A very intelligent person should be able to figure out a way to improve their finances.
It's not that simple.
You could be exceedingly smart but medically handicapped, which leads to lower paying jobs. Or could have been a high earner and then come down with an unfortunate disease which greatly impacts you ability to work and medically bankrupts you.
> You're assuming the negative. Your spouse can be a huge overall help in achieving happiness
I am not assuming anything, but explaining that, in theory, one could decide to have or not to have a spouse to increase their happiness — if they could reasonably deduce what the outcome would be, which they can't.
I was mostly tongue-in-cheek in relation to a spouse: that's a "poorly defined problem" that, according to the article, intelligence does not help with.
> It's not that simple
Oh, agreed. But we are talking about averages, and there is a known correlation between intelligence and financials.
Statistics, unfortunately, never says anything special about any single case.
I don't think our society has any focus on happiness, it's not easily measured or produced and there's little proof that it'd benefit the economy..
I mean..
What if people suddenly discovered that enough food and shelter is available, that they could do maybe a days work a month and just walk around to smell the flowers the rest of the time?
There are many people for whom that is true (chiefly the retired). The ones who are physically able generally choose to do something marginally “productive” than continuously smelling flowers. (Perhaps that’s related to what got them to a position to retire, whether a work ethic, other personal mindset, or programming.)
Lack of happiness isn’t relegated only to “smart people”.
My observation: managing stress related to ever growing amount of responsibilities (as comes with age), finances, and spouse can have a disproportionate impact on one’s happiness. None of which are tied to intelligence.