**3. The peculiar human nature**

Osmo [3], however, considers that the perspective presented in the previous topic is only the foundation for understanding human action because its focus is on what is common between humans and other animals. Thus, in order for us to understand all kinds of human actions, he suggested that it is necessary to add to these perspective elements that are particular to humans.

We are known for being "sapiens" and rational, and not for nothing, as we actually have two capacities that other animals don't have: (1) that of understanding more and more about reality, beyond the dimension of perception [11–13] (theories acquisition); and (2) that of making choices based on our why theories (rational choices). Regarding "2", it is worth noting that this capacity implies being able to understand why we are seeking an end and by certain means; that is, to understand why an end is more worth pursuing and why certain means are the best to be employed in a particular situation. In this kind of reasoning, the person accesses his or her network of theories about reality to analyze the consequences that the choices of ends and means can generate, and then establish what is best to pursue and in what ways [14].

#### *True Happiness as a Shortcut to Mental Health: A New Theory of Psychopathology… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.103131*

In this view, the exercise of rationality means, in essence, supervision, followed by acceptance or review of the line of action dictated by the first BCP activated in a given context (or conscious activation of a BCP when the situation was initially seen by him or her as neutral); which is based on the personal network of theories [3]. This process allows, for example, the person to resist a piece of the pie (activation of BCP 2), because he or she understands that health is superior to the pleasure of eating something that, although tasty, can be harmful. In this case, the person acted out of fear of some peril (activation of BCP 3.1), diabetes, for example, and so had to use self-control to resist the craving of eating the pie. Thus, what happened, in this case, was the person being aware of their first inclination, which is the first BCP activated in a given.

An alternative option would be the person, for having the habit of prioritizing health, seeing, beforehand, the pie as an evil, and, with that, not feeling crave to eat it. In this case, in which the person only needs to accept, and not review, the first activated BCP, based on what he or she believes to be right, there would be what Aristotle called harmony between the rational and appetitive parts of the soul [1].

In fundamental terms, this harmony seems to occur with the consolidation of new inductive heuristics in the BCP, these in line with the person's current worldview, due to the experience of advantageous consequences from its use over time, in various situations. It is important to note that, based on the perspective presented, this harmony occurs between the theories of the person and, specifically, the first emotion of trajectory evoked; that is, the first categorization "what end to seek" (e.g., end of acquiring the benefit "health") [3].

In this line, Osmo suggested that, while the person still experiences the conflict between his or her worldview and the first categorization "what end to seek?" he or she needs to use principles (self-rules or meta-heuristics) that offer support for decision-making in the direction in line with his or her worldview, which is a different direction to which this first categorization and the emotion of trajectory (that emerges from it) point. So, roughly speaking, the person needs to adopt some principle that helps him or her deal with the emotion that is in disarray with the best of his or her knowledge and supports the task of reviewing the "what end to seek?" categorization.

In the case of inadequate activation of BCP 3.1 and experience of fear, this principle can be something like "I need to choose the best end in spite of being afraid". In this way, Osmo concluded that behind the task of reviewing each basic end there is the adoption and internalization of principles that enable the management of basic trajectory emotions. With regard to BCPs, this management has to do with reevaluating the categorizations made (or lack of categorization, in case of viewing something as neutral) with the help of principles; something that only humans would be able to do.

### **4. Virtues**

The aforementioned notion, in fact, reflects what Aristotle argued about moral virtues. According to him, moral virtues are principles that are internalized in the soul of the person, which are responsible for making possible the choice for the best end [1]. Furthermore, it is evident in his writings that he understands that each moral virtue exists to make it possible the management of an emotion [15]. The moral virtues would then be rules that we establish for ourselves (that is, self-rules) and that we learn to follow, leading us to acquire the ability to reason better when we feel

an emotion that drives us towards a goal; or even when we don't feel the emotion we think we should feel. Thus, the possession of a moral virtue means the possession of the ability to put into practice a self-rule capable of making us reason well (based on the knowledge we have so far), in situations of the domain of a trajectory emotion [3].

It is worth noting that the relationship between moral virtues and emotions implies that if we know, which are the basic emotions of this type, we will know which are the basic moral virtues. As we talked about earlier, our view is that there are five basic emotions that have this property, that of driving us (five emotions of trajectory). Thus, the five basic moral virtues that seem to exist are: (1) Courage, to deal with fear or lack of fear; (2) Moderation, to deal with craving or lack of craving; (3) Mildness, to deal with anger or lack of anger; (4) Useful curiosity, to deal with curiosity or lack of curiosity; and (5) Generosity or Love (and self-generosity or self-love), to deal with compassion or lack of compassion (which includes self-compassion) [3, 5].

