# What do you think the meaning of life really is? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 19, 2016, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549 "2016-01-19T04:33:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Dallas\_Jones](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dallas_jones/32/3277_2.png) [@Dallas\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dallas_Jones)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/41 "2016-01-20T19:33:08Z")
Entropy. Life is here to increase the disorder in the Universe. To use raw materials and turn them into less usable byproducts. To consume energy that cannot be recovered. To spread out the uneven heat. Stars are better at this than life is, but life too has a role. Leaves fall and become dirt. Worms convert the dirt into nutrient rich worm poop. Humans convert the rich soil into food. The heat of these and other processes spread out into uselessness. An orderly Universe would have no life in it. The universe we live in includes life as an entropy increasing part of the equation. If you find all of this equation, it’s the L part. Entropy, disorder, heat distribution. Life, is what that is about. The worm may have a different outlook. To the worm, all that wonderful dirt has been created by the Dirt Creator solely for the benefit of the worm. And that is partially true, from the worm’s perspective, but it is not the whole answer. But it is true enough to keep the worm happy and its life relevant. This is my theory of Relativity. Everything depends upon your point of view or reference frame. There are no solid truths. Entropy. Disorder. It is what we are here for. Life is good until this worm is told otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Dallas\_Jones](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dallas_jones/32/3277_2.png) [@Dallas\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dallas_Jones)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/42 "2016-01-20T19:41:46Z")
> [@Martian Bigfoot](#): > > Eat, survive, reproduce. Although not necessarily in that order. Sometimes you eat dinner first, then reproduce and survive. And sometimes you reproduce first, but you had better make or buy breakfast the morning after. Sometimes you survive an ordeal, someone feeds you, then you get laid. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/43 "2016-01-20T19:41:54Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Protein. It’s all just protein. That’s funny-I would have sworn that it was [meat](http://www.terrybisson.com/page6/page6.html) instead… ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/44 "2016-01-20T19:52:42Z")
[ul] [li]Crush your enemies[/li][li]See them driven before you[/li][li]Hear the lamentations of the women[/li][/ul] ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Nylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/77aa72/32.png) [@Mr.Nylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Nylock)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/45 "2016-01-20T20:02:01Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > [ul] > [li]Crush your enemies[/li][li]See them driven before you[/li][li]Hear the lamentations of the women[/li][/ul] Sometimes, with the right amount of flatulance, I do all three at once. It is very satisfying. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/46 "2016-01-20T21:32:01Z")
I don’t believe that life has any meaning, other than what we ascribe to it. We exist and then we don’t. Thinking about the future is pointless, as is lamenting the past, as little can be done with certainty about the former and nothing can be done about the latter. That said, I’m as vulnerable as anyone is to doing both. ---
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/47 "2016-01-20T21:49:46Z")
We are on holiday. This is heaven. It’s going to be real disappointing to a lot of people who have been uptight their whole lives and then have to go back to work for eternity. ---
**Author:** ![UberArchetype](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/2bfe46/32.png) [@UberArchetype](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UberArchetype)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/48 "2016-01-20T21:55:33Z")
Love ---
**Author:** ![Rebo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rebo/32/13005_2.png) [@Rebo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rebo)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/49 "2016-01-20T22:06:03Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > Be excellent to each other. This. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/50 "2016-01-20T22:44:30Z")
> [@kopek](#): > > Leaving the world a little less pissed off than I entered it. > [@Ludovic](#): > > Be excellent to each other. Things like that are not a “meaning”; they’re a directive of how to live one’s life. Totally different animal. As an atheist, I’m comfortable with there being no meaning of life. We came from nothing and we return to nothing. Might was well enjoy your limited time here, but don’t expect there to be some “meaning”. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/51 "2016-01-20T23:43:27Z")
