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Jasmine G Carranza

Jon Beadle

English 115

22 September 2019

Happiness is achievable

Everyone's goal in life is to be happy. Many try and achieve this by starting a family,

having the job of their dreams, or even having the car and house of their dreams. Most of these

goals even though achievable, achieving them does not mean that it will make you any happier

than you already are.​ In the article “How Happy Are You and Why” by Sonja Lyubomirsky, it is

explained how every person is born with a specific set point that allows them to reach a certain

happiness level. Lyubomirsky argues that “40 percent is still available to us to

mold”(Lyubomirsky, 189) this means that we are able to mold ourselves into becoming up to 40

percent happier. Based on the use of Ethos, Pathos and Logos Lyubomirsky’s argument was

most efficient in demonstrating them.

In Lyubomirsky’s article this was shown more effectively. This is because out of Dvid

Brooks and Graham Hills articles Lyubomirsky was most credible. Lyubomirsky showed That

efficiently in her argument by proving to have both the credibility as a writer and as some on

who has an exemplary background on the topic of happiness. Lyubomirsky wrote eight articles,

book chapters on the subject of “ development of “sustainable” happiness and “cultural

influences on the pursuit of happiness” (Lyubomirsky179). As far as her background on the

subject of happiness goes “Sonja Lyubomirsky is a professor of psychology at theUniversity of

California, Riverside. Born in Russia , she earned a PhD in social psychology from Stanford

University in 1994”(Lyubomirsky 179) Lyubomirsky is credible because she holds a Ph.D on the
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subject. Hills article “Living with less. A lot less”, states “He holds a degree in architecture and

studies industrial design”and argues that living with a lot less will make you a happier person. As

an architect from Carleton University, although educated this alone does not give him enough

credibility as a writer nor enough education on the subject of happiness to argue on the matter.

Hills does not seem to have enough credibility as a writer, although his argument is credible

through the use of experience; it is still although weak compared to Lyubomirsky’s . In the

article “What suffering does” by Brooks although it appears that he is credible enough as a

writer “Since 2003, David Brooks has written a regular opinion column for the New York

times.”(Brooks 254), as far as the subject of happiness goes he can only provide intel on the

subject through his knowledge on detrimental historical events, “ Abraham Lincoln suffered

through the pain of conducting a civil war, and he came out of that with the Second Inaugural”

(Brooks 286). Lyubomirsky’s article showed ethos most effectively because out of David

Brooks and Graham Hills articles Lyubomirsky was the most credible having a sufficient amount

of education to argue on the topic as well having experience as a writer.

The appeal to Pathos was present in all three articles. In the article Hills argued that the

emotion love is the thing you need most in life to be a happier person “Intuitively, we know that

the best stuff in life isn’t stuff at all, and that relationships, experiences and meaningful work are

the staples of a happy life” (Hill 311). This appeals to pathos because it tries to encourage others

to not focus so much on your belongings but on the relationships you have and make with others.

Hills argument is not as strong even though he does back up his argument because although this

method of becoming a happier person worked for him, this does not mean that getting rid of

possessions will work at achieving happiness for others as it did for him. Unlike Hills,
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Lyubomirsky’s argued her emotional appeal threw her multiple test subjects who have had

similar experiences “As Angela sees it, Ella doesn't always have what the other kids have, but

she gets more love than she could possibly want”(Lyubomirsky,180). She then uses the multiple

experiences from others as examples to back up her argument as well as the data from her

research. Brooks argues that the suffering people go through is a good thing and everyone

shouldn't be so discouraged to go through hardships, “Think of the way Franklin Roosevelt came

back deeper and more empathetic after being stuck with polio”(Brooks,284) this appeals to

pathos by encouraging others to embrace the emotional pain that suffering causes and comes

with life, this alone although does not mean his argument is not less effective than

Lyubomirskys. This is because unlike Lyubomirskys he is using examples from the past as

evidence that this can be seen as outdated evidence whereas Lyubomirsky is most recent and

therefore best.

An appeal to Logos can be seen throughout all three articles. Lyubomirsky undoubtedly

used the appeal to logic effectively and then backs up her argument with facts from her research

making her argument the strongest. Not to mention that her experiments were conducted well

and are reliable “ So, by measuring the degree to which twins are similar in their happiness

levels, we can infer how much of their happiness is likely rooted in their genes”

(Lyubomirsky187). Lyubomirsky claims we have a specific set point for happiness“ But just

because your happiness set point cannot be changed doesn't mean that your happiness level

cannot be changed”(Lyubomirsky 190). Aside from words she even includes visuals like graphs

to back up her argument apart from what she collected from her research on twins. In the pie

graph it can be seen that fifty percent of the one hundred percent is the set point which you
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inherit determining someone's happiness capacity, forty percent is intentional activity meaning

what you do from now on to become a happier person for example by being optimistic and ten

percent is circumstantial or things people are not in control of like being born with a genetic

defect. David Brooks claims that logically people can not stop themselves from feeling pain “Try

as they might, they just can't tell themselves to stop feeling pain, or to stop missing the one who

has died or gone.”(Brooks 286). He believes that the best thing to do now is to embrace it since

there will always be hardships in life and the outcome of embracing it mill make you a better

person in return. Graham Hill displays logos by providing some logic through the experiences

he's overcome to becoming a happier person “There isn't any indication that any of these things

make anyone any happier; in fact it seems the reverse may be true.”(Hill 308) He states

possessions can't make you happy or in this case as happy as you think it will because there will

never be an end to what you can or can't have/buy when you have money leaving you feeling

empty and without joy.

It is not that Hills and Brooks articles were not up to par when it came to presenting a

good argument through the use of Ethos, Pathos, Logos but the fact that Sonja Lyubomirsky's

article managed to do so more diligently. In fact all articles were excellent or did a good job

presenting their arguments and backing it up with either their experiences or their research.

Lyubomirsky although provided multiple experiences through that her test subjects went through

as well as backing up her argument with science that wasn't solely based on the experiments she

conducted on others. She also provided factual evidence collected through out her research on

happiness to back up her claim as well. Lyubomirsky use of science was the main reason hers

was best unlike the rest that was mainly based on their experiences and their perspectives .
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Works cited

Brooks, David. “What Suffering Does” , Pursuing Happiness, edited by Matthew Dawn

Skorcewski, Bedford St Martin’s, 2016, pp 284-287

Hill, Graham. “Living With Less” Pursuing Happiness, edited by Mathew Parfitt and Dawn

Skorczewski, Bedford St Martin’s, 2016, pp 308-313

Lyubomirsky, Sonja. “How Happy Are You and Why?” Pursuing Happiness, edited by Matthew

Dawn Skorczewski, Bedford St Martin’s, 2016, pp 179-197