Before offering some final words, I want to thank the editors for
inviting me to share my thoughts this week about The Good Life:
Unifying the Philosophy and Psychology of Well-Being. A quick rec...
The network theory explains well-being in purely descriptive terms.
But well-being is normative. Tim’s well-being is intrinsically
valuable for Tim. Can a purely descriptive theory of well-bein...
If you were going to describe someone who has a high degree of
well-being, it might go something like this: “Felicity is in a happy
and fulfilling committed relationship, she has close and cari...
Positive Psychology is a theoretical mess. For example, it has no
consensus definition. Most scientific disciplines can be characterized
in terms of identifiable categories in nature that are th...
To investigate the nature of well-being, let’s start with the basic
respect assumption: Most people with a concept of well-being are
generally successful in talking about and identifying instan...
Science is descriptive. It tells us what is the case. All matters
normative are found within the confines of philosophy. The human
sciences can tell us about the content and evolution of our mor...
I’m Mike Bishop. I teach philosophy at Florida State University. And
I thank the editors for inviting me to cause trouble here at The
Brains Blog by writing about The Good Life: Unifying the ...
