Close Topic Options

Purpose Of Life

Do you agree with the following statement or do you find it pessimistic and untrue?

The only absolute knowledge attainable by man is that life is meaningless.

Life Purpose

I don't know who this quote or sentence came from, but I don't believe at all that it's true, and really, if that's how you see life, then you haven't got much to look forward to. I think to make a statement like this, you'd have to be pretty fed up with life. (In my opinion)

Purpose Of Life Health & Special Psychology

If looked at in a broader sense, the question of whether Life is meaningless can lead you down the path to examining Existence itself.

For the purpose of answering this post, I chose to look at the word, "Life", not in personal terms, but in a conceptual way.

Consider what we know of the universe (or, at least, what very intelligent scientists, astronomers, and mathematicians tell us what we know of the universe):

1) It's very big
2) It is getting bigger all the time.
3) It comprises galaxies, which comprise stars, some of which have planets orbiting them.
4) A rare few of these planets, whether through accident or design, host Life!

"Life" in these terms can be explained as, "Any cellular organism that can reproduce itself".

Now, this planet we call Earth developed Life, and millions of years later, that life evolved to the point of producing sentient, thiking, intelligent beings complete with emotions, aspirations, dreams, and questions; questions like, is Life meaningless?

It's a profound question when looked at conceptually, because one day our sun will go supernova or burn out. The Earth will have been destroyed long before that happens, and any life that hadn't previously figured out a way to leave the planet will come to an end.

So, what was the point? Millions and billions of years suddenly wiped away. The universe will carry on, new stars will birth and die, and planets will birth and die with them. Any life those planets spawn will likewise be born and die.

For what purpose? Perhaps there is no purpose, and conceptual Life is purely accidental. In this respect, it becomes "meaningless".

And so, in the brief existence of Life developing sentient beings, we look for the possibility of "purpose" existing. We look for meaning to our existence. We start asking wider questions; Is there life after death? Does God exist? Do parrallel dimensions exist and can life as we know it exist within those dimensions? etc, etc...

However, to ask whether Life is meaningless without exploring whether it has meaning, is meaningless. And, unfortunately, the you and the me who are corresponding in this forum will never know, because the Life that developed on planet Earth still has millions of years left to itself; to evolve further, to develop new technologies, thought processes, and tp make new discoveries. Somewhere in the future, we may discover the meaning of Life.... unless we clever Humans cause our own extinction in the meantime.

The quote you began this post with has far more relevance when looked at conceptually. The question can not be answered on a personal level except by individuals, and with relevance to their own lives. In this respect, it is indeed pessimistic and untrue!

Edited: Philosopher on 9th Jun, 2007 - 7:47pm

Life Purpose

Here is the purpose of life, of all biological existence: to propogate your genetic code.

Sentience is just a side-effect. We are born, we live, we struggle, we love, we lose, we die. This has been the way of things on our little ball of dirt for millenia, and we have something more, free will, we are no longer simply an animal ruled by its basic programing, it's emotions, it's instinct, we are capable of so much, both creation and destruction, and most of us are still ruled by our instincts despite the higher functions we are all born with. We're still, as a majority, animals, often even worse than animals, horrible machines of destruction.

And no one does anything but pray to their gods for deliverance.


but if anyone wants the secret to happiness it is this: happiness is found in the doing not in the done.

If you try and find happiness in and of itself, you will fail miserably. I believe that one can only find happiness in pursuing life, do what you do best and that which makes you pleased with yourself.

Live for yourself, but not at the detriment of others. (it is in the bill of rights set down by the US founding fathers)

but seeking happiness will only bring sadness, that I am sure of, because you don't and won't know where to find it.

I don't know, we are such a hopeless species, so much squandered potential, such ignorant leaders.


Sometimes I just wish they'd press the button and get it over with... because it all seems so... inhibited by our current state.


I'd like to just tear it all apart and rebuild.

Life Purpose

All I know is that if you talk in absolutes you will get absolutely nothing therefore it is true that absolute life is meaningless.

If you do not talk in absolutes then life has a meaning. Its meaning is in each of us as we think and carry on our lives for the betterment of our children. That is what life really means. TO go forth and multiply and to better the lifes of those ahead of us as those behind us have done. It may not look very well right now but we are still progressing towards the stars. Soon I think we will get there and life will have even more meaning due to the fact that our race will continue to grow and expand until the universe implodes upon itself.

Purpose Of Life

I disagree because there is more that we can know than the meaning of life (or lack thereof). We can know absolutely that we do exist (I think therefore I am) which by itself proves this statement to be untrue

Purpose Life

"The only absolute knowledge attainable by man is that life is meaningless." ." is attributed to Leo Tolstoy. In his time, just after the Russian Revolution and the beginning of Stalinism in Russia, life was pretty pessimistic. However a philosophical look at the question requires tearing it down. What does "absolute" mean? According to the Merriam-Webster online Dictionary Absolute means 1 a: free from imperfection : perfect b: free or relatively free from mixture : pure c: outright, unmitigated
2: being, governed by, or characteristic of a ruler or authority completely free from constitutional or other restraint
3 a: standing apart from a normal or usual syntactical relation with other words or sentence elements bof an adjective or possessive pronoun : standing alone without a modified substantive cof a verb : having no object in the particular construction under consideration though normally transitive
4: having no restriction, exception, or qualification
5: positive, unquestionable
6 a: independent of arbitrary standards of measurement b: relating to or derived in the simplest manner from the fundamental units of length, mass, and time c: relating to, measured on, or being a temperature scale based on absolute zero; specifically : kelvin
7: fundamental, ultimate
8: perfectly embodying the nature of a thing
9: being self-sufficient and free of external references or relationships
10: being the true distance from an aircraft to the earth's surface

I think we can eliminate definition 2, 3, 6 and 10. But that still leaves open to question what Tolstoy meant by life. Does he mean life, in general, the existence of self replicating, aspirating and eliminating entities? Or was he referring to the more complex life of human beings?

In my humble opinion if he was referring to the meaning of being human, we each CREATE the meaning of our own lives. For life to have "meaning" to any individual it is by that individual's own standards that meaning or meaninglessness is measured. Yes these standards are influenced by family, environment, education and society, but they are STILL an individual decision. In a very empirical way, we are each the gods of our own creation.