There have been many people on this website that have gotten into arguements with me about how “survival” is the most important thing in life and how it is our true purpose to survive or at least ensure the survival of others. This right here is your chance to state your case. In order for this arguement to start I will need the person who argues for survival and I need that person to state his/her view on the issue, and I also need a full and complete definition of the word “survival” as used here, and an explaination of why survival is our purpose.
Depending upon the definition of survival, I will be most likely arguing against this view and propose my own idea of purpose or at least what the most important thing or capacity of a human being is.
So to anyone out here who believes in survival as the purpose in life this is your big chance to state your case.
I will wait for arguements before I give mine and some responses
Of course, a lot of people completely missed the point of what I was saying, I think. I will try to clarify in a consise manner.
If you fail to stay alive, all else is moot. (to you)
You do without happiness, you can do without love, you can do without knowledge, ad nauseam. You cannot do with out survival. Once you cease to survive, you cease to be. That makes it the MOST important thing.
I already put something about this in “Knowing the Lost Cause” (which you can find some of in the creative writing forums. The following is the view of a character, not me, but it applies to this topic:
"Individuals have come up with any number of things to live for: Gold, fame, the gods, and so on. They choose something, declare it to be all important, and live for it for the rest of their days. Now, I do not often make sweeping philosophical claims. My seething self-hatred has prevented that, but I’m about to make one now. I’m about to share with you the root of all these beliefs; the real thing that we all live for. We all live not to die. That’s it, that’s where all religion, all drive, all goals come from. That’s why we find a mate and produce young, so some bit of us can not die. That’s why we make heroes of those who do some imagined great service, so they can not die just a little bit. That’s why we view suicide as a crime and martyrdom as an act of valor. Martyrs give their lives to not die. Suicides give their lives to die. That’s an affront to everything we really stand for. Usually our drive not to die lurks in the background, in some subconscious push that leads us in everything. Rarely does it step to the foreground and enter our conscious minds as itself. "
But after you die, everything ceases to matter…to you.
You have to be alive to be able to judge what is important.
In order to make a judgement that survival is not the most important thing, you must survive long enough to make that decision.
All your ideals, philosophies, judgements on what and what is not worth living for, what and what is not worth dying for, all hinge on being alive to think those thoughts. Otherwise they don’t even exist.
For me the meaning of life is to live, and further to live to the best of my ability. If you make the meaning of life anything else would automatically limit it. Survival fits into this very easily since it is a requirement of life.
An area which could cause confusion is that we don’t know what happens when our physical body dies, and personally I’m not convinced that that is the end of life, just a transition of some sort. Thus survival could mean different things for different people - a terrorist could be a suicide bomber who thought that they were going to a better life in heaven and so feel that they are still living, and living to the best of their ability.
I think you have a point about surviveal being the most important, but then the question becomes what you want to count as the self.
I half recall Socrates covering this when he refused to let his prosecuters be merciful upon him. He said that they wanted his ideas to die and his body to live, whereas he wanted the opposite.
So I think so-called self sacrafice is easily explained in the case where someone would be more dead (lost more of what they count as their identity) if they physically live. So the soilder that jumps on the grenade would rather be dead than be a coward. He identifies more with the dead soilder than the cowardly one.
Afterall, to die is not the same as to cease to exist. It is indeed a state of existance, if a much simpler one.
Are we talking about “our” as in humans only for sake of the argument? If so…
Quick remark on death. Some decide to end their lives for various reasons. The purpose in life is not to not die.
Next, a remark on “purpose in life”. Human purpose is removed from the natural purpose outside of the levels of conscious meddling. I believe you to be speaking of the underlying natural purpose.
I am a “survival theorist” to an extent.
I lean toward this type of explanation: The continuance of the species.
We do not feed on our own kind before we feed on other species. It is not in our nature. We are part of a system as necessary as the universe itself. Our species’ characterstics may change, but we will always be what we are regardless of what that is. That point is, as we humans are, part of the vicious cycle. If some part of that cycle ends us, so be it. But “separate entities” do not end themselves. They must exist. Any friction to destroy is only an attempt at further life. I will elaborate if you or anyone else comes up with a compelling argument against…We will most likely be arguing the same point from oppposite sides of the cycle. What is is what is…
Survival is not the most important thing in life, not by any means. Survival just is… …it’s a ‘fact’ of life, part of the ‘baggage’ of life, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with things that count in life. It is quite absurd to posit survival as ‘important.’ It just doesn’t belong in that class of objects. It was a glib answer to a serious question.
