Is life for its own sake?

[Makko]

Do you live just for the sake of living? Do you read "happiness" as "a life of quality"? A life with physical comfort, emotional fulfilment and intellectual stimulation? Is that the ultimate aspiration? Are your goals inside of life?

Or is life an intrument towards some other goal? An expendable resurce you consume to reach something that is outside of life? Something immaterial?

 

[Superdeterminist]

I live mostly because I find it difficult to die. I understand a life of happinesss to be one where the individual is happy most of the time with little to no experience of misery. My goals are all within life, and I'm not convinced that anything else exists besides life. By life, I mean reality, by which I really mean 'all that exists'.

 

[signifying nothing]

I don't know. Trying to imagine or contemplate something outside of life is similar I feel to trying to see outside of the universe. In other words, from the position of life I don't think we can know what lies outside of it. The only way to really find out is to end life and see what, if anything, happens.

In the meantime, I balance my curiosity and interest in what life is with the struggle and problems I am faced with. One day that balance will I think inevitably shift in favour of ending my life.

 

[IHaveNoName]

I feel like life is pointless really and when we die our minds die with us, a bit like how ram works in a computer the contents only exist while it is powered as our body's are basically just a biological generator keeping everything running.

 

[BandAddict]

Gonna try to answer this to the best of my ability because it's such a good question, but my brain feels fried.

I feel like life is for the sake of experiencing the physical, or "real" world, but also experiencing the nonphysical, or the world beyond the physical. So a balance of physical and spiritual experience. In the world we live in today, I feel like the spiritual part of ourselves is inhibited, or put to sleep. There's so much stimulus and radiowaves interfering with our natural attunement with energies that are beyond the material world. I think that's something we lack, and perhaps one reason as to why everyone feels so purposeless and depressed (things are of course different for those who are subject to untreated trauma, etc.)

But again, I think we sort of need both? I think fulfillment through goals and trying to learn new things and create are as important in the material world as they are in the spiritual realm. I think if one is lacking, then the other might feel incomplete.

I personally think I lack in both areas, at the fault of both myself and things that are/were out of my control. Right now I'm just living to live, trying to find things to occupy my brain both passively and sometimes actively when I have the energy.

 

[GenesAndEnvironment]

It's a means to death, and from what little I think I know death means the end of existence.

In the world we live in today, I feel like the spiritual part of ourselves is inhibited, or put to sleep. There's so much stimulus and radiowaves interfering with our natural attunement with energies that are beyond the material world. I think that's something we lack, and perhaps one reason as to why everyone feels so purposeless and depressed (things are of course different for those who are subject to untreated trauma, etc.)

Reminded me of this:

 

[deflationary]

If life was an end in itself I wouldn't be suicidal.

Though most people do seem to approach it as if it was an end in itself. That kinda what explains why this society is the ridiculous place that it is.

Edit: Oops, I think I misread the question. I thought the question was whether life was a good thing for its own sake. That's clearly a no. But if the question is about whether there is something meaningful *outside* of what life has to offer then, no, I don't believe there's anything beyond the experiences of this life.

 

[booray]

As my exit date gets closer, I find it difficult to conceive that there is only nothingness that awaits me. I've gotta think that there is some kind of afterlife and I hope and pray that God looks kindly upon me and understands why I ended my life. So, my answer is no and I think that life is a means to an end. What that end is, I can't say but I just hope that it isn't an eternity in hell.

 

[Dr Iron Arc]

Do you live just for the sake of living? Do you read "happiness" as "a life of quality"? A life with physical comfort, emotional fulfilment and intellectual stimulation? Is that the ultimate aspiration? Are your goals inside of life?

Or is life an intrument towards some other goal? An expendable resurce you consume to reach something that is outside of life? Something immaterial?

I personally think it's the former. To me it's pointless to strive for anything beyond life without even knowing what lies in that great beyond. Whether I'm depressed or edgy or not doesn't matter, I think even if I was happy I would still focus more on keeping my happiness at the moment than worrying about some euphoria beyond life that may or may not exist.

