Meaning of Life? epicplainjane: what's the point of living? why are we here? what is meaning of life?A question that can occur to us in moments of joy, boredom or despair. Is there an answer to this question, or is the solution to be found in the process of searching? epicplainjane: Colinian, what is the difference between human form of life and the animal form of life,If being "Just Here" is all that we are meant to be doing. Beyond the activities humans and animals have in common (eating, sleeping, mating, and defending), we have a fifth priceless ability: the intelligence to inquire into the truth of our existence.  CoIin: "the truth of our existence"? You mean the truth THAT we exist or some other metaphysical "Truth"? The former seems hard to deny. The latter is incomprehensible to me. I took your original question as "meaning" being conferred from without. I see no evidence of that. This is not necessarily bad news insofar as it gives us the freedom to design our own lives, i.e. confer our own meaning to our lives, if you like. (see existentialism ) As for the animals.... well from the point of view of evolution, I'd have to say that there may be no qualitative difference between "us" and "them". Or if you prefer, we ARE them. Any differences between us and them would be quantitative differences on an evolutionary continuum. At least that's the way I see it. I may well be wrong. How about you? epicplainjane: Thanks for expressing your opinions on this topic. According to Evolution theory :Civilization is the product of the cerebral cortex.But there are lot more things which science fails to explain. Humans nodoubt belong to the animal kindom,What separates them from animals is their ability to be introspective:This is the extraordinary ability gifted by God/Nature to humans—to question the meaning and purpose of our existence and endeavor to find a solution to human suffering—that sets humans apart from animals. Where would we be if animals Too..had the power of introspection CoIin: Well, assuming the standard definition of civilization (which is a bit pejorative), humans had a cerebral cortex for countless millennia without "civilization" emerging. And there are still "uncivilized" peoples out there... I guess we might say that it's a necessary, but not a sufficient condition. As for religion's role, I'd be inclined to say that over the grand scheme of things, religion has added to human suffering rather than reduced it. The three "big ones" in particular have a long history of actively causing suffering, while resisting the attempts of others to ease suffering. m00t: I don't feel comfortable jumping in to follow this debate, but I like this topic. The main difference between humans and animals is we are on the top of the food chain. We have no persistent predators. We have the luxury of time to develop a conscious mind and question things because we aren't distracted by so many dangers animals have or a primal human once had... I think it's simple. I truly believe the conscious mind is a sixth sense and we are evolving (or have already evolved) into a species of thought. We question death and fight to survive; animals merely fight to survive and know no concept of what death is. They only know survival because they need to in a world of continuous danger of predators. As far as the meaning of life? Well that's just it... That question alone is the evolution of our species, it is our thought evolving into a stronger conscious mind; we are curious and need to know why we are here. We must find meaning in things in order to move through life. Mystery is what keeps us going, mystery is why we live, it's the beauty of life, the beauty of the potential. epicplainjane: Thanks for sharing ur thoughts. Are we civilized or not? that would be another debate Evolution theory has lot of loopholes.I dont beleive that we are just a bunch of complex organised cells working together with no purpose.If we were then each human must act and react in only one way to a particular situation.but we don't...thats a good news We have a evolved thought process.sixth sense is actually the intuition mind or the subconscious mind.I think this ability is much more evolved in animals.animals operate with their subconscious mind.Animals can sense danger in advance.I think they are much more evolved than us in terms of sixth sense Each one of us creates our own meanings.Each of us has our own unique ways of seeing, experiencing, and thinking about things and situations. No two of us will give the same meanings to situations we find ourselves in or to words we have heard or read. Experiences give meaning to life.  the real slim DEEPy: the meaning of life is as such: to learn and to practice universal love, so that in the next world, we can live in peace and harmony, without laws or punishment. there are 2 motivatirs in life- selfish and selfless. a selfish motivator is obvious, to reap reward or aviod punishment. a selfless motivator is love, empathy charity and such. in otherwords, there are 2 ways to live, you can live out of selfishness, and ignore the concern of others- opr you can willingly balance your needs with those of others and live a life of charity and in universal love. of the 2, only the latter can sustain an anarchic utopia, for laws are only needed to curb selfish motivations, and are redundant in the absence of greed and hate.. "If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed." einstein CoIin: What if the machine breaks down? "When the machine breaks down, WE break down" - Barnes (Platoon) Seriously folks... The question about the "meaning of life" is incomprehensible to me. It seems to be a vestige of the old Aristotelian teleological worldview i.e. the universe