The apparent absurdity of life

[DrZoidberg]

I hear this thrown around quite a bit through circles of studious people. They spend their lives curious and then eventually conclude that the world and their lives are absurd. I don't buy it anymore.

To start off with the definition of absurd is to be 'wildly irrational'. This isn't only a subjective (and so arbitrary) interpretation of life and the universe, but I'd also go further to argue that life is and works exactly as it should.

And there's the second point. We're a thing called 'life' that's evolved as a part of the universe in which we exist and are a part of. The question then isn't so much 'what's the point'.. it's 'why should there be a point?'. We're a part of the universe that experiences it's transient existence, then we die.

Where people get tripped up, I think, is that they think existence should have some kind of objective purpose, when it clearly doesn't, and shouldn't have to. So because there's no non-transient meaning life must be absurd, the only way people can rationalize the meaningless of it all.

These days I like to think of it instead as a moment of experience, just something that's happening to us.*

*Might have something to do with my sense of self problems

Totally agree. When I realized this is when life started IMHO. I was free to do what I wanted. To define life as I saw fit.

I try to see life as nothing but a piece of black humor with an unclear punchline.

 

[PyramidHead]

I hear this thrown around quite a bit through circles of studious people. They spend their lives curious and then eventually conclude that the world and their lives are absurd. I don't buy it anymore.

To start off with the definition of absurd is to be 'wildly irrational'. This isn't only a subjective (and so arbitrary) interpretation of life and the universe, but I'd also go further to argue that life is and works exactly as it should.

And there's the second point. We're a thing called 'life' that's evolved as a part of the universe in which we exist and are a part of. The question then isn't so much 'what's the point'.. it's 'why should there be a point?'. We're a part of the universe that experiences it's transient existence, then we die.

Where people get tripped up, I think, is that they think existence should have some kind of objective purpose, when it clearly doesn't, and shouldn't have to. So because there's no non-transient meaning life must be absurd, the only way people can rationalize the meaningless of it all.

These days I like to think of it instead as a moment of experience, just something that's happening to us.*

*Might have something to do with my sense of self problems

Totally agree. When I realized this is when life started IMHO. I was free to do what I wanted. To define life as I saw fit.

I try to see life as nothing but a piece of black humor with an unclear punchline.

Is that not an acknowledgement of its absurdity, in a way?

 

[DrZoidberg]

Its a game. Is that absurd?

It is? How do you win? Or lose? If it's a game this would be a factor, wouldn't it?

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Totally agree. When I realized this is when life started IMHO. I was free to do what I wanted. To define life as I saw fit.

I try to see life as nothing but a piece of black humor with an unclear punchline.

Is that not an acknowledgement of its absurdity, in a way?

Yes. Which is why I write that I agree with the OP

 

[braces_for_impact]

The "absurdity of life" is something contemplated by those who have nothing better to do, which is the majority of people today.

Consider the human as an animal. Except for the few who find themselves in a war or a famine, life is not all that difficult. As a species, we have overcome most of the challenges of survival. There was a time when going out to find lunch included the real possibility of being lunch for some other animal. These days, when a human is killed by an animal, it's treated as a freak accident, not the natural course of nature.

This leaves us a lot of time to think, and that's the real problem. Since we have evolved our higher order of logic, which allows us to turn the universe into an endless list of "what if?" and "why not?" queries, we also somehow decided there are answers to these kinds of questions.

I was actually thinking of something similar to this. When your goal is day to day survival, it doesn't seem so absurd. Tragic perhaps, but not absurd.

 

[iolo]

Does anyone else think the survival of the species might matter? I think that was why I was brought up to a purpose that made sense, the thinking being that democratic socialism might prevent the looming, and otherwise inevitable, destruction of humanity.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Does anyone else think the survival of the species might matter? I think that was why I was brought up to a purpose that made sense, the thinking being that democratic socialism might prevent the looming, and otherwise inevitable, destruction of humanity.

