Mark Kingwell In Pursuit Of Happiness Analysis

In Mark Kingwell’s excerpt, “In Pursuit of Happiness,” he discusses the challenge of defining happiness. This work serves to inform the audience on a topic they may never have considered while using evidence and support from philosophers, authors, and even scientists to contribute to various viewpoints on the subject. At the end of the excerpt, Kingwell discusses happiness, even unhappiness, and concludes with his own opinions on the subject. Since the beginning of human existence, people have tried to define happiness, but no one has described it sufficiently, which means the search continues. Even credible sources such as the New English Dictionary give unclear definitions of happiness. Another major problem with this task is that happiness describes many concepts which means finding one precise way to describe happiness is challenging. Kingwell brings up the

This discovery explains that “nothing in your own life plans or aspirations and accomplishments will alter a built in, hardwired capacity for contentment,” (Kingwell). Genetics determines a person’s ability to obtain certain levels of happiness despite their search for happiness. Although genetics are a limiting factor towards one’s contentment, even the geneticists do not have a definition of happiness.

In the conclusion, Kingwell asserts that philosophical thinkers have some truth in their thinking that questioning the definition will lead to unhappiness and he also believes that the geneticists are only looking at the facts instead of introspectively “raising the deeper question of what they, or we, mean by happiness,” (Kingwell). This type of thinking, the kind that limits the human understanding of happiness, is the hurdle /limiting factor/ that puts a damper on finding the true definition. He does believe that this question of happiness is “answerable and