It is interesting to hear that the Danish people are the happiest people on earth. I am glad that someone is.

It would seem that happiness would have something to do with knowledge, as it would seem to be impossible for anyone to be happy without knowing they are happy. Knowledge is not the same as opinion, as opinion is mixed with ignorance and ignorance is the contrary of knowledge. People, then, can be of the opinion that they are happy when they are not. A common notion seems to be that happiness is equated with pleasure. It would seem that happiness would include pleasure, at least not exclude it.

If happiness does have a correspondence to knowledge, it would seem we would more likely be happy the more intelligent we became. If happiness is a byproduct of knowledge, this would be another reason to consider ignorance an evil.

I concur about some of the social science literature on happiness. They never clearly define what exactly they’re measuring. It should be obvious that expectations matter in a person’s judgment about their condition. It is too bad they don’t read our books.

As to the Danes, I am sure they are happy because of their beer. And when global warming allows them to grow wine grapes they can graduate to the pursuit of nirvana. (Yes, I am revealing a prejudice.)

Of course, because Nirvana is more difficult to achieve and quality wine grapes difficult to grow they will no longer be happy having raised their expectations.