On Friday, 331 reflected on Julia Annas's claim that some people's "desires are in obvious ways defective," and whether it is possible that "defective desires" might give someone the false impression that they are happy.
To further stimulate our discussion of this issue, we watched a short clip from the 2000 film Traffic, directed by Steven Soderbergh, in which a conservative politician comes home to find his daughter smoking crack. We went on to imagine a conversation the two of them might have (when the daughter's high wore off) in which the daughter might claim that she is happy with her life, and her dad might counter that she doesn't know what happiness is if she thinks smoking crack makes her happy.
Is happiness purely subjective? Is there a good reason to think of happiness in a different way? Could the dad be right?
Move to minute 6:33 mark if you would like to see the clip we watched, but be prepared for "strong language" (you might want to turn down the volume if there are kids around; the film is rated "R"):
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