Are we merely the pawns in one big chess game, a plentiful replaceable resource, and would we be missed when once we are gone?
You, sir, would not be missed for asking such stupid questions. Good day
Oh, the chess game is a metaphor for fate, isn’t it? There are 5 billion or so of us, why yes we happen to be plentiful. However wether we’re replacable is a question of ethics, not purpose. Why are we here? a better question methinks is ‘can we ever answer that before we die?’
Does it make any difference either way? Would it really change anything if we were? I personally dont think it would.
Maybe not chess - but maybe we are experiencing the future of online gaming… we’re all back on planet Zogg wearing our VR headsets. Anybody see that Red Dwarf episode? Quality! 
Wonder what my score is?
DALE
Maybe not chess - but maybe we are experiencing the future of online gaming… we’re all back on planet Zogg wearing our VR headsets. Anybody see that Red Dwarf episode? Quality! Wonder what my score is?
DALE
Why not be here?
Sorry about my double post, not sure why it did that.
Was that directed at me? What do you mean Zak?
-DALE
I was asking anyone, mainly jd. We often ask why are we here why dont we ask why not be here? Where eles would we be?
You can read the original question two different ways:
1: why are we here and not not-here
or
2: we ARE here (have life), so what shall we do with it?
ie, what’s the purpose of us being here (having life) ?
I think your point is a good question that leads to another question - why are we so keen on answering them?
Maybe the search for the answer to 1 gives us the answer to 2?
DALE [/i]
Perhaps there is no ultimate meaning in the objective sense…concerning an application of a certain meaning for everyone. We are here and its our job to give our lives meaning…not necessarily reach some “destined” ends.
here is his original post:
“Are we merely the pawns in one big chess game, a plentiful replaceable resource, and would we be missed when once we are gone?”
This is an interesting anthropic question.
Immediately we see he uses adjectives like ‘missed’ and this shows how mired the writer is in the importance of our species. What does it mean to be ‘missed’. Does it mean being longed for? I don’t think he meant that. I will take license here, and say (I mean write), heintends to say it would it make no difference to the universal existence whether intelligent species existed or not.
The answer to this question is two-fold, as was his question.
-
We ARE part of a universal ‘chess game’ so to speak. Though the question is so laced with a notion of meaningfulness to the universe as to make a reader think he’s a born-again Christian. The universe is an existing reality. It is nothing more. We cannot assign meanings to it. It is a real external, existing thing. It does exist, and we can understand ‘it’. But, there is nothing more to be gleaned from it than understanding ‘it’. By that I mean as an object outside of our collective selves.
-
If our species died out, no, it would not matter in the least to this universe. That is to say, it would not stop existing.
There are those that think our existence is an integral part of the universe. That all cosmological machinations have been leading up to ‘us’. Meaning the human species, when I write ‘us’. That we are, well … so to speak, the ultimate point of existence. And this species-centered idea is repugnant, but some do advance it. God if you only did exist, (which you don’t) you’d put a stop to this kind of childish reasoning.
I don’t know why we are here nor do i know of a reason. We just are.
The original topic was “why are we here” followed up by a completely different question “would we be missed” some are answering the first question, and some the other.
As for your point Robleh:
Maybe, but you can’t be sure of that. I don’t believe we ARE the main purpose of the universe, but I do imagine that we are an important part that if you removed could bring the whole “tower of cards” down. Take a look at the human body for instance - all the little blood cells may ask “would the body miss us if we were gone”, unaware of the important part they are playing. The body wouldn’t even BE if it wasn’t for the blood, and all the other parts that made it up.
The universe knows itself through us. We enable the universe to be self aware, seeing itself from our human perspective. We are conscious beings. If there was no consciousness, then would the universe even exist at all? To Whom? and if you are sure you know the answer, why are you so sure?
DALE
Are we here?
Strangly that made sense to me.
I like the way you phrased this. Thank you!
Well, if your friend dropped dead standing there in front of you, would you cease to exist? The same might apply for the very first consciousness(if there is such a thing) and the fact that the world would probably go on existing if that consciousness never happened. I think its safe to assume that the tree does make a sound when it falls in the woods and you don’t hear it, I’ll give the empiricists that much.
However, the “universe” I am refering to here, I believe, is the one that is bound up in human sense and rationalization…almost to the point where it would be lacking any phenomenological subjective truth. But as Robleh mentioned the universe is understood, so in a sense subjectivity is inescapable and that “universe” you are refering to, Dale, is necessarily a subjective concept: a universe might exist when you die, but that is a different universe, figuratively speaking. So you got me, pal, no, I can’t say that that thing you are refering to when you mean “universe” does in fact exist without your consciousness. But I can’t deny that there are objective truths in this universe that exist in your absence. Sure, I gotta be there to experience the sound of the tree falling, but it is a safe and logical bet that this event causes the same sensations in you as it does me, or anyone else. Then “subjectivity” is nothing more than a “piece” of an objectivity which exists for everyone. Here I am infering causalty through logic and not experience, that is, I don’t need to be there in the woods to assume this.