Because of our instinct to survive we survive. But it isn't the meaning of life. The purpose of a car is to drive people around. But the car itself and the various components of the car couldn't care less.

It's Hume's is/ought problem.

 

[GenesisNemesis]

Does anyone else think the survival of the species might matter? I think that was why I was brought up to a purpose that made sense, the thinking being that democratic socialism might prevent the looming, and otherwise inevitable, destruction of humanity.

No. The Universe is entirely indifferent to us. It doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

 

[rousseau]

It is? How do you win? Or lose? If it's a game this would be a factor, wouldn't it?

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Totally agree. When I realized this is when life started IMHO. I was free to do what I wanted. To define life as I saw fit.

I try to see life as nothing but a piece of black humor with an unclear punchline.

Is that not an acknowledgement of its absurdity, in a way?

Yes. Which is why I write that I agree with the OP

I argued from the viewpoint that the world isn't absurd. Our definitions are different but we seem to agree that the world is basically without purpose, and is what it is.

I like what you mentioned about how it was freeing for you. I completely agree. The last few years of my life have opened my eyes to the fact that the only real standards I need to live by are my own, outside of the constraints of social/biological reality.

 

[iolo]

Does anyone else think the survival of the species might matter? I think that was why I was brought up to a purpose that made sense, the thinking being that democratic socialism might prevent the looming, and otherwise inevitable, destruction of humanity.

No. The Universe is entirely indifferent to us. It doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

To hell with the Universe - I was asking if we matter to ourselves as a species.

 

[DrZoidberg]

No. The Universe is entirely indifferent to us. It doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

To hell with the Universe - I was asking if we matter to ourselves as a species.

I don't think the question makes sense. Who is "we"? To whom is the care directed? Who is caring? What is it caring about? How is it caring? Are their more than one way to care?

 

[iolo]

To hell with the Universe - I was asking if we matter to ourselves as a species.

I don't think the question makes sense. Who is "we"? To whom is the care directed? Who is caring? What is it caring about? How is it caring? Are their more than one way to care?

Well, I'm always a bit baffled when I'm told only the individual (a 'bundle of sensations' with no coherence from where I'm standing) is all that matters. I wondered if the species might have any importance, since we are currently ensuring its destruction.

 

[PyramidHead]

I don't think the question makes sense. Who is "we"? To whom is the care directed? Who is caring? What is it caring about? How is it caring? Are their more than one way to care?

Well, I'm always a bit baffled when I'm told only the individual (a 'bundle of sensations' with no coherence from where I'm standing) is all that matters. I wondered if the species might have any importance, since we are currently ensuring its destruction.

Morally speaking, no. This is why efforts to conserve endangered animal species are entirely done for the benefit of species other than the one being conserved (usually homo sapiens). If the last panda dies in captivity after enjoying a languid, stress-free life, there is no accompanying harm from its death due to the species going extinct--no harm to the pandas, anyway. Humans will have to learn to cope without cute panda videos on their phones.

 

[4321lynx]

Well, I'm always a bit baffled when I'm told only the individual (a 'bundle of sensations' with no coherence from where I'm standing) is all that matters. I wondered if the species might have any importance, since we are currently ensuring its destruction.

Morally speaking, no. This is why efforts to conserve endangered animal species are entirely done for the benefit of species other than the one being conserved (usually homo sapiens). If the last panda dies in captivity after enjoying a languid, stress-free life, there is no accompanying harm from its death due to the species going extinct--no harm to the pandas, anyway. Humans will have to learn to cope without cute panda videos on their phones.

The death of the panda species might possibly benefit some kinds of bamboo species, somewhere. The extinction of the human species would certainly benefit many other species all over this planet. Just look at the wildlife at, and around, Chernobyl.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/...byl-wildlife-thirty-year-anniversary-science/

Of course the long-term effects of the radiation (after many more generations) might show themselves to be be disastrous.

