What is the meaning of life?

[Saz]

I kinda agree with you there EG.If Everyone had a set meaning to their life, a purpose i mean, i wonder how many people fulfil it?

Everyone's views on this will be different (obviously   ) But personally mine is to... Make the most of whatever life offers to you and to deal with it the best you can.

Yet ...If there was a set meaning to life...Why would we exsist? Just for the sake of it? Maybe the meaning of life is, to wonder what it is  


Not too sure there if i made sense at all but it just came out  :-[  

[Dagger]

I kinda agree with you there EG.If Everyone had a set meaning to their life, a purpose i mean, i wonder how many people fulfil it?

Everyone's views on this will be different (obviously   ) But personally mine is to... Make the most of whatever life offers to you and to deal with it the best you can.

Yet ...If there was a set meaning to life...Why would we exsist? Just for the sake of it? Maybe the meaning of life is, to wonder what it is  


Not too sure there if i made sense at all but it just came out  :-[  

If that was the case - and all we're here for is to procreate, why are so many people unhappy? Dissatisfied with the world and their existence? Disgusted at the rest of the human race?

I've been on this forum roughly two years now, amongst others, and the vast majority of people I've had these kinds of online discussions with agree that the human condition is flawed. We have too much intelligence (for want of a better word) to simply be here to procreate, or to be placated by a minimalist existence. We are more likely to destroy ourselves with this intelligence than to happily exist as the rest of the animal and plant kingdoms do. While there are those who believe we may not have been bestowed with the ability to think, and rather we evolved it, that doesn't answer the question of why the almighty Evolution is happening at all.

People in general don't like to think there's no point to anything, that their lives might be totally insignificant and worthless. They need some sort of purpose to hold on to. That's fair enough. The concept that life might simply be existing because it can and for no other, greater purpose, could be a bit of a mind-blower.  

[EG]

it wasnt a joke....

at the end of the day, the basics of it are, is that we are all animals.....  any life form exists to ensure its race survives.... be that for good, for evil, for disgust in others.... whatever....

no species wants their race to die out.......  in the face of diversity, even the smallest of seedlings will do its utmost to survive

[Dagger]

it wasnt a joke....

at the end of the day, the basics of it are, is that we are all animals.....  any life form exists to ensure its race survives.... be that for good, for evil, for disgust in others.... whatever....

no species wants their race to die out.......  in the face of diversity, even the smallest of seedlings will do its utmost to survive

Yes, but why? Why even bother living when you're only going to die, and your offspring are going to die and so on. There's no real purpose behind it, we're all just living so that we can maintain a cycle of death and change by your rationale... and then what is the purpose of learning, of personal development, or indeed of being able to 'think' at all? Being human isn't exactly just about procreation, or so most people will say. So just what is it about, I wonder?

[EG]

Animal instinct doesnt go that far....

it doesnt question why, a cow grazing in a field, doesnt wonder why she and the rest of them need to exist...

the point I was making, is that at the route of it, we, from an animal instinct point of view..... are no different from a cow....


thats a very basic point youre making Dagger... do you seriously beleive in the hundredish years you may survive on this Earth... you contribute NOTHING.... NOTHING! to those who love and care for you, nothing to those you help and assist..... SERIOUSLY!!!

[Dagger]

Well... to be honest, I'm not sure. I may influence other people during my lifetime, yes... the people I am related to, the people who are my friends, the people who dislike me, etc. or anyone at all who comes into contact with me to some degree... but... after I'm gone, what's left? Their memories? The possessions I once owned? I don't remember my great-grandfather because I never met him, and after my grandparents die, everything he was will die with them and their memory. Unless I made some significant mark in history, whatever I was will vanish like it never existed. And the point I was making before was that history, too, will eventually be forgotten. Nothing lasts forever, right?

I'm a little confused. EG, you say we're here to procreate, and animal instinct goes no further, yet you're also saying there's more to our lives by the way we influence others? Well... that's sort of what I was saying too... that there's more to it than that for us humans... or at least we think there is. Is that what you meant? That animals are different? If so, I agree... after all, I haven't had a stimulating conversation with a dolphin yet, or a chimp or any other animal...

I don't suppose anybody really cares for my opinion, but I think personally you have to make up the reason for existence for yourself. Otherwise, if you think about it from an animal instinct point of view, you're here for a single purpose, and once you've completed it, your task it simply to die... and to make way for the next generation. I don't know what the meaning of life is, but I do know that it isn't just to procreate, else I'd be doing that quite happily. At the same time, though, I've been given no proof that there's a definite higher purpose intended for us all, or that something better awaits us after death. I think... the paradox is that early in our lives, society puts many ideas into our heads as to what life should be, and as we grow up we come to question these ideas, especially if they are contradicted.

Umm... for example, when I was a kid I was depressed, and my parents said that I had nothing to be depressed about, even though I knew I was. Or another time, when someone said how amazing life is, and I saw kids starving in Africa on the TV and I realised that it wasn't always so amazing because it was also very unfair.

My point is, I think people become confused about existence because they are fed ideas about it by society, or religion or whatever... and some people come back to questioning that.

Ah, it's late and I'm rambling. I'm going to crawl back to my pit now, before I say anything even more incomprehensible.



