Happiness in Different Countries

What is happiness? There are so many definitions that define happiness. Little children think that happiness is new tow, lovely dog, shiny day or something like this. However, it is not very accurate. It would be better if we define happiness as a state of well-being during which people are having positive emotions and mood.

I would like to compare happiness in three different countries – Lithuania, United States and Tibet.

Firstly, little about Lithuania and perception of happiness here. Unfortunately, Lithuania is not one of the happiest country. It falls to the end of the list. One measure of unhappiness is suicide rate and there are really high number of suicides in our country. What is ineresting that males are more likely to kill themselves that females. On the average 8 of 10 self-murderers are males. So it is a fact that some lithuanians are not satisfied with their lives. Crisis, lower salaries, higher taxes, reports about murders, stealing and other bad events are words that are frequent in Lithuania. So maybe people think that the life is not so good and happy.

American have a different understanding of happiness. The American Dream is an idea which suggests that all people can succeed through hard work, and that all people have the potential to live happy, successful lives and a lot of people from United States have such dream. They think that happiness is a feeling when a person has a good job, earn lots of money, have an opportunity to allow their children to study in prestigious universities and so on.

Finally, I would like to talk about happiness in Tibet. There are totally different perception of happiness. According to a monk from Tibet, people can‘t find happiness or peace simply by changing their external surroundings and what they need is a change on the inside. In this case, people can find their plenitude and happiness and it is important to know that life is not a competition where people should seek to be better than others.

All in all, happiness is subjective state and all people perceive it really differently. For one person it could be money, big house or other material things and for other – it could be the harmonious life and the inner peace.

References:

http://thehappinessshow.com/HappiestCountries.htm

http://junling.wordpress.com/2008/01/30/comparing-happiness-of-different-countries/

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-the-american-dream.htm

http://sermons.logos.com/submissions/84661-Finding-Happiness-in-Tibet#content=/submissions/84661

Biorhythm

Biorhythm is an attempt to predict various aspects of a person's life through simple mathematical cycles. So I would like to compare my biorhythms and test results that I have got. When I had been taking my test my primary rhythms wasn’t really high. All of these were lower than midline. My physical intellectual biorhythm was about -50% and Emotional and Physical biorhythms were about -90%. However, I have done my test very well on that day – I got 100 %. What is more, I felt happy and energetic. So I don’t think that biorhythms are reliable because there was no link between my test results and biorhythms on that day.

References:

http://www.facade.com/biorhythm/personal/?Name=Rugil%EB&Month=7&Day=22&Year=1991&tMonth=3&tDay=31&tYear=2011&range=14

http://biorhythms.perbang.dk/?aid=29&name=Rugil%26%23279%3B&d=22&m=7&y=1991&t=19&min=05&z=2&phy=1&emo=1&inte=1&custom_lang=en&js=&ctrl=&custom=1&js

Cloning

To begin with, the idea of cloning animals was first suggested in 1938 by German embryologist Hans Spemann. So since then everything began and has been developing until now.

Firstly, I would like to talk little about the first mammal which has been successfully cloned from an adult cell. It was sheep named Dolly. She was cloned in Scotland. Although she seems healthy enough, she lived only six years – from 1996 until 2003. Dolly died from progressive lung disease and now her remains are at Edinburgh’s Royal Museum.

What about human cloning? Today science is not so far advanced that it could be possible for scientists to clone a human. I suppose that it is not necessary to do it because there is too much risk. Cloning is not natural process and we don’t know how it can affect a cloned human’s organism.

Of course, there are a lot of myths about it. There are some reports about cloned human but it is not truth because it hasn’t scientific proof. Moreover, some people think that clone is a copy of a real person, but it is not true. Clones aren’t exact copies. A human clone would be as similar as the genetic identical twin. A clone would have its own personality, character, intelligence and talents. It is impossible to clone a person’s brain or mind.

In my opinion, cloning is useful only for medical purposes when particular organs are cloned and transplant into human’s body. In this case, a lot of lives could be saved and people wouldn’t die from so many diseases. In addition, cloned organs would be genetically identical to a particular person so there is high probability that these organs would be accepted.

