The Search for Meaning

[Belinda]

The Question of the Meaning of Life: Answerable or Unanswerable?
Jeffrey Gordon wonders what it would mean to have meaning

Our premonition of the meaninglessness of life is a case of our capacity for disinterested reflection serving a personal will for release. Weary with life, we wish to withdraw from it, and intellect furnishes an irrefutable justification for doing so.

The "tired of living, but scared of dying" frame of mind.

On the other hand, it's likely that those living very different lives will experience this in ways that may not always be easily communicated. We might have completely different reasons for withdrawing. And the chances are for those who do withdraw, it will be a circumstantial quagmire that precipitates the tug of war, and not an "intellectual" perspective.

The significances with which we invest our daily agitation are of strictly human invention; they are not shared by the dog in the chair falling into the slumber of boredom, nor by the feverish soldier termite protecting its hive against assault, nor by the placid angel strumming its harp in the clouds.

Are we perhaps the only creatures in the entire universe able to experience this? Then the part where some will wonder if they are actually experiencing it at all. Autonomously, in other words.

Still, if there are placid angels strumming their harps up in the clouds, that introduces God into the picture. And tell me [if there is one] that doesn't change everything.

And my deeply felt personal significances begin with the birth of my consciousness and end with its dissolution – never to be shared, never to be repeated.

Except, of course, no one really knows for sure what exactly "my consciousness" encompasses. Either going back to God or to a No God universe in which "somehow" matter was just able to become self conscious of itself as matter. Spooky to say the least.

It is also my distinctly human point of view that allows me to perceive what is pitiable in another’s situation, what is triumphant in a person’s self-overcoming, what is humorous in someone’s pretensions. And it is my individual subjectivity that enables me to experience without mediation the urgency of events in my own life.

No, in my view, it is our own distinctly individual point of view as mere mortals in a No God universe that is most crucial regarding human interactions. Some things are clearly applicable to all of us. But other things are not.

No of course we're not. Universe? Singular? How?

The God hypothesis cannot even be got to philosophically. It can't survive the posit, the let's pretend.

Meaning is what we make it, how we feel: the ultimate manifestation of the illusion of free will.

True, meaning is what we make it.

I want and intend to resist others' classifications of me, because I am not what I mean to others. I am what I mean to myself.
Dasein is not others' classification of me . Dasein is my inner life that changes and evolves. I enjoy finding labels for what I just wrote. 'Dasein' is one such "label" and before I heard about Dasein (about twenty five years ago) my idea was uselessly vague or piecemeal ----hardly idea at all. I think arts help you and me to define humanity, to make the meaning of humanity.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

The Question of the Meaning of Life: Answerable or Unanswerable?
Jeffrey Gordon wonders what it would mean to have meaning



The "tired of living, but scared of dying" frame of mind.

On the other hand, it's likely that those living very different lives will experience this in ways that may not always be easily communicated. We might have completely different reasons for withdrawing. And the chances are for those who do withdraw, it will be a circumstantial quagmire that precipitates the tug of war, and not an "intellectual" perspective.



Are we perhaps the only creatures in the entire universe able to experience this? Then the part where some will wonder if they are actually experiencing it at all. Autonomously, in other words.

Still, if there are placid angels strumming their harps up in the clouds, that introduces God into the picture. And tell me [if there is one] that doesn't change everything.



Except, of course, no one really knows for sure what exactly "my consciousness" encompasses. Either going back to God or to a No God universe in which "somehow" matter was just able to become self conscious of itself as matter. Spooky to say the least.



No, in my view, it is our own distinctly individual point of view as mere mortals in a No God universe that is most crucial regarding human interactions. Some things are clearly applicable to all of us. But other things are not.

No of course we're not. Universe? Singular? How?

The God hypothesis cannot even be got to philosophically. It can't survive the posit, the let's pretend.

Meaning is what we make it, how we feel: the ultimate manifestation of the illusion of free will.

True, meaning is what we make it.

