Defining the Good Life

The Good Life

• The concept of a "good life" is subjective and can vary greatly from person to person.
• However, some common aspects of a good life that most people agree on include:
  • Material comfort
  • Wellbeing
  • Engagement in meaningful activities/work
  • Loving relationships (with partners, family, and friends)
  • Belonging to a community

What Makes it a Good Life?

• The "good life" of sugar consumption in the past coincided with the suffering of Africans, highlighting the negative impact of unregulated consumption on others.
• Similarly, modern life's unregulated consumption of goods and use of non-biodegradable materials affects the comfort of other people and organisms.

Key Components of a Good Life

• Clarifying one's values helps invest life with meaning.
• Identifying valued life domains and investing in activities within those domains is intrinsically rewarding.
• Playing to one's strengths helps overcome challenges and achieve goals, leading to greater life satisfaction.
• Setting valued goals and making practical plans to achieve them is essential for living a good life.

Importance of Relationships

• Healthy relationships with partners, family, friends, and colleagues are essential for living a good life and achieving one's goals.

Human Flourishing in Science and Technology

• Analyze the human condition to reflect and express philosophical ramifications that are meaningful to students as part of society.
• Evaluate human flourishing vis-à-vis the progress of science and technology to define the meaning of the good life.

Guide Questions

• Reflect on personal body parts that require medical attention and consider the possibility of regenerating defective body parts.
• Compare two images to notice differences and identify what could have affected the development of computer storage size and its impact on society.

Technology

• The James Webb telescope is the world's largest space telescope, expected to capture views of the dimmest and oldest galaxies in the universe and gaze into cloudy nebulas.
• It is expected to be launched in space by 2019 and serve as NASA's "premier observatory" for the next decade.

Causality

• Causa Materialis: the material cause, e.g., the material out of which a silver chalice is made.
• Causa Formulis: the formal cause, e.g., the shape into which the material is fashioned (shape of the chalice).
• Causa Finalis: the final cause/purpose, e.g., the chalice is made for the holy rite of communion.
• Causa Efficiens: the efficient cause, e.g., the artisan, or the silversmith who crafts the chalice.

Enframing

• Enframing is the way technology reveals things, e.g., the engineer seeing a river as a source of hydroelectric power.
• Human interest in what others think of us, our immersion in idle talk, can be an example of enframing, instead of philosophical thoughts.
• Activity: Explain the meaning of images in relation to enframing.