 

[Durin]

tries to remember where he heard this.
oh well here goes.

"The day your born you start to die"  god, how morbid is that

[Dagger]

I've always imagined that your own personal death doesn't belong to you. You're never going to 'experience it' - because you'll be dead - and the aftermath belongs to others. You are only ever going to know what it's like to live, so look on the bright side...  

[Q-Tip Cloud]

As far as humankind using any sort of intelligence..baffles me. Still....we have never learned how to communicate or be sensible enough to handle things on a peaceful basis. It has always confused me how so many feel the need to be on top and screw everything else. It's a "get what you can while you can" society that humankind has created..the worst animal of all.

[Saz]

It's a "get what you can while you can" society that humankind has created..the worst animal of all.

If that is the point.... why do people bother living? Why don't we just kill ourselves now? This view has a lot to do with pesimisy (sp?) and optismisy (sp?). (obviously again  :-[ )

"The day your born you start to die"  god, how morbid is that

Yeah that is really depressive.... yet true... too true, we have created a "dream world"  (come a long way...evolution) and we are not consistant to the truth. We do not want to here that. We listen to what WE want too. I mean are you really prepared to come to terms with that quote....

Well I'm not.. so i will (as usual) forget it ("Ignorance is bliss"). It will be forgotten just like the rest of the home truths that circulate our generations.  Not everyone will have a goal (s) in their life, but maybe they have a goal, to set a goal

[Dagger]

As far as humankind using any sort of intelligence..baffles me. Still....we have never learned how to communicate or be sensible enough to handle things on a peaceful basis. It has always confused me how so many feel the need to be on top and screw everything else. It's a "get what you can while you can" society that humankind has created..the worst animal of all.

I'm not so sure. Are we any different from the cat that plays with a dying mouse but doesn't eat it? Or the bacteria in a dish that multiplies until all the resources are spent, and the colony dies? Are we any different from the elephant seals that rape in the mating season? Or the lions that kill the cubs that aren't their own? They're all selfish organisms, just like we are, governed by the instincts of greed, survival and sex. Not a pretty picture, but there we are.

When people say (in response to the above) "human beings ought to know better" I think... well yes, maybe we should - but we're still animals, we're still subject to instinct, to greed and short-sightedness... we're not infallible, or supremely intelligent at all. We're animals that can think. Doesn't mean we're any better off than the rest of the animal kingdom, in fact we are probably in the most precarious position of all, given that we're clever enough to create things like atomic bombs, but not smart enough to put them away afterwards.

I see humanity as (ultimately) innocent, just like these other animals. A developing species, that, like a child, will experiment and push the boundaries of risk, will fail sometimes, will make mistakes. Humanity has gone through the process we all have in our lives - of growing up. We don't know what the future will hold, and we really are blind in the dark on our little planet... just like the rest of life on earth.

The concepts of 'good and evil', 'right and wrong' are human concepts. Looking at life through the eyes of such concepts will make it seem unbearably unfair. It will make the human race appear selfish, evil perhaps. Of course it will. Fairness is something uniquely human, and not a bad thing... perhaps the greatest thing we have ever created. For that I am not sad.  

[Asteris]

Well, you can consider life as one part of nature. Adn what I love about nature is that it seems always to have its own way to balance itself. The concept of good and Evil thingy is a matter of people's feelign, is the matter of our thoughts...what is good? what is evil? We made it up...we look at this and we say this is good and that is evil but would we say otherwise if we've never known or been told abotu it before? What is right? What is wrong? That's a matter of opionion.

[Lady Catz]

I used to think the meaning of life was to make new life...but that would be a problem for homosexuals..

So, I beleive life is what you make it. Things don't always go your way...but if you always got your own way life would be dull and so....planned...life is unpredictable which I think is what makes it interesting...

We don't live in a world we want to, because we all want different things...most people want peace on earth and to end world hunger, but obviously some people don't because if everone on earth wants peace....in the millions of years the earth has existed we would have achieved it by now.

Everyone has goals, or targets that they want to achieve before they die, some achieve them, some don't. Thats how life is...if no one ever achieved their goals the world would be even worse than it is...for example, Martin Luther King, he had many goals to create equal opportunaties. To an extent he did, and he died happy that he had acheived...but today, anyone would agree, we don't have equal opportunaties...there will never be a balance in blacks and whites, women and men unless we try hard enough...

There are people in this world, no names mentioned who bring hell to earth basically and are the cause of why the world can't come together and be in peace.

Back to the meaning of life....it's different for different people...some people were born and developed goals to make the world a better place, and some to make it worse. That's it really.....were all different....we all want different things and these things wont always be good.

[Afirewiel]

i was watching a really intressting si-fi program (i'm not a space geek or anything but

i do think it was intressting) about space coloneys, and one guy at the end said that

maby the meaning of life was to create other life and expand to other planets, to

over come barriers and to make space stations and travel space and perhaps find

other life on other planets. i think that it could be the meaning of life.

[Trueogre]

The meaning of life is 42.

Here is a simplistic view of life.

You're born.
You live.
You pro-create.
You grow old.
You die.

End of.

Our basic need for survival is to spread our genes as much as possible.  Men are not meant to be monogamous since it is in their genes to pro-create with as many females as possible to spread their genes.

We are the way we are because of intellect.

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