I want and intend to resist others' classifications of me, because I am not what I mean to others. I am what I mean to myself.
Dasein is not others' classification of me . Dasein is my inner life that changes and evolves. I enjoy finding labels for what I just wrote. 'Dasein' is one such "label" and before I heard about Dasein (about twenty five years ago) my idea was uselessly vague or piecemeal ----hardly idea at all. I think arts help you and me to define humanity, to make the meaning of humanity.

I love your emphasis on Dasein. And good for you. We are Daseinen. We are Dasein.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Had a great conversation with my Polish tattooist this afternoon. Suffice it to say, and I'm not advocating it, but I'm considering micro-dosing even more. I'm 71 tomorrow, and have nothing to lose. If I do, I'll report.

[popeye1945]

One doesn't have to look far in search of meaning; it is what happens to your biology, your being, and that is played upon you, similar to a melody played on an instrument. Admittedly, strange things can happen through the understanding, both in the moment and from the content of long-term memory. The meaning of life, if one is to consider it seriously, has to try to be as objective as one can and include all life forms, and what does that tell one about its value? The harshest reality of life is that life lives upon life, big fish eats little fish, and life is food for other forms of life. The foremost meaning of life, and you might call it a directive, is self-survival and procreation, which is true across the board. Far more progeny are born to organisms than can survive, so most life is expendable from the start as fertilizer and food for those who survive. It is a harsh reality, and as Nietzsche questioned, can humanity live without its illusions, thinking mainly about the fairyland of religion, the answer may be no. As Schopenhauer stated, Life is something which should never have been, but it is, and it has no meaning in and of itself; it just is, like the physical world itself. If life is to have meaning, it must bestow it upon itself, as it does upon a meaningless world. We cannot escape the fact that life lives upon life, but one can know that we are not alone; we are all in this together. This should indicate to one the need for a new mythology, one that holds all life as sacred, creating a life of compassion for all life forms, even the ugly and dangerous ones, they are all relatives of ours.

[Belinda]

Happy birthday Martin

[Age]

Had a great conversation with my Polish tattooist this afternoon. Suffice it to say, and I'm not advocating it, but I'm considering micro-dosing even more. I'm 71 tomorrow, and have nothing to lose. If I do, I'll report.

As long as 'you' got 'to report' 'the days', which 'you' find 'important', and thus 'have meaning'.

[Age]

One doesn't have to look far in search of meaning; it is what happens to your biology, your being, and that is played upon you, similar to a melody played on an instrument. Admittedly, strange things can happen through the understanding, both in the moment and from the content of long-term memory. The meaning of life, if one is to consider it seriously, has to try to be as objective as one can and include all life forms, and what does that tell one about its value?

Just about every one claims or believes that whatever they, personally, consider right or correct, others would to, ' if they just took it 'seriously' '.

The 'meaning' of any thing is whatever 'you' personally 'give it'.

However, and far more simpler and easier, is if one really wants to find 'the meaning' of some thing, then just 'look it up' in a dictionary.

Now, to me, ' the meaning of 'life' ', is, literally, just living; being alive. Nothing more, nothing less. And, ' the purpose of 'life' ', itself, that is ' the purpose of living; being alive ', is to just make 'life', itself, better. Now, the only thing that could, or who would want to, do 'make living; being alive better' is you human beings. But, if 'the purpose' of you human beings is to make 'life', itself, better, then you would have to, first, learn 'how to'. Which, by the way, 'the purpose' of you human beings, in Life, is to just 'learn', and then 'teach', but not necessarily in 'that order', at first, how to make 'life', itself, better. Obviously there is 'no purpose' at all in making 'life', itself, worse. So, making 'life', itself, better, for absolutely every one, and not just some, is obvious.

Also, and to now note, you adult human beings have a tendency to want to make 'a better life' for your offspring, and/or a select few others. Which goes against the very thing of 'being human'. However, because in the 'current days' when this is being written you human beings 'learn from' the older ones, instead of the 'other way around', which is, exactly, why, in the days when this is being written, things are so 'backwards', so 'behind', and so completely 'back to front'.

