The Meaning of Life

[frezal]

The notion that evolution is simply one animal coming from another is completly wrong. That is an aspect of evolution yes, but the entire theory itself is more encompassing and broad than that.

EDIT: Yes, it works

I blame Pokémon for that ultra-simplistic view of evolution.

[Urjak]

I blame Pokémon for that ultra-simplistic view of evolution.

So very true!

[Sage]

Fastest Thread to reach 100 posts (as far as i know)

[Hydro]

0.o wow...

[Clickbeetle]

Well here's my 2 cents.

1st cent: Regarding Creation vs. Evolution.  First off, contrary to popular belief, creation and evolution are NOT mutually exclusive.  God may have created the first life forms, true, but it makes sense that they would have changed somewhat since the beginning of time.  Evolution, in other words.  Especially when you factor in the Fall.  People often ask, "If God created life, then why does it suck so much?" although usually in more words than that.  Well originally, it didn't suck.  But as soon as Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, evil entered the world, and you got stuff like disease and aggression and all that nastiness.

However, what I want to say here is that it doesn't matter how life on Earth came about, or to what degree evolution played a part.  All that matters is that God did it.  How, why, when, we can never know any of those things for sure and I really don't think God cares whether we believe he created the universe in six literal days or whether it was over billions of years, as science suggests.  Just that God is behind it all, however it happened.

2nd cent: Regarding the meaning of life.  Even Christians will give you widely varying answers to this, and frankly I'm not 100% sure of it myself.  I think it's safe to say that our purpose on Earth is "To Do God's Will", although that is an oversimplification and gets into the issue of what is God's will, which is a totally different gnarly religious issue.

While I can't say with any clarity what exactly "the meaning of life" is (unless you count 42), I can say that it's NOT just to procreate.  Even the lowliest of animals have a greater purpose than that.  Down to the smallest bacterium, it will at least provide a food source for some other organism higher up the food chain, some more advanced lifeform that could not survive on its own.  Smaller organisms keep on providing sources of nourishment for larger ones on up the food chain until you get to the top, where humans are.  We are entirely dependent on bugs and germs for our continued existence.

The purpose of the lowliest organisms, therefore, could be said to be "to procreate and to support higher forms of life."  However, even that is an incomplete definition.  Many more advanced forms of life exist for less scientific reasons.  What is the purpose of a domestic dog or a cat?  Perhaps originally they were kept nearby to control pest populations, but today their main purpose is to bring happiness to their owners.  Survival of the fittest alone cannot explain the existence of many domesticated breeds of cats and especially dogs.  Pets are something we humans have artificially--I hesitate to use the word "created"--guided the evolution of, recently for the sole purpose of companionship and/or beauty.  Sometimes, we even preclude the most basic purpose of life--procreation--by sterilizing our pets, in order to focus on those last qualities, and we always prevent them from becoming food (unless you're either a sadist or starving).  Therefore, the purpose of pets could be said simply to be, "to bring happiness, companionship, and/or beauty into the world."

Now if mere cats and dogs have such a noble purpose as that, don't you think humans should have a purpose at least as noble?  I'm not going to try and get into exactly what that nobler purpose might be, but I will say that to assert "the purpose of life is to procreate" is to reduce humanity lower than the most basic, animalistic level of existence.  We have something no other life form has--intelligence and self-awareness--and with it comes the power to change the world for better or for worse.  I don't want to sound cliched, but... with great power comes great responsibility.  We have a responsibility to care for the world and protect its life for the sake of future generations.  To simply Exist and Procreate is to ignore that responsibility, with the inevitable result that the world will be less able to support life.  It's happened many times before on a small scale, every time a pest organism invades new territory and drives local species to extinction.  Only with humans (which, if you change the definition of a pest to be "harmful to Earth's welfare" instead of "harmful to human welfare", fit every aspect of it) the scale is the whole world and the local species are worldwide.

Not to mention that the idea of our sole purpose being procreation and the perpetuation of microscopic strands of peptides is just plain depressing.  What about people who never reproduce?  Einstein never had any kids.  Neither did Jesus, for that matter.  Did they have no purpose then?  Just inconsequential blips in the course of history that may as well have never existed for all the difference it makes?  In that case, nothing we do matters.  "Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die," in the words of the Bible.