Aristotle also defended the existence of virtues related to good reasoning itself, the intellectual virtues [1], such as: (1) Wisdom, a set of theories that an individual has, and that reflect reality reasonably well; (2) Discernment, ability to identify, based on wisdom, the best goal, the best means, and whether there was even success or failure in achieving the end; (3) Prudence, ability to choose the end and means established by discernment, based on wisdom; (4) Facility in the apprehension of universals, ability to apprehend difficult causes, making use of existing knowledge, which implies an easiness in reaching new knowledge and in developing the virtue of wisdom; and (5) Understanding, ability to identify, based on wisdom, what is relevant to take into account in a particular context [1].

Thus, we see that moral virtue is responsible for calling reasoning, which starts with a good grasp of the particulars of the situation (understanding) and continues with the determination of the best end and means (discernment, making use of wisdom). Then, the actual decision-making takes place, regarding the end to be pursued and the means to be employed; this on the basis of the options that discernment has established as being the best. Making such decisions means putting into practice the virtue of prudence. And finally, there is again the performance of discernment, based on wisdom, to carry out a good assessment of whether or not there was a success in reaching the end. It is still possible to have the ability to learn difficult causes acting after all this process, especially in case of perceptions of unexpected success or failure, which prompt us to investigate why things went right or wrong; what refers to the attempt to apprehend new universals, new theories [3, 5].

### **5. Vices**

Aristotle suggested that there are moral and intellectual virtues, as we speak. Moral virtues would be abilities to follow self-rules that lead us to put intellectual virtues into practice, so that, in a particular situation, we can deal well with our emotions of the trajectory (or lack of them) and make choices based on the knowledge we have so far. Not practicing a moral virtue can cause us to fail to act rationally (especially if we are under the influence of emotion of trajectory), that is, it can cause us to fall into some vice. Thus, for each basic emotion of trajectory, there must be a specific vice. In fact, Aristotle said that there are two types of addiction related to an emotion, that of excess and that of lack [1].

Starting with the extreme of excess, it would occur, for example, when someone criticizes a belief we have and, almost without thinking, under the influence of anger, *True Happiness as a Shortcut to Mental Health: A New Theory of Psychopathology… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.103131*

we go on the attack. In essence, what happened, in our view, was that we interpreted criticism as a threat that could be eliminated, perhaps a threat of domination, which made it settle in our minds that we must pursue the goal of eliminating this threat; and then, almost without thinking, we set out to try to eliminate it.

We did not seek, therefore, to review this objective based on our knowledge, which could have occurred if we had followed a rule such as "I must choose the best objective in the presence or absence of anger" and therefore practiced the moral virtue of mildness, which could even serve to simply confirm that it was appropriate to feel anger in the context (which would lead us to confirm that the best thing to do was, in fact, to "eliminate" the criticism).

People who tend to resolve things impulsively, following an emotion almost blindly, demonstrate the possession of vice related to excess. In the case of anger, the vice of irascibility, which would be nothing more than letting flow an ancestral inclination that is well established in our personality: the inclination that directs us towards the elimination of threats. Note that if anger is not the emotion we believe is appropriate for the context, the "wrong" emotion we experience (anger) is of the "emotion of trajectory" type, and "accepting" it means acting in a wrong direction. Here, therefore, one "sins" by action, and not by omission.

In the case of vice related to lack of emotion, we see that this can happen in two ways: (1) feeling an emotion of result when we actually believe we should feel another emotion; such as, feeling joy when we've just noticed that our best friend has lost money on the stock market. In this case, the person may believe that what was actually right was to feel compassion, but instead felt joy; which may denote the nurturing of some level of competition for status with the friend, so that seeing his or her downfall meant realizing success in being better than him or her, causing this person to feel joy. Note that as the emotion experienced here was joy, an emotion of result, which does not generate an impulse, the person did not fall into the error of going in an inappropriate direction, but into the error of not acting, that is, "sinned" by omission.