Life is meaningless. Your pleasure is meaningless. Your virtue is meaningless. Even if you died and went to heaven, what would be the meaning of it? Nothing. Oh, God says it has meaning? Who died and made God boss? God wrapping meaning into every proton and electron doesn’t give them meaning. God torturing you for eternity in hell doesn’t make your suffering meaningful, and rewarding you for eternity in heaven doesn’t make your pleasure meaningful. But the good part of the meaninglessness of the universe is that meaninglessness is meaningless. Some people seem to think that if you really think the universe is meaningless, you should immediately start raping and killing, or kill your self, or take to your bed shivering. But why? If the universe is meaningless, what’s the point of raping and killing, or killing yourself, or sitting in bed crying over the meaninglessness of it all? I don’t rape and kill because I don’t want to rape and kll. I don’t kill myself because I don’t want to kill myself. I don’t sit in bed crying because I don’t want to sit in bed crying. And why don’t I want those things? Because I’m a particular type of life form that evolved in a particular way. And I’m that way because my ancestors survived by acting that way and reproduced that way, and so here I am. If I were a dung beetle I’d find giant balls of antelope manure delicious. But I’m not a dung beetle, I’m a human being, and so I like the typical things human beings like. Long walks on the beach, cozy meals with my family, snuggling with my wife, and so on and so on. If I were even a little different evolutionarily I’d want some of the same things, but lots of different ones too. If I were an orangutan or chimpanzee or gorilla I’d be physically similar, but socially very different. And so I live my life trying to avoid the sorts of things that cause human misery. That’s not because human misery is wrong on a cosmic scale, but because I’m a human being and don’t like being miserable, and don’t like it when the human beings around me are miserable. It gives me pleasure to exercise my natural facilities, because that’s how I was created. I can decide not to eat a bar of chocolate, but I can’t decide not to want to eat a bar of chocolate. I can decide not to take care of my children, but I can’t decide to not want to take care of my children. I can decide to be cruel to my wife, but I can’t decide to want to be cruel to my wife. Does this leave my shaking in existential dread? No, because why would it? Why should it? Learning that God wants certain things of me wouldn’t make those things more or less meaningful than the things that evolution programmed into my body and brain. ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_Panic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/don_t_panic/32/398_2.png) [@Don\_t\_Panic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_Panic)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2016, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/52 "2016-01-20T23:49:03Z")
I’ve never met an existential crisis that money and sex couldn’t distract me from. ---
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2016, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/53 "2016-01-21T01:36:13Z")
Great post **Lemur866.** I don’t think there is any meaning to life. And sometimes that just feels like such a waste. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2016, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/54 "2016-01-21T05:57:43Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” - Jesus Ditto. ---
**Author:** ![Grestarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grestarian/32/3227_2.png) [@Grestarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grestarian)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2016, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/55 "2016-01-23T06:18:46Z")
> [@kopek](#): > > Leaving the world a little less pissed off than I entered it. Well, considering the ratio of you to the world’s increasing population, I suspect that’s a losing battle, particularly amongst those whom you’ll never even know. I applaud the intention and effort, though. Very noble. And consider it a twisted compliment that a lot of people whom you know quite well will probably be pissed off about you exiting. That could imply that your efforts, at least on the local level, were relatively successful. And, of course, it’s better than having people rejoice over your demise. 😃 –G! ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2016, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/56 "2016-01-23T06:27:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Sentient beings are numberless, > I vow to save them. > Desires are inexhaustible, > I vow to put an end to them. > The Dharmas are boundless, > I vow to master them. > The Buddha Way is unsurpassable, > I vow to attain it. Yeah, it’s pretty daunting, but I think this is my thing. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2016, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/57 "2016-01-23T06:50:09Z")
**HMR Irruncible** : Another quote, in the same vein: “Everyone or no-one, all of us or none. One alone his lot can’t better. Either gun or fetter. Everyone or no-one, all of us or none.” Bertolt Brecht. Yeah, we can’t have perfection. We can’t save everyone. We can’t have perfection. Well, tough, because I’m working for it anyway! ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2016, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/58 "2016-01-23T12:30:58Z")
I discussed classical Philosophy’s view on how to give life meaning. But for me, personally, I have boiled it down to a phrase: **Find Yourself Trying** In my experience: - I want to be trying - trying new things, trying to improve myself, to do unto others - I want to have humility - be aware when I am trying to myself and others - If I do these things, I am moving towards Finding Myself - i.e., being more centered from a Zen standpoint. I like it’s triple entendre layers and the messages they hold for me. If I am living them, I feel I am giving my life meaning. ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Wayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4bbf92/32.png) [@Charlie\_Wayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Wayne)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2016, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549/59 "2016-01-23T13:56:38Z")
Hey Lemur866, I must agree that was a great post. Except for one part. You may not have ever shit in bed … **YET** … but the longer you live, the less control you will have over your bowels and eventually … everyone shits in bed. They just can’t help it. That is why they invented colostomy bags. OK. I wuz just j/k. You know … like her … [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-the-meaning-of-life-really-is/743549.md?page=2)