What is the meaning of life? Many philosophers have thought deeply about this question, but
does the question even make sense to ask? Is there such thing as meaning at all? In
this video, I’ll look at this question, including if I think it can be answered and,
if so, what I think the best answer might be. Keep in mind this is just a guess of mine,
no one really knows the answer for absolutely sure.
First, when asking the question ‘what is the meaning of life?’, we have to make sure
the question makes sense to ask. The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein wrote about how philosophers
often become confused by language and attempt to solve philosophical problems that to begin
with, are unsolvable.
Wittgenstein’s aim in philosophy was “To show the fly the way out of the fly-bottle”.
Simply put, philosophers, or flies, become trapped in the bottle banging off the glass
or repeatedly failing in finding answers to philosophical questions. However, the correct
answer lies on the way out of the fly bottle in understanding the question, perhaps, couldn’t
be logically solved at all.
Today not everyone agrees with Wittgenstein’s core philosophy, but the idea of chasing answers
to pseudo questions or unsolvable questions is important to take note of.
So before trying to answer the question ‘what is the meaning of life?’ we need to examine
if it’s a question that can potentially have an answer.
When individuals ask ‘what is the meaning of life?’, sometimes they actually are asking
a slightly different question or a series of questions such as…
What is life all about? What is the reason to live?
What is the purpose of life? What is the origin of life?
Who are we?
For this video, I will strictly focus on the question and semantics of ‘what is the meaning
of life?’ as these other questions may have totally different meanings and thus have different
answers.
First, what exactly is the meaning of meaning? Meaning in semantics, philosophy of language,
metaphysics, and metasemantics, is, according to professor Richard Morehouse “a relationship
between two sorts of things: signs and the kinds of things they intend, express, or signify".
Simply put, when we say something has meaning, we mean it has some significance and value
to it.
More specially, meaning appears to be a mental event, a cognitive and emotional phenomenon.
By ‘life’ we mean each individual's life. Your life. Not the life of the entire human
species.
Next, is ‘meaning’ something real? Does meaning exist in the world like, say most
people assume tables and chairs exist? Or, because meaning appears to be a mental event,
is it not real, and thus the question ‘what is the meaning of life?’, is a pseudo-question
or fake question?
Well, this starts to get into the subbranch of philosophy called ontology which has to
do with what exists and what is real in the world.
According to physicalist emergent theories of ontology, meaning, being a combination
of thought and feeling, exists and is real.
Physicalism is the most common metaphysical theory about reality that states what is real
is simply nature and the laws of nature, one unifying substance. There’s an objective
reality we all share and nothing exists in it beyond the physical.
And emergence, specifically weak emergence, is what occurs when we observe something that
seems to have properties its parts do not have on their own.
A hurricane appears as a thing unto itself, but upon further analysis, it is really just
water, wind, and temperature interacting with one another. We can say a hurricane is an
emergent phenomenon.
The phenomenon of feeling something is meaningful is just as real as the neurons that make up
that combination of thought and feeling, and the neurons are as real as the cells that
make up the neurons, and the atoms that make up the cells.
Meaning is just as real as anxiety, love, jealousy, and other mental events.
It’s important to note that our wedding ring, for example, is not meaning or meaningful
in itself. Rings or diamonds in themselves aren’t meaningful. It's the feeling of significance
and value, the story we tell ourselves and the feeling we get from seeing or putting
it on.
This means that our life as a whole or parts of life can potentially give us this feeling
of meaning or significance.
Is it possible that there are people out there that feel no meaning throughout their life?
Perhaps, such as individuals that can’t form concepts of the past and present like
infants or those with severe depression.
But our best theories of how the brain works suggest almost all humans are wired to feel
meaning regardless if they want to or not, similar to how we experience fear, anxiety,
sadness, and other feelings.
Even an individual who tries to live a nihilist’s life, and believes there’s no meaning in
life, feels some meaning from attempting to do this.
So I think the question ‘what is the meaning of life’ could perhaps be better framed,
perhaps ‘what is it that gives our lives as individuals meaning?’ but the question
is worth trying to answer as meaning is a real thing and the question I think is answerable.
What’s the answer, then?
Answers to this question have been put forth by many different thinkers across many different
cultures through the centuries.
The meaning of life could be trying to live as close to a God as possible, such as those
who believe in Christianity or another religion.
The meaning of life could be becoming your own unique, individual person as existential
philosophers such as Nietzche wrote about.
Those who argue for a main, overarching meaning or significance of life say that there’s
an objective truth that gives all our lives significance above everything else.
For the most meaning in life or perhaps only meaning in life, one ought to obtain this
objective truth.
This philosophical view on meaning is referred to as objective naturalism by the philosopher
Thaddeus Metz. It states some things are meaningful in themselves or convey a sense of meaning
for everyone objectively when obtained. For example, living a moral life or morality may
be objectively meaningful in itself. If we live a moral life, all of us will obtain a
sense of meaning and significance in life no matter what.
This view differs from subjective naturalism, which states there is no objective source
of meaning for everyone. Meaning is an individual phenomenon that each of us determines subjectively.
Could objective naturalist meaning exist? Is there something that gives an overarching
meaning to life or things out there that give us all meaning no matter what when we obtain
them? Well, possibly, but right now, I don’t see any rational arguments for those things.
There are things like, say, love and relationshisp that are significant to many, many people,
but not one thing that’s meaningful no matter what to everyone. Nor some sort of main overarching
meaning and significance to life.
Again, something like ‘becoming who you are’, or ‘you must live for God’ can
be thought of as very meaningful things and even overarching meanings to life for some,
but perhaps not to others. There doesn’t appear to be some sort of objective truth
to meaning woven into the fabric of the universe.
It appears many different things can give our lives meaning, and they may be meaningful
to us but perhaps not to other people.
For instance, meaning may come from getting married, praying to a God, winning a sports
game, choosing your own career, and more. These things may be meaningful to you, but
not necessarily to everyone else.
What is the meaning of life, then? The answer is there are many answers. Different things
can give different people a feeling of meaning and significance.
Now, if this is the best answer to the question of what is the meaning of life, it think it
opens up the door to even more significant and meaningful questions. For instance, are
there some things that give lives more meaning than others. If so, should we ought to try
to obtain those things and help others?
What is it or what combinations of things that makes life the most meaningful or makes
life go best for the greatest number of individuals as possible?
I’ll be exploring these questions more in later videos if you want. But, hopefully this
take on the meaning of life was interested and meaningful to you. Let me know what you
think of anything covered here and what you think about the question what is the meaning
of life.