Finding our own meaning in life is delusional

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If materialism, naturalism, and scientism are true, then you would be delusional to find meaning in your life (as stated by materialism, naturalism, and scientism which state that life is just a bunch of meaningless atoms and particles). There are things in science that do have objective meaning. For example, the fact that the Earth revolves around the sun is a scientific fact and you would, therefore, be delusional to think otherwise. Same thing with creating our own meanings in life since life really has no meaning in terms of science. You would, therefore, be delusional in finding your own personal meanings in life since life has no meaning. If you are going to say something here such as that this is a logical fallacy I am presenting here, then what I would have to say in return is that your own personal viewpoints in that people would not be delusional in creating their own meanings in life, this would also be a logical fallacy since finding your own personal meanings in life when life has no meaning is a contradiction. I don't even care if it's in our evolutionary design to find meaning in life in order to survive and benefit our survival. You would still be delusional in finding your own meanings in life anyway.

Now you might also be thinking that, since it is in our evolutionary design to find meaning in life in order to survive and benefit our survival, that to even perceive this as delusional would contradict our evolutionary design and would be a delusional viewpoint in of itself in terms of evolution as a result. But this would be false because the only way for it to contradict our evolutionary design is if we were to tell ourselves the message that "We are not designed by evolution to find meaning in our lives." That would be the only message that would contradict our evolutionary design. Telling ourselves that "We are delusional in finding meaning in our lives" does not contradict our evolutionary design.

To say that something IS when, in reality, it is not, would be delusional regardless of what you think otherwise. So any personal meanings you create in life are your brain's way of telling you that these meanings ARE. Even if you tell yourself something such as that these meanings you create are not objective (definite) meanings, the fact is, for you to view these personal meanings as true for yourself and for your personal life is your mind's way of telling you that these meanings are definite meanings which would be false since they are not. It would be saying that since even you as a person are a bunch of meaningless atoms and particles, that any personal meanings you create hold true for you which would be false because you would be saying that you and this life both have meaning while at the same time they both don't have meaning which is contradictory.

So for you to believe that any personal meaning you create in life holds true for you and holds true for your own personal life would be no different than saying that "I know that it's a scientific fact that the Earth revolves around the sun. But I don't have to believe that it holds true for me as a person nor that it holds true for me in my own personal life and that I can create any personal meaning I want and instead believe that meaning holds true for me and holds true for my own personal life. I can believe anything I want such as that the Earth is flat and is the center of the universe and that words don't have to mean what they mean or that scientific facts have to be what they are. I can say that the color blue is actually the color black, that hot is cold, etc. and this will hold true for me and my own personal life while in actual reality itself it doesn't hold true at all. And even if these personal meanings don't hold true at all for me and in my own personal life, I can still have them anyway in my life and live by them anyway."

So as you can see here, this would be nonsense since it is a scientific fact that life has no meaning and that we are also a bunch of meaningless atoms and particles. This is no different than the mindset of a religious person who has a delusional belief in a God and the supernatural. Therefore, it's not just religious people and delusional people who are the only ones delusional. Even atheists, highly intelligent people, and scientists themselves can be delusional here. Sure, you can still live by those personal meanings you have created in life despite knowing that they are not true since this universe does not tell us how we should think, but it would all still be nonsense anyway. I don't even care about the fact that if we didn't have any created personal meanings in life, that we would all be dead since we would all just be sitting there and not finding any reason to get up and eat, socialize, or do any other activities. We would all still be living nonsensical and delusional lives anyway for being human and living our personal lives and making the best of this life regardless of the fact that this is in our evolutionary design to do so and that this is how evolution designed us. It's only if this life had an objective meaning through there being a God and an afterlife of eternal joy would we find reason to live our lives and find that meaning in our lives.

Now if you are going to ask something such as that "To be is not to be? To be is not the way to be?" what I would have to say to that would be that there is no "way" in the first place since even that quoted word is a personal meaning.

Now if you are going to ask me something such as for me to define "meaning," what I would have to say to that would be that there is no meaning. It is just a bunch of atoms and particles and that is it. But this would only hold true for things besides scientific facts such as the Earth revolving around the sun and also the scientific fact that this life has no meaning.

