NOTE : Neil posted his response, to Frank's earlier article, in this issue of Commensal on PDGList, to which I had originally posted Frank’s article by way of soliciting immediate feedback. This is Frank's response, also posted to PDGList.
Dear Neil :-
Thank you for your interesting message and kind words. I only have one comment, concerning pleasure; because this is directly relevant to (Freudian) 'happiness', while your other points were either corollaries or spinoffs, not directly concerned with the specific topic of the paper. Remember, this was not my doctoral dissertation; but a minor academic exercise, specifically interested in examining and evaluating the original Freudian statement, no more. Sorry, if it was a bit lengthy or tiresome; but blame Freud, please, who was notorious for his sweepingly vague and hopelessly nebulous phrases.
Pleasure, while a bit more specific (as the opposite of pain); is almost as difficult to define as 'happiness'. At least, here we are dealing with a genuine psychological variable, rather than with an artificial construct touted as a genuine (natural) human value; and pleasure can be operationally defined with reasonable unambiguity, and taken into the laboratory. I had personally done neurophysiological-psychological experiments with rats, into whose brains electrodes were inserted at the precise locations where (sexual) pleasure centers are located; and trained them to press levers, using mild electrical stimulation to those centers as reinforcement.
Well, the results were far more spectacular than had I used food pellets for reward for correct response. My rats had learned the lever pressing astonishingly fast, with no more than one or two mistakes per subject (p>0.001); and as soon as they knew that a successful lever-pressing was rewarded by mild (sexual) pleasure, they were literally pressing and pressing, like maniacs, without caring about food or water, until sheer exhaustion, almost regardless or reinforcing schedules. The lever pressing sounds went like this; click...(zilch)...click, (zilch), click, click, clickclickclickclclickclick ...(ad infinitum) ! Sometimes, I sat there whole nights watching the monitors; and the darn horny little beasts had far greater stamina, than I did.
So, pleasure is a powerful psychological variable; and it has specific motivational and neurophysiological correlates, such as measurable neural activities. However, I'd be reluctant to say the same about 'happiness', as explained in my paper. Which is why I think Freud was a bit careless or perhaps biased (blowing his own trumpet) when making his statement.
Fank Luger (Budapest, April 6, 2000)