And eventually, if a meteor doesn't strike the Earth first, or we don't ruin the environment to the point where life is impossible, the sun is going to burn out and go dark, and nothing will be able to live anymore.  All our efforts to preserve the species will be for naught.  In the end, entropy always wins.  There is a limited amount of energy in the universe and it grows less every day.  Even if we eventually settle other planets and continue the human genetic line there, we can't escape that basic, cosmic truth.  A billion, or a trillion, or a googleplex years from now, it doesn't matter, the universe will run down and there will be no meaning or purpose to anything anymore.  In fact, with that in perspective, there is no meaning or purpose to anything now either, if you believe we are only here to procreate.

That's why I don't understand people who believe that about the meaning of life.  If you ask me, I couldn't live without the idea of some higher purpose, some hope of beating entropy.  The alternative is just too bleak.


...Whew.  That turned out more like two dollars than two cents.  If you actually read that whole post, congratulations, you get a virtual cookie or something.  I'm going to sleep now...

[frezal]

I've been waiting to discuss religion with you since I read your website.  Here it goes.

1st cent: Regarding Creation vs. Evolution.  First off, contrary to popular belief, creation and evolution are NOT mutually exclusive.  God may have created the first life forms, true, but it makes sense that they would have changed somewhat since the beginning of time.  Evolution, in other words.  Especially when you factor in the Fall.

I think most Catholics and other rational theists would agree with you on that.

People often ask, "If God created life, then why does it suck so much?" although usually in more words than that.  Well originally, it didn't suck.  But as soon as Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, evil entered the world, and you got stuff like disease and aggression and all that nastiness.

I think that is a rather pessimistic look at life on Earth.  In no way does life "suck".  Life is amazing (in the true sense of the word)!  Sure, there are a lot of horrible things that occur (genocide comes to mind), but to say that life sucks doesn't sit right with me.

The story of the forbidden apple (or pomegranate, depending on who you ask) doesn't sit well with me, either.  What kind of tyrannical dictator would set up such a trap?  God created Adam and Eve with the "flaw" of curiosity.  He then tells them that they can eat from any tree, except that one.  Of course with the inherent flaw of curiosity, the built in desire to learn, they'd go for the apple (and since God is all knowing, he knew they would before he even made such "flawed" beings).  Then, like a true fascist, God punishes them and all of their descendants by making them feel pain, shame, and marked them with original sin.  If what God did wasn't evil, what is?

However, what I want to say here is that it doesn't matter how life on Earth came about, or to what degree evolution played a part.  All that matters is that God did it.  How, why, when, we can never know any of those things for sure and I really don't think God cares whether we believe he created the universe in six literal days or whether it was over billions of years, as science suggests.  Just that God is behind it all, however it happened.

What makes you believe it was the Christian God that created all?  Why do you subscribe to this supernatural being, and not Zeus, Thor, Mithra, Horus, Krishna or any of the other gods?

2nd cent: Regarding the meaning of life.  Even Christians will give you widely varying answers to this, and frankly I'm not 100% sure of it myself.  I think it's safe to say that our purpose on Earth is "To Do God's Will", although that is an oversimplification and gets into the issue of what is God's will, which is a totally different gnarly religious issue.

"Doing God's Will" can be a pretty dangerous statement.  So much evil has been done for that cause.  On the Muslim side of the fence, there was the Armenian Genocide, the genocide going on in Sudan, the September 11th hijackings, and a whole lot of violence in between.  On the Christian side of the fence, there was the holocaust (Hitler was raised a Roman Catholic, and used Christianity to rally people together), the genocide in Rwanda, the genocide in Bosnia, and a whole lot of violence in between.  

All of these atrocities were backed by passages out of their respective holy books.  While the more sane members of the religion tend to dwell more on the cheery and uplifting passages, it cannot be denied that the justification is there.

While I can't say with any clarity what exactly "the meaning of life" is (unless you count 42), I can say that it's NOT just to procreate.  Even the lowliest of animals have a greater purpose than that.  Down to the smallest bacterium, it will at least provide a food source for some other organism higher up the food chain, some more advanced lifeform that could not survive on its own.  Smaller organisms keep on providing sources of nourishment for larger ones on up the food chain until you get to the top, where humans are.  We are entirely dependent on bugs and germs for our continued existence.

While organisms do serve as nutrition for other organisms, that doesn't mean that we serve a purpose other than spreading our DNA far and wide.  In fact, many organisms are intentionally eaten so that they can better spread.

