Apart from the normal ways to increase our happiness discussed in the previous chapters, there are other ways opened up by science and technology. Moreover, these new ways may increase our happiness by many times more than the traditional methods. First, for the traditional methods, including some technological advances in the past like the invention of television, their contributions to happiness are subject to the serious limitation of adaptation, losing their novelty and high marginal utilities very quickly. While the adaptation effect will no doubt also dilute the welfare significance of such innovations as web-surfing, there are at least two areas of expected future advance that will not be significantly subject to the satiation (applying at the moment of consumption) and adaptation (applying in the longer run) effects. Instead, they are likely capable of increasing our happiness by x times rather than x%, where x is a large number.

12.1 Stimulating the Pleasure Centers in Our Brains

First, there is the stimulation of the pleasure centres in our brain. It has been known for more than six decades that deep brain stimulation (DBS) with electricity or other meansFootnote 1 can relieve acute pain, induce intense pleasure, and promote a sense of well-being without the undesirable health effects of drug addiction.Footnote 2 There have been research experiments and medical therapies in using DBS, especially in treating Parkinson’s disease (e.g. Cai et al. 2020), depression (e.g. Coenen et al. 2018; Kisely et al. 2018; Liu et al. 2020), and post-traumatic stress disorder (e.g. Koek et al. 2019). However, the enormous potential benefits of DBS have neither been adequately explored nor widely discussed. Much increased research effort and eventual widespread use of DBS are called for.

Positive reward associated with DBS leading to voluntary self-stimulation was discovered by Olds and Milner (1954) when they observed that a rat returned to the place where it received direct electrical stimulation of certain parts of its brain. Further research established sites that induce pleasure (medial forebrain bundle, septal, limbic and hypothalamic areas), pain, and ambiguous or mixed feelings. Stimulation of the pleasurable sites clearly produces positive reward as suggested by experiments in which rats were willing to cross a painful shock grid in order to obtain the stimulation, and as confirmed by human subjects. Moreover, the pleasure induced is so int ense that rats prefer DBS to food and sex, and if not stopped by experimenters, will continuously seek stimulation until exhaustion. In humans, ‘patients who were having emotional or physical pain experienced such intense pleasure with stimulation that the pain was obliterated’ (Heath et al. 1968, p. 188). Scholars describe the feeling from brain stimulation as ‘super–pleasure or ‘supramaximal’ (Dror 2016.)

Apart from relieving pain and inducing pleasure, DBS may also be used as a ‘primer’ in improving well-being. For example, Heath (1964, p. 236) reported, ‘strong pleasure [from brain stimulation] was associated with sexual feelings, and in most instances the patient experienced spontaneous orgasm … This patient, now married to her third husband, had never experienced orgasm before she received … stimulation to the brain, but since then has consistently achieved climax during sexual relations.’ Once the right neurons have been excited, they become excitable more easily. The right neural pathways have been established.

Among the important social problems of our time are drug addiction, crimes and (mental) depression. These social problems, and possibly others, seem to be largely solvable with the widespread use of DBS. In comparison to DBS, the use of addictive drugs like heroin is a very inefficient and dangerous method of achieving a ‘high’. If one has easy access to intensely pleasurable sensations by just turning on the electricity, there seems little reason left to try dangerous alternatives like heroin. Just as intractable pain may be relieved by DBS, mental depression should also be largely removable by positive DBS. Since most depressions are caused by failure to achieve happiness one way or other, the availability of happy sensations by DBS should provide a definite relief. Among others, the amelioration of stress (Patterson et al. 1994), reduction of stress ulcers (Yadin and Thomas 1996), improved performance in maze (Jiang et al. 1997), and the treatment of alcoholics (Krupitskii et al. 1993) have been reported.

Though DBS is not physically addictive, it might be psychologically addictive. However, in contrast to heroin addiction, DBS addiction is not dangerous to health. From the quite large amount of evidence we have, the proper use (Kavirajan et al. 2014; Patterson and Kesner 1981; Zhang et al. 2020) of DBS over a sustained period for a long time (e.g. a few hours daily over a number of years) has proved to be efficacious and safe.Footnote 3 Thus DBS addiction is only a problem if it leads to the serious disregard of other duties such as to threaten the welfare of (mainly) other people (especially the future generations). While the pleasures induced by DBS can be intense, I doubt that psychological addiction of such a magnitude would occur. Rats choose to use DBS until exhaustion but humans only for “up to half an hour daily” (Sem-Jacobsen, reported in Delgado 1976, p. 484). Relative to other pleasures and objectives, the pleasure of DBS does not seem to be compelling for humans (Bishop et al. 1964; Valenstein 1973, p. 28). If one believes in creation, perhaps God made us this way so that we could eventually provide happiness not only for ourselves but also for animals. In the unlikely event of serious addiction, the problem could be solved by using legal and/or technical devices restricting the unlimited use of DBS. For example, the electricity that could be used for brain stimulation is supplied over certain limited hours only.

