why are we here

Unfortunatly, unless that question is answered AFTER death, noone really knows.

Re: why are we here
Baz
That is the ultimate question. Like Leibniz question: why do things exist instead of nothing?
There is no answer. We are here. Things exist.
To answer such questions you should be "outside" our human experience and that is impossible.

To me, its a matter of choosing between an answer someone else made up, versus making up an answer yourself.

I love...and identify with...all the responses so far!!!

Why not ask why the plants and animals are here. I guess it is an ego thing.

I think it's not so much 'why are we here,' so much as 'what are we going to do now?' I could say I'm here because my parents had sex, or that Baby Jesus wanted me to exist, etc., but in the end, all that matters is what reason for existence I choose. So, in conclusion, what Greyfan said, just more of it.

Why

I was stuck on How for so long, I wasn't even looking at your true question. Now I've wasted so much thought on giving you a perfectly reasonable answer to a question you didn't even ask. @&#!

And of course you understand I am only taking a stab at it. I don't intend to pretend I have all the answers or any of them for that matter.

The Divine angle - We are here because a Divine power is playing the ultimate game of chess so to speak and because It has that power over us, we are forced to play as if we are a child's toy. Free will makes the game interesting and we aren't merely pawns to be moved, but pawns that move ourselves. It finds the game more interesting to see what we come up with rather than what It has in mind.

Scientific - The purpose of our existence is to improve our status and constantly work toward finding viable solutions for generations yet to come. While other creatures tend to keep with the simplistic approach to life, humans are geared to progress. Our wires get crossed when that very same progress could lead to our destruction and rather than a struggle of good and evil, scientifically there is a struggle between opposing extremes of success. In all of us is the programming that life must go on and our future must be preserved. There are only opposing views of how.

Is it really important?

We're here, no one knows why and it's a waste of time to try and find out the answer to a question when the answer doesn't exist.

Maybe you should spend more time on how you can make the best of your time here, instead of wondering how and why you got here.

Wonder what answer Bush would give to that question?

interesting little paradox here...because the answer is only important if you think the answer is "because God put us here", because the original question is pretty much a wrapper for "does God exist"

Syn: Amen.
Au1929: probably that he was put here to rule the world! I mean...America...