Purpose of life
 

I am in a psychological/philosiphic mood...

so, what is the purpose of life.

Strictly:

life -> nothing that is dead or 'not living'
purpose -> goal

I would say:

the purpose of life is to survive, by surviving danger, by breeding species (to enlarge chance of survival of the species).

You could also say:

purpose of life is to die

in this case you just state something ala matrix:

every beginning has an end

which is doubtfull, because 'beginning' and 'end' are made up words by humans. Related to time which is to be discussed, some theories out there state there is no time while some think there is time. And in several 'types', like psychological time experience, absolute time, etc.

I am not a guru at this, but i find it interesting to discuss about.

Re: Purpose of life
 

Interresting with the philosiphic touch here. I have no idea of what I am talking about, I find it very interresting though.

The purpose of live for most simpler beings is simply to ensure the survival of their specie. That is ensured by getting as many kids as possible and by ensuring that they survive.

I believe in that life give you the chance to change, or at least try to change, things and people in this world.

From a christian side of view we are placed here as Gods hands on eath. We are here to follow the christian way of living and get others to do the same. We want to use our life for whatever God want to.

Re: Purpose of life
 

I don't want to turn this topic into a religion discussion, but i'd say that everything that is written , is not by 'hand of god' but 'hand of man interpreted by 'God''. I don't believe in God or some sort of higher power in that sense. I do believe there are things that are far beyong regocnition.. lol, FUBAR :)

Something i find interesting is the following:
When ALL things in life (that means EVERYTHING) have a 'set of rules' to 'behave', then in theory this means that all things that happen now are all 'logically' (read, followed by rules) going. If this is true, this could mean that "life" could be the same all over again...

Okay, about purpose. I simply don't know. I just do what i do, but i do because i have to do ... erm, because other people set up this world for me to live in and i have to live according to these rules. I don't know what my PURPOSE is, i do know what people EXPECT

Re: Purpose of life
 

That's basically quite my opinion too.

Not at the expense of the resources that make them live. Getting as many kids as possible is pointless if to survive they burn out all the resources that their descendants would need to survive themselves.

This is where political action, action towards the common wealth, kicks in.

Political action is about proposing a model of living for society that will ensure the preservation of the species.

Communists tried to propose such a model. They believed hard in it and fought hard for it. Unfortunately in Russia, if it worked at the start some time later it degenerated into a dictatorship.
Nazis too tried to propose a model. Unfortunately for them this one was rotten from the start and doomed to failure - which is lucky for us. I wouldn't fancy living in the world where a small fraction of the population lives at the expense of all the rest.
The anarchists model for society has not been tried yet but not many people believe it can succeed. I don't too; I don't believe anarchism is viable, today. People are just too selfish and uneducated - hence uninterested for that.
We're just starting to see the results of the capitalist/trading model being experienced nowadays. It granted a severe boost to mankind on the power man has over his environment. But it also creates ever-widening iniquity and inequalities all over the world. This model forgets that where there is increase somewhere, there has to be decrease elsewhere.
The society model that will save mankind is yet to be found :)

I find it noble, though, people who believe in ideas for the common good, and fight for them. This is the main difference that separates us from the rest of the animals.

And this is also, IMO, the purpose of life.


One book to read:
Man's Fate
by Andre Malraux
(suggest yours, too ;))

Re: Purpose of life
 

*edit*

dude, from the instant where you were born, you are dying already. :)

*edit 2*
shit, double-posting :|

Re: Purpose of life
 

Well my opinion is small on this topic.

The meaning of life is unknown.
The meaning of all living creatures on this planet is to reproduce.

But why that very first something started to live ...?
Probably trigered by competition.
or that other theory about chemicals and lightning.
But right after that come competition.

In short ... me me me me me.
kill the other for food. Eat him or take his food(ofspring).

===========
/* edit */
I don't agree.
This goes for all living things.
No matter race, species or religion

Re: Purpose of life
 

depends how you look at it. Biologically you are growing until around 20/21 years old and then you will slowly 'break down'... so i would say at that age you are are dying... in some way.

Re: Purpose of life
 

your skin cells are dying everyday :D

Re: Purpose of life
 

Seastars don't grow old.
In that way not everything starts dying from birth.
Seastars only die by being eaten or diseace.

