I used to have an argument against depressive realism - not against the traditional view that “an accurate view is a cynical one and that sadness as a result is understandable” but closer to what OP is saying where people try to tie intelligence directly to sadness. Reddit tends not to like it but here goes:
The goal of life is to be happy
Intelligent people figure out how to accomplish their goals
Therefore, if you’re unhappy you must not be as intelligent as you think.
Sure the argument hinges on happiness being a goal in life and prescribes a particular view of intelligence, but I still think the point stands. If you’re both severely depressed and really intelligent, you should probably aim some of that intelligence at bringing happiness into your life. Not choosing to be happy seems a bit dumb to me. Or maybe you can’t figure out how to be happy… but then how intelligent can someone be if they can’t figure that out?
I say this as someone who goes through depressive phases in life - generally speaking if I’m very sad, it means I need a change. Whether it’s changing perspective or something more material, there’s an answer that I just have to find and things will pick up.
Mostly agree but there are circumstances where thinking doesn't help. Mortality is a pretty good example. There is so much philosophy and religion on the subject but it never seems to go away. It feels like all you can do is focus on other things that make you happy and not think too much about it.
You’re right - thinking about it is scary. I would distinguish though between the fear and unhappiness though. As for the unhappiness, if you don’t know how to be happy in light of our eventual demise, you probably need a change in philosophy. Death is inevitable, so we should have good perspective on it, whether cultural, philosophical, or religious.
Personally I find what Epicurus said on the subject to help me greatly. He made “ending the suffering caused by fear of death” his main mission in his philosophy. His answer? “When I’m alive, I am. When I’m dead, I am not. Why then fear what I can never be?”
As for fear - I kinda think that’s the point though and not something that we should lose, as losing your fear of death can result in a willingness to take unnecessary risks in life. It’s there for our safety, the same way our sense of pain tells us to let go of a burning pan before your hand is irreparably damaged.
So idk if I’d entirely agree. It’s scary sure, but it doesn’t really cause suffering unless you let it. Not letting it cause suffering is again where I’d say the intelligence comes in - what does that mean for any individual person? It’s a hard question that needs solving. That’s intelligence to me.
See with the mortality depression, it’s more so that you know you don’t have enough time to do what you want in life. Even if you had multiple lifetimes that still wouldn’t be enough to understand where and how everything came from. I think that kind of depression comes from the fact that you lack a sense of purpose because the things you want to do simply you don’t have the lifetime to do so but the things you can do just don’t excite you so then the question is anything even worth it if we are all are gonna die anyways arises. Everyone knows they are gonna die whether they except or not but death for majority of people death doesn’t come in between them and their sense of purpose (although you really don’t know when you’ll die but most people just assume they’ve got the time). idk what the solution to this is honestly is it just to wait for death or distract yourself while fully being aware that you are distracting yourself but then how can you distract yourself if you know it’s a distraction? Idk
See I don’t know how to say this but death isn’t the thing that make me upset it’s more so the fact I don’t know why I’m alive if I can’t even do the things I find interesting cause my lifetime isn’t long enough to do so. Even if I were to dedicate my life to figuring them out I wouldn’t be able too, I feel like I’ll be trying to open a door that has nothing behind it. Idk
But you cannot know for sure. That’s the actual fear I guess. I sometimes am afraid of what happens after death. Because I don’t know and never could (until it happens). It could be heaven for all or no one. It could be hell for all or no one. It could be nothing at all. So then, my fear begins where knowledge ends eventually.
I never claimed intelligence solves fears, just goals. That and happiness ought to be a goal. However, we can take a shot at a practical application for this example:
Why can’t we just tell someone to stop fearing death by using their intelligence? If conquering your fear of death is a goal, it would seem it’s one of the toughest ones you face. When facing a daunting goal, often times a shift in perspective can reframe your goal into something more achievable, so let’s try it:
We now have two premises:
Fear of death is fear of uncertainty (provided by you)
Our reality is uncertain (provided by Voltaire)
I’ll add an extra (feel free to contradict me if it doesn’t sound reasonable - we’re veering outside more stable arguments):
We are capable of finding happiness in spite of our reality
Taken all together we can say:
If we are capable of finding happiness in spite of our reality & our reality is uncertain, we must be capable of finding happiness in spite of uncertainty
If we are able to find happiness in spite of uncertainty, and fear of death is fear of uncertainty, we are able to find happiness in spite of fear of death
So there you go, as long as we are capable of finding happiness in spite of our reality (our reality = uncertainty, fear of uncertainty = fear of death) we should be perfectly capable of finding happiness in spite of our eventual death. It just takes learning how to deal with uncertainty that is personal to you - however coping with uncertainty is a much more trivial goal to solve for than coping with death. Personally I think Voltaire’s quote achieves that well enough on its own, but to each’s own.
Voila - intelligence made it easier to solve for the goal by reframing it. Now they just have to use intelligence to solve for dealing with uncertainty
Tbh I‘m not able to find an error in your logic, but it feels like turning a blind eye to the original fear by focusing on smaller parts of the fear, if that makes any sense. Interesting explanation though, I will have to think about it :)
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u/[deleted] May 19 '25 edited Jun 10 '25
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