Making 'life', [living; being alive], itself, 'better' for every one will always far outweigh making a 'better life' for some only. The term or phrase 'make a better life' has an instant connotation, well for some anyway, of monetary wealth or more material possessions for 'some', only. Whereas, the term or phrase 'making life, itself, better' can induce the thought of 'some thing for every one', instead.

In the days when this is being written it is very clear that you human beings are failing miserably in 'learning', and 'teaching', what is actually Right, and Wrong, in Life. The amount of absolute greed and selfishness you adult human beings have 'learned', and have obtained, along the way, would be impossible to believe true, if it was not for the blatant and very clearly obvious amount of pollution, killing, warring, displacement, separateness, and disproportion of 'sharedness' among you human beings happening and occurring in 'these days', here.

Now, to me, 'life', itself, could never 'try to be as objective as it could be', as 'this' is certainly not some thing 'life', itself, could do other than be 'it'. 'Life', itself, does not 'look at' things 'subjectively', and thus could change to 'look at' things 'objectively'. It is only you human beings, here, who 'look at' things 'subjectively', and thus do not 'see' things 'objectively', or as how they Truly are, nor even 'could be'.

Also, and by the way, using the words, 'try to be', will always 'lesson' 'you', and/or 'remove' 'you', from achieving. one can 'not do' when one only 'tries to'. one also can 'not achieve' when one only 'tries to achieve'. And, to prove 'this', just, or only, 'try to do some thing', and then inform 'us' of how you went. But, anyway, 'the meaning of life', would be in relation to 'life', and not about 'you', anyway.

So, 'the meaning of life, itself', when 'looked at and from' a Truly objective viewpoint has nothing at all to do with only what you human beings 'could or can do', but has to be some thing in relation to 'life', itself.

The harshest reality of life is that life lives upon life, big fish eats little fish, and life is food for other forms of life.

However, 'it all' exists in the One never ending 'Life', Itself.

'Looking at' 'individual lives', only, is never going to help you individual people understand, 'the meaning of 'Life', Itself'.

The foremost meaning of life, and you might call it a directive, is self-survival and procreation, which is true across the board.

When you say and write, 'self-survival', here, what are you referring to, exactly?

Because if you are referring to 'each individual living thing', then 'self-survival' is a complete and utter 'waste of time', for as you just pointed out above, here, each of you individual things just ends up, so-called, 'eaten up', anyway. So, the words, 'self-survival' is obviously as moot, and a non-starter, as there could be.

Far more progeny are born to organisms than can survive,

But you just said and claimed nothing survives. Or, is your view and perspective, here, so narrowed and/or closed you only 'see' things in a very short period of so-called 'time'?

so most life is expendable from the start as fertilizer and food for those who survive.

Are you able to name 'one thing' that 'survives'?

Or, again, is 'your version' of 'survives' just for a 'period of time', only?

Which if it is, then 'this' only gets more nonsensical.

It is a harsh reality, and as Nietzsche questioned, can humanity live without its illusions, thinking mainly about the fairyland of religion, the answer may be no.

Once again, 'we' have another clear and prime example of how 'these people' will 'look for' and 'use' words, in 'a way', in which they believe and hope will back up and support 'their 'currently' held onto belief/s'.

These threads are just about filled with 'these people' 'trying to' fight for, or against, 'current views, assumptions, and beliefs'.

Instead of just 'discussing' views or ideas with one another, 'they' much preferred to fight for or against views or ideas.

As Schopenhauer stated, Life is something which should never have been, but it is, and it has no meaning in and of itself; it just is, like the physical world itself.

Well what, another, Truly absurd and ridiculous thing to say and claim.

And, imagine that instead of producing, and presenting, your own thoughts, knowings, or views, which you could Truly stand behind and prove to be irrefutably True, you just 'used another' in 'the hope' that 'their views or beliefs' could help you in some way, here.

