Scientists never tire of churning out ever “newer” findings about happiness, like e.g.

“5 Reliable Findings from Happiness Research”

http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2010/04/10/5-reliable-findings-from-happiness-research/

This is the comment I made on their site:

The students who started attending Epicurus’s school-communities 2300 years ago and kept on building their lives on practicing his teachings uninterrupted for over 800 years would have smiled heartily at the “newness” of the never-ending row of “evidence” in support of opinions that used to be are  self-evident for them.  Although Epicureans have never referred to the achievability of happiness in percental terms, they knew and know that we can change some things (basically our attitude) and we cannot change other things. They knew that human relationships were the alpha and the omega of happiness and therefore they cultivated friendship  in their communities and their couple relationships. And they knew what Scattycat stressed in his comment and what Democritus propagated before Epicurus:

“At one and the same time we must philosophize, laugh, and manage our household and other business.”