What is the actual point to life??

Really? What could it be? It's so depressing. I am employed on an on-call contract and today I wasn't needed at work so I am at home, applying for jobs. I've been lucky to have work full time since July so I haven't been sat at home all day applying for jobs, but today takes me back...

I'm sat here on the laptop, opening all the job vacancies in new tabs, thinking how depressing this is. What is the point to it all?
We're born, we go to school, we (might) go to college, we (might) go to University, we get a job to earn money to live. Is that it? We get a job to earn money just so we can survive and continue to live?

The world is such a horrible place. No-one can find a job, people are struggling to eat, people don't even eat for days or weeks, they don't have homes... Why would we want to carry on living? :s-smilie:

What's the point?

The optimist would say something like you should make the most out of life, or you get as much as you give... I don't really know, as I'm a pessimist.

But seriously, why are we here and what is the point to life? If indeed there is a point? Religious people will have something to say about god, but I'm Atheist so I don't believe in any of that stuff.

Don't know if it came across, but I was having a bit of a rant there. Thought this might be the best place to vent! Genuinely interested in other peoples' thoughts.

Reply 1

starkrush

There is no objective of meaning of life if you're an atheist, that much is pretty clear. What you can do, however, is create subjective meaning for yourself. If you personally don't have a reason to exist, give yourself one - aim to do the most for other people, try and accomplish a certain thing, and so on. You have absolutely nothing to lose because there's no meaning of life (objectively) so why not try to do things?

You can focus on what you really can and want to do, and do those. Then you can live the life you want to, irrespective of how futile your existence is in the grand scale of the world.

(I've blogged about these sorts of things before, if you're interested)

Spoiler

There isn't a point.

According to my Biology teacher, the point of life is to simply survive and reproduce, so your alleles will pass on to the next generation.

And that's it.

Reply 4

milkytea

What would a "meaning" to life even look like? I don't see the point in there being a specific meaning. I see, however, that this world is beautiful and complex and that there are millions of experiences and opportunities out there available to all of us. One of the foremost of those is the opportunity to interact with other humans, which is pretty ****ing cool.

Human life is one of the most valuable things in the universe, from my point of view. I'd much rather that the universe has humans in it than if it was just populated by asteroids or amoebas. We have culture, language, art, music, etc. It's all pretty good.

Don't get depressed by the fact that there may be no objective "meaning" to life. That doesn't mean that you can't attach value to things which exist in the world. I'd say that a search for a universal meaning is in the first place misguided.

Reply 5

Martyn*

There isn't one really. And if you are asking if there is one, then you have probably missed it. Life is to be lived.

Moral: never ask what the meaning of life is.

Reply 6

the mezzil

Something to do isn't it?

Reply 7

dragonrabbit

I'm afraid I Kant answer that for you. :smug:

Reply 8

Integer

Lol it sucks doesn't it

Reply 9

RoyalBlue7

I think there is NO purpose in attaching oneself onto something impermanent.
If you are an atheist just read about Buddhism, it can help you plus there are no God's in Buddhism.

No religious person ever says that. One advantage of religion. Read the Bible or the Koran again. If you haven't read it. Give it a shot, and see if it can solve your problems.

:colonhash:

Posted from Android app.

Reply 10

419

To quote Tyler Hawkins "Gandhi, said 'Whatever you do in life will be insignificant, but it's very important that you do it'. I tend to agree with the first bit"

Reply 11

RandZul'Zorander

I don't understand why people think there must be a 'point' or purpose to life or that it must be some objective thing. :confused:

Reply 12

Dragonfly07

I always say this and I'll say this again here.

There isn't any specific reason you're here. If you're thinking about death, then rather than killing yourself just do what you want to do - because you know soon you'll be dead anyway. Take risks and live life. Chances are you won't want to die by the end of it, because even though there's no purpose, life can be good as soon as you remove all the silly stresses from it like social status etc. After death there's nothing. In life you can do absolutely anything you want.

Reply 13

smithyinthehouse

We live to have fun with our friends and family..... WORK HARD PLAY HARD

Reply 14

username1044970

As others have said before me, there's simply no objective purpose to life. At first I also found this quite depressing, but gradually I've come to the realisation that actually, it's not that bad. In fact, it's VERY relieving in a sense. Think about it: nothing that you do, whether positive or negative, matters in the long-term. So instead of trying to please some hypothetical, all-powerful conscious being, or any being, I've shifted my focus towards the study of the natural world. As a student of science, my 'purpose' in life is to find out as much as I can about the physical world. Some may disagree with me, but I'm just a collection of atoms and molecules who like being in the configuration known as 'me'.

(edited 11 years ago)

Reply 15

snake0644

That's pretty clear that the meaning of life is the meaning of the whole universe where we are living. And we are too small to understand the whole universe.