Value and meaning is our responsibility

01Jan07

Theists are often troubled by the notion that meaning is not something handed to us from God. Without a God whose divine plan we are all a part of, we are but worthless piles of matter in their minds. If life will ultimately lead to death, and death does not lead to an afterlife, but rather an abrupt end to our consciousness and rotting of our body, they find life worthless. I find this kind of thinking bad, as it leads us to a kind of intellectual apathy. All will come to an end with death anyway, so why bother filling your life with meaning? Keith Augustine says it well in Death and the Meaning of Life:

Does the finality of death make life meaningless? Although many people feel that it does, a moment’s reflection will show that death is irrelevant to the question of the meaning of life: If human beings were naturally immortal–that is, if there were no such thing as death–there would still be a question about whether or not our lives had meaning. The underlying assumption behind the claim that life is meaningless because it ends in death is that for something to be meaningful or worthwhile it must last forever. The fact that many of the things we value (such as relationships with others) and activities that we find worthwhile (such as working on a political campaign or raising a child) do not last forever shows that life does not need to be everlasting to be meaningful. We can also show that everlasting life may not be meaningful by providing examples of lives which last forever yet are meaningless. In Greek mythology Sisyphus is punished by the gods for cheating death by being forced to roll a heavy stone to the top of a hill. Just as the stone is about to reach the top of the hill, it rolls back down to the plain. Sisyphus is doomed to repeat this meaningless activity for eternity. The duration of our lives has nothing to do with their meaningfulness.

Would you want a life like that of Sisyphus, eternally doomed to carry on with a meaningless activity? In fact, I would say that an atheist has more meaning in his life, because atheists don’t depend on their God to give them meaning. Instead, they work to make life meaningful to themselves right from the start. Contrast this with the common theist belief that life is only a means to an end (the afterlife). Life is nothing but a test to show yourself worthy of an eternal afterlife in paradise. But what’s the meaning of the afterlife? Meaning is not a thing that can be given to you by someone else; it is something you must accept for yourself. Think about reading. The symbols have a given meaning, but everyone has their own interpretation of them. That’s probably why there will never be a movie adaption of a book that completely satisfies the book fans. Everyone has their own mental image of the protagonist, the environment, the supporting cast, the action.

Imagine that God had a divine plan for your and everybody else’s life. God planted the seeds to humanity when He created the universe. When the human race has reached sufficient average intelligence, God will invite everyone up to Heaven for a great Divine Debate. Here, the best food ever to touch someone’s tongue will be served, the greatest questions of all time will be debated and the meaning of life will finally be revealed. You can sit next to Socrates and Plato and Descartes and Da Vinci and Dawkins and discuss your ideas with them. Now, what does this mean to you? Absolutely nothing. It means nothing to you unless you accept is as your meaning. You’re only a cog in the great machinery of the universe, only a small step on the way to this great debate. What if you don’t care about the great questions in life? What if you’d rather read a book on trains, or eat a dinner with your family, or play a game of Scrabble with your friends, or ride a wave on the Pacific? There’s no such thing as absolute meaning. And perhaps most importantly: why would God bother? After all, he is almighty. He doesn’t need to plant a seed; He can gather the fruits of them as He chooses. There’s no reason why He’d enjoy watching us lead our lives and discuss his existence. He already knows the answers. And being all-knowing, God already knows that creating the universe will cause much harm. There’s absolutely no reason whatsoever that creating the universe would mean anythig to God at all.

The same goes for value. Some theists are absolutely terrified or even disgusted by the notion that we aren’t worth more than animals or even stones or the ocean. What these people don’t seem to get is that value and meaning are subjective concepts. There’s no objective “value” in you, or me, or anyone. We create value for ourselves. If you take a thing and ask various people what it is worth, you will get widely differing answers depending on who you ask and what measure you use. An economist might be able to tell you the thing’s market value. An anthropologist might be able to tell you the social status of the thing. A mathematician might be able to tell you the mathematical properties of the thing. A random person might be able to tell you the emotional value the thing has to them. But common to all the estimates is the fact that they are just that, estimates. They’re not objective truths. Value is a concept that exists in our minds.

Those who claim that God gives them value and meaning don’t know what this meaning and value is either. In order for life to matter to them they’re forced to find this meaning themselves. We create the meaning. It is our responsibility. We need to deal with that, and that’s what atheists have been doing all along.

Filed under: atheism, ethics, meaning, morality, religion, theism, value   |  Closed