While DBS addiction is unlikely to be so serious as to threaten the survival of a civilized society, it may be feared that it would significantly reduce mutual human relationships. If one could obtain pleasure by simply turning on the electricity, there might be little motivation left for the cultivation of personal relationships. This is unlikely to happen. Even if one could obtain a variety of pleasurable sensations by DBS, there would still be the innate need for companionship left. Secondly, the pleasure from DBS to humans does not seem to be as fulfilling as, say, a full sexual relationship with its simultaneous stimulation of a number of areas and close personal contact, nor as rewarding as spiritual fulfilment of the highest order. Thirdly, the provision of pleasure which might otherwise be unavailable in sufficient amount may in fact create many happy and easy-to-go-with individuals. This may remove many personal conflicts and promote better mutual relationships. Fourthly, even if personal relationships were reduced, the benefits of DBS would still likely to much more than compensate for the loss. For example, the introduction of television probably has significantly reduced conversation. But that does not necessarily make it a bad thing. Its benefits have to be taken into account as well.

In this connection, the long-lasting nature of pleasure from DBS definitely gives it a big advantage. Things like television usually appear to have enormous potential benefits around the time of their initial introduction. After prolonged usage, some of their disadvantages are discovered though some other beneficial usages may also be found. More importantly, the novelty value has disappeared. For example, while watching television is very enjoyable for those just getting access to it, it may become a second best option after its novelty value has disappeared. The benefits of television probably still outweigh its costs by a very wide margin, but not by as much as it would be if the novelty value could be maintained. With DBS, the situation would be different. Since DBS is the direct stimulation of the brain, the pleasure during stimulation does not depend on any novelty value. Moreover, the intensity of pleasure from DBS does not diminish with prolonged stimulation (either continuously or daily over a number of years). Our hypothalamus where pleasure is produced continue to respond normally to stimulation many thousand times unabated. Thus, there is no diminishing marginal utility in DBS.

Common methods of enjoyment through the stimulation of our senses (through the peripheral nervous systems) like eating delicious food and having sex is, after some point, subject to fast diminishing marginal returns. This is so because we are programmed through natural selection to protect us from over-eating, etc. On the other hand, activities that yields no significant diminishing marginal returns such as reading typically produces low levels of reward at each moment. This is so since these activities had not been very essential over our long evolutionary history in increasing our selection fitness. True, humans are capable of higher levels of happiness including spiritual fulfillment. If it is not the only species on Earth that is capable of spiritual feelings, it is certainly the only one where such feelings could be so strong or intense. Nevertheless, even here adaptation and diminishing marginal utility apply quickly. Thus, even the winning of a Nobel prize is said to yield a high for only about two weeks. Thus, our ordinary biological capacity for happiness is rather limited. However, in our eons of evolution, our brain was not stimulated intracranially (bypassing the peripheral nervous systems) and hence there has been no need to program diminishing marginal returns directly within the pleasure centres in our brain. Thus, brain stimulation promises high happiness due to the absence of diminishing marginal utility. Hence, intense pleasure over long duration is possible, and with no apparent harm. For example, a monkey receiving stimulation presses the button three times every second, 16 h a day, several days a week, over many years. Researchers have to arrange it such as to prevent death from starvation or lack of water, not from stimulation. I do not mind being that monkey! Thus the enormous increase in happiness brought about by DBS could be expected to be maintained largely unabated, and in fact could be greatly increased through better techniques of stimulation (Cf. Sathi and Hosain 2020).

DBS may be regarded as unnatural in the sense that it does not occur in the course of our natural biological evolution. But most civilized products, institutions, medical treatments, etc., are unnatural in this sense. This does not make them bad. To improve our welfare, we have invented many “unnatural” things. DBS is a recent invention that if properly made use of widely, possesses welfare significance surpassing all previous inventions put together.

Many people from the West may find, upon first contact, the culture, tradition, and ways of enjoying life in the East and in some primitive tribes degrading. The same is true for people from the East on some Western ways of life. But we have learned from liberalism to be more tolerant towards different cultures and ways of life as long as they are not harmful. Many liberals would go further in tolerating individual freedom of action even for those actions which are harmful to the actors themselves. DBS is about the least harmful way of inducing intense pleasure and should never be regarded as degrading by anyone who has the slightest adherence to liberalism. (See also Pugh 2020 on the ethical issues of some possible personality changes, existence of which is still being debated.)

