Happy Environments: Bhutan, Interdependence and the West

Why Buddhism and the West Need Each Other: On the Interdependence of Personal and Social Transformation

The highest ideal of the Western tradition has been the concern to restructure our societies so that they are more socially just. The most important goal for Buddhism is to awaken and (to use the Zen phrase) realize one’s true nature, which puts an end to dukkha—especially that associated with the delusion of a separate self. Today it has become more obvious that we need both: not just because ...

Bhutan and the European Community

The Monetisation of Bhutan

The objective of this paper is to describe how Bhutanese society has become monetised over the years, at first very slowly, but rapidly during the last half century. I will briefly comment on the effect that monetisation has had on Bhutanese Society, and the potential conflict that exists between traditional values in Bhutan, which are largely non-monetary based, and so-called “modern” values, ...

Happy Street: a point to reach the happy city Case study (Bu-Ali Sina and Pasteur axis of Hamadan city)

The happy city is one of the topics that has been considered by many urban experts in recent decades. The issue of happiness in urban space is becoming one of the urban spaceschr('39') expectations. From Montgomerychr('39')s perspective, happiness is not a vague concept but a defined and measurable equation directly influenced by the manchr('39')s environment. The issue of a happy city in our c...

Happy Chatbot, Happy User

We compare our own embodied conversational agent (ECA) scheme, BotCom, with seven other complex Internet-based ECAs according to recentlypublished information about them, and highlight some important attributes that have received little attention in the construction of realistic ECAs. BotCom incorporates the use of emotions, humor and complex information services. We cover issues that are likel...