Thursday, July 1, 2010

purpose of life



What if the purpose of life?
Before more is discussed, i think what needs to be pointed out is that the question
is not actually one. But is a set of three. Each connected and answered by the other
1) Where are we?
2) What are we?
3) Why are we?

The purpose of life is only a manifestation of the above three eternal-immortal queries. And the question can only be answered if only one could ever understand the answer of the three queries.

It’s a question that has been asked and answered and asked again, then answered again many times in history of our consciousness. Religions came to existence and exited. Philosophers pondered and proposed theories. Scientists have come to prominence in our age and they too have their reasons. Yet whatever be the time, for ages it has been the very hallmark of our consciousness. The ability to ask the very question.. Why? What is the purpose of this life?

What is the purpose? For each-his own, the question persists in the mind of each living human and he seeks to find the purpose of life, his life, in his works, his religion, and his philosophy and above all in his life.

Religions define the purpose of life essentially as worshipping the lord almighty and on the sidelines often suggest doing well to others as the purpose of life. They define the purpose of life to be thankful to the lord almighty for his very creation, i.e. us and this world around us. From Hinduism to Christianity to Jainism to whichever religion one may name, all of them nearly follow a similar path to redemption and meaning of the question.

Philosophers throughout ages have thought and pondered and have come up with philosophies ranging from absurdity at best (there is actually a philosophy called absurdism) to very intriguing and answering ones such as theories of existentialism , humanism and epistemology. These theories in their essence have been results of hard thinking by our greatest thinkers. And it isn’t hard to find many answers in them. Yet the biggest of the shortcoming of these theories is the fact that they still cannot answer the three eternal questions of What? Why? and Where?, All together simultaneously and satisfactorily.

This is the age of science. In the last 200 years which we have changed so much ( i wonder if we can call it a progress). And fields of science have developed at a rate unprecedented, Be it astronomy to biology or physics. All the branches of these developments in the core of their curiosity only seek to answer the very queries of what? Why? and where? And for the moment there has been no answer.

I think we don’t know for sure. No one can claim that he alone is correct and the other view
is incorrect.

If one understands and appreciates the view that us Humans are imperfect creatures. And Have our own biases and views, one can clearly understand that each one of us looks at our lives with a different point of view. To some life is merely living and to some it is seeking something through life something which is beyond life.

To sum it up, I think the answer is stares right in our face. To each-his own, life has its ownpurpose its own meaning. We humans and other life forms are life. We live, procreate and die. Us gifted humans unlike other life forms also have aspirations and our curiosity. And to seek out to those purposes and aspirations and curiosity is the purpose of our lives in spirit.

Thus although we may not be able to answer the question of where’s and whys and what’s of our lives, yet fulfilling our curiosity and aspirations and our feelings in essence remains something that we all aspire for. Thus it is our purpose. Life is living.

The question which was thus answered remains unanswered...

2 comments:

iago said...

Only I know the purpose of this essay :D

Gulfam said...

hey, it was coming out really well, but the last and second last paragraph defeated the whole purpose of it. We are here to serve our purpose? But isn't that the question that what is the purpose, if any at all?

You were right about the religion thing, whatever little knowledge I have about the Quran and Bible, may be you could have included the views of some of the philosophers like Darwin, Weinberg and Sartre as well, who worked a lot on answering it.