This topic didn’t really cross my mind until I was watching a YouTube video titled “[Going Seventeen] EP.102 13 인의 성난 사람들 #2 (13 Angry Men #2).” In the video, twelve grown men sit in a circle at their desks, gearing up for a discussion on a specific topic.
They can choose to either agree or disagree, splitting into two groups where everyone gets to share their views on the topic—that’s just how discussions roll. After that, they’ll vote to see if a majority can agree on the idea that “happiness you’re not aware of in the moment doesn’t count as happiness.” And yeah, that question is one of the discussion points from the video.
Personally, I believe that our feelings, including happiness, are tied to our minds. In simple terms, it all comes down to our consciousness. You don’t need to be consciously aware to feel happy, just like any other emotions; it’s all about how we react to what’s going on around us.
You might wonder when we actually become conscious? Well, aside from times when we’re asleep, knocked out or gone, we’re usually awake or aware. As long as we’re conscious, we can feel, think and act as we normally do. The truth is, we often miss our feelings; we’re frequently unaware when we’re happy, sad, upset, angry or disappointed.
I think feelings can’t really be shaped or defined—they’re just part of us, surrounding our conscious selves. Now, is “happiness” that we’re aware of in the moment really a happiness? I’d say that’s not the true form of happiness; it’s just our definition or our concept of the word “happiness”. So at the moment you realize you’re feeling happy, it’s really just you recognizing what you think happiness should be.
There’s so much about emotions and feelings that our brains don’t fully grasp—like that tingly feeling on your skin, your heart racing, adrenaline pumping, lips turning into a smile, eyebrows lifting and your eyes shining—that’s just your body reacting to what you think of as happiness.
Emotions, including happiness, are always there, even if we don’t notice them; they’re part of us—and all around us. They aren’t stuck to a particular time or place, but rather linked to us and our consciousness. One just need to be conscious to experience happiness. In other words, one does not need to be aware of happiness—one does not need to realize on being happy.
Speaking of awareness or consciousness, it reminds me of Saint Augustine’s idea of time, which ties back to our earlier question about whether unrecognized happiness counts as happiness. So let’s keep the words ‘aware’ and ‘at the moment’ in mind as we dive deeper into this. But first, who’s Saint Augustine of Hippo?
Biography
St. Augustine was born in November 13, 354 in Thagaste (modern-day Souk Ahras, Algeria). He didn’t grow up in a super religious family; his mom was a Christian, but his dad followed pagan beliefs. In fact, he didn’t get baptized until he was thirty-three, even though his mom probably wished it would’ve happened way sooner. His journey to becoming a Bishop was pretty long and tough, but it helps explain how he ended up there and why he’s seen as a key figure in Christian philosophy in the West.
A lot of this is laid out in Augustine’s ‘Confessions,’ which is probably his most famous work and is often called the greatest spiritual autobiography out there. This book was actually a game-changer in its genre. Augustine was known for his many “firsts.” He even came up with a style he called “Soliloquies,” where he had inner dialogues. He also introduced some philosophical ideas that we still recognize today. For instance, he had ideas that are pretty existential, and he kind of hinted at what Descartes later famously said, “I think, therefore I am.” No doubt, he was a huge influence on Western thought for a thousand years!
At sixteen, Augustine headed off to Carthage, a lively city full of distractions for a young guy. While he was there, he got into all sorts of trouble and sinful behavior, which left him with this ongoing struggle between wanting to be spiritually good and dealing with the not-so-great stuff in the world. During this time, he also had a mistress, and they had a son named Adeodatus together.
Augustine really got into religion when he moved to Milan in 384. He was inspired by Bishop Ambrose, who ended up baptizing him in 387. A few years later, in 391, Augustine went back to Algeria with his mom, and that’s where he became a priest. Not long after that, he became the Bishop of Hippo, which is now in Tunisia, and he stayed there until he passed away in 430. By that time, he’d already written quite a bit, but it was in those later years that he put together his big work, ‘City of God.’
On Time
While trying to figure out what time really is, he eventually realized it’s pretty tricky and full of contradictions. The puzzles he raises about time were already mentioned by Aristotle and by skeptical philosophers, well known to Augustine thanks to his exposure to Cicero. But there is no ancient text that explores the paradoxical nature of time as thoroughly as the eleventh book of his ‘Confessions’.
The fundamental problem is identified by Augustine when he asks how time can have any length. He pointed out that the past doesn’t exist anymore, and the future isn’t here yet. That leaves only the present time to exist as having length. But a length of time, like a month, day, minute, or second, cannot be present. Only this instant right now can be present, and such an instant seems to have no length.
That is why he says that there are three times: “a present of things past, a present of things present and a present of things future.” Indeed, although Augustine doesn’t mention this, Aristotle had described the present instant—in Greek, to nun, which literally means “the now”—as a duration-less division or limit between past and future.
Moreover, we can also see that he finds common cause with the Stoics too, when he says that if time exists it needs to be some kind of “extension” or “distention” (distentio, corresponding to Greek diastema). Yet how can this be, if time has no length? He realizes that he has not really solved all difficulties by his theory, but instead “my soul yearns to know this most entangled enigma,” he says, and he prays to God to enlighten him, assuring Him that his interest in the problem does not arise from vain curiosity. “I confess to Thee, O Lord, that I am as yet ignorant what time is.”
Even though it’s hardly to solve this problem, Augustine turns to the example of a spoken phrase, giving the not very randomly chosen example deus creator omnium—“God, creator of all.” It takes time to utter these eight Latin syllables, so the sound of the entire phrase is never present as a whole, any more than every minute in an hour could be present all at once. Yet we have no difficulty in hearing this phrase as a unity and understanding it. This can only be because our minds are—at least if we know a bit of Latin—remembering and interpreting the sound as it passes into our ears. We retain the parts of the phrase that have already sounded, and anticipate the syllables yet to come. He also uses the example of hearing a song. The song may go on for minutes, but your mind is capable of putting it all together into one, more or less coherent experience.
It seems that the only things that exist are things that exist now, given that past things no longer exist and future things do not exist yet. But, my question is, then how can it be true to say, for instance, that Socrates drank hemlock, or that there will be a philosophy class tomorrow morning in UIN? This is a problem that still fascinates philosophers today, but Augustine was proposing an answer: “The present of things past is memory; the present of things present is sight; and the present of things future is expectation,” and in that way they do exist presently.
He made it clear that the only time that’s real is right now, even though it slips away so quickly and is hard to hold on to. He talked about how we interact with time through memory, sight and expectation—this little trio shows how we try to “capture” time, even though it’s always moving. The past and future only connect to the present when we’re aware of them, shaped by how we perceive time in our minds. He stressed that this personal experience of time is real—living in our consciousness. This subjectivity really highlights how fluid and dynamic time is as it weaves into our lives.
Now we know the conclusion he takes that time is in the human mind, which expects, considers and remembers. It follows that there can be no time without a created being, and that to speak of time before the Creation is meaningless. So does happiness you are not aware at the moment doesn’t count as happiness? My final answer is yes. As from now on let us live our―one and only―life to the fullest even in the state of questioning that keep us conscious.
Bibliography
Bertrand Russell. ‘A History of Western Philosophy’. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1972.
Peter Adamson. ‘Philosophy in the Hellenistic & Roman Worlds’. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015.
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