Re: Purpose of life
 

funny, determine 'old' ;) As where we come to the 'experience of time'. I find it interesting that scientists state that 'in the beginning' there was 'no time'... So,how did something get 'started' when there is 'no time'? :)

Re: Purpose of life
 

nitpicking, eh ? ;)

*edit*
oops, that was directed to the posts above Stefan's

@Stefan: you mean, how did things emerged out of void ?

Time is just a dimension, like distances. The 4 dimensions belong to the continuum we all know. In this regard you cannot separate them and ask something such as e.g how did time emerge from void ; since this question would be irrelevant or at least very incomplete because hiding the fact that not only time emerged from the void.

The key is to define void. It can sound stupid but have you ever wondered whether the absolute void, nothing, rien, nada, existed intrinsically at all ? Back in time, the air was believed as void. Later on, the space - between planets - was believed to be the void. Now, it's what was beyond the big bang. I dunno what to think.

What is certain though, is that the big bang created only antagonisms. Matter existed because of anti-matter, and energy because of what astrophysicians call "black energy". Time is nevertheless, like all dimensions, a distance that can be walked back and forth.

Let's not forget we can comprehend only 4 dimensions in the Universe, and practically represent ourselves only 3 of them at a time. What is above and beyond is subject to the craziest speculations. We're allowed to dream on!

Re: Purpose of life
 

Well yea if one wants to find the reason.
All non consistent factors need to be excluded. :D

Re: Purpose of life
 

nitpicking, me? It is at the end things you have to count in :D

So , nobody can answer my question. When did 'this' started. There is no beginning, so there is no end? :D

Re: Purpose of life
 

'time' is something humans created...
so before we invented 'time' there was 'no time'

Re: Purpose of life
 

^ my reply is in fact 3 posts above...

Re: Purpose of life
 

Not nessecarly we ppl like to think there is a begin and an end.

Maybe there are somethings that just ARE.
no begin no end.
This void PM speaks of sounds more as an "entity"
what could be totaly void (i call it void now but void is what we ppl think is void there for not nothing) is what's not in void ("entity").

Re: Purpose of life
 

Thinking about void, nothing, inexistence alone is enough to turn your brain into scrambled eggs... if you take the metaphysical point of view, then "nothing" doesn't exist at all. It's just a word we invented in order to have an opposite concept for "something", for "existence" or whatever you want. We couldn't speak of light if darkness didn't exist as well. We cannot grasp anything in an absolute way, I think. All we can do is compare, contrast, categorise... we see everything in relation to something else. Everything comes in pairs (or in more complex patterns) and only makes sense that way (to us, at least). The funny thing when talking about existence is that in this case the counterpart, which is essential for us to be able to talk about existence, does not exist. o_O
And the purpose of life, phew... the first replies given here aimed at some species or another, but I don't know if you can separate them from the rest. At a first glance, the purpose of the life of a duck may be to keep the duck population at at least the same level, ensuring the species' survival. But what the heck are ducks doing here, anyway? (Not that I bear any grudge against ducks, don't worry...) What's the purpose - not of the life of one or another species, but of life itself?
I think that whatever it may be, we'll probably not be able to conceive it anyway. When we are giving our individual lives a purpose, we do what we always do - we compare and see things in a relative way. We know behaviours we don't want to adopt, we see different ways of living and acting in relation with each other, and we judge and decide Whenever we see something we judge as "good", we have an opposite concept of something "bad" or "evil" in mind. As soon as one of these poles is eliminated, both are unthinkable for us. And what if the purpose of life is something absolute, something that doesn't have an opposite concept? I guess we wouldn't be able to grasp it, it would be beyond our reach.
----------------------
Another approach is this one:
The meaning of life is 42
(Recommended book: Hitchhiker's Guide Through the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (R.I.P.) :D

Re: Purpose of life
 

for human: to love

Re: Purpose of life
 

define "love" ?

love somebody in particular ? self ? other NOT self ? other AND self ?
love everybody in general, christian-style ?

if you mean love everybody in general, it goes in the same direction as the search for the common good - which is aetymologically, and also in the philosophical sense of the term, a political action. :)

For myself I love myself. That's a good start :D

Re: Purpose of life
 

Right. U R half way. :)
shortest def. I can comeup with:
love = God
found the def.:
http://software77.com/onlinebibles/f...rby/46_013.htm :)

Re: Purpose of life
 

Love = god? Ouch that is one of the many definitions. So what is God then?