Will God approve DBS? If one does not believe in God, the question does not arise (but then he/she should read Ng 2019). If one believes in God, then the answer seems to be affirmative. For example, the ten commandments do not include: Thou shall not engage in DBS! Nor do they include: Thou shall not enjoy yourself. Moreover, if God does not want us to use DBS, why did He create us in a way that DBS can induce intense positive rewards?

If higher funding for research could result in such spectacularly welfare-improving discoveries and inventions as DBS, the present writer would be prepared to halve his post-tax income to help pay for them.

For the 500 million or more of people just in China who have attained the level of reasonable comfort, a further increase of even a hundred thousand (Chinese) dollars each will not increase happiness appreciably at the social level in the long run. However, if these half a billion people contribute just ten dollars each, we will have 5 billion dollars. Alternatively, this sum of money may be allocated by the Chinese government. This amount is less than one in 4 thousands or 0.025% of the foreign exchange reserve of China, and also less than one in twenty thousand or 0.005% of the annual GDP in China. This relatively small sum of money would be enough to fund research to develop a machine or instrument that we may use to stimulate our brain for pleasure safely. The increase in happiness will be many times that of increasing the GDP by ten times. Spreading the result to the rest of the world, China would contribute more than its four ancient innovations combined!

After mass production, each machine will likely not cost more than that of a TV set. If needed, I would be willing to pay millions of dollars to get one. My consumer surplus would likely be many thousand times its price.

After learning of my views on this, a commentator in China emailed me, ‘When it comes to experiments on humans, would you be willing to volunteer? Or rather, you would wait until China used its prisoners for experiments to produce the fruit that you Western advisors would enjoy?’ I replied to her immediately that I would be glad to volunteer to be the first human guinea pig. I do not see this as being altruistic. Rather, I cannot wait to be that monkey.

12.2 Genetic Engineering and Our Own Transformation

Another expected advance that will lead to dramatic leaps in happiness may be expected in genetic engineering. It is true that here we have to be even more careful than in brain stimulation to avoid being counter-productive. Nevertheless, with care and sufficient safeguards, genetic engineering promises great leaps because it may transform our capacity for enjoyment itself. Short of the extremes like brain stimulation and starvation, the happiness level of a person depends more on the subjective factors than the objective circumstances. The subjective factors are shaped by our upbringings, education, social contacts, and a host of other factors. However, these factors affect mainly the waves of happiness around a set point. The level of this set point for each person is largely genetic (Lykken and Tellegen 1996; Lykken 1999). This does not mean that we cannot affect our happiness levels at all. Even Lykken (1999) who has established the high degree of association of happiness and a host of other things with genetic factors through the study of identical twins (including those reared apart), believes that we can learn to become happier by affecting the waves of happiness. Nevertheless, the dominance of the genetic factors in determining the set points remains. Even with DBS, the degree of the intense pleasure is also set. This suggests that a way to increase happiness by a quantum leap more important than brain stimulation is through genetic engineering. Of course, a very high degree of care has to be taken for such an endeavour. Is it too risky nevertheless? While there are some risks, they could be reduced by sufficient safeguards. Moreover, the risks involved are far less than those created by our current path of high growth without sufficient environmental protection. The returns of this high growth are just some chance (if problems like climate change turn out to be of no significance) of higher output that contributes virtually nothing to happiness. The risks are high chance of environmental disasters including human extinction. In contrast, genetic engineering promises a very high chance of huge quantum leaps in our happiness, at negligible and avoidable risks. Why do many people still feel comfortable with the former and not with the latter? I do not advocate using drastic forms of genetic engineering to transform ourselves right now or even in the near future. However, research on this and its eventual gradual usage with sufficient safeguards should not be precluded.Footnote 4

To put it emphatically, it may be said that mankind is facing the greatest cross-road in its entire history: We may choose to ignore the threat of global warming and choose business as usual and go to Hell (extinction), or we may adequately solve the problem of environmental disruption and ensure our road to Heaven (survival and quantum leaps in the welfare of our offspring). The human species had faced the threat of extinction before. Yet the current cross-road is more remarkable than previous ones for two reasons. First, the current threat is man-made and could be undone by us. Second, if we could avoid the current threat, we will have very good chance of going to Heaven (quantum leaps in welfare). The difference has never been greater!