RoR: Forum

At this point in my life, I would say that the meaning of life is "trudge, fight, succumb, die".

Post 61

Monday, June 27, 2005 - 8:27pm

Vernon,

Please.

Let me tell you a story. Years ago, probably thirty years by now, I was hiking with a few friends in Yosemite Park. We hiked for several hours through some of the most gorgeous
scenery you can imagine. Got tired, hot and sweaty. We stopped next to the river and my friends took off their clothes and jumped into the water. I hesitated. I HATED cold water. This water was FREEZING. But my friends were having a great time. I was miserable, but I HATED cold water. It suddenly came to me that I defined myself as someone who hated to be in cold water and with a thought I could just as easily be just like my friends, and enjoy it. I took off my clothes and jumped in the water and had a ball.

You can change yourself with a THOUGHT whenever you've a mind to. Do it. Don't look back.

Post 62

Tuesday, June 28, 2005 - 9:12am

The meaning of life is to discover that we can all be heroes.
dc

Post 63

Tuesday, June 28, 2005 - 7:09pm

Hoy,-

The meaning of life is to discover that we can all be heroes.

Honey! On the day we say a ton of feathers weighs as much as a ton of bricks answers like that one will suit our silly selves.

Sarah,-

You assume I am not looking for the answer, or I think there is no question

"Just live dammit, and live well." argumentum ad nike
"why do such issues pop up among objectivists of all people?"
"The whole thing reeks of mental masturbation."

Nice try.

You should try a few more exchanges before you presume to know what I am embarrassed by or what conclusions I have drawn.

Looking forward to it Sarah.

Ed,-

My claim is that we all need reason. Nobody's got one.

If you were so inclined, I'd definitely accept an apology from you for misrepresenting me with the term "Nobody" -- one involving an appeal to hasty generalization, on your part.

Apology? Me? What, and risk exploding?

Your eudiamonia is the right answer, the right definition, but it's still just honey. What is required is the authority of reason, not of Sarah's Nike or good cadence, pretty words or divine authority. There are many propositions, of which yours is the best, but nobody seems to think a rational authority is required. Or are you holding back?

But why do you want to choose death?
While there is breath in you, you must fight to live.

Rick, keeping context,
The "man" had already died

If your counter-example is post-mortem then it is irrelavant to my assertion.

Do you, or do you not, agree with my answer (updated) that:
The meaning of (human) life is psycho-spiritual growth (along with the happiness which necessarily tracks this growth -- in all humans).

I do agree. I agree with good reason, who else can say the same?

However, one does not know the meaning of life who does not have reason as their cause.

Of course, y'all realize that when Rand was asked this question - what is the meaning of life

Ayn Rand gives us a philosophy for 'living on Earth', she left the decision to live on 'earth' up to us. This is a functional answer, but not a final one.

Post 64

Tuesday, June 28, 2005 - 7:48pm

Rick

There are many propositions, of which yours is the best ...

Why ... why, thank you, Rick. I ... I don't know what to say.

... nobody seems to think a rational authority is required. Or are you holding back?

Have I held back? Or is the rationally-authorized answer already contained in the words which I have already typed? A few of my arguments were enthymemes, Rick (had missing, but "assumed," premises). Yet the answer is there, in my words ... in my reasoning.

Here is a riddle: Can you find the enthymemes and tease out what the missing premises would have to be (I promise not to use moving text!)?

Cheshire Cat

Post 65

Tuesday, June 28, 2005 - 8:07pm

Rick,

Ah, I see now. Those statements were about justifying one's right to live to others, not a meaning of life. I do hope this will stop your baseless slurring of me now.

Sarah

(Edited by Sarah House
on 6/28, 8:13pm)

Post 66

Tuesday, June 28, 2005 - 10:13pm

Ed - if your text isn't moving, does that mean it's dead?

Post 67

Tuesday, June 28, 2005 - 10:35pm

Robert, in this particular context, it would seem that "death" is in the eye of the beholder.

Ed

Post 68

Wednesday, June 29, 2005 - 4:30am

Happiness has almost piped "total height" at the post.

Interesting, what could this mean?
A late resurgence of people that put the pursuit of happiness above seeking the total height?

One could see this as an achievement/passion-happiness dichotomy.

There need be no dichotomy in my opinion.

Post 69

Wednesday, June 29, 2005 - 5:38am

One could see this as an achievement/passion-happiness dichotomy.

There need be no dichotomy in my opinion.

I agree with you, Marcus: "passion-happiness" is basically the pleasurable awareness of a process, while achievement is (generally defined as) the (successful) end of a process. In those terms, there is no fundamental dichotomy. Indeed, they may feedback pretty well.

Joel Catal�

(Edited by Joel Catal� on 6/29, 5:42am)

Post 70

Wednesday, June 29, 2005 - 8:24pm

'a sexually transmitted disease with a 100% mortality rate.' Well that's about it! We have no clue otherwise. Sex feels good, we like what feels good. Because we do what feels good we transmit life forward. Doesn't this agree with our understanding of the expanding universe? Read "God, Cosmos, and Man". I muse over what happens after all matter stops expanding. It doesn't make sense that there's enough matter, to start a great squeeze. So if there's nothing else, then life has no meaning, but to expand until entropy wins. BUT why expand in the first place? Because it is, it hints at "something" we haven't detected yet, to make reasonable sense to like sex in the first place. I think there's a great deal we don't know. Maybe our creator is the feeling during sex. The feeling to desire sex must be an important part of expanding life and the universe. Don't you think?

Post 71

Wednesday, June 29, 2005 - 9:04pm

Hi Scott,

It's a wonderful view that you have posted. I agree with you perfectly.