I like your idea of the “tower of cards.” I agree, but I think in your analogy you should include that consciousness is probably the tip of that tower. To remove it doesn’t compromise the foundation.
You could maintain a materialism and hold that consciousness is an epiphenomenon. This is the most popular view because it is the simplest and in good keeping with logic. To go saying that consciousness actually constitutes reality would require something more than what philosophy, mathematics and science have to offer. It is a metaphysical question and for pragmatic reasons I think such a position shouldn’t be a priority for philosophy. But that’s just my opinion.
Thanks for your thoughts, they are good ones. I’ll reply purely from own opinion, not saying it’s any more right than yours, but it my perspective at this time in my life based on what I have experienced so far . 
(end of disclaimer)
If “dropping dead” meant the end of his consciousness, then - from HIS perspective - yes.
Well I personally do not think it is safe to assume that. For the tree would not even exist “as a tree” without any consciousness perceiving it. It would have no colour, no shape, no size and make no sound… as these things only take form once they are detected and translated by the perceivers senses. The “tree” would exist as a mass of unmeasurable energy, with no physical properties. It would be both infinitely big, and infinitely small. Unmeasurable. Our consciousness brings the “tree” into existence, as a tree. Before that it’s energy, possibly in a “potential” state. (I don’t know much about quantum science but I guess this links with that). Didn’t Einstein realise that energy was all that there really was?
I think I see what you are saying, you are comparing consciousness to, say, a working PC that is powered up and operational. And if you removed the motherboard, the PC would no longer work - but it wouldn’t mean the rest of the PC no longer existed.
If that what you mean, that is a fair point, but my example was trying to get across the point of “everything is created & sustained by everything else” . I realise my cards analogy was a too linear example.
Your points are all right IF there is a starting and ending point. (a foundation and the result) i.e., parts of a PC that results in a working PC or cards that result in a tower.
but… (and please forgive me for struggling to explain this) what I am thinking of is a system that has no start and end, but only exists because of the other parts, more like a circle than a line, where the end creates the beginning as much as the beginning creates the end. Like the little cards makes a card tower, and this tower is part of a bigger tower, which is part of an even bigger tower, etc… and it gets bigger (and smaller) for infinity. Every card creates the tower, and every tower creates the card. a Completely self dependant, contained, sustained and reliant system. “As above, so below.”
I know that is a head bending idea, and I also know that I am not explaining it very clearly. I will hopefully come up with a better example later.
(When I meditated on this I was shown what looked like a mandabrolt fractal pattern. I’ve just got to work out what that means! … does anybody reading this know much about fractals, can you see how my vision fits into what I am trying to say? any help would be appreciated)
Yes it would.
Imagine we are in a dream. In our dream, the dream scientists would be measuring and breaking down the dream reality into it’s smallest parts, striving to understand dream laws; the dream philosophers would be scratching their dream chins and debating; the dream mathematicians would be counting and measuring dream stuff… but none of them would really understand / know the true nature of themselves and their reality, not until they actually awakened… and that is an individual “spiritual” process, not a scientific, mathematic, or philosophical one. - However, these processes (especially philosophy IMO) would most definitely assist the individual in reaching (realising) his own awakening/“enlightenment”.
The parts and the whole, the inner and the outer, the truth and the illusion, the dreamer and the dream, the thinker and the thought - all existing because of each other.
DALE
If existence is subjective, ur here for whatever reason u wanna be here for, if anything and if you even want to be here at all.
I was hoping that idea was not my opinion, actually. We should be shooting for absolutes and facts, not personal beliefs or whims.
This is good stuff, askewd. It is kinda like a reinactment of the empiricism contra rationalism debate that spanned four centuries.
I’ll agree, but we’ve got to be careful with this next statement:
Are you denying that those energies exist so to be sensed? There shouldn’t be much difference between raw energy and the perceptions they constitute. So its not that the “tree” existed before you perceived it, but that the substance of the object which you call a “tree” did. I don’t see a need to seperate an object of consciousness such as a tree from other objects such as the energy/being that constitutes the tree.
This is an empirical argument that seems logical and sensible, don’t ya’ think?
There might be some problems with this.
For one thing, if that is the case, then the universe that your dead friend had in his perspective when he was alive was not the same universe you have in your perspective. But what about that substance that makes up the tree? Shouldn’t it be percieved by one as it is by all? Then the “you” that he perceived when he was alive should be no different than the “you” I percieve right now, in this general sense. And if he perceives the same objects, he’s most likely perceiving the same universe. So the universe should carry on after he ceases to be conscious.
No?