The Question of Gaming - Does it lead to happiness?

I doubt there is any of us here who hasn't been faced with the decision of whether they should or should not play Vs, whether be limited a time, manner, or place, or playing it in its entirety.

The foremost question remains - will this make me happy? The idea that gaming may lead to happiness is a tenuous one, and one that we should all deliberate.

The first question to answer in this deliberation, then, is what is happiness? The answer will vary from person to person, but no truer definition has ever been given than by the Greek Aristotle.

This answer is unusual to many, a response which Aristotle predicts.

So then, according to Aristotle, a happy life is a good life. A life with virtue is good, a life with vice is bad. A complete list of virtues and vices can be found here - http://www.molloy.edu/academic/philo.../ne2_notes.htm .

The key to happiness, then, is knowledge of what is good. Only when equipped with this knowledge can someone make right decisions and become happy. As Thomas Jefferson stated:

So does gaming, then, make people happy? A cursory view of the “gaming crowd” in general lends mixed results. Many examples abound of gamers who self-indulge, are vain, stingy or extravagant, apathetic, boastful, boorish or buffoons, unpleasant, shameless, envious or spiteful; though there are certainly examples of the opposite. The final link to determine is, then, if this is a product of gaming in of itself.

It can be said that gaming in general is a competitive pleasure. The primary goals of gaming, put forth by the developers, is to produce pleasure in the individual while tapping man’s zeal for competition. Knowledge of what is good, and the desire to cultivate it, is gained incidental to these activities. Some games encourage it moreso than others, but rarely is virtue the primary focus.

Whether gaming itself helps in the pursuit of happiness depends then entirely on how much it cultivates virtue, and how much it discourages vice, in the individual. This is done either internally, by way of the game’s plot and goal, or externally, the nature of playing it itself.

Internally, a game that encourages the player to perform good acts (Kingdom Hearts) helps this pursuit, whereas one that does the opposite (GTA) hinders it.

As the nature of man requires friendship and companionship (man is a social animal), isolation of the individual hinders the pursuit of happiness. Good occupation and knowledge, also being necessary to happiness, are generally hindered by gaming by the act of gaming itself and the isolation it brings (the Zombie example is fitting here).

Gaming, by virtue of its external nature – resulting in isolation, styming of the pursuit of knowledge, and interfering with good occuption – is inherently disadvantageous to happiness. However, the degree of these three factors varies very much from game to game. One type of game may encourage friendship and companionship in small doses, whereas another encourages isolation and ignorance.

Gaming, then, in theory is dangerous to personal and collective happiness to a certain extent. There are many varities of games and gaming – video, card, sport, and the like – and each cultivates vice or virtue to different extents. It’s important, then, to be prudent in engaging gaming activity and anaylze the nature of the activity itself, as the long term effects can be disastrous.

Vs. System, in specific, has a number of positives and negatives. It’s positives, though few, are internal - the comic nature of it promotes virtuous character (Spider-Man, Superman), though this is mitigated by the prevalance, and support, of anti-heroes (Punisher) and villains.

Externally, however, Vs. System is a much rougher beast. There are well over 30 teams in Vs to utilize, a far greater variety and depth of gaming combinations than in any of its competitors. Though flouted as a positive by many, this has the large negative of greatly exacerbating the vices of gaming.

To be a high-lever Vs gamer, it’s necessary to dedicate one’s life to learning these enormous combinations in several different formats. The aforementioned vices - self-indulgance, vanity, stinginess and extravaganance, apathy, boastfulness, boorishness or buffoonery, unpleasantness, shamelessness, envy and spite - then naturally flow forth either in large, or in part.

Dude, it's blatantly obvious that you're really Hans Joachim Hoh using his fancy-pants philosophy degree to try and draw us all away from gaming, thus injuring UDE in retribution for banning you. This is made only more obvious by the fact that it comes so soon after getting slapped around good and proper at a Magic Pro Tour. Get a life, really.

;)

Yes.

Not bad. I'd give it a B. Mainly because you didn't give an argument for people who enjoy wallowing in vice. Happiness is also subjective which you seemed to ignore for the most part. You seem to be intent on convincing us that gaming is inherently bad and not providing an impartial critical view. I'll assume there is going to be a Part 2 or a follow-up essay, either that or you're ranting and I'll just ignore you.

The problem with the Aristotlian definition of happiness is that it doesn't jibe well with what people mean when they say they are happy. While some of your points may have merit in the system you are using, what you really need is more proof that the system in question is relevant or accurate. Also, there is the problem that "sufficiently equipped" is poorly defined (i.e. above poverty line vs. suburbia, etc.), as is virtue in many cases. So it's an interesting argument, but it seems to rely on too many assumptions and unclarified terms.

*copy and paste* ok now my next paper is done

Okay, this the the first thread in a long time that made me wait until after school to respond.

