Coincidentally, yesterday I attended a talk by Bernardo Kastrup on the topic of finding our purpose in life. Kastrup is a philosophical idealist, he explained an alternative to the existentialist view of creating your own story and meaning in a essentially meaningless universe outside of ourselves reasoning in part from recent insights in physics. For example:
In one of his books he says the meaning of life is "about experiencing existence, in all its angles and glory, for the sheer and pure sake of experience itself! We don’t eat a nice meal, make love or travel to beautiful locations just to understand or make sense of something. We do these things because the experiences themselves imbue our lives with a kind of timeless meaning, independent of comprehension."
-- Kastrup, Bernardo. More Than Allegory: On Religious Myth, Truth And Belief (p 203). John Hunt Publishing.
Ask yourself the right question in the moment itself, fully aware of your emotions and the things around you, and the answers could rise up automatically - 'the meaning of life' cannot be an armchair intellectual exercise he says.
This has been my experience in life as well, it takes practise to get back to the Nexus. As Dr. Soran tells Picard: "They say time is the fire in which we burn. Right now, Captain, my time is running out. We leave so many things unfinished in our lives... I know you understand"
> In one of his books he says the meaning of life is "about experiencing existence, in all its angles and glory, for the sheer and pure sake of experience itself! We don’t eat a nice meal, make love or travel to beautiful locations just to understand or make sense of something. We do these things because the experiences themselves imbue our lives with a kind of timeless meaning, independent of comprehension." -- Kastrup, Bernardo. More Than Allegory: On Religious Myth, Truth And Belief (p 203). John Hunt Publishing.
That's an interesting perspective, but, let me poke at it bit.
If you were to be able to experience all those things you describe but had no one to share them with, would they have meaning? What if you were in a simulation so that it seemed like you were doing all these things with other people, but you knew that you are in a simulation all alone? Would these things still have meaning? Would the experience be worthwhile?
I would suggest that whilst they may still be somewhat worthwhile, without other people to share those experiences with, without a public sphere within which to express your unique and distinct story to the rest of humanity, life becomes significantly less meaningful.
To build meaning, we need both the private experiences you describe and the existence of others who can bear witness to our lives and give it an existence outside of our own minds. Yes, the experiences are valuable but they become exponentially more so when they are part of the story of our lives, communicated to our equals.
Hi Snowbat, I don't think Bernardo assumes such a simulation (a kind of solipsism?) or is this thought experiment for the sake of 'what if'? "Make love" as Bernardo says in this sense implies genuine meaningful relationship, even though both persons are dreams within 'the godhead', transcendent or ultimate reality or whatever you call this 'timeless meaning'. If so there's still both illusions of active agents (humans who love), which are meaningfully 'real' in the socalled "mind-at-large".
Even if you were all alone, crashed or stranded on this planet or another, you can find unity in relationship with the environment which is 'not you'. I think you could relate to plants and animals with love, admiration, beauty and an intense purpose. Animals can return this love as well. Of course other humans would amplify the meaning significantly as I think the love between men reflects the transcendent better, perhaps mystics disagree and their union with God is above anything else. I have no clue, but I for sure would agree with you.
This aspect is - for what I understood of Bernardo Kastrup's views - not undervalued and likely just as much emphasized as you and I do. But it's sure good to point it out, love gets it ultimate expression in human relations. I wonder though what theologians and/or mystics would say about this. Bernardo Kastrup argues theology can (and should if the ideas are true) be re-examined in light of the implications of his thought. I'm not sure if I make sense to you or in general?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1cHg_S3X3A
Yep, you do make sense (though I would suggest more line breaks :-P ). Also my username is swombat not snowbat...
A great source for this discussion is Hannah Arendt's book "The Human Condition". I find it really heavy and difficult to read but full of incredible insights and powerful ideas about certain features/definitions/perspectives of human life. Highly recommended.
> What if you were in a simulation so that it seemed like you were doing all these things with other people, but you knew that you are in a simulation all alone? Would these things still have meaning? Would the experience be worthwhile?
If it is in fact a perfect simulation, and you as the actor in said simulation cannot detect a tear in the fabric of the simulated reality, you will, in due time, repress any prior knowledge of said previous "reality" by integrating it with your reality i.e. rationalizing it as a dream. As there would not be any discernible difference between being real and feeling real, any worthwhile experience would, by definition, be worthwhile.
* S. Gröblacher, T. Paterek, R. Kaltenbaek, Č. Brukner, M. Żukowski, M. Aspelmeyer, and A. Zeilinger. An experimental test of non-local realism. Nature 446, 871–875 (2007) http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v446/n7138/abs/nature05...
In minute 38 I ask the question if he can describe an example of finding meaning in life. https://youtu.be/D-EeF1quouY?t=2305
In one of his books he says the meaning of life is "about experiencing existence, in all its angles and glory, for the sheer and pure sake of experience itself! We don’t eat a nice meal, make love or travel to beautiful locations just to understand or make sense of something. We do these things because the experiences themselves imbue our lives with a kind of timeless meaning, independent of comprehension." -- Kastrup, Bernardo. More Than Allegory: On Religious Myth, Truth And Belief (p 203). John Hunt Publishing.
Ask yourself the right question in the moment itself, fully aware of your emotions and the things around you, and the answers could rise up automatically - 'the meaning of life' cannot be an armchair intellectual exercise he says. This has been my experience in life as well, it takes practise to get back to the Nexus. As Dr. Soran tells Picard: "They say time is the fire in which we burn. Right now, Captain, my time is running out. We leave so many things unfinished in our lives... I know you understand"