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Brooks: Enjoyment Requires Combining Pleasure With Social Connection and Memory

Arthur Brooks · Harvard Professor Arthur Brooks on the simulation we're living in | Masters of Scale · Mar 27, 2026 · at 2:23

Arthur Brooks, Harvard professor and behavioral scientist, breaks down the three neuroscientific channels of human well-being while discussing the modern crisis of purpose.

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“One is enjoyment, which is not pleasure. It's pleasure plus people plus memory. It's, you know, pleasure doesn't lead you to happiness, The pursuit of pleasure leads you to rehab, but when you actually add people and memory to it, you transfer the experience of the pleasure into the prefrontal cortex, which is the executive centers of the brain, where their pleasures can be managed, and they don't manage you.”

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