The human world is the unique world with value and meaning in the universe. Hence, value and meaning is the very divide between mankind world and other worlds. One who asserts the question on the meaning of life is meaningless, obviously has confused the human world with others.

So, from such a highly absurd point of view, we can see even more clearly, to clarify the meaning of life is really a radical meaninful question for human being. Its meaning can never be over-valued.

Well, It's very good to meet you here on this site.

Wen

Post 72

Wednesday, June 29, 2005 - 11:57pm

Good insight, Wen. You make an important distinction between the human world and the non-.

On this point, perhaps R. Bidinotto should have led the responses with: Who's meaning? (instead of: Who's "life"?).

As soon as we bring up the word meaning, we have restricted our subject matter to that which is human. Our world is the only one that truly has meaning. Here is a great example of this insight from The Philosophic Thought of Ayn Rand, p 34 (caps replace italics):

-------------
" ... correct theory of meaning (which I think must begin by recognizing that it is not concepts, nor even words or sentences, but PEOPLE that mean) ... "
-------------

Earlier, I gave examples of plants etc. "growing" to support the omnipresence of growth with all life. Now, I am rationally-compelled to relegate non-human examples as merely analogical to the human example -- and not univocal to it.

Ed

Post 73

Thursday, June 30, 2005 - 7:59pm

Ed,-

Here is a riddle: Can you find the enthymemes and tease out what the missing premises would have to be (I promise not to use moving text!)?

Cheshire Cat

Hah! Don't try to trick a tricker.

Sarah,-

Ah, I see now. Those statements were about justifying one's right to live to others, not a meaning of life. I do hope this will stop your baseless slurring of me now.

Hmmm. If you say so I believe you. Call it even. I don't mean to slur you kid. You make useful points, I'm glad you're around.

Paul,-

'a sexually transmitted disease with a 100% mortality rate.'
Maybe our creator is the feeling during sex. The feeling to desire sex must be an important part of expanding life and the universe.

More dismal Hamletspeak!
It's not sex. Sex, rightly, is a summation of a set, or the set, of life's values. Sex is for life, life is not for sex.

(Edited by Rick Giles on 6/30, 8:01pm)

Post 74

Thursday, June 30, 2005 - 8:03pm

Rick,

Kid!? Grrrr...

Sarah

Post 75

Thursday, June 30, 2005 - 8:44pm

Rick,

------------
Hah! Don't try to trick a tricker.
------------
Very well then. You have earned the name: T-Rick-ster (whether you like it, or not).

Now, how about a response to that profound insight embedded in my post 72 above, huh?!

C'mon, man -- stay with the program. I'm counting on you to tackle my reasoning head-on -- to state your primaries, your corollaries, your premises, and your reasoning. Hell, you don't even have to state your conclusion! This is because, upon becoming aware of these other things, I WILL KNOW YOUR CONCLUSION (and whether, or not, it holds any water).

As ABBA (not to be confused with A.B.A.H.) once said: Take a chance on me.

So ... allllrighty then ... let's hear it!

Ed

Post 76

Friday, July 1, 2005 - 1:10am

I asked Nathaniel Branden this question a few years ago. I don't want to speak for him, obviously, and I do not recall his exact words, but I feel the need to give him credit for the insight: The meaning of life consists of maximizing your potential as an individual.
Another way of saying the same thing would be: to make the best possible use of your most precious possession--your mind.
As I recall, he expressed confidence that this was also Ayn Rand's view of the issue. Needless to say, this is my understanding and my words, not necessarily Branden's actual view of the issue. But I very much liked his response.

Post 77

Friday, July 1, 2005 - 8:48am

Thank you, Dennis!

It's about time I had some real company on my side (the TRick-ster's company has been fleeting). The side that thinks human life matters -- in some fundamental way. Human life doesn't literally BEGIN to matter -- only after "making" some pre-moral, explicit choice. After all, babies matter, and they haven't made this explicit choice.

The only way to continue on with the pre-moral thing is to reduce it, implicitly, to performatory contradictions in the following way:

Humans are beings that act in ways to sustain their existence (note how the 'choice to live' has already been made -- by eating, breathing, etc). In this respect, anyone still existing has made the choice and now matters. Folks who haven't made the choice don't exist -- so there is no referent in reality to "make" this pre-moral choice. Your first breath was your only "pre-moral choice."

All humans that exist have already made the choice -- therefore, it is now pointless to use it abstractly (intellectually), in trying to gain any philosophical ground.

Ed

Post 78

Friday, July 1, 2005 - 10:21am

Ed,

All that talk about choice with babies and whatnot! Choice is a higher attribute of living organisms arising from the necessity to survive, not one of the basic drives of them.

The best description I have read of this was by Aries de Geus in a marvelous book, The Living Company, which is a study comparing corporations to living organisms

In it, he gave the fundamental drives of life to be two: (1) prolong the organism's life as much as possible, and (2) realize the inherent potential of the organism.

For a human being, realizing potential translates into using the mind properly and letting it "bloom" through maturation and training, with strong emphasis on the faculty of reason.

Are there exceptions? Yup. That, like chance and chaos, seems to be one of the things we bump into out there in reality.

Anyway, in your baby example, the baby's basic drive is not choice. The drive is to get on with the maturation process to realize its own inherent potential - body and mind (actually the mind already is a part of the body, it just has very different things to deal with than, say, the digestive tract, or muscle and bone development). The baby's other drive is to prolong its life (eating comes to mind as a start). Choice comes later as a part of that journey.

Michael

Post 79

Friday, July 1, 2005 - 12:04pm