 

[PyramidHead]

Morally speaking, no. This is why efforts to conserve endangered animal species are entirely done for the benefit of species other than the one being conserved (usually homo sapiens). If the last panda dies in captivity after enjoying a languid, stress-free life, there is no accompanying harm from its death due to the species going extinct--no harm to the pandas, anyway. Humans will have to learn to cope without cute panda videos on their phones.

The death of the panda species might possibly benefit some kinds of bamboo species, somewhere. The extinction of the human species would certainly benefit many other species all over this planet. Just look at the wildlife at, and around, Chernobyl.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/...byl-wildlife-thirty-year-anniversary-science/

Of course the long-term effects of the radiation (after many more generations) might show themselves to be be disastrous.

The extinction of the human species would also prevent all of the suffering that would have been experienced by the generations of humans that would have existed. They presumably wouldn't care much about not being born, so I'd call that a win-win. Not that I'm in favor of causing humans to go extinct against the will of the people who are currently alive, because obviously they have a say in the matter. Yet, if we suddenly became an infertile species, the last remaining elderly would have a rough time but otherwise it would avert a massive amount of future suffering.

 

[DBT]

Good management would be a better option. A fairer system with a much lower population figure...

 

[untermensche]

I don't think the question makes sense. Who is "we"? To whom is the care directed? Who is caring? What is it caring about? How is it caring? Are their more than one way to care?

Well, I'm always a bit baffled when I'm told only the individual (a 'bundle of sensations' with no coherence from where I'm standing) is all that matters. I wondered if the species might have any importance, since we are currently ensuring its destruction.

If the species is worth saving that is saying the individual life is worth living.

And this therefore directs our actions to make the world such that life is most worth living.

It is the optimistic option.

The option we are free to take.

 

[GenesisNemesis]

Another note, the only reason we view life as "absurd" is because we expect it to conform to our endless desires, and it doesn't. I don't see a reason why we should expect it to. Longing for what you don't have obviously isn't going to do anything to make life easier.

 

[DrZoidberg]

I don't think the question makes sense. Who is "we"? To whom is the care directed? Who is caring? What is it caring about? How is it caring? Are their more than one way to care?

Well, I'm always a bit baffled when I'm told only the individual (a 'bundle of sensations' with no coherence from where I'm standing) is all that matters. I wondered if the species might have any importance, since we are currently ensuring its destruction.

But we're not ensuring it's destruction. "We" are a bundle of genes. If we see the mechanic of evolution is to spread genes... well.. Everything on the Eukaryotic branch is very closely related. Homo Sapiens may go instinct. But I have a hard time believing that everything, humans is closely related to will go tits up.

I see all life on the entire Earth as being one super organism.

 

[iolo]

Well, I'm always a bit baffled when I'm told only the individual (a 'bundle of sensations' with no coherence from where I'm standing) is all that matters. I wondered if the species might have any importance, since we are currently ensuring its destruction.

But we're not ensuring it's destruction. "We" are a bundle of genes. If we see the mechanic of evolution is to spread genes... well.. Everything on the Eukaryotic branch is very closely related. Homo Sapiens may go instinct. But I have a hard time believing that everything, humans is closely related to will go tits up.

I see all life on the entire Earth as being one super organism.

Well, most life on it won't be able to stand the coming heat, so I suppose it might as well leave the kitchen!

 

[Speakpigeon]

Another note, the only reason we view life as "absurd" is because we expect it to conform to our endless desires, and it doesn't. I don't see a reason why we should expect it to. Longing for what you don't have obviously isn't going to do anything to make life easier.

Our endless desires, which are not so endless in fact, are largely hard-wired and many people get to a point in their lives where there's a mismatch between expectations and outcomes. So, in this sense, life sets us up to find life absurd. It's difficult not to attribute meaning to what people say even though I know they often don't really mean what they say. Yet, what matters here is that even this false meaning I can use it to think new thoughts which might get useful to me. It's not over till it's over.
EB