Life itself seems to only have the goal of propagating itself. DNA is truly the ultimate scourge of this planet, forcing perfectly innocent inanimate objects to be shaped, destroyed, or consumed at the whim of living beings all just to continue the existence of said living beings.

 

[Makko]

When I read the answers I see a familiar pattern: "I don't know the outside, therefore I can't work with it or care about it". This view presupposes that evidence-based knowledge is the only thing that decides what is important and what is not, as if life is a court litigation or a laboratory experiment.

Do you never notice that the subjective experience of life doesn't work this way? How much of your subjective experience actually revolves around scientific knowledge? When you imagine "happiness", is this happiness really in the science of things? When you let the science decide your outlook on life, but also put happiness as your priority, do you not reflect on how little the science relates to the happiness?

 

[Superdeterminist]

When I read the answers I see a familiar pattern: "I don't know the outside, therefore I can't work with it or care about it". This view presupposes that evidence-based knowledge is the only thing that decides what is important and what is not, as if life is a court litigation or a laboratory experiment.

Do you never notice that the subjective experience of life doesn't work this way? How much of your subjective experience actually revolves around scientific knowledge? When you imagine "happiness", is this happiness really in the science of things? When you let the science decide your outlook on life, but also put happiness as your priority, do you not reflect on how little the science relates to the happiness?

I only respect things that are supported by evidence, because people can and do lie, and people can be and VERY often are wrong about reality. We need a way to distinguish imagination from reality, and science is by far the best tool we have for that. Happiness isn't related to science per se, but we expect that there's a 'science of happinesss' waiting to be discovered. If we disocver it, then we could make real change to improve people's happiness.

We didn't evolve to learn the truth, we had to struggle for years to get all this scientific knowledge. For example, cells never come into our lives to actually be experienced, yet they make us up entirely; look down a microscope and you will see them, every time. And we have to learn about cells if we want to solve problems that impact people's lives terribly and reduce their happiness, the problem of disease.

 

[Dr Iron Arc]

When I read the answers I see a familiar pattern: "I don't know the outside, therefore I can't work with it or care about it". This view presupposes that evidence-based knowledge is the only thing that decides what is important and what is not, as if life is a court litigation or a laboratory experiment.

Do you never notice that the subjective experience of life doesn't work this way? How much of your subjective experience actually revolves around scientific knowledge? When you imagine "happiness", is this happiness really in the science of things? When you let the science decide your outlook on life, but also put happiness as your priority, do you not reflect on how little the first relates to the second?

That's a good point. Though when I said I believe there's no point in seeking happiness in the beyond because I can't find proof about it, I'm really just speaking through a lens of cowardice and paralysis more than an uppity scientific bias. I actually don't care that much about science or evidence, I'm just a low risk taker and I'm thinking more about sunk costs and my encompassing fear of putting effort into something that might not be true which I guess is approaching scientific thinking in a way but I'm fueled way more by fear and anxiety than rationality, which almost never comes into play for me.

I'm not saying the existence of happiness in the great beyond is impossible or that other people should not believe in it either. Perhaps each life experience really is all building up to something, maybe we're all the same consciousness spread out through all of time and we're being tested by something else so we can achieve some ultimate happiness like in that theory I once saw in a YouTube video. It would be comforting if it were proven but doing so would be a risk that I'm too much of a spineless wimp to want to embrace, which is how I feel about all belief systems though. More power to anyone else who can feel fulfilled in seeking this outer peace though.

 

[Makko]

We need a way to distinguish imagination from reality

Why do you put imagination outside of reality? How is it a foreign object?

 

[Superdeterminist]

Why do you put imagination outside of reality? How is it a foreign object?

Imagination is real, but I what I mean is that we might hold false beliefs about reality in our imagination. E.g. some people sincerely believe the world is flat, and in the past, it was widely believed that disease was caused by 'miasma' ('bad air') since they had no idea about the very real microbes around them. These people have been shown to be wrong. It's possible, in fact it is very easy, to be wrong, as I'm sure you know, I know I do. When you make a mistake and realise later that oh yeah I overlooked this or that. So we need a method to determine which thoughts in our imagination truly correspond to reality, and which are untrue, because only some of them actually will be correct.

