Correct. There is no intrinsic meaning to life. Meaning is something that applies to concepts and symbols. Often meaning is used instead of value or purpose. If it is taken to mean value, life is the only thing that makes values possible. If meaning is taken to mean purpose, then life is an end in itself.
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“To be the eyes and ears of the Creator of the Universe.”
—Kilgore Trout
—Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (Breakfast of Champions)
Atheists cannot see, sense, or mentally ponder anything beyond the material. Everything revolves around physical appearances for them.
For them the material is all that exists and never occurs to them anything else within the imperfect human senses.
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That is not true. I’m an atheist, and I think existence exists, in whatever form it exists. concepts, love, time, and space exist. Are they made of matter? I wouldn’t say so. Of course, we can not see a concept, but we can mentally ponder it as we are doing right now. Not all Atheists are materialists. Some are, to be sure, but not all. Many scientists are atheists, and yet they ponder quantum mechanics, star formation, and gravity. Is gravity made of matter? I don’t know. Is curved spacetime made of matter? I don’t think so.
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I don’t either. Coherence attracts further coherence. When a coherent entity is massive enough, the effects really become measurable.
Spacetime? Sounds like a cool name for a superhero.
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.
..to then navigate the world through.
.
..unlike the Universe, which does not have a purpose, other than to be at the whim of the elements.
How do you know?
.
Nature called, it wants it’s purpose back.. 
Nature called, to tell humanity to stop hanging up on it yo!
Nature called, to tell humanity to stop impersonating it. 
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Yes.
And as Einstein allegedly stated…
“The fanatical atheists are like slaves who are still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard struggle. They are creatures who—in their grudge against traditional religion as the ‘opium of the masses’—cannot hear the music of the spheres.”
Indeed, the absolute perfection of this holographic-like (dream-like) illusion that we call a “universe,” has completely fooled the hardcore materialists into believing that this projected illusion* we are all collectively experiencing…
*(which, of course, is what Plato insisted is nothing more than the metaphorical equivalent of “shadows on a cave wall” when compared to the higher context of reality that the “shadows” loosely represent)
…may be all there is to reality.
Again, the perfection of this highly designed level of reality, combined with the purposely attenuated (sleepwalking-like) level of consciousness that all humans must deal with from birth, is just too overwhelming for the hardcore materialists to see past in order to allow them to realize…
(or at least entertain the possibility)
…that there exists a higher level of wakefulness above and outside of this temporary, again, “dream-like” illusion.
Yes.
And as Terence McKenna allegedly stated…
“Modern science is based on the principle ‘Give us one free miracle and we’ll explain the rest.’ The ‘one free miracle’ is the appearance of all the mass and energy in the universe and all the laws that govern it in a single instant from nothing.”
…which pairs nicely with one of my favorite cartoons…
Just to clarify what I am getting at, when we Google “materialism,” the first dictionary definition that often pops-up is something similar to this:
ma•te•ri•al•ism
noun
materialism
2. PHILOSOPHY the doctrine that nothing exists except matter and its movements and modifications.
And the point is that if according to hardcore materialism there is literally nothing else other than matter,…
…then that means that the stuff that forms our thoughts and dreams is simply an inward extension of the same stuff that forms the stars and planets.
Which then furthermore implies that if humans…
(within the inner context of our own minds)
…can willfully grasp the same fundamental substance that forms the stars and planets and transform it into anything we wish just by “thinking It” into existence,…
…then why is it so difficult to imagine that a higher consciousness…
(as is loosely suggested in Berkeleyanism, for one example)
…may have done the same thing with this universe?
And what that ultimately implies is the plausible possibility that as we stand on the Earth and look out into the universe, we are witnessing…
(from a “fetal-like” perspective - from within the “cosmic womb” of a higher Being)
…the extent to which consciousness has evolved its ability to “think things into existence.”
Indeed, evolved even to the point of being able (via sheer thought)…
…to replicate itself by “conceiving” its own familial offspring (the literal “seeds” of itself) within itself, as is depicted in the (perhaps, overused) illustration I uploaded upstream for the poster boy of the Dunning-Kruger Effect…
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Because the universe doesn’t face, and does not have to act on the alternative of going out of existence. Only living things do. Only living organisms have to act to continue existing. Life creates needs. Needs create goals. Goals create purpose.
Also, the universe isn’t a thing. It’s a concept we use to talk about the collection of all things.
I am well aware of this.