If life is to have meaning, it must bestow it upon itself, as it does upon a meaningless world.

Once again, as 'this' stands 'it' is nonsensical.

If 'life', itself, is 'to have' meaning, then 'life', itself, 'must' bestow 'meaning' upon itself, as 'life', or 'meaning', bestows upon a 'meaningless world'.

Will you elaborate, and clarify, here?

if no, then why not?

We cannot escape the fact that life lives upon life,

'life', itself, does not 'live' upon itself. But, in saying this, living things do survive, and live upon, 'eating', (for lack of a current better word), other living things.

However, the One eternal Life does not 'live' by 'eating' or 'living upon' any other thing. 'This Life' survives, always, through being Self-sufficient and Self-supporting.

but one can know that we are not alone; we are all in this together.

So, again, are you, and will you, elaborate and clarify, here?

If 'we' can not escape being 'eaten up', then what would it matter at all if 'we' are all in 'this', being 'eaten up', together, anyway?

This should indicate to one the need for a new mythology,

Are you 'now' saying and claiming that there 'now' needs to be a 'new mythology' from your above 'mythology', here?

one that holds all life as sacred,

But, all 'life', living things, are sacred. Why were you presuming that they were not?

creating a life of compassion for all life forms,

Do you not have 'compassion' for every 'living thing'?

Oh, and by the way, when, and if you ever, 'look' Truly objectively, then absolutely every thing in the whole Universe, including the whole Universe, Itself, is just living, anyway.

even the ugly and dangerous ones,

So much for 'the compassion'.

Words like, 'ugly' and 'dangerous', will just about instantly and automatically remove just about 'all compassion', that is; if there was really any 'there' to begin with.

they are all relatives of ours.

I suggest instead of using words like, 'relatives of ours', as though 'you' are 'one thing' and 'they' are something else, separate, or able to be 'owned', then this will help, tremendously, in what you are trying to say and claim, here. Which is; 'we are all One', or, at least, 'we are all living things, with as much 'right' 'to live' as each other', correct?

[Belinda]

Age wrote:

Making 'life', [living; being alive], itself, 'better' for every one will always far outweigh making a 'better life' for some only. The term or phrase 'make a better life' has an instant connotation, well for some anyway, of monetary wealth or more material possessions for 'some', only. Whereas, the term or phrase 'making life, itself, better' can induce the thought of 'some thing for every one', instead.

Your heart is in the right place! Your reasoning (the entire post is too long and rambling to copy and paste all of it as all few would read it) okay too .Although I agree Popeye needs to tighten up some of his explanations.
I hope that you and Popeye will agree eventually.

[Age]

Age wrote:

Making 'life', [living; being alive], itself, 'better' for every one will always far outweigh making a 'better life' for some only. The term or phrase 'make a better life' has an instant connotation, well for some anyway, of monetary wealth or more material possessions for 'some', only. Whereas, the term or phrase 'making life, itself, better' can induce the thought of 'some thing for every one', instead.

Your heart is in the right place! Your reasoning (the entire post is too long and rambling to copy and paste all of it as all few would read it) okay too

Just out of curiosity how much actual effort does it take you to copy and paste a whole post, instead of just some of it?

And, how, exactly, could 'the rambling' in one's post affect the ability of another to copy and paste all of that post?

Also, when you say, 'your reasoning is okay too', does the word, 'okay', imply not yet fully satisfactory?

If yes, then how, exactly, could 'my reasoning' be improved, here?

But, if no, then what does your use of the 'okay' mean or is referring to, exactly?

.Although I agree Popeye needs to tighten up some of his explanations.

Does not every writer, here, need to tighten up their explanations. That is; if they Truly want to be fully heard, and understood?

I hope that you and Popeye will agree eventually.

Do you not hope for 'this' for every one, in Life?