 

[signifying nothing]

When I read the answers I see a familiar pattern: "I don't know the outside, therefore I can't work with it or care about it".

Being alive is more than enough to have to deal with right now. I'll deal with whatever happens afterwards when I get there.

In fact for me the same thing applies to the future generally.

 

[Makko]

Being alive is more than enough to have to deal with right now. I'll deal with whatever happens afterwards when I get there.

In fact for me the same thing applies to the future generally.

Are "outside" and "afterwards" the same thing?

 

[signifying nothing]

Are "outside" and "afterwards" the same thing?

No, I don't think so. By afterwards I mean once I (this body) am dead.

 

[virginiawoolf]

i think i am a little confused by your concept of inside/outside life. what do you mean by this - that life does not encapsulate what we feel or that is tangible?

my answers to the questions that i can answer:

• i do not think of my life as having meaning. (i live because i am already living and for now i am inert.) i am simply experiencing the world. my life is random, just what i happen to be born into and to come across. i don't believe in religion nor an afterlife although it is nice to imagine one and maybe somebody will convince me someday.
• happiness is an emotion. i am not sure what event will bring it about for me. i am privileged enough to have a life of quality already so i do not read it as so. the only times i have experienced happiness recently are through social contagion. i think being socially accepted and able to appreciate your social network is probably key.

but @Makko every time you create a thread i am confused. they are very philosophical. what motive do you have for questions like these? you want to persuade yourself or us or just to figure out people's thoughts? or to find out if there is a common thread / worldview leading to contemplation of suicide?

 

[GenesAndEnvironment]

When I read the answers I see a familiar pattern: "I don't know the outside, therefore I can't work with it or care about it". This view presupposes that evidence-based knowledge is the only thing that decides what is important and what is not, as if life is a court litigation or a laboratory experiment.

Do you never notice that the subjective experience of life doesn't work this way? How much of your subjective experience actually revolves around scientific knowledge? When you imagine "happiness", is this happiness really in the science of things? When you let the science decide your outlook on life, but also put happiness as your priority, do you not reflect on how little the science relates to the happiness?

I don't feel able to ignore science, logic and reason to replace it with something that makes me happier. My imagination was severely incapacitated along with the aging process for some reason. I'm not sure I would if I could, even, since I would want to stay in touch with reality in order to avoid large amounts of physical pain. If I could go 50/50 or something, then I would start overriding (my guesses about) reality with elaborate wishful thinking/dreams/etc.

You make a good point in that, from your point of view(?), it may seem as if (unhappy atheists or whatever) are playing a video game whilst constantly thinking about the hardware of their computer and about how they will soon have finished the game. Am I getting this right? Maybe you don't perceive the hardware as something external?

I have no idea how I would "work with" something I cannot get any information of, I guess caring about it is possible (but why care if you can't change it at all due to not having any idea of what's going on?).

Great thread, btw, this is interesting and a step up from the usual religion/spirituality thread.

 

[deflationary]

Frankly, I'm getting more and more confused as to what's actually being discussed the more this thread goes on. What is this "outside of life" that we're talking about? Apparently it's not imagined stuff because the OP said that falls inside the scope of life. It doesn't seem to be afterlife either.

So this just seems so nebulous as to be meaningless. Could I get an example of something outside of life that could give life meaning? Because it seems like we're talking about some sort of free-floating meaning that's not actually connected to any object and that doesn't make any sense to me.

 

[UseItOrLoseIt]

Why would there be anything outside of what is? It doesn't make sense.
Still, I get it. The only way a finite mind can give meaning to a infinitely complex reality is to distill it into a simpler one. Faced with infinity, you either draw a line on the limits of your perception, or you change the direction of perception inward and project it by building another level of meaning, point for point, on top of it.
Paradoxically, by giving up on the search for universal meaning and surrendering to the complexity of life you also acknowledge its centeredness, and by trying to make absolute sense of it you downgrade it to a subordinate phenomenon.