Generation X and Y Happiness

This morning in class as an effort to get the students thinking about John Stuart Mill s Utilitarian philosophy I asked them to make a list of five things they need to be happy. It could be as abstract as freedom and as concrete as food I said. Then they were to rank them and turn to a neighbor to compare. I expected at least some major differences in rankings and or happiness needs. Take a minute to mentally do the exercise on your own below the fold I ll talk about the results. The students in my class belong to Generation Y young people who have never had to use a rotary phone and for whom the Internet has always been an existing reality. I can remember first seeing the sluggish Netscape Navigator at the US Naval Academy in the EE department and going to a network room where the shrieks and whistles of the dialup tones were constant. In that sense at least I m an old fogey to them though I m sure some of my readers will say Hey I used punchcards and coded in FORTRAN when ! it was cool Okay FORTRAN was never cool. But that s beside the point. The results of my mini survey showed that the students mostly seemed to agree on the most important things and their priority. I as a Gen X er was thinking in pretty individual terms about my own freedoms ability to be compensated pursue my dreams etc. Them . Love . Family . Friends Cell phones also came pretty high up in the list. Freedom got added on after we went through the entire class s brainstorming. They did see the possibility of conflict between aims of happiness though so in that sense the small task was a success. So too was the discussion about whether Mill s idea of human sympathy as a motivator is too optimistic. Seeing the world through another generation s eyes is yet another benefit to teaching. Discussion No comments for Generation X and Y Happiness Notify me of followup comments via e mail Post a comment. First time commenters will be moderated there is no need to resubmit. Your email ! address is never shared. Typically once you ve been approved you won t need to have your comments actively approved. However I reserve the right to moderate comments for reasons including but not limited to ad hominem attacks spamming of personal websites off topic rants general rudeness etc. All that aside thanks for your comment and come back again Name E mail Web site XHTML You can use these tags Comment Subscribe without commenting E Mail Recent Comments ck Jeong you re in agreement with R. dru johnson Same problem in the UK http www.timesonline.co.uk tol news politics article .ece ogre Experience is still. experientially. real. . Jeong I m in agreeance with R. Elena s. ck Jeong yes there may. Anonymous Categories Announcements Art Asides Blogs Technology Books Buddhism Christianity Education Ethics Featured Films Gender god History Humor Islam LGBT Linkdump Logic Moleskine Music Newsworthy Personal Philosophy Epistemology Language Metaphysics Mind Pluralism Politics Pop culture Quotes Race Reference Religion Sanskrit Science Sexuality STL! Story Thesis UU worship c arbitrarymarks.com

Source: http://arbitrarymarks.com/wordpress/2008/03/12/generation-x-and-y-happiness/