Finally, even Stephen Hawking himself has stated that philosophy is dead and that science is all there is. The viewpoints that others have regarding that you can find your own personal meanings in life and that this would not be delusional, these are philosophical viewpoints which would actually be "dead" (false).

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@MozartLink,

Finally, I'm just going to throw one more thought of mine out here in case it is convincing and refutes all of philosophy and the beliefs about finding your own value in life not being delusional nonsense. To say that concepts such as value, worth, and beauty do exist in this universe, but are not things that are scientific and can't be defined by science and, therefore, you are free to live by them and not view them as being delusional since they are separate from this universe and are not a part of this meaningless universe and can't be defined by this meaningless universe, this would be false. These concepts are created by the meaningless atoms and particles in our brains that come up with these concepts in the first place (so these might be measurable concepts in the future through advanced neurological technology that can measure the amount of value, worth, and beauty in this person's mind by measuring the amount of activity of those atoms and particles that have created these concepts in this person's mind). Therefore, these concepts ARE the functioning of those atoms and particles that have created them in our brains and are, therefore, meaningless as well and to view them as being true for yourself and true for your personal life would be delusional nonsense.

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@MozartLink,

Just one more thing here and this will be it. How we come to the conclusion (the scientific fact) that this universe is meaningless is through scientific evidence. Therefore, you might be thinking that since there is also scientific evidence for created personal meanings being accomplished as something meaningful in life, in helping ourselves and others, doing great things in life, keeping us alive, etc. that this would somehow mean that these created meanings are not delusional nonsense. But this would be false. This entire universe and everything in it is all meaningless and the meaningless of all these things is what defines even our own personal created meanings in life.

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@MozartLink,

If you really believe nothing in life has meaning then I must ask, why are you creating and sharing these theories of yours with us in the first place? Are your meaningless theories REALLY that important to you?

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@mikeymojo,

The fact that I am finding meaning right now to post my theories is false and delusional as well. So why am I doing it? It would be because it is in our evolutionary design to find meaning in life anyway. But I am here just to let you know that this evolutionary design is false and delusional according to the scientific fact that states that this entire universe and everything in it is meaningless.

The scientific fact of this universe being meaningless tells us that our created meanings are false just like how the scientific fact of the Earth revolving around the sun tells us that we would be false to have created personal meanings that say things such as that the Earth is the center of the universe and that the sun revolves around the Earth instead.

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@MozartLink,

If nincompoopism, as a philosophical perspective, ever needed its representative -- it has found it...

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@MozartLink,

I am not sure if you are asking the question: Does life have meaning?

You may be.

You may also be informing us that life does not have meaning.

If the former...the answer is: I do not know...and I suspect you do not know either. There are reasonable scenarios where life has all sorts of meaning...and others where there is no meaning to it at all.

Choosing one or the other or some point in between...is nothing but blind guessing.

If the latter...I would have to ask you: How do you know life does not have meaning?

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Belief has always been more important to humans than allegations of fact. I believe i'll go make a meatloaf sammich.

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For the most part, "beliefs" essentially ARE allegations of facts.

I believe there is a GOD.

I believe there are no gods.

I believe there is a Heaven and Hell.

I believe each person has his/her own reality.

I believe each person who dies is reincarnated into another body.

I believe a person can have an out-of-body experience.

All of the above essentially ARE allegations of facts.

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@Frank Apisa,

I believe for ev'ry drop of rain that falls,
A flower grooooooooooooooooows.

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@MozartLink,

First off, I said before that any personal created meanings in life are delusional since life has no meaning. I would actually have to correct myself on that now that I have thought about it. This would just include meanings that do not go against science. So since it is a scientific fact that any personal meanings we create are no different than the combined functioning of the atoms and particles in our brains that create these meanings, then to actually say that our personal created meanings have no meaning, this would mean that we don't have any functioning atoms and molecules in our brains which would be false here. However, this would only include meanings besides "good" and "bad" since, as I'm going to explain below, good and bad are scientific properties. This would also include meanings besides being in your own mind and the pleasure of others not being anything good from your perspective since you cannot experience their pleasure and that it would all just be neutral thoughts from your perspective that judges the pleasure of others being either good or bad.