The purpose of the lowliest organisms, therefore, could be said to be "to procreate and to support higher forms of life."  However, even that is an incomplete definition.

Supporting higher forms of life really isn't the purpose, though.  If I was eaten by a bear, my purpose on Earth wasn't to become brunch for a bear.  My purpose was still to spread my DNA (which means I would have failed as I have no children.  That's beside the point, though).  The bear evolved in such a way to take advantage of my slow running speed and small physical stature to eat me, and thus increase its chances of having [more] babies.

Many more advanced forms of life exist for less scientific reasons.  What is the purpose of a domestic dog or a cat?  Perhaps originally they were kept nearby to control pest populations, but today their main purpose is to bring happiness to their owners.  Survival of the fittest alone cannot explain the existence of many domesticated breeds of cats and especially dogs.  Pets are something we humans have artificially--I hesitate to use the word "created"--guided the evolution of, recently for the sole purpose of companionship and/or beauty.  Sometimes, we even preclude the most basic purpose of life--procreation--by sterilizing our pets, in order to focus on those last qualities, and we always prevent them from becoming food (unless you're either a sadist or starving).  Therefore, the purpose of pets could be said simply to be, "to bring happiness, companionship, and/or beauty into the world."

Survival of the Fittest explains domesticated pets perfectly.  We used cats for ridding our homes of pests.  Cats used us to get a warm home and guaranteed meal.  We were mutually helping each other to survive.  While things have changed a bit, the premise is about the same.  Cats relieve stress, which helps us avoid heart and other health problems.  We still provide them with a warm home and meals.  Thus, mutual survival.

We used dogs to help us hunt, navigate, and to give us company.  Dogs used us for protection, guaranteed meals, and a warm home.  Mutual survival, again.  Now, it's about the same.

Now if mere cats and dogs have such a noble purpose as that, don't you think humans should have a purpose at least as noble?

No, because I don't believe they have those purposes.  I think you're treating pets as if they are material things that are here for the purpose of entertaining us.  While it's fun to pretend that cats sit on our laps because they love us, the truth is that they are just wanting some warmth, and our laps happen to be a very good, and comfortable, source of that.

I'm not going to try and get into exactly what that nobler purpose might be, but I will say that to assert "the purpose of life is to procreate" is to reduce humanity lower than the most basic, animalistic level of existence.

We are simply animals, so our existence is the same as any other animals.  Just because our nervous systems are more complex, that doesn't mean that our biological instincts are any different from the days of Lucy and before.
 

We have something no other life form has--intelligence and self-awareness--and with it comes the power to change the world for better or for worse.

Dolphins, great apes, bears, octopods, and many other animals are also highly intelligent.  While they may not be as smart as us, they are certainly intelligent.  And any species (including species outside of the animal kingdom) can change the world for better or worse.  It'll take longer, but you mentioned nothing about time being a factor.

I don't want to sound cliched, but... with great power comes great responsibility.  We have a responsibility to care for the world and protect its life for the sake of future generations.

Why?  I agree that we should intentionally try to kill off any species, and that we should keep our pollution to a minimal, but that doesn't mean that we have to prevent species from going extinct.  If a species can no longer cut it, it's their time to join the 90% of creatures that ever existed.

To simply Exist and Procreate is to ignore that responsibility, with the inevitable result that the world will be less able to support life.

Earth supported life just fine before us.

It's happened many times before on a small scale, every time a pest organism invades new territory and drives local species to extinction.  Only with humans (which, if you change the definition of a pest to be "harmful to Earth's welfare" instead of "harmful to human welfare", fit every aspect of it) the scale is the whole world and the local species are worldwide.

The Earth has always had the metaphorical bumper sticker that says, "Adapt or GTFO!"  If they aren't surviving, perhaps it's because they're not the fittest.  If we can't adapt to life without them, perhaps we're not so great after all.

Not to mention that the idea of our sole purpose being procreation and the perpetuation of microscopic strands of peptides is just plain depressing.

Why would that be depressing?  Why must you serve a tyrannical space dictator by worshipping and preventing weaker species from going the way of the dodo?

What about people who never reproduce?  Einstein never had any kids.  Neither did Jesus, for that matter.  Did they have no purpose then?

