What is the Point of Life? 26 March, 2010Posted by paralleldivergence in afterlife, astronomy, Earth, God, heaven, hell, Life, Religion.
Tags: atheism, Life, philosophy, Religion
Today I received a personal invitation from Aim for Awesome to share my thoughts on “The Point of Life”. Vern said it could be “two sentences, or two pages – up to you”. Anybody who could so profoudly sum up the answer to this question in two sentences is a better person than me. To me, it’s a question that demands respectful consideration.
Before anyone can work out the point of life for themselves, they must work out their own ground rules. Most choose to simply accept someone else’s ground rules by blindly following the indoctrination of their parents and their religious community and believe in an illogical, invisible and impossible entity which demands of its followers, kooky rituals that confusingly vary widely between multiple different religions that seemingly follow that very same entity – all in the same selfish goal of securing passage after bodily death into an unknown paradise forever more, instead of being sucked into an equally unknown eternal paradisean-antithesis that they morbidly fear. Blind Faith demands obedience.
Now when you put it that way, it makes you think more seriously about the real point of life. Firstly, I share two beliefs with the majority of the inhabitants of Planet Earth. We are born, and we die. Everything else is debatable.
When you unravel and expose religion, I simply cannot accept that GREED and FEAR would be the two key motivators of Mankind.
Why was I born and get to live in a country where the average lifespan is about 74 years while other humans are born in and must live in countries that have average lifespans of a mere 30 years?
Why do I and my children have easy access to health care, education, fresh food and clean water, while there are children and babies suffering unimaginable pain from the day they enter this world until they succumb to childhood mortality?
A God that loves us all would not allow this, but blind faith makes you dismiss any questionable event or situation as part of “God’s Plan”, which is conveniently beyond our comprehension.
Within the timeline of the universe and the existence of this world, the reign of mankind is almost an unregisterable blip. But human history has shown evidence of massive progress by the Earth’s most dominant species, all in the name of humanity.
As one of six billion humans, living on an insignificant rock careering around one star out of an almost infinite number, who was fortunate enough to have been born in a developed country at the junction of the Industrial and Technological Eras, I have my chance to make a tiny difference before I disappear forever.
What kind of difference? Who knows. Improving the living conditions for one less-privileged human; working to benefit your local community; inventing a breakthrough solution to a known or unknown problem; generating a larger than required income which is then shared with the poor or less-fortunate; educating the masses either directly or indirectly. In other words, making YOUR mark in human history – leaving a legacy for the species and for our current home, Earth.
An ant is born and dies. A cat is born and dies. A shark is born and dies. What is their Point of Life? A human is born and dies. The difference is, many of us have an ability to make a difference, but we individually choose not to. Imagine how it could be if they all did make a difference.
That’s my Point of Life. What’s yours?