Anyway, this is just like saying:

Apple=Peer=Fruitgrape

About void, its something we created? I am not sure. But i do believe that we are currently only discussing things we are aware of. I can imagine we don't see a total other world (5th, 6th, 7th dimension?) that is also going on right now in my room and everywhere else. Perhaps 'death' and such can be called a dimension. I've even read a 'black hole' is the 20th dimension.. wtf?

I begin to wonder if we humans are merely just recievers, something like PM said about a TV antenne. We are all 'tuned' at the same golf-length (dimension) and thus we all 'see' the same , hear the same, 'think' the same in some level. Some people that are 'weird' perhaps recieve more or from other layers (dimensions) then the common human does. The question is, what is a dimension in this sense? I'd say:

a dimension is something we can 'recieve' , 'interpet' and 'react uppon'. (imagine).

Like, time, i can try to anticipate on the unknown future, and i can learn from past mistakes. The fact that i remember makes me aware of time in some sense.

Re: Purpose of life
 

if Love = God then obviously God = Love. So U have your answer.

Re: Purpose of life
 

If love and god are equal then one is redundant...

Well the option of more dimensions is something to consider.
But no need to think about more dimensions if there is no knowledge about our current dimensions seperatly.
Like PM said we can represent our selfs only in 3 dimension.
Well i think its 4 but the time dimension is only temporary. well is it ??
Guess not we constantly represent our selfs in the time dimension.

But it more puzzeling if one could represent him self in only 1 or 2 dimensions. To me that would seem impossible.

Re: Purpose of life
 

If both are equal there is one ;)

Re: Purpose of life
 

So , in your theory i could say:

I God the world.
I God writing bots.

which is not correct btw ;) Seek up 'God' in the dictionary and you'll see that it won't fit :)

Re: Purpose of life
 

Wrong def. of love here, thats why these sentences don't make sense.

Re: Purpose of life
 

:D somehow I love this humour or whatever it is :D

@Stefan: I don't agree with your definition of "dimension". I think it is incorrect for there are much more things than a "dimension" which you can receive, interpret, and react upon. A dimension, strictly speaking, is the whole range of coordinates in which you pick an number in order to help you pinpoint an occurence (event, point in space, entity) on a certain referential. For example, ! - Let's consider the instant where I pressed this exclamation point. I can characterize this event as a point in a 4 dimension referential: x, y, z, t. The latitude, longitude, altitude and time relatively to the center of the Universe and the beginning of Time where in my life, a balance of forces located at a certain point under my finger triggered the "!" key. These are the 4 dimensions I need to characterize this event in its uniquety. If I miss the t component, I can't pinpoint this event among all the ! keypresses I will make in my whole life (provided my computer doesn't move). If I miss the z component, I can't tell how high I was located when I pressed this key (was it in a particular floor of a building where all the floors would be identical ?). If I miss the x or y component, I miss the exact location of my computer. It may slide 10cm left or forward on the table, or 400km further - well, assuming the origin of the Universe is the center of planet Earth, but as usuals with maths I'm free to choose my own referential. :P

Imagine the Universe would be a fixed point. That would be an universe with 0 dimension. Everything that would fit in this universe would need 0 dimension to be described accurately. Why can we comprehend and represent a point in its entirety ? Because we live, our plane of existence happens, among 4 dimensions. 4 > 0. On the contrary, an inhabitant of the "point" universe would not be able to represent his own world.

Now imagine the Universe would be a line. That would be an universe with 1 dimension. You only need 1 dimension (that's to say, "x"), to locate a point in this universe. Why can we represent ourselves a line in its entirety ? Because our plane of existence happens in a space with a greater number of dimensions (4 > 1). This "overview" allow us, for example, to tell that a point, which is a space with 0 dimension, is the intersection of two lines, which are spaces with 1 dimension. And how did we figure out that ? Because we moved two of these lines in a plane, which is a space with 2 dimensions.