is understood in terms of purposes. A stone falls because it "belongs" on the Earth. Science has led to the erosion of such a worldview, but obviously not its eradication since people are still asking such questions. It seems to me that a much more important question is "How should we live our lives" as the poster above remarked. the real slim DEEPy: "It seems to me that a much more important question is "How should we live our lives" as the poster above remarked." - colinian "willingly balance your needs with those of others and live a life of charity and in universal love." "Love everyone Hate no one" - Nicotina2 funny how i had the right answer to the wrong question- it seems, tho, that the differrence between the old and new way of thinking is one of semantics. i mean, you cant explain something if you havent the words to describe it. the meaning of live is to have kids and love them, and for them to have kids and love them. when you truly love someone, you live in the hearts of your loved ones, you CHANGE them, and your essence is added to their essence; thus, if you love your children and so on, and so on, you will live forever, when earth becomes another venus, do you think that they would have had any room for a%z^~^w* in the one ship with the slightest chance of raching the new earth? fy$ no. only those who love the strongest, the best of the best, will be chosen for the single spacecraft with the slightest chance of reaching the new earth. with them, they will start a utopian anarchy, with only the love passed down from generations to guide them. if you love your children enough, your lineage might have a chance of making it to the stars. i question the global woarming trimeline, i think the iccp is stating the minimum, which is a ffuin ROUGH estimate, for the oceans have the ability to absorb about 97% more co2 a year (and 99% of the ocean floor is unexplored- we have NO IDEA what the f^~% down there.) than is produced by ALL industry, but the water cycle and geothermal activity keep it at full capacity already. the science is still in its infancy, for we barely understand the oceans, and are just learning hints of how complicated the relationships between pollution, temperature, marine biology and co2 absorbtion are. there are a lot of variables to be studied however, i would put the maximum between 250,000-500,000 years. its like this, weve let so much pollution into the ocean that its inevitable. you think its "natural" to find out that we've been coincidentally sitting right on the brink of disaster since the beginning of the industrial age, immediately after the mid-1800's blizzards, for longer? shit nah, we had the oceans sufficiently polluted 50 years into the industrial age to change marine biology FOREVER. maybe its ALWWAYS like this, and didnt take much to fxw up, buy maybe theres a self-correct mechanism when the co2-free ice caps melt into the sea and start to absorb co2, or maybe geological activity has been out of control since the 1850's and we are only one major earthquake or eruption away from the point of no return, and any effort by man is futile. the moment we develop the science to detect it, its too late, well, damn? "love will be the death of my lonely soul brothers... but their spirits shall love on in the the minds of their lovers.... in the hearts of all others -depeche mode the real slim DEEPy: god is love and love is god and only the son of god (the son of love) can lead to eternal life, in the "archaic" terms. beloved, let us love one another. for love is of god and everyone that loveth is born of god (the sons of love) and knoweth god... 1 John:7-8 CoIin: "the meaning of live is to have kids and love them" Does that mean people who do not/can not have children are, um, screwed? (Post deleted by staff ) the real slim DEEPy: people without kids are screwed? no, their dna will not survive (thus not their intellectual abilities), but "their spirits shall live on in the hearts of their lovers". look, if you impress anyone with your attention ot the concerns of others, your love will become their love. like i said, your intelligence will not pass, but your love will pass. deuce916: The meaning of life. Hmmm. What is the meaning of life? What could it be? Could it be good versus evil? Hmmmm. The meaning of life. Could it be a transition from one state of mind to another? The meaning of life. Hmmm. Could it be a god trying to fill in time? Infinite time. What is the meaning of life? Hmmm. Point5andahalf: Like individual cells in our body, that die and are replaced, for the survival of the body, so are we, as individual humans part of a species that it is becoming more aware and responsible. Whatever is beneficial for the survival of the species is retained by future generations, and whatever is destructive is bred out as time goes by. We have a choice which side to take.  Die another day: life is like a big exam there is too much thing in ur life you donot like to make it but some time you shall do it, maybe for money need for family need there is too much things when you are still young and you watch on tv live movie and some one kill another and some take drags and some kill his self you said how much this people stupied i will not make like him but when u inter the life every this is possible.  Waverid3r: I dont see life as a giant Exam so much, but more try to survive and prosper, and somewhere along the way procreate and teach your kids to be better then you are. But I guess you could say its an individual exam for each of us. It doesnt matter really what we do in life, but more how we make it through life, and try to become smarter about what is around us. | Philosophy Chat Room 9 People Chatting Similar Conversations |