Even if happiness involves multiple dimensions that cannot be precisely quantified or summed, approximate measures of happiness or its dimensions remain feasible.

With the explosive rise of empirical research on happiness, a central question is how far, and how, happiness might be measured.[11] There seems to be no in-principle barrier to the idea of measuring, at least roughly, how happy people are. Investigators may never enjoy the precision of the “hedonimeter” once envisaged by Edgeworth to show just how happy a person is (Edgeworth 1881). Indeed, such a device might be impossible even in principle, since happiness might involve multiple dimensions