The other way (2), which also makes one fall into the error of omission, is when the person does not feel any emotion, believing he or she should feel an emotion of trajectory. Bringing up the same example above, the person may have remained indifferent to the fact that the friend had lost money. This denotes the perception of what happened as something neutral, thus not leading to an assessment capable of making the person feel an emotion. If the person in question really believes that "okay, it's a part of life to lose money, and that it's even a learning experience", then it is understandable that he or she has perceived what happened as neutral, not feeling any emotion (i.e., rational evaluation from the point of view of the person); but if this person believes that, at that moment, the right thing to do was to offer a few words of comfort to the friend, for example, then he or she should think that compassion was the right emotion to feel. Note that if the person realizes this, he or she may revise their previous assessment, feel compassion to some extent, and thereby want to act in the direction of providing emotional comfort to the friend (thus avoiding falling into the error of omission, in case the person has actually decided to act in this direction) [5].

In both cases, of excess and lack, not experiencing the emotion appropriate to the context may represent not following self-rule capable of calling reasoning, which in the case of the last example could be something like "I need to choose the best objective in the presence or absence of compassion", which may mean not putting into practice the moral virtue of love. This, in turn, means not behaving in a way peculiar to humans, acting almost exclusively on the basis of what we perceive, without considering the knowledge we already have about reality.

Note that if there are five basic emotions that drive us toward something, and two vices for each emotion, then there must be ten vices, namely [5]:

	- Excess: the person "blindly accepts" the emotion of fear (cowardice).
	- Lack: the person "blindly accepts" another emotion (trajectory or result); instead of the emotion of fear (which, according to his or her knowledge, would be the right emotion to feel) (temerity).
	- Lack: the person does not pay attention to the details of the situation which, if perceived and evaluated based on what the person already knows, would make him or her feel the emotion of fear (temerity).
	- Excess: the person "blindly accepts" the emotion of anger (irascibility).
	- Lack: the person "blindly accepts" another emotion (trajectory or result); instead of the emotion of anger (which, according to his or her knowledge, would be the right emotion to feel) (passivity).
	- Lack: the person does not pay attention to the details of the situation which, if perceived and evaluated based on what the person already knows, would make him or her feel the emotion of anger (passivity).
	- Excess: the person "blindly accepts" the emotion of craving (licentiousness).
	- Lack: the person "blindly accepts" another emotion (trajectory or result); instead of the emotion of craving (which, according to his or her knowledge, would be the right emotion to feel) (rigidity).
	- Lack: the person does not pay attention to the details of the situation which, if perceived and evaluated based on what the person already knows, would make him or her feel the emotion of craving (rigidity).
	- Excess: the person "blindly accepts" the emotion of compassion ("soft hearted").
	- Lack: the person "blindly accepts" another emotion (trajectory or result); instead of the emotion of compassion (which, according to his or her knowledge, would be the right emotion to feel) (indifference).
	- Lack: the person does not pay attention to the details of the situation which, if perceived and evaluated based on what the person already knows, would make him or her feel the emotion of compassion (indifference).

*True Happiness as a Shortcut to Mental Health: A New Theory of Psychopathology… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.103131*

	- Excess: the person "blindly accepts" the emotion of curiosity (investigation without criteria
	- Lack: the person "blindly accepts" another emotion (trajectory or result); instead of the emotion of curiosity (which, according to his or her knowledge, would be the right emotion to feel) (closed to novelties).
	- Lack: the person does not pay attention to the details of the situation which, if perceived and evaluated based on what the person already knows, would make him or her feel the emotion of curiosity (closed to novelties).

### **6. The true happiness**

Aristotle gives us good tips on what happiness is, we just need to connect the dots and add a dash of evolutionary psychology. He said that of all animals only humans are capable of experiencing happiness [1], and that happiness is what we all ultimately seek [1]. Furthermore, he also said that to achieve happiness one must use reason (and the virtues) [1]; and that happiness is a kind of pleasure [1].

Well, what pleasure can only human beings feel? It must depend on the awareness that we are agents in the world, that is, on the notion that our actions themselves cause things. With that, we then discard the pleasures of sex, drinking, eating, among others. These are what Aristotle calls the pleasures of the senses [1], which are those that depend only on sensory contact with something to be experienced; this kind of pleasure, other animals are also capable of feeling. And we also discard the pleasure of the most rudimentary joy that comes when we see success in reaching a goal; which can be anything from getting a fruit on the tree, to gaining status, resources, or identifying patterns in something we see as new in the environment, for example. This kind of pleasure other animals can also experience [16]; what changes between us and them is that we are able to set more specific goals, and with that, feel joy with more specific things.

