Odemus

Quite the contrary, I think it is impossible for you to believe anything of consequence.

Which brings me back to my original question.What is the point?Why bother debating something that doesn't exist?

You are the first athiest so far to display the conclusion one must draw from unbelief.


Nope, that isn't my goal at all.

Up till now you're the only one to respond like this.So who's opinion holds more value, yours, mine, or the other athiests here who think life can have meaning without God?

Odemus

Forgive me, I should clarify.Why are you passionate enough about your unbelief to debate an issue that you know will never be resolved?

Yes

Apart from your own 'intellectual stimulation' why not?What does it matter what anyone else believes?

I believe life has meaning.

When I say 'higher purpose' I mean above and beyond anything that a man could conceivably live for.The answer to your second question is because you are alive.

That's only consistent if you believe that your life holds the same lack of meaning as that of someone who maintains their happiness at the expense of others.

Christopher Lord

Your right, at some level my thoughts, your thoughts, life, the universe, and everything has no meaning. This is a truisim from my perspective.

But on a metalevel, on a pile of abstractions, upon the results of many billions of years of surviving, the replicators preceeding me and you learnt that there is such a thing as meaning in things, and that it is EVERYWHERE. At least so far as their agenda is concerned (key point).

Even though those simple replicators (life) are really truely pointless accedents in the cosmos, that doesn't preclude the individuals from having very sophisticated minds. In other words, Just because I am a highly tuned replicator built from ape parts in order to survive as a hunter/gatherer on the savanas, that does not mean that that is my only purpose. I can retool the amazing machinery in my brain to do anything I want, maybe even worship a GOD if I was so inclined. I can use the abilities which were originally used to catch animals or building tools in order to instead catch good deals and build software products, or ponder the meaning of it all.

So why the search for meaning in the universe?

I think that the hunter/gatherer sees meaning in everything they normally encounter (another key point).

Twigs broken and disturbed grass means something large (potential food or danger) moved past here before. Thunderheads mean rain. Lioness with cubs mean danger.

Its hard to come accross a meaningless thing on the savana upon which our ancestors were struggling. Therefore it is to be expected that we would have trouble dealing with the ultimate meaningless nature of the universe.

Meaninglessness is actually a simpler concept than meaningfullness, really. When you program a computer, the simplest possible response to a request is a 'meaningless' response. Providing a stream of meaningful results is much harder. Just dont confuse irrelevant with meaningless here. We can brush off the irrelevant with ease.

So we just never encounter meaninglessness, and so we dont know how to deal with it and simply make up meaning (God, for example) and jam it in the 'Empty Space' left by meaninglessness, even if not appropriate.

Zippy

I'm afraid Odemus, you are approaching this subject with several very severe misconceptions about atheists.

Atheists don't believe that inevitable death, or the lack of a higher purpose, renders life itself worthless. We just don't believe in fairy stories. It's quite simple when you think about it.

Paul

[ July 12, 2002: Message edited by: Zippy ]</p>

RogerLeeCooke

I'm not sure who you are addressing here; is it all of "us" (atheists)? I going to assume that it is. I don't speak for anyone but myself.

You and I are simply thinking in different categories. First of all, I'm not "passionate" about being an atheist. I am a bit "tetchy" from having been constantly told by theists that I'm morally reprehensible. And, like all members of minority groups, I'm VERY tired of explaining myself to the majority, who just don't get it.

But I'll try one more time. The fact that YOU can't see any purpose to life unless it goes on forever says nothing about ME. I see plenty of good reasons to live: my family, the society around me, there are things to learn, and exciting things to do. The fact that they aren't eternal, and neither am I means I live in the present as much as possible. If all the life I'm going to get is a few brief decades (and it is), why waste them in wishful thinking.

Why do you think "better" and "worse" are useful categories for people's wishes about the kind of people they want to be and the kind of society they want to live in? Is it so important to believe oneself holier than those of a different persuasion? Is it so vital that in some completely unverifiable sense the universe "endorses" your opinion of what is right?

Your last paragraph is just the latest variant of an old argument known as Pascal's wager. The refutation of it is almost as old as the wager itself. As for me, I'm being cremated when I die, and I don't want or care about any epitaph. In my opinion, you are the one who should be asking why you want to waste the only life you are going to get pretending that you'll get more.

phlebas

Hmmm... another theist who has built an amazing superstructure to hide his fear of death. Happy happy joy joy. I haven't seen this argument in, I don't know, at least several days.

I don't understand this drive to hammer out some kind of objective "meaning" to existence. (Although I am impressed with Odemus' persistence. When told that life need not have a meaning, he asks what that means.)

