Dear All,

I dedicate you the materialization of this contradiction at the link

https://sites.google.com/site/margheritachang/populorum-progressio-in-which-direction-is-it-going

there you will find one of my paintings.

Have a good night.

Ting Fa Marg

Dear Kamal,

rationality would suggest as you indicated, but Keynesian economics argues to the contrary that for a development of gross domestic product it must act selfishly consuming and wasting. Only by pursuing private vices the economy may reach the public virtue and then to hope for a recovery from recession. This is the paradox that emerges from the austerity policy. According to the Keynesian demand-driven model, the increase in savings at the expense of consumption would lead us to stagnation or worse the economic setback.

The contradiction lies in the fact that the squandering does run the economy, while the virtues of abstinence from consumption leads to misery.

Thank you for having raised this serious contradiction.

Marg

I believe that in the implementation "or vice versa...".

Dear Ting,

I think public happiness has layers and this characteristic is a various phenomenon.

Regarding my experience I would alter Kamal’s dtermination:

Public happiness is related to suitably tolerable and consumable quality (quality is a relative value and we live in a world tend to lose the quality), carefulness, immorality, irresponsibility and mental nihilism where the beauty, the noble ideas and solidarity are going to abandoned!

Moderation in expenditure & in frugality is a sound approach for the society to adopt in order to have a steady well-balanced state of affairs. At one hand, money ought to transfer between hands so as the economical "wheel" keeps rotating & the people fulfill their basic & extra needs enjoying life itself. On the other hand, there has to be some savings for the sudden unpredictable downturns in which the citizens find the resources needed when problems arise. Falling in debt means humiliations during the days & worries during the nights as the wisdom has said. 

I fully agree with Dr. Nizar that moderation in expenditure and in frugality is a sound approach for the society to adopt in order to have a steady well-balanced state of affairs. 

Dear All,

I dedicate you the materialization of this contradiction at the link

https://sites.google.com/site/margheritachang/populorum-progressio-in-which-direction-is-it-going

there you will find one of my paintings.

Have a good night.

Ting Fa Marg

Dear Kamal,

Thank you.

As you can see, there is the world of science, represented by our past Magnificent Rector Cristiana Compagno, and there is the world of nature, represented by an Australian aborigine decorated with the technique pimpled native.

Populorum Progressio: in which direction is it going?

Good night

Marg

There appear to be several ways to understand what is to be recognized as *public happiness* and *mercantile society*. So all in all the question does not make sense to me. It would appear that there are several boundary questions which would need to be discussed before this questions makes sense. And then ofcourse - from who's point of view? From which group of individuals? From the leadership of such a society? What metrics is to be understood as appropriate and in what context?

First, the question is vital, above the secondary ones that usually dominate even the academic agenda, and goes much further.

For example, speak of virtue would be completely off-topic nowadays, something coming from a Frank Capra movie and inconceivable outside of that distant reality. Keeping the standard of Hollywood, few films now have mere traces of virtue (which does not mean at any time using language "corny").

Waste have always been frowned upon, well in advance of environmental problems. That is, the correct use of material goods is something that binds to virtue, being a perennial value - though again the days of cheap gasoline or that address the problems of lack of water or food.

Thus, I believe that virtuous behavior from families that make up their children is the indispensable foundation of a society that can be considered well-formed, and therefore the way to being a group of happy people.

Dear @Ting, beehive is inspiration! "Human society is exactly like a beehive, for everyone is engaged in collecting honey from various flowers, or collecting money from various sources, and creating large empires for common enjoyment. However, after these empires are created, the bites of other nations have to be suffered. Sometimes nations declare war upon one another, and the human beehives become sources of misery."

I do suggest a very good reading The Beehive Society: A vision of the future!

http://vaniquotes.org/wiki/Human_society_is_exactly_like_a_beehive,_for_everyone_is_engaged_in_collecting_honey_from_various_flowers,_or_collecting_money_from_various_sources,_and_creating_large_empires_for_common_enjoyment

http://english.pravda.ru/science/earth/28-02-2011/117040-beehive_society-0/

One need to clarify the perspective. are we look at society from individual perspective or individual from society perspective.

I believe we all are part of a collective. so the public happiness is a collective of individual happiness.

We are part of a large structure of nature. which has it own structure and system. Normally what we see is that the manifestation of ones feelings generally is BIG. be it the mega structures that we see across geographies on earth or the loudness of expressions. 

But a larger debate / discussion is needed to define the virtues. Is being frugal being happy? Is it the denial and acceptance of denial being frugal. which one leads to happiness?

For me the word peace is the key. If there is peace there is happiness. And peace would not come with consumption or wastage or excess. Peace comes with sharing. Peace comes with being true. to nature, to society, to oneself.

Dear all,

thank you so much for different points of view. Reading your thoughtful considerations, I realize that the human race needs to create value systems and scales on which to compare the various gradations of good and evil.

Is the good (or bad)  an absolute or a relative value?

Does our  heart make us to decide for a positive versus negative judgment? Or is it rather the sense of justice?

The issue, we are dealing with, seems to confront us with the following dilemma. “The selfish attitude is directed to maximize individual utility. Does it determine in a long period a worse or a better collective well-being?" It is like asking whether the preservation of the species can exist without selfishness in the personal satisfaction of the individual independently of the other.

In economics, the mainstream claims that the pursuit of a behavior that maximizes our personal utility leads to a balanced situation where we attain the maximum in terms of efficiency and equity. The Nobel Laureate Amartaya Sen instead goes against this view and argues that in these cases you get to an equilibrium Pareto’s efficient, but without equity.

Greetings

Ting Fa Marg

I think that happiness as anything in life is an experience completely dependent on the subjects desire, willingness and ability to recognize difference. To understand lack of suffering one must also understand the difference between suffering and lack of suffering. To make judgements one must also have something to compare with *personally* and not hearsay. One cannot replicate the experience of other people. We cannot read each others mind. We may be able to exchange messages - but the meaning of them and the experience of them is our own, personal and subjective. We can not even replicate our own experiences as life is a flow which is not static.

Happy is a characterized by feeling of enjoyment, pleasure and satisfaction. Public happiness of a mercantile society can be related more to virtue, prudence and frugality.