Goethe once wrote, “If you want to get pleasure out of life you must attach value to the world.â€
Schopenhauer replied, “No wealth can equal the possession of greatness in oneself.â€
I believe both are true to an extent, it really depends on how much you believe life is lived for pleasure. If a person’s life is filled with nothing but constant suffering, I wonder how much meaning is really there for them?
At one time I was a great believer in God and heaven, but now I don’t see any hope for such. God shows very little interest in his earth leaving it to follow whatever course we choose to take it on. Some would say he has given us his commandments, but I would argue that most moral philosophers today would have been able to come up with better ones, an all-knowing God that didn’t know about the future morality of his people! That’s an interesting concept. I also don’t hold much faith in the transcendental ideas of Buddhism. To give up ourselves is to give up what makes us unique, from my understanding of Buddhism, wanting uniqueness is bad. We should want to be all and nothing, but not only that, it is what we really are.
So you might not be surprised to find out that I think the only way to find meaning in life is to create one. Even if there is a higher power, he is very vague about what it is he wants us to do. (Please don’t start quoting the bible, as I’ll have to dig up all my old quotes on God wanting people murdered, and that slavery is actually okay.) I will never deny that there is a good possibility that a God could exist, but unless he personally tells us what we should live for, we might as well live for what we believe is Fair and Just.
For me life is about expanding my abilities, setting goals and trying to achieve them. I don’t always succeed, but when I do I can take pride and pleasure, in conquering a foe of my own making. I’m a believer in the “seize the day†attitude. I feel in the river of life you need to fight the current from time to time, as it’s only in those times that you find out who you really are.
This is just my way of experiencing life, and the great thing about life is, that there are many ways to live. No one way is greater than another, unless you can find a reason why in your own heart.
Here is one of my favourite cut’n’paste pieces of text on freewill.
Why does a certain unique DNA chain make me or
why is H2O water or 12 electrons make carbon? The fact that certain
arrangements of matter make things. The rules of the universe are
consistent and there is seemingly endless variety
Or why do we live in a Universe that follows rules, which would seem to require more effort to create, then a random universe? This is one of the five proofs for the existence of God give by Aquinas. (i.e. the world as its created follows order not chaos).
I’ve thought about this problem for a long time and I keep coming back to the fact I just don’t have enough information to make a fair and rational decision. What it comes down to is I either believe that the Universe begot itself and always existed in some form. Or I can believe that some intelligence (most would call God) created the Universe so I can live in it for purpose that is still unknown to me. (I don’t believe a single world religion is right, but I still believe the existence of God is a valid choice).
This is a repost of an old post I made, which was talking about a Chemical Deity.
The basic idea behind what I said was: What physics is, is the simulation of the “real world†in a “perfect world†(maths being that perfect world). But does our “real world†work to the same level of accuracy that is possible in the perfect mathematical world? Because, if there is margin for error in the “real world†this error might be utilised in away to create freewill. (Some how?)
Getting back to freewill; I think there is a small randomness to the universe. Maths as we use it is still quite simple. 1 + 1 = 2, are whole numbers. 1.3 + 4.3 = 5.6, are decimal numbers (or fractions). As you know there are an infinite number or numbers. Between 1.0 and 2.0 there are also an infinites number of decimal numbers (or fractions). To recreate the universe with maths would require infinite number accuracy. Something we are not capable of yet, maybe never? But maths is also unlike anything else in the world, it is pure and incorruptible; meaning 1 + 1 will always from this day to the end of everything even beyond that, 1 + 1 will always equal 2. I don’t believe the universe lives up to this perfect accuracy. In chemical reactions (and the expending of energy) in the universe I think there is margin for error, and this error over time can create randomness. This randomness could create something along the lines of freewill. (I’m still thinking about how this works as the last step is a bit of a jump). But it would be like this: some how the human brain has found away to harness this error to allow freewill. (As a side note, this might be why computers have problems in imitation of human thought.)
Pax Vitae