Stumbling on Happiness
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Stumbling on Happiness is a book of non-fiction by Daniel Gilbert. It was published in the US and Canada in 2006 by Knopf, and has been translated into 20 languages. It is a New York Times bestseller.
Gilbert's primary thesis is that it is very difficult for a person to predict what will make him or her happy in the future. He discusses the psychological barriers to being aware of feelings and desires, honestly evaluating alternatives, and accurately predicting the future.
The advice Gilbert offers is to use other people's experience and opinions. It is surprising how similar are people in much of their experiences, he says. he does not expect too many people to heed this advice, and our culture, accompanied by various thinking tendencies, is against this method of decision making.
[edit] External Links
- Stumbling on Happiness web site. includes a blog where the author adds every month or so an article related to the book.
- Reviews of Stumbling on Happiness
- Publisher's website for Stumbling on Happiness
- Short interview about the book from SXSWi 2006
- Comprehensive interview on the book
- Video of Gilbert discussing humans' failure to predict what makes us happy. Presented July 2005 at the TED Conference in Oxford, UK. Duration: 22:02
- Gilbert's Profile Page on UK publisher's blog, fifthestate.co.uk
 |
This article about a non-fiction book is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