Whether or not Jesus actually existed is debatable, but due to the needlessly complicated (and utterly false) story moving him from Nazareth to Bethlehem, I'll concede that the Jesus in the Bible is at least partially based on the life of a man of that time. Anyways, biologically speaking, their purpose was to spread their seed.  Just because Einstein was a whiz at physics, that doesn't mean his biological urge to have lots and lots of sex went away (though shackin' up with his cousin probably helped).

Just inconsequential blips in the course of history that may as well have never existed for all the difference it makes?  In that case, nothing we do matters.  "Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die," in the words of the Bible.

Why must one fulfill his/her biological purpose in order to be significant?  Besides, Einstein did quite a bit to further our species by expanding our knowledge in physics.  We've been able to survive because of our expansive knowledge, and expanding it further will only help us survive better.  Besides, his work in relativity may someday save our sausages.

And eventually, if a meteor doesn't strike the Earth first, or we don't ruin the environment to the point where life is impossible, the sun is going to burn out and go dark, and nothing will be able to live anymore.

You forgot something!  Our sun might also swell up into a nice red giant.  Or we could get swallowed by that red giant that's heading this way.

All our efforts to preserve the species will be for naught.  In the end, entropy always wins.  There is a limited amount of energy in the universe and it grows less every day.

We have always had the same amount of energy.  Energy, like matter, cannot be created or destroyed.

Even if we eventually settle other planets and continue the human genetic line there, we can't escape that basic, cosmic truth.  A billion, or a trillion, or a googleplex years from now, it doesn't matter, the universe will run down and there will be no meaning or purpose to anything anymore.  In fact, with that in perspective, there is no meaning or purpose to anything now either, if you believe we are only here to procreate.

If we are here to serve a fascist and to prevent dud species from dying out, how will that matter once "the universe runs down"?  And what do you mean by that?  Do you mean once the universe is no longer inhabitable by us?

That's why I don't understand people who believe that about the meaning of life.  If you ask me, I couldn't live without the idea of some higher purpose, some hope of beating entropy.  The alternative is just too bleak.

You want to live under a ruthless dictator who demands that you worship at his feet, despite providing no evidence to his existence, or suffer the consequences of eternal punishment?  To me, that would be bleak.[/QUOTE]

[System32]

I read it, and I disagree with most of it.

While I can't say with any clarity what exactly "the meaning of life" is (unless you count 42), I can say that it's NOT just to procreate. Even the lowliest of animals have a greater purpose than that. Down to the smallest bacterium, it will at least provide a food source for some other organism higher up the food chain, some more advanced lifeform that could not survive on its own. Smaller organisms keep on providing sources of nourishment for larger ones on up the food chain until you get to the top, where humans are. We are entirely dependent on bugs and germs for our continued existence.

It is. But more advanced (Multicellular) lifeforms choose what to eat, where to eat. Perhaps it's because the species is too slow to catch prey, and must become a herbivore. Viruses and bacteria Can't really think, but are still capable of doing the two basic things for survival (Eating and reproducing) And over time they can change their food. It's how swine flu came to be.

Not gonna say much, I have a cold.

[Naryar]

But more advanced (Multicellular) lifeforms choose what to eat, where to eat.

Nearly all of them don't. An animal won't make unnecessary efforts to get some food when they can get some in an easier/safer/less tiring way.

[philetbabe]

 On the Christian side of the fence, there was the holocaust (Hitler was raised a Roman Catholic, and used Christianity to rally people together),

I am not used to investigate such debate, but i can't accept such an idiocy :  this is deep misinformation  or deeper stupidity !

All of these are quotes from Adolf Hitler:

Night of 11th-12th July, 1941:

    National Socialism and religion cannot exist together.... The heaviest blow that ever struck humanity was the coming of Christianity. Bolshevism is Christianity's illegitimate child. Both are inventions of the Jew. The deliberate lie in the matter of religion was introduced into the world by Christianity.... Let it not be said that Christianity brought man the life of the soul, for that evolution was in the natural order of things.  

10th October, 1941, midday:

    Christianity is a rebellion against natural law, a protest against nature. Taken to its logical extreme, Christianity would mean the systematic cultivation of the human failure.

14th October, 1941:

    The best thing is to let Christianity die a natural death.... When understanding of the universe has become widespread... Christian doctrine will be convicted of absurdity.... Christianity has reached the peak of absurdity.... And that's why someday its structure will collapse.... ...the only way to get rid of Christianity is to allow it to die little by little.... Christianity the liar.... We'll see to it that the Churches cannot spread abroad teachings in conflict with the interests of the State.