You are conflating what the word (or concept) “universe” refers to with that concept itself. Unless specified literally ( like ‘the concept of dog’), that word stands for what it refers to (‘the dog’), not its concept or word.
If that wasn’t so, you would be a concept. Now, the concept of you is a concept, you are not a concept.
No[quote=" , post:292, topic:80152, full:true, username:pseudoai"]
You are conflating what the word (or concept) “universe” refers to with that concept itself. Unless specified literally ( like ‘the concept of dog’), that word stands for what it refers to (‘the dog’), not its concept or word.
If that wasn’t so, you would be a concept. Now, the concept of you is a concept, you are not a concept.
[/quote]
No, I’m not. I’m conflating the concept with a category. The category of all things. Things exist. The universe doesn’t exist except as a mental integration.
Universe implies boundaries. We are certainly not aware of those boundaries, if there are any.
The concept of universe doesn’t exist except as a mental integration, maybe. Now, the universe does exist, since the concept of universe refers to all that exists. So, if you say the universe doesn’t exist, that is not referring to the concept of universe, but what the concept of universe refers to, so you would be saying that all that exists doesn’t exist, which leaves the only possibility: nothing exists, not even you
Quite the contrary. Nothing can be outside of the universe, so there is no boundary (there’s nothing in the ‘other side’ of the boundary)
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For funzies, I took this up with Google’s AI Mode…
Me:
Define the word “universe.”
AI Assistant:
The word universe refers to the totality of everything that exists, including all matter, energy, space, and time. It encompasses all celestial bodies like stars, planets, and galaxies, as well as the fundamental forces and physical laws that govern them.
Scientific & Practical Definitions
The Physical Universe: Often called the cosmos, this is the entire system of space and matter that emerged from the Big Bang roughly 13.8 billion years ago.
The Observable Universe: A more restrictive scientific term referring only to the portion of the universe that humans can theoretically see with current technology. Its diameter is approximately 93 billion light-years.
Multiverse Context: In modern physics, “a universe” may refer to one of many hypothetical systems in a broader “multiverse”.
Me:
If there truly does exist a “multiverse,” then does the word “universe” fully encompass everything implicit in what the word “multiverse” represents?
AI Assistant:
No. If a multiverse exists, the word “universe” no longer encompasses everything. Instead, it becomes just a single component of a much larger structure.
The Shift in Definition
Traditional meaning: Historically, “universe” meant the entirety of reality.
Modern meaning: In a multiverse scenario, “universe” refers only to our specific, interconnected pocket of space-time.
The Multiverse: This term represents the grand collection of all separate universes combined.
Why “Universe” Falls Short
Physical Isolation: Other universes may have completely different space-time continuums.
Different Laws: Alternative universes might operate under different physics and constants.
Casual Boundaries: Events in one universe may have zero causal impact on another.
And none of that takes into account the possibility of the existence of higher dimensions of reality such as those proposed in metaphysical and spiritual philosophies.
I guess my point is that the word “universe” has a limited reach, and that niallm is correct in his assertion that the word implies a boundary.
The Big Bang is the boundary. Think of the Big Bang as a race. The stopwatch doesn’t begin until the race begins. We can not see past the zero on the stopwatch. That marks the boundary of the universe
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That marks the boundary of our universe? How do you know?
Is it a vortex boundary? A bubble boundary? What kind of boundary? A mycelial boundary?
Or is it a trouble with tribbles situation, endlessly expanding?
Dunno.
The concept universe reduces all that exists to a single mental unit. That’s how concepts work. They integrate an unlimited number of units into a single unit. The concept universe reduces all that exists to a single mental unit. That’s what it means: uni: one. Versus: turning. Universus: turning into one.
When we look outward, we don’t see the universe. We see existents. The concept universe is what we use when we see existence as a whole. It is different than the concept chair. It is a much higher-level abstraction. In fact, it’s the highest possible abstraction. There can’t be any wider because there’s nothing more than everything. And abstractions don’t exist except as attributes. The universe is not a thing. It’s an abstraction, a mental product. The universe is not an entity, and only entities exist.
You’ve no doubt seen the cone model of the Big Bang with the little point expanding out to form the cone. That’s not really a good representation. A bubble is a better way to visualize it. The skin of the bubble marks the big Bang. It’s the boundary.
Singularities don’t exist in reality. Quantum fields have identity. That implies limits. limits forbid infinities. There is a maximum energy density. There is a maximum spacetime curvature. The singularity is an artifact of the math of General Relativity taken beyond its limits.
I know by applying the law of identity to the Big Bang.