I think people today do not know what happiness is. They live their entire lives as a pathetic string of temporary, shallow, banal satisfactions. The urges that drive modern man are media induced brainwashed-in desires that were implanted in order to sell soap. At least that's the majority of the people I come in contact with in a large American city.

What does that have to do with Vs. System? Hmmm.

The nasty little brats, some of them in their thirties, who flock to this game to improve their self-esteem just a little bit? They fall into the above category. They have defined happiness by watching Jerry Springer and Professional Wrestling (is there a difference?) and they know no better. They will keep hitting the demand bar whenever there is another human around and say "SEE NOOB, I GOODER THAN YOU!!!" No happiness there.

The comic myth junkies, I hope, are seeking a deeper source of happiness by connecting to the Joseph Campbell stream of power that leads to true bliss. They might actually step in a steaming pile of true joy on the way.

The elitist pricks who continue to insist that they have held themselves above the rest of us on the Pro Circuit and are now better than the scrubs beneath them? Ummm, next.

The casual kooks, now that's a bunch we should focus on. They are having fun, laughing and experimenting and flexing their creativity. Those little bubbles of laughter they get when they beat the "best" deck? That is real happiness...

... in my humble opinion.

Stu

I have one problem with your theory

If we were brainwashed to buy soap, why do most gamers............

'cause we're stinking it to the man!

(you can groan... it's ok...... i did.)

me like soap

(and he's right. just replace 'soap' with 'brand x')

In Gary's case, since he is one of the thirtysomething Springer fans, change 'soap' to 'make-up'.

(Did that really make me happy?)

Yes.

I have a couple of problems with this. One of my main problems is that you say this like happiness is all-important. To me, this in and of itself seems rather selfish, to value the happiness of yourself above everything else. Maybe that's not what you're trying to say, but, if it's not, then self-happiness should not be the big motivator here.

Second, you talk about pursuit of knowledge as being one of our goals (whether this was a part of happiness or in addition to happiness I feel unclear on, but I'm sure it's important somehow). I find it odd that you don't think card-gaming of any variety encourages pursuit of knowledge. After all, it takes a large amount of skill and mind juice to play this game effectively and to win. You have to learn many skills that are useful elsewhere, such as patience (saving Fizzle instead of blowing it at the first plot twist you see), math (wait, so, after using 5 pumps and then a Team Tactics, am I doing 50 damage yet), sportsmanship ("Don't be a dick."), and many other skills.

Finally, I (personally) don't like to judge anything off of Aristotle's notion of virtues. After all, if you're not a virtuous person, you won't be able to truly spot what the true virtues are. And, if you're not a virtuous person, you may THINK you are, but just be wrong. This notion lead to one of Nietzche's more popular sarcastic mockeries: Ubermench.

Should we be gaming? Will it make us better people? Or will we just enjoy ourselves along the way, and hope that whatever lies ahead of us in this life or another life is willing to forgive our unnecessary indulgences?

After all, who gave Aristotle the right to define happiness? What if the unnecessary indulgences along the way are what life is really all about?

It's like the Dalai Lhama said: "On the road of life, you need to stop and smell the new VS cards."

k

My degree is in Political Science, not philosophy, but I do read it from time to time.

Mr. Fike makes an excellent connection to Joseph Campbell. Joseph Campbell wrote "The Hero with a Thousand Faces," which draws lessons from mythology (Greek, Native American, etc) that can be applied to our lives to enrich them.

Spider-Man is modern mythology. The lessons that Peter Parker teaches us, which are replicated in Vs to a certain extent, include humility and rightous indignation, among others. A good paper on this can be found here - http://www.calstatela.edu/faculty/sfischo/ClassicalHeroes.html

Vs System is different than other games in that it encourages these mythologies, which then encourage people to do good, and ultimately, pursue happiness.

Vs System also encourages, when taken to its highest level (professional gaming) is isolation and studying of combinations. As profparm pointed out, these lessons have some aid in increasing general knowledge, but it's primarily skilled knowledge (attacking, counting), not knowledge of the good (and ultimately the pursuit of happiness).

It's also true that everyone defines happiness differently (Aristotle said this too). It's further true that everyone defines race differently. At one point a common definition of races was based on genetic differences, as James Calhoun argued, thereby "proving" that one race is genetically superior to another.

That definition was obviously incorrect. Many definitions of happiness are also incorrect. But how can we really know for sure? The best way to know is through learning. We learn by reading, watching, and listening. Reading mythologies, as Campbell wrote, is one way. Reading philosophy is another way.

What we see, however, is that gaming in general stymies the most important kinds of learning, but most particularly when taken to its extremes. As Mr Fike points out, casual players are the most likely to gain the most benefits from gaming and the fewest negatives, while for professional ones it's the exact opposite.