...
current catholic pope shows off in one of his recent  book how far was hitler ideology from christian's one. And even if tomorrow we get a mad pope, a christian ben Laden  wishing war and crimes, all we should say is that this man is far from the jewish or christian message of peace and happiness. Christian philosophy (and jewish) is on the opposite side of Nietzsche one.

The fact that there have been christian supporting Nazi, Fascist or Franco (in spain) does not mean that their belief is coherent with those ideology, it just mean that there are not coherent with themselve... idiocy is universal.

[Madiaba]

Thanks, Phil, I was going to mention that...

I has been biting my tongue, not saying anything cause I all is not home and on an dial-up connection slower than a mopar running on 2 cylinders. And even then my time is sooo limited for RA2 forum stuff(as I recently informed ACAMS).
These arguments are too narrow; i.e Survival of the fittest does not at all facilitate evolution, but only lets the strongest still live.  Evolution requires an increase in extremely complex and specific information to produce a more complex life form.
On the other side, God does not exist/not-exist just because we want or don't want Him to.  Try pretending that with a Mac truck is/is not coming at an intersection,,... Reality it is what it is.   My thinking needs to be subject to reality because reality is not subject to my thinking...
...
Some other relevant factors in this equation:
...RNA/DNA and Information Systems
...Irreducible systems.
...Radio-metric dating.
...Ontology
...Systems analysis within Increasing Entropy
...Order Facilitating factors
...Epistemology (the most primary)


As a former atheist and thus evolutionist, I used to hold this same paradigm as Jeffrey.  But I must say that at least he thinks about these grander themes in/of life, instead of living in a little shell.... like most.

 Later...
.

[philetbabe]

Reality it is what it is.   My thinking needs to be subject to reality because reality is not subject to my thinking...
...

Since i've seen Madiaba driving a ten ton truck on a crossroad while i was surfing on a quantum wave, i may believe in everything

-private joke-

For Jeffery, it's strange that a man from longview, WA writes pokémon with a "é", it looks very french.

[Urjak]

Wow.... I just read both Jeffery and Clickbeetle's posts, and I am blown away. I still don't see how viruses fit into your "equation" Clickbeetle.  Viruese do not support other life forms, as other lifefroms very rarely use them as food. Also, were they created by god? Not all viruses are a bad thing, some actually form mutualistic relationships with other animal (There is an example of this involving a virus and a wasp but I forgot the details). But anyway, since viruses can be considered both living and nonliving, were they created by god?

And System 32, viruese do not eat. They simply transfer their genetic material into the host cell which then causes the host cell to become "hijacked" and begin making more viruses, after which its cell membrane ruptures and new viruses are launched out. And also something to note, the viruse "dies" when it infects another cell.

And yes, incase you are wondering, I love viruses.

[System32]

SpiderYourdoomweight?

I saw that on in the womb. The viruses attack the host's immunity cells, allowing the wasp's eegs to survive.

[Naryar]

Urjak = biohazard weapon.

Anyways, are viruses really used for FOOD by several species? That makes no sense to me. They're tiny as hell compared to other lifeforms, not really nutritive excepted for the shell's proteins and dangerous to eat for an unicellular organism (risk of infection if the unicelllar phagocytes the virus)...

[man manu]

Virus's are not living as there is a list of properties a thing must have to be classed as living (Can't remember) that we did in science one time and a virus has only 2 or 3 of them so it is therefor not living.

[frezal]

Virus's are not living as there is a list of properties a thing must have to be classed as living (Can't remember) that we did in science one time and a virus has only 2 or 3 of them so it is therefor not living.

I think the debate amongst biologists is whether or not to change the definition of "living" to include viruses.

I'll respond to philetbabe later.  I'm about to drive seven hours across the state.

[Pwnator]

This should be interesting

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mimivirus

Though the virus doesn't metabolize nor show response to stimuli, it does contain codes for amino acid and nucleotide synthesis.

[Urjak]

I actually just learned from this that the Mimivirus is so large that another virus is able to infect it and use it as its host cell.

[Pwnator]

I actually just learned from this that the Mimivirus is so large that another virus is able to infect it and use it as its host virus.

Edited. Note that a virus doesn't have the necessary components to become a cell.

[Urjak]

Ah, very true. Wrong word usage there.