Now I said that the word "good" means "that which is desired." But there could also be other definitions of the word good out there. So one might say that our pleasure is not what we would call a "good" sensation, but instead a "pleasant" sensation and, therefore, we can still be good people in other ways besides pleasure. However, these other definitions are delusional because good can only mean one thing in terms of evolution which would be our encouragement (pleasure) to survive and benefit our survival. Again, pleasure really is something that encourages our survival in life, but can be misused in not benefiting ours and the survival of others and can be used in harming ourselves and others. And as I said before earlier in my writing, you can still harm others and you would still be a good person as long as you have pleasure. However, I would never harm others because it is in my wiring of my brain and evolutionary design to be caring and compassionate towards others even despite my personal beliefs here. Nor would I ever consider such a thing anyway.

The reason why the only thing good is pleasure is because if we had no emotions or any pleasant or unpleasant sensations to any degree whatsoever, then all thoughts would be the same in the sense that they wouldn't encourage us to do anything in life. You would still get up and do things anyway in life, but it would not be encouragement, "looking forward" to things in life, or viewing anything as "good" at all. If we have just thoughts alone of things being good in life, being encouraged, and looking forward to things in life, these thoughts are just mere neutral images, words, sounds, etc. that only trick us into believing so.

If we had no emotions or any unpleasant sensations such as pain whatsoever, then I ask you how a thought (message) in the brain of your life being good is any different than a thought that your life is bad other than them simply being different words, sounds, images, etc? Sure, one type of thought might send messages to other parts of our brain that enable us to perform actions such as walking, talking, etc. while another makes us perform different actions or doesn't make us do anything at all. But all these other parts of our brain responsible for other things besides emotions and unpleasant sensations, they cannot be defined as anything good or bad or be defined by any other personal meanings we create either since, again, the combined atoms and particles that define our personal created meanings in our brains cannot define the combined atoms and particles of these other parts of our brain since they are different. And they wouldn't be anything good or bad on their own anyway.

Now you might be thinking that "Ok, so my life is nothing good without my pleasure. But at least my life is still worthwhile." But even this word "worthwhile" is based on perceiving things as good in life, looking forward to living your life, being encouraged in life, etc. As I said before, pleasure is the only thing that is good in life.

Therefore, good is a scientific property (which would be the atoms and particles that give us pleasure). Same thing for bad. So you would be delusional to think that your life is good or bad or that you are a good or bad person without feelings of pleasure or pain since good and bad are actual scientific properties and your personal created meanings in life (your thoughts) can never be these scientific properties. As I said before, "good" is a scientific property (which would be the pleasure itself) while all our thoughts remain a different scientific property.

Finally, I should say that the emergent property (pleasure) is the result of all the combined atoms and particles in our brains that are responsible for it. But it does not exist as anything else in this universe besides the combined functioning of those atoms and particles (such as some supernatural entity that cannot be defined by the functioning of atoms and particles).

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@MozartLink,

Quote:

First off, I said before that any personal created meanings in life are delusional since life has no meaning. I would actually have to correct myself on that now that I have thought about it. This would just include meanings that do not go against science.

Think about it a bit more, because this is no better than your first version.

Are you really so positive "science" (that stuff we human being do) has all the answers that ever will be found?

If not...then there may be "meaning" to life that "goes against" what paltry little we humans know.

You are much too complicated in what you are doing here.

Stop trying to impress and actually give us an idea of what your take on all this is...is a few sentences. No need to write a book.

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@MozartLink,

MozartLink wrote:

If materialism, naturalism, and scientism are true,

Does materialism allow for the existence of life??

Does materialism allow for the existence of consciousness??
If so: how??

MozartLink wrote:

then you would be delusional to find meaning in your life

Please define: "meaning in life"

David

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

I can't image anything (any theory of Reality) that allows for the existence of consciousness--that is philsophy's hardest problem. For me it's an impentretable mystery, i.e., this allowing for the understanding of consciousness by consciousness.

