Pessimism and optimism

[duszek]

Yes, I said:

how can a pessimist be happy if simple pleasures like food are accompanied by negative thoughts ?

If both an optimist and a pessimist has a glas of wine the accompanying thoughts are:

1. this wine will make me relaxed and will inspire me and I will figure out something interesting
2. this wine will spoil my stomach or my liver will get damaged or I will get drunk and get a ticket on my way home and my wife will ask me to sleep on the roof

[duszek]

At first I backed up Jaded S. by doubting that a pessimist can enjoy anything at all.
Should he not imagine the worst (pessimo) happening after or during the meal ?

Then I offered a solution:
a pessimist can be a selective one: while eating he is a realist and thus can enjoy food or even fly in a plane without worrying (taking statistics into account) and in many other respects he is a pessimist.

Now:

How much pessimism is necessary to call someone a real full-fledged pessimist ?
Is pessimism a matter of degrees ?

This is where the confusion came in. He wanted to say that pessimists can't be happy. That was his strawman. I said that pessimism can't yield happiness. My statement leaves open the possibility that a pessimist can experience happiness, if, say, he suspends his pessimism in favor of realism.

He, Dalek, wanted to say that pessimists can be happy ?

Me, dooshek or little ghost, doubted the possibility of experiencing pleasure if pessimists are making the experience.

[Dalek Prime]

You know, you both reminded me of a lesson in life. Who gives a fuck why or how I'm happy. I am, and there's fuck all you can do to change that. As well, I don't have to put up with shits in my life. Easily done. Enjoy the rest of your days, until they are cut short by tragedy don't care about.

http://rlv.zcache.ca/smiley_face_giving ... vr_512.jpg

[Jaded Sage]

I don't doubt pessimists can experience pleasure, but surely, it is tainted by the pessimism.

[duszek]

You know, you both reminded me of a lesson in life. Who gives a fuck why or how I'm happy. I am, and there's fuck all you can do to change that. As well, I don't have to put up with shits in my life. Easily done. Enjoy the rest of your days, until they are cut short by tragedy don't care about.

Yes, but perhaps we are afraid of becoming pessimists ourselves because we don´t want to miss certain pleasures in life and wish to enjoy them to the fullest.

Pessimists look grumpy, they sound ironic and sarcastic.

If you show us that there is no risk of losing the ability to experience pleasures then we could dare a step into the negative. And thus enlarge our horizons.

I don´t want to be cut short by a tragedy, I try to think of something positive anyway, like for example: thank you for this occasion to get immune against sadism.

[Melchior]

I'm very optimistic about the prospects for pessimism. We could find a benefracture for humanity!

https://youtu.be/1TDPSoWAxPA

https://youtu.be/rX6Y_0iICjw

[Jaded Sage]

Wait, what's the difference between pessimism and cynicism? Is cynicism a specific kind of pessimism?

[Melchior]

Wait, what's the difference between pessimism and cynicism? Is cynicism a specific kind of pessimism?

Ask Arthur.

[Pluto]

The world is a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those that feel. The optimist has transcended the pessimist's angst.

[duszek]

Is a pessimist inclined to paranoia ?

He imagines that the worst can happen.

Does a pessimist worry more than other people ?

[Jaded Sage]

For the record there is a difference between lowering your expectations and being a pessimist. Pessimists have bad expectations not low expectations.

[duszek]

Yes, but do pessimists dwell upon their bad expectations and therefore worry more than other people ?

[Jaded Sage]

I suppose. I'm just interested in clearing up the confusion from earlier.

[yiostheoy]

What leads to pessimism? What leads to optimism? Is it just luck?

I think this just happens to be a brain chemistry thing.

In my family, my youngest sister and I are both continually optimistic, and to a certain extent stoic too.

Our mother and middle sister are both pessimists and whiners.

Our father was a pragmatist and quiet person, who himself never got over the PTSD of tank warfare during WW2. He may have once been optimistic but became utterly stoic and eventually uncommunicative.

Anyway that's my initial hypothesis from anecdote. It would require extensive clinical testing to get any further with this topic.

[yiostheoy]

Yes, but do pessimists dwell upon their bad expectations and therefore worry more than other people ?

My mom and my middle sister do indeed, yes.