[iambiguous]

Happiness & Meaning
Why You’re (Probably) Wrong About The Meaning of Life
Lewis Vaughn asks what it’s all about.

After tragedy and heartbreak – after the war is lost, after the pandemic takes someone you love, after climate change destroys your home, after your life seems to be rendered nonsensical by illness, personal failure, or injustice – deep questions may linger like a bruise: What is the meaning of all this? Does life have any meaning or purpose at all? What is the meaning of my life?

That's often how it works. You go about the business of living your life when, out of the blue, you tumble over into a circumstantial quagmire...a brand spanking new calamity that prompts a rethinking regarding any number of conclusions revolving around what it means to think, feel, say and do, well, you tell me.

In other words, is there in fact One True Path that makes all this go away?

Oh yeah:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_philosophies

Only, as many objectivists will insist, it's not yours. It can't possibly be because it's theirs.

Easy answers to such questions drop casually from the internet, books, and media. The meaning of life, we’re told, is pursuing pleasure or happiness, or giving and receiving love, or finding your passion, or doing something great, or living out your purpose, or being involved with something greater than yourself.

Of course, here, even to the extent objectivists agree their own answers are the correct ones, they have to come up with all manner of "proof" that the other answers are, at times, not only incorrect, but [for some] dangerous.

"Or else", for example.

But these commonplace answers are only partly right, and the questions are mostly wrong. So say a host of contemporary philosophers who have been studying meaning in life. They argue, contrary to the skeptics of previous generations, that human lives can indeed be meaningful, although perhaps not in the ways that many people assume.

Yep, here we go again. Essential meaning vs. existential meaning. Demonstrably objective truths in either/or world vs. "one of us"/"one of them"/"my way or the highway" moral, political and spiritual prejudices in the is/ought world. Meaning in terms of how we understand our interactions subjectively/subjunctively from day to day and then those who insist that what they believe "in their heads" is how all rational men and women are, in fact, obligated to believe the same.

The "lucky ones" here being those who reject moral and political and spiritual objectivism, but happen to live in a community/nation that tolerates it. No "or else" in other words.

Today, however, here in America, Trump and MAGA seem intent on bringing us all back to the 1950s. Though, sure, that may all be a con job in and of itself enabling the ruling class in America to reconfigure its foreign policy to match the strongman mentality of the BRIC nations.

[popeye1945]

Truth is experience, very fallible, but it's the best we have in our journey through this world.

[Belinda]

Happiness & Meaning
Why You’re (Probably) Wrong About The Meaning of Life
Lewis Vaughn asks what it’s all about.

After tragedy and heartbreak – after the war is lost, after the pandemic takes someone you love, after climate change destroys your home, after your life seems to be rendered nonsensical by illness, personal failure, or injustice – deep questions may linger like a bruise: What is the meaning of all this? Does life have any meaning or purpose at all? What is the meaning of my life?

That's often how it works. You go about the business of living your life when, out of the blue, you tumble over into a circumstantial quagmire...a brand spanking new calamity that prompts a rethinking regarding any number of conclusions revolving around what it means to think, feel, say and do, well, you tell me.

In other words, is there in fact One True Path that makes all this go away?

Oh yeah:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_philosophies

Only, as many objectivists will insist, it's not yours. It can't possibly be because it's theirs.

Easy answers to such questions drop casually from the internet, books, and media. The meaning of life, we’re told, is pursuing pleasure or happiness, or giving and receiving love, or finding your passion, or doing something great, or living out your purpose, or being involved with something greater than yourself.

Of course, here, even to the extent objectivists agree their own answers are the correct ones, they have to come up with all manner of "proof" that the other answers are, at times, not only incorrect, but [for some] dangerous.

"Or else", for example.

But these commonplace answers are only partly right, and the questions are mostly wrong. So say a host of contemporary philosophers who have been studying meaning in life. They argue, contrary to the skeptics of previous generations, that human lives can indeed be meaningful, although perhaps not in the ways that many people assume.