What is the reason behind our being here? Well, if you just mean humans, it's because some ancestors had a beneficial mutation that made them into what we later defined as "human." For more information on this, the good people at the Evolution/Creation forum will give it to you my the ton.

As for some purpose, I guess our purpose is no different from that of, say, dogs. Dogs exist to eat, sleep, and make more dogs (and, in the case of my dogs, to rid the world of rabbits and lizards and frogs). Our ability to think about purposes doesn't change the fact that our purpose in living is to live.

You claim (by repeating "to glorify God") that our purpose is to stoke God's ego. But what does that solve? What is the point of doing that? Getting into Heaven, presumably, but what good does it do God? Does it make him happy? Why is our happiness meaningless and his so important?

The problem with Heaven, or whatever you want to call an eternal, "perfect" afterlife is that it robs mortal life of any possible meaning, not to mention any worth or beauty. What's the point in enjoying Shakespeare if his best work is worse than what you get from a Bazooka gum wrapper when compared to Heavenly poetry or prose? Michaelangelo and Van Gogh might as well have been scribbling on the wall with chalk. Mozart was making fart noises under his arm. (Well... composing fart noises anyway. Placido Domingo and Yo-Yo Ma are making them.)

All that, not worth a damn thing. Your heaven might be beautiful, but it sure makes your Earth bleak and barren.

You're probably right, though. Nothing I do or feel will matter when I'm gone, unless I become one of those rare people whose works outlive them. One the people who knew me during my life are also gone, then I will only exist as a name on someone's geneological chart.

So I'm left with coping with life. But it's okay, since I enjoy it. My enjoyment is purely subjective and very fleeting. But I pursue it because I haven't discovered a better alternative.

As for why we argue with theists, it's for much the same reason I guess. Many of us enjoy the argument for its own sake, because it keeps our mental muscles trim (not that it matters in the long run). Many of us are trying to keep the theists from swarming us over and making life in the future miserable (so it's more an investment in happiness rather than a short-term gain). Plenty of us, I expect, do it for both reasons, and many more. Always chasing happiness, one way or another.

And you do the same thing. You have simply convinced yourself that your happiness will last forever. You're trying to maximize your future happiness by kissing up to the being you hope will give it to you. And you're here badgering us with tiresome questions because the more who believe the same as you do, the happier you will get, either through peer support now or heavenly brownie points.

We don't mind, though. We enjoy it

Perchance

I'm someone who is glad that, so far as the evidence points, I will end my days in oblivion. I want to live as long as I think life worth living, and then not have it continue to last.

Does that deprive my life of meaning? No, of course not. It might not mean anything to anyone else, but it sure means something to me. And which is the more important, in the final analysis? The opinion of the person living the life, or the opinion of the person observing the life?

If life has no meaning without God (and we'll leave aside the question of God's existence for a moment), isn't that rather sad? Does family mean nothing, then, to a theist? Does what he does from day to day mean nothing? Does he ignore sunsets and starlight and music because there's a God? Does he truly live a life just panting to get into heaven?

A lot of the theists I know don't act that way, as if God were the most important things in their lives, even though they believe in him. They do find contentment here in their lives, and religion is only a part of it. They might miss religion if it were stripped away, but I don't think it's the foundation of their joy.

As to why I, personally, debate or talk to theists:

1) I don't understand a lot of their belief structure, having been raised in a non-religious household myself, and so want to understand.

2) Any argument is fun, and can be constructive.

3) Sometimes they themselves are funny.

-Perchance.

Theli

Odemus...

How can you say that another persons "meaning in life" has no meaning, when the word "meaning" is subjective?
Even your "Glorify god" is a meaning from your own perspective. It is not more of a meaning than any of ours.
If it serves no purpose and you don't like it, then why do you do it?
It you do like it, then it is a meaning of it's own. Just like us discussing on this board is of meaning to us. Or we wouldn't be doing it.

Eudaimonist

Only as a side-effect of caring about my philosophy of life, which happens to be nontheistic.

See and touch and measure and feel and experience and achieve.

'Better' can exist within the context of human well-being, which does exist and without any need for divine purposes.

Not so. My life means something to me while I am alive. I don't need immortality and indestructability for life to have meaning.

You are correct in that my life will have no meaning for me after I cease to exist. BFD.

Mine is true to reality.

My epitaph will only be my life's meaning for others. What matters to me is my life's meaning while I'm alive.

Happiness -- the greatest "point" of all.

Koyaanisqatsi

So, the "meaning" of your entire life is to glorify a fictional creature from an ancient Middle Eastern warrior-deity mythology?

And you wonder why we are so passionate in deprogramming people like you?



[ July 12, 2002: Message edited by: Koyaanisqatsi ]</p>