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@JLNobody,

JLNobody wrote:

I can't image anything (any theory of Reality) that allows for the existence of consciousness--that is philsophy's hardest problem. For me it's an impentretable mystery, i.e., this allowing for the understanding of consciousness by consciousness.

He mentioned Materialism. My challenge was focused on that,
how Materialism accounts for consciousness; or maybe it just denies
the existence of consciousness, does it??????

What is his comment????

David

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@JLNobody,

JLNobody wrote:

I can't image anything (any theory of Reality)
that allows for the existence of consciousness--that is philsophy's hardest problem.

U wanna try it the other way, backward,
i.e., consciousness dreaming up matter and Materialism???

Who was it who sang: "Life is but a dream: its what u make it" ?

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@MozartLink,

Life is god gift .We should enjoy it.

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@MozartLink,

MozartLink wrote:

If materialism, naturalism, and scientism are true, then you would be delusional to find meaning in your life (as stated by materialism, naturalism, and scientism which state that life is just a bunch of meaningless atoms and particles). There are things in science that do have objective meaning. For example, the fact that the Earth revolves around the sun is a scientific fact and you would, therefore, be delusional to think otherwise. Same thing with creating our own meanings in life since life really has no meaning in terms of science. You would, therefore, be delusional in finding your own personal meanings in life since life has no meaning. If you are going to say something here such as that this is a logical fallacy I am presenting here, then what I would have to say in return is that your own personal viewpoints in that people would not be delusional in creating their own meanings in life, this would also be a logical fallacy since finding your own personal meanings in life when life has no meaning is a contradiction. I don't even care if it's in our evolutionary design to find meaning in life in order to survive and benefit our survival. You would still be delusional in finding your own meanings in life anyway.

No worries, i won't accuse you of a logical fallacy. There's no need; you aren't even pretending to be logical (and certainly not grammatical).

MozartLink wrote:

Now if you are going to ask me something such as for me to define "meaning," what I would have to say to that would be that there is no meaning. It is just a bunch of atoms and particles and that is it. But this would only hold true for things besides scientific facts such as the Earth revolving around the sun and also the scientific fact that this life has no meaning.

Now i am confused...you can't define "meaning" linguistically, despite your using it in context, because there is no meaning? Except the self-contradictory claim that there is a "scientific meaning". And your agument relies upon the "meaningless" fact that there aren't just random atoms and particles, but larger patterns like the "meaningless" Earth's revolutions around the "meaningless" Sun. And that somehow invalidates the scientific meaning of other patterns...like "meaningless" individual lives.

i think that you don't actually understand the terms you are using ("materialism, naturalism", or "scientism" [which is not the same as "science"]). It seems to me that in failing to grasp the meaning of those terms you undermine your own argument.

To finish up, a person doesn't have to deny that the Earth revolves around the Sun, or the randomness of atoms, to find personal meaning.

"Delusional"...i doubt you can define that term any better than "fact", "meaning", or "science".

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@JLNobody,

JLNobody wrote:

I can't image anything (any theory of Reality) that allows for the existence of consciousness--that is philsophy's hardest problem. For me it's an impentretable mystery, i.e., this allowing for the understanding of consciousness by consciousness.

It may well be that you or I or any other human being cannot imagine and scenario or theory of REALITY that does that, JL...

...but surely even you can understand that does not mean that it does not exist.

We humans MAY BE just insignificant living things on a relatively insignificant planet, circling a relatively insignificant star in a relatively insignificant galaxy in a relatively insignificant portion of a relatively insignificant piece of a much, much vaster and incomprehensible existence.

The ability of humans to understand or imagine something...is hardly a standard for suggesting that it does not exist...or even worse, that it cannot be.

You do realize that, right?

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@Frank Apisa,

You are right: I cannot argue with certainty that there is no grand objective and absolute theory of the world. It is just that I am convinced that all (human) theories are our inventions. At least that's my theory.

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Finding our own meaning in life is delusional

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