Yep, here we go again. Essential meaning vs. existential meaning. Demonstrably objective truths in either/or world vs. "one of us"/"one of them"/"my way or the highway" moral, political and spiritual prejudices in the is/ought world. Meaning in terms of how we understand our interactions subjectively/subjunctively from day to day and then those who insist that what they believe "in their heads" is how all rational men and women are, in fact, obligated to believe the same.

The "lucky ones" here being those who reject moral and political and spiritual objectivism, but happen to live in a community/nation that tolerates it. No "or else" in other words.

Today, however, here in America, Trump and MAGA seem intent on bringing us all back to the 1950s. Though, sure, that may all be a con job in and of itself enabling the ruling class in America to reconfigure its foreign policy to match the strongman mentality of the BRIC nations.

Life's meaning relates only to living entities that have central nervous systems or similar.

Completely social creatures like ants and wasps mean life to be social and never individual. Partly social creatures like humans mean life to be variously social/ individual.

At present for historical reasons we are in an era of the individual. The meaning of life in individualistic societies is an individual creation: religions are either become liberal, markedly authoritarian, or fading away. For educated adults in free societies there is no general meaning of life and each individual makes their own meaning, normally within the bounds of law and order.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Happy birthday Martin

Thank you very much Belinda! It was the best yet. My kids were wonderful.

[iambiguous]

Happiness & Meaning
Why You’re (Probably) Wrong About The Meaning of Life
Lewis Vaughn asks what it’s all about.

For most of the twentieth century, philosophers ignored or dismissed the question of life’s meaning, even though many lay people assume that philosophy is mostly about the meaning of life. A lot of those dismissive philosophers insisted that the question is nonsensical because ‘meaning’ typically refers to words and symbols, not to objects, activities, and lives.

On the other hand, words and symbols are often used in order to communicate what objects and activities have come to mean to us, in order to convey further what life itself means to us. Instead, as always, in my view, effective communication really comes down to that which you are able to convey to others through actual day to day demonstrations derived existentially from day to day social, political and economic interactions. The things all rational men and women are able to agree regarding and the things that precipitate fierce communication breakdowns.

To them, asking ‘What is the meaning of life?’ is like asking ‘How heavy is the color blue?’

Here though, from my frame of mind, distinctions have to be made between essential and existential meaning. The laws of nature, mathematics, demography, the empirical world around us, the rules of logic, facts about our lives etc., seem to encompass that part of human interactions where facts and figures can be conveyed in objective descriptions.

Others thought that answering the question is in principle impossible, or that even if answerable, no one knows or ever will know the answer.

Then the part where we run that by any number of these folks:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_philosophies

Note how many of them make little or no distinctions between the either/or or the is/ought worlds. Then note how despite the fact there are hundreds of conflicting objective moralities from which to choose around the globe, each one claims to be the one and only true path.

However, over the past four decades this icy pessimism about meaning in life has been thawing. A growing number of thinkers have been probing two areas: (1) What the meaning of life question means – what we’re really asking when we inquire about life’s meaning: and (2) What, if anything, makes life meaningful – what things can give meaning to a person’s life? Along the way, philosophers have debunked some myths that have led countless people to believe that their lives are meaningless.

What I'm asking, of course, is not what one believes the meaning of life is but what actual empirical and experiential evidence one has accumulated in order to establish that the assessment reflects the optional account...morally, politically and philosophically.

Given a particular set of assumptions at the existential intersection of identity, value judgments, conflicting goods and political economy. After all, from the cradle to the grave, our day to day interactions with others are bursting at the seams with meaning. Instead, the conflagrations flare up regarding whose meaning shall reign given any particular community out in a particular world awash in both contingency, chance and change and conflicting goods.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Like the search for the Holy Grail, meaning is a myth never factored into the existence of anything or for anything born on planet earth. Meaning can be denoted as the superset or historical archive of every type of wishful thinking encountered by humans from day one. Subtract all that and the set is empty.

Rich with meaning.