Now imagine the Universe would be a plane. That would be an universe with 2 dimensions. Because you only need 2 dimensions (x and y) to represent accurately a point in such a space. And how come we can represent it accurately anyway ? Because we live in an universe which has a greater number of dimensions (4 > 2). And this allows us, for example, to tell that a plane (x and y, like a sheet of paper), is the intersection of two volumes (like spheres, or like bubbles of soap glued together : in the middle they make a visible plane). How did we figure out that ? Because we moved these volumes (3 dimensions) in space until they met together. And we saw their intersection makes a plane: 2 dimensions. We can still represent this in our mind, even if it becomes more and more tricky as we're adding dimensions.

Now imagine the Universe would be some sort of big sphere, with a center somewhere, and planets and galaxies inside (this is how many people still represent themselves our Universe, even nowadays). That is a space with 3 dimensions. We can make a mental picture of such an Universe ; how come ? you'll say, because that's the Universe where we're living, right ? How come we can manage to represent it ? Wait: NO - this is NOT the Universe you're living in. Not anymore. It is the Universe you were living in at time T. But at time T plus one second, things happened in the world already, and that's simply not the same Universe anymore. It's trickier to represent ourselves a 3D thing in our mind, such as a volume. Even, some people cannot "think in space". Most of us can, though. Why can we ? We can represent ourselves a 3 dimensions universe, because we live through a 4th one: time. At time T, you were inside the Universe you're now trying to represent, hence unable to represent it yet. At time T+1, you moved outside of it so that you could "see" it, in your mind, and from that instant you have been able to represent it like it was. You moved forth on the time plane. You couldn't help it anyway, that's the way we live. Now, try to represent yourself what a 3 dimension space is the intersection of ? Haha, here it becomes tricky. But still, 4 > 3 so we should manage to figure it out. Think about a sphere. A sphere is a 3D thing. Now take this sphere, and make it move smoothly around in your mind. That is a sphere moving with time. That is a space with 4 dimensions (3+1). We added one dimension to that 3D thingy, much like we added the width dimension to the length dimension of a single line to get a plane. With this sphere moving around, you have now a space with 4 dimensions. Don't lose it. Take another sphere, and make it move around in your mind too. You see them ? Now make them meet together and "cross" each other. What happens when they're confused with each other ? When they're confused with each other we're at time T, we must stop the time so that this event lasts, and we see one sphere. We get one fixed sphere out of 2 spheres moving. We got a 3 dimension space at the intersection of two 4 dimension spaces. :)

Now one pack of beer to the guy who tells me what a 4 dimension space (our Universe), is the intersection of. :D

We can't, and why can't we ? Because that's the Universe we're living in, and that's all that we know of it, these 4 dimensions. We can't represent it completely in our mind, because we're unable to reach the next dimension in order to look behind us and have an overview of it all. It is possible, to represent the universe, but only at a time T, like a "screenshot", but can you represent the whole Universe with its 4 dimensions, entirely, including the way it was back in the limbos of Time and the way it will be in thousand of billions years ? That's impossible. We know 4 dimensions in our Universe, and we're able to represent ourselves only 3. All that's beyond, we can't do much but calling it "void".

So yes, in a sense, void is something man invented. But to invent it was the only thing he could do about it :D

---
*edit*
lad, when you take a photograph, don't you represent the world in 2 dimensions ? :)

Re: Purpose of life
 

I believe we each make our own purpose in life!
I have made it my purpose to leave as many marks on this world as I can, so I will not be forgotten. Anyone who does not leave any kind of mark on this world (good or bad, but that's a whole other discussion) is forgotten very quickly, making their life "without" purpose. This stance on life probably has much to do with the fact that I'm an artist. Yes, a pretty general term (artist), but I see myself as artistic in many fields.
This is a very highly opinionated topic and I've enjoyed reading all of your posts! especially the bible beater!

God = Fear!
I Fear the world.
I Fear writing bots.
LOL

Re: Purpose of life
 

this is really deep stuff, especially from PMB ???:( - i'll admit i skimmed your post. but i think the gist of it is that human science is too limited to explain everything, we can only make theories from assumptions and look for evidence to prove it, until then we're left to wonder

my opinion of the purpose of life: there isn't one, existence doesn't need to explain itself to you

Re: Purpose of life
 

nice post pierre. I'll read it again when I'm not too tired and maybe try to answer something from a more mathematical side :P

Re: Purpose of life
 

I don't think the picture could exists or be viewed without time.

And even e picture has depth.
No surface is 100% flat as in 2 demensional.