I am sorry but I did not ask you to state your opinion on survival. If you could please give me a detailed definition of survival and how it relates to purpose. You have sort of given me an opinion or thought here but what I asked for was a complete definition.
I need something like
survival: the act of…(whatever you believe survival is)
and after that I need your arguements for survival as the most important thing in life. You have just given me one or two up there so if you have any more please add them underneath your definition
There is no importance in natural events. There are occurances. It just so happens to occur that all human actions engage in the continuance of its own species for reasons I have described already…
Life is life because it continues. If each species of life didn’t inherently have its methods of keeping itself alive, then there would be no life. It is by natural law necessary for life to continue itself or it wouldn’t even exist. So this is the one thing it always engages in. Nothing else in life holds that level of necessity.
Now, if we start arguing definitions of “life” etc., like in another post, then there is no argument for or against your claims and this becomes another one of those off the topic threads…
Let’s just call a rock a bi-product of the universe, like a turd, and the universe continues to produce itself… like humans (of which are each little universe children surviving because they must)…
Wow look, PSW trying to argue again without stating a case. How novel <–heavy sarcasm.
Will you ever learn?
I should take a page from your book: “survival is the most important thing because it IS!!! arguing with me is preposterous because I’m right!”
But I won’t because I am not an idiot.
I wasn’t aware I did. My reply was grounded in reasoning that is pretty hard to deny…at least I have yet to see anyone present an argument against it besides “you are wrong”
I am defining survival as ‘the act of staying alive’, as oposed to not surviving, which is death. As for purpose…purpose? What has that to do with anything. Purpose is subjective. What person A believes his purpose is will be different from person B and person C, but all 3 of them must survive long enough to form those opinions.
It’s a rather simple argument. All descision making hinges on being alive. (surviving) the original question was
“what is the most important thing in life”
Not, what is lifes purpose, or, what is the most important thing to you.
If you do not first meet the needs of survival, any subjective opinions you may hold about importance are moot. Survival is OBJECTIVE importance, but on a subjective level.
What amuses me Dr.S is that you actually believe what you’re saying to be somehow true! And, you seem to expect others to believe in your delusions! I accept you have them but don’t ask me additionally to subscribe to them! That’s asking too much! I mean, there’s enough mass hysteria on this site already!
I don’t think survival is really a purpose in life anytime but it is the first most important thing in life because we all want to be happy and what will happiness mean if we’re not even there or there is a tendency for our demise. So, first we ensure that we live and survive and once this is confirmed for a long duration and we become comfortable with it then we move on to making ourselves happy. And if we’re generally happy then we want more, so we move on to achievements because just being happy is not enough anymore. And this achievement thing moves on to bigger or greater achievements, whatever makes us more happy. I feel that’s the way it goes and survival cannot be a purpose in life ever it is only something we strive for first of all. Purpose in life is something that you would live for, would you live for survival? Nope! Mother Teresa helped others and made that her life, she lived with it, that’s a purpose, you can live with purpose, you can’t live with just survival or there would be no such thing as suicide.
We all make our own purpose. The meaning we each give to our lives is a totally subjective and individual reconing we all come to. Even if it is to say we have no purpose at all.
I agree ‘survival’ makes a lousy purpose for living. I personally live to experience. That is my ‘purpose’
But it remains that you can have survival without purpose, but you can’t have purpose without survival.
That leaves survival as the most important thing in life.
Whitelotus,
Firstly, I agree with your first post, which does not run contrary to anything I said.
Secondly, I did not anywhere claim to support evolution as a theory, that sir, is an assumption.
Of course I do favor evolution(as i’m not an idiot), but that is beside the point. And where do you get off questioning my grasp of said theory? It may very well be you have a firmer grasp on the theory than I, but that has yet to be demonstrated either way.
If you would have read a little closer, you would notice I defined ‘purpose’ as something we subjectively assign ourselves.
My case here is that survival is the most important thing in life(not the purpose of life), simply because it is the one thing life can not be without.
Regardless of the properties of life itself.
.
It is obvious we are talking about different things, which means you either didn’t understand what I meant or you are being beligerant. I’ll assume the former.
When I say purpose(meaning) given to ones own life, I am not refering to anything biological, or the big picture of continuing a genetic line, (I assume this to be the meaning that is decided for us) but what we as thinking people project apon ourselves.
Apples and oranges.