All in all, there are a lot of unanswered questions about cloning and I suppose that it would be good if people used cloning for medical purposes. On the other hand, it is not natural and we don’t know how it can affect a human.

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloning

http://www.bionetonline.org/english/content/sc_cont5.htm

http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/elsi/cloning.shtml

Stress test

I would like to review results of a stress test that I have taken.

My overall score is 4,19 on a range of 1 to 5. This score is a measure of overall emotional well-being.

The second score assess my quality of life. My assessment is 4,1. This is a measure of how happy or satisfied I am with my life, including overall self-esteem, health, friends and family and work or school. I think this evaluation is quite good and it reflects my quality of life. I feel happy with my life and although I have only few friends but, I suppose, they are really great and reliable people.

The third score measures my symptoms of depression, anxiety and hostility. My score is 4,22. This score means that I am quite well-adjusted. I suppose that this is true because I am not depressive and blue person. Of course, sometimes I feel sad for particular things but this feeling is not so strong and it don’t last for a long time.

The last is level of functioning score. This is a measure of how well I am able to get along in the community. My score is 4,25. In my opinion, I can socialize quite well but sometimes it is difficult to me to interact with people who I don’t like.

All in all, I would like to say that I think this test isn’t very reliable because, for instant, when I feel bad, I think that my friends are not as good and my life is not so well. So I suppose that the score depends on a person’s mood and isn’t always accurate.

References:

www.lessons4living.com/stress_test.htm 

 

Giving Entire Cultures a Personality Test

Summary

It is thought that every member of a nation has personality traits which are typical in all cultures. There are a lot of stereotypes such as British people are unemotional and reserved, German people are organized and so on.

A large group of researchers tried to answer the question whether it is true. They investigated people living in 50 different cultures by a test that can be used cross-culturally. Researchers also wanted to know common beliefs about people from those cultures.

According to results of the study, members of a particular culture were able to give consistent summaries of their national character. What is more, the summaries of national character did not match the actual personality profiles of individuals within those cultures.

All in all, a national character shows how people see themselves within a culture but it does not reflect the actual personality traits.

Personality Test

I'm going to review results of two personality tests that I have taken.

Firstly, I would like to review results of Jung Typology Test. According to this test, my type is ISFJ. It means that I am slightly expressed introvert and  I have moreately expressed sensing and feeling personality and slightly expressed judging.

The second test was The Big Five Personality Test. There are five personality traits – openess to experience, concientiousness, extravesion, agreeableness and neuroticism (or emotional stabilty). According to this test, I‘m somewhat conventional. I think it is true because I am skeptical of innovation. On the other hand, I am creative and curious. This test shown that I‘m introvert. It means that I tend to be reserved and quiet. I‘m agree with it because, in my opinion, I have more traits that are typical for introvert than extravert. What is more, my assessment of neuroticism was 60 percent. It means that I tend to become anxious and nervous. Yes, sometimes I am worried and concerned about various things but I suppose that my concern is not too intense. I can be relaxed and calm and don‘t worry over little thing.

All in all, I suppose that these tests are quite reliable but we shouldn‘t blindly rely on them. It is not enough to take one or two tests in order to find out the personality. 

References:

http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/jtypes2.asp

http://www.outofservice.com/bigfive/

English Language Invasion

Summary

Invasion of the English language is becoming a huge problem in other countries such as France or Chinese. It is fear that English can take over the local language.

To begin with, English invasion into French is clearly noticeable. There are a lot of areas where French was changed to English. Some organizations and unions constructed slogans in English. It is thought that English invasion could be avoided but there was lack of political will. What is more, statistics states that French is becoming less popular.

Moreover, Mr. Hugan, chairman of the International Federation of Translators, is the person who is strongly resisting English invasion to Chinese. In his opinion, this phenomenon causes a lot of problems and, according to him, using English does not make people open-minded and international. However, although Gu Yeugo agrees with Mr. Hugan, he also supposes that English invasion is a global phenomenon and there is no way that China can stop it.

All in all, it is the fact that English makes considerable influence on the nation, traditions and customs and it is natural that people are resisting invasion of foreign language. However, it is almost impossible to stop this phenomenon.

References:

Articles: “Chinese language damaged by invasion of English words” and “English invasion threatens French language more than Nazis did”.