We already know a little bit about what happiness is not, but what we want is to know exactly what it is. The key to this is Aristotle's assertion that to feel it, it is necessary to employ rationality; which means that happiness is a reward for the use of reason. Based on this notion, and making use of the evolutionary approach, we can say that happiness is then a pleasure selected by evolution for stimulating us to act rationally, which is the way of acting that puts us at an advantage in the fight for survival in relation to other animals; and in relation to other humans as well.

But then, what is happiness? We can only think of a type of pleasure that meets all these requirements: that would be precisely the pleasure that arises when we feel proud of the result of our rational actions [17], which is when we look to a recent or distant past and feel proud of what we have done through thoughtful choices; it can be something simple, like being proud of having managed to fix a shower, or more complex, like writing a best-seller. Another pertinent example is feeling proud of having reached a conclusion through the "reasoning" action itself, being proud of a "eureka!" (actually, this has to do with being proud of any conclusion itself, which we perceive to be the result of good reasoning).

Happiness would then be a specific type of joy, which arises when we perceive the result of rational action as being good when we realize that we have performed good works of reason [1, 18, 19].

Note, however, that we do not experience this pleasure when we see the outcome as bad, even though we are aware that we have done our best. A soccer player who looks at the angle of the goal, makes the movement the way he or she trained, but sees the ball passing close to the crossbar, is unlikely to be proud of his or her action (this player would have to make a mental effort to feel this). Certainly, such a kind of pleasure other animals cannot feel. And, in fact, for us to feel it, we really need to employ reason. We are only proud of a result if we realize that it was the result of choices we made based on the knowledge we had so far, that is, rational decisions. A painter who is proud of the result of his work only feels this because he or she realizes that it was the result of good decisions regarding which color combinations to use, for example; a knowledge this painter already had, and used it to support his or her choices about how to paint the picture.

There is, however, a small inconvenience to happiness: although it seems to be the pleasure we all ultimately seek, we cannot experience it if we seek it directly. This is because, if, at the moment we make a rational choice, we are focused not on the immediate objective in question, but on the pleasure, we will obtain in achieving it, we will not engage in the action to the point of being able to produce an expected result [20]. A soccer player who, at the time of shooting at goal, instead of focusing on hitting the angle, is focusing on the happiness he or she will feel if he hits it, he or she will not be able to produce the expected result, and thus will not feel happiness; unless this player gets lucky this time and manages, even without focusing on the angle, to hit it. However, that would be an exception, and what we want is the frequent experience of happiness. This implies that, although happiness is probably, by nature, fixed at the top of the hierarchy of values of every human being, it is important to place just below it the value of acting rationally, since it is through the achievement of this goal that it is possible to experience happiness. Thus, for practical purposes, it is worth considering the objective of acting rationally as our greatest goal, and happiness as the prize that comes whenever achieving this goal brings good results [21] ( good results from the perspective of the individual).

It is worth noting that having "acting rationally" as our ultimate goal implies experiencing sadness whenever we fail to achieve this goal. In fact, a specific kind of sadness that we call regret that only humans can feel because it depends on the consciousness of agency. However, as we said, the emotion of sadness is a pain that serves the function of stimulating us to act differently in the future (also in order to avoid experiencing it again, in the case of humans). Thus, as we are not born with the habit of acting based on the knowledge we have so far, the pain of regret for having failed to act rationally serves the function of putting us in the direction of acquiring this habit [20].

However, it is also worth noting that having "act rationally" as our goal, achieving it can provide a reduction in the intensity of the pain of regrets. This is because we are led to conclude that, despite having generated a bad result, we acted based on the knowledge we had so far, that is, we did the best we could. In this case, regret would not cease to exist, but it directs our perception to what really matters: the fact that our knowledge was insufficient to promote a better result; and thus influences us to increase our level of wisdom [5].

Before moving forward, we would like to highlight that there are two types of emotions that depend on agency awareness, but which we see as not being very useful

#### *True Happiness as a Shortcut to Mental Health: A New Theory of Psychopathology… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.103131*

for the development of virtues, and therefore, to the ever more frequent experience of happiness: self-blame and shame. We believe that such types of emotions are not very useful because what we want with the experience of a negative emotion that depends on agency awareness is not that it leads us to attack the "I" of the past (as is the case with self-blame, that leads to the experience of anger), or running away from a negative evaluation that the other may be making about us (as is the case with shame, which leads to the experience of fear) [19, 22, 23]; but to lead us, especially to lamentation; to repent for not having acted according to what we knew, or for not having the necessary knowledge to have acted better, so that we can become wiser and more adept at acting rationally, in order to do better in a similar situation in the future2 [5].
