Other engineer: I put half of my water in a redundant glass.
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I see your point, and it’s a good one.
It’s just never felt that way with regards to my own depression. It’s not optimism that ever kept me going. It was necessity.
“This is the worst shit ever, but if I don’t get up and go to work, I’ll be depressed and homeless, and lose my health insurance. Things can only get worse”
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I was just about to comment about Stoicism!
I try to be a stoic, and the goal isn’t to passively endure the endless awful things that will happen but rather accept that there are bad things that will happen, but that spending a lot of energy worrying about the chance they might is a waste of time. For me it’s a kind of optimism (as close as I’m likely to get). That may sound bleak, but honestly it’s not.
I have to wonder how these studies measured optimism or pessimism, and if that is even the right question. I suspect it has more to do with whether one is focused on the present or the future (as in worrying about the future, or looking towards a future when everything will be much better than now).
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Yeah that makes total sense. IME it comes into play when I’m already depressed and anxious as per usual, but something has also happened to compound it. Say the job is lost and now things can only get worse… but they could end up better. They could, I just don’t have access to that information, so it becomes important for me to deliberately think along those lines even though I’m not actually perceiving anything to encourage it. At that point for me it becomes critical to convince myself that there is something else to try, something that I might be glad in the future for, etc. It’s like I have to convince a part of myself to work to save me anyway when it’s already concluded that it’s time to call a total loss.
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Great dinghy sail trainers for kids. On the principle that most serious sailing can be replaced by standing fully clothed in a cold shower and tearing up £10 notes, I can’t think why they never made a scaled up/adult version and called it a Pessimist. 
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Pessimism/optimism is a rather oversimplified way of expressing an outlook or personal philosophy.
Depression is brain chemistry. I don’t see why there wouldn’t be people in all 4 quadrants.
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Mine has been “Hope for the Best, Prepare for the Worst.” Maybe I’m just slightly pessimistic…
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Credit to: @dailyrev , @DukeTrout , @gracchus , @fuzzyfungus , @zuludaddy , @capnjimbo
OPTIMIST: The glass is half full!
PESSIMIST: The glass is half empty.
REALIST: The glass contains N ml. of liquid. Now, do you have a more interesting question?
ENGINEER: That glass is not the optimal size.
PHYSICIST: Postulate a perfectly spherical glass…
INDUSTRIAL DESIGNER: Did you fail topology or have you never used a glass, physicist?
PHILOSOPHER: The glass is all the way full, just with air for the top half.
MATHEMATICIAN: places Klein bottle on table, asks you to clarify what you mean by “full”.
Sorry if I missed anyone else’s contribution.
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I remain deeply pessimistic.
My dedication to my own physical health and well being is powered purely by spite.
The best revenge is living well, and I intend to make those fuckers pay for making me a pessimist in the first place.
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The chemist says : it really depends on the density and temperature of the fluid, expansion or contraction can cause the fullness to change. Remember a “pound is a pound the whole world round, but a gallon isn’t always a gallon.”
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That’ll teach them.
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Randall Munroe: The pessimist is probably more right about how it turns out than the optimist.
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ENGINEER: The glass is too big.
Edit: aw fudge! (only I didn’t say fudge). davide405 beat me to it.
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That’s why serious science is done in SI units. 
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I am only the chronicler, none of that post is original to me 
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We’re “Muricans” dammit and we LIKE to be contrary .
But he’s really relentlessly optimistic about anything involving himself, the pessimism is what he installs in everyone around him, “oh gawd, there he goes again”. If he believes his own PR he’ll beat Methuselah!
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I thought they switched to Euros?
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Like hell, you are.
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