We only like to think that sumting is 2d or without depth

Re: Purpose of life
 

i begin to wonder, dimensions are just 'tools' for us humans to understand the world we live in. Perhaps there are other ways we don't know off. Like this, we have a sense of the world, via the 5 senses we all hopefully have:

- eyes
- ears
- smell
- touch
- taste

you could say, we intercept (recieve) 'life' in 5 'ways'. (channels?). PM talks about 4 dimensions, and we can't take a picture of a whole, simply because T (time) is always 'moving and changing'. I think we humans can definatly picture 4 dimensions. Something like watching a video would even 'capture' 4 dimensions although you view it on a screen (which will likely change in the future where you can just walk into your own movie, being projected as if its happening right now).

Perhaps there are more dimension, but we are not aware of them. Like i said, you can say we have 4 dimensions, but assume there is a 5th called 'death' (or alive). You could say that at the 5th dimension we at this moment (we, being all in the same 'level of the 5th dimension') have to work with eachother. People who die, could 'gain' to the next (or previous) level of the 5th dimension, thus not meeting us (at this level of 5th dimension).

See it like:

X,Y,Z,T,D(level)

We are at (for example)..

X,Y,Z,T,D(2)

perhaps some people are at

X,Y,Z,T,D(1)

where D(1) also means that this 'level' can mean that the entire world , all material is in another 'stage'. Like you have - sub-universes. Who says there is only ONE universe? I also wonder how it is possible that some people do experience 'death' or 'previously bad things that happened'. They can feel it, so something must be 'left behind'. Or even more creepier, there is some 'connection' to this 'world' we cannot see...

I still believe we have more then 4 dimensions PM, dispite your very convincing explenation about the 4 dimensions.

Re: Purpose of life
 

I would say: today’s 4 dimensions is the way to describe world as we understand it today (wait for next dimensions to come ;) ). All the five senses you mentioned can be expressed in 4d system as well: at the given time you see, light gets to your eye and the electrical signal goes to your brain… and so on with other senses. All can be described very precisely. For the physical world this representation seems ok for today. …aren’t we off the subject?

Re: Purpose of life
 

and when you wreck the boss you save the princess and you see the end credits ? :D


</joke> ;)
Of course we have! Don't get me wrong. I did not say we only have 4 dimensions, I said we can only represent ourselves 3 of them and we only know 4 of them. But there are obviously way more! Because we don't know them doesn't mean they don't exist, and on the contrary the intersection model nD space = intersection of 2 n(D+1) spaces should confirm you that. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if there was an infinite number of them. :) And for sure, goes without saying, other Universes (which is in fact the same thing as other means to represent it). We know only 4 dimensions in our Universe, as if we knew of a road at night only what a lighting pole makes visible. If you land near another lighting pole, you'll recognize nothing of the road, but it'll still be the same road. If you were "projected" into other dimensions, you'd recognize nothing of our Universe, but there would nevertheless be the same matter, the same things, you would be talking to the same guys, you would be living the same life as now - the only thing is that you could simply not recognize it. Science progresses, and new theories are made, only when from a new lighting pole a scientist manages to recognize the same things he was viewing when he was near another lighting pole. That's exactly what Einstein did to find out the general Relativity: he dropped completely Euclidian geometry, and took the Riemann geometry instead (which states that a square angle is more than 90 degrees, that the sum of the angles in a triangle is more than 180 degrees, and that parallel lines do not exist). Look up for Riemann or Lobatchevski on google, you might find out what sort of weirdos these guys were and what they did :)

*edit*
I've found a little explanation
http://www.upscale.utoronto.ca/Gener.../Geometry.html
there may be better ones though
If you're not fond of math you can start reading at the middle of the page where it says: "In 1817 Carl Friedrich Gauss wrote: ....." The rest is very accessible.

*e 2*
oh and wea yeah, I think we've come quite offtopic too =)

Re: Purpose of life
 

the next chapter in my linear algebra lectures is about projective geometry and states that 2 circles on a plane have 4 intersection points, if not identitical. We only have 2, but the others are at infinity ... I'm really looking forward to it, since it's something you can imagine, at least a bit - maybe even something to contribute here. But for now I gotta go back to phi invariant subspaces, nilpotent matrices, so that's gonna be a hard night ...