# Why continue life? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 16, 2011, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865 "2011-03-16T01:52:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Clu-Me-In](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dfb087/32.png) [@Clu-Me-In](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clu-Me-In)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/21 "2011-03-16T03:15:31Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > By paying taxes and creating wealth, you are bettering your fellow man. That is your purpose. A robot can do that in my place… that’s boring. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/22 "2011-03-16T03:27:04Z")
So is this thread. ---
**Author:** ![matt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@matt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/23 "2011-03-16T03:36:20Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > Cats. Cats are nice. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/24 "2011-03-16T03:47:46Z")
The answer I think is God. Who knows for what purposes He may use you for? ---
**Author:** ![Orr\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ee59a6/32.png) [@Orr\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orr_G)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/25 "2011-03-16T03:50:23Z")
> [@Clu-Me-In](#): > > Is there a reason to continue life if all an individual does is produce wealth, pay taxes and wait for death sometime in the future. If you have no family, and no heirs, what is the purpose of existence? Just one more level… ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/26 "2011-03-16T04:17:12Z")
> [@Clu-Me-In](#): > > Why would you NOT need a reason? What would be the purpose of living without a reason to exist? > > If you have no one to continue your being here on Earth, why not move on to what’s next? I’m not sure what kind of answer you expect to get to questions like these. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/27 "2011-03-16T04:19:19Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > I don’t plan on dying. “It’s just too bad she won’t live. But then again, who does?” Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Kolga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e56c9b/32.png) [@Kolga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kolga)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/28 "2011-03-16T04:22:56Z")
Oh, joy, yet another statement that those of us who are childless (by choice or not) have no purpose in life. I teach - I’m pretty sure that at least some of my students will remember me, with varying levels of emotion. I have friends, who have children, and whose children love me as the crazy sorta-aunt - those children will remember me. I have a brother who’s having children - those children will remember me. And even people who HAVE children aren’t remembered much beyond their great-grandchildren’s years. Enjoyment of life and accomplishment within the lifespan aren’t necessarily related to progeny. So, it’s disingenuous at best, and deliberately insulting at worst, to condemn those of us without children to a meaningless existence. But it’s been done before on these boards. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/29 "2011-03-16T04:27:41Z")
> [@Clu-Me-In](#): > > Is there a reason to continue life if all an individual does is produce wealth, pay taxes and wait for death sometime in the future. If you have no family, and no heirs, what is the purpose of existence? I agree with others that say that a purpose is not necessary to have a fulfilling life. However, if I had to think of a purpose, it would be something like this: – To find out what happens tomorrow. – To learn something new every day. – To plan for the future, and see if the future unfolds as planned. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/30 "2011-03-16T04:38:36Z")
> [@Clu-Me-In](#): > > Is there a reason to continue life if all an individual does is produce wealth, pay taxes and wait for death sometime in the future. Consider an individual with the intention of commiting suicide since before high school. He graduates from high school. He applies and is admitted to college. He has four years in college and is due to graduate. Before graduation, he commits suicide. Why did he go to college? ---
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/31 "2011-03-16T04:41:28Z")
wow. If you are basing your existence on family, legacy, or whatever, and you are a sole person floating on an ice block, you might as well jump into the ocean. You can’t possibly be happy, especially if you don’t see your situation changing. After all, if you die, who is going to miss you? If the answer is “no one”, and you want it to be “some one”, then you have three choices. Change your situation, change your attitude (or measuring stick on what gives you a reason to live) or suicide when you simply can’t stand it any more. Is this a personal question, or a general one? Because it could be viewed as a question of why we are put on the earth at all. Why we live. A simple answer is to propagate the species, but I don’t believe that. We aren’t fruit flies. We personally don’t need to reproduce to propagate the species. There are plenty of others that are picking up that slack. So if you are gay or “barren”, your life isn’t worthless. But by your standard, it is. We are not here for only a few days, so we have to reproduce before we die. There are countless things to do to be both self-satisfying, and productive/helpful to the species. If you own a large company and are rich, but have no one to leave your countless millions to, you are still helping many people by providing jobs, etc to help them keep their own dreams alive. Hell, if you really need to have something to perpetuate your legacy, donate your millions to a university and have them name a building after you. Or buy the worlds largest headstone. Or send me a PM with your attorney’s name and address, and I’ll contact him to make sure your money is passed along to me. I won’t let your memory fade. There is a bigger question here, of course. And it’s why we live at all. And that is a question that can never be answered. For example, if you look at life objectively, what is it, really? Just a series of events, distractions, etc., to keep you occupied until you die. You didn’t ask to be born. The fact that you personally are here at all is a miracle. The odds are so against you being created in the first place, that being here is a true sign of the randomness of life. If that sperm that created you came out at a different time, place, angle, whatever, you wouldn’t be here. Someone else would. So, read a little of this board, and you are an hour or so closer to being dead. You’ve distracted yourself a bit before the big end. Congratulations! Tomorrow is another day! ---
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/32 "2011-03-16T04:44:52Z")
> [@Kozmik](#): > > Consider an individual with the intention of commiting suicide since before high school. He graduates from high school. He applies and is admitted to college. He has four years in college and is due to graduate. Before graduation, he commits suicide. > > Why did he go to college? I did that! I have no idea why I went to college! I did that again for grad school! Still don’t know. The bigger question for me, then is “why did I commit suicide?” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/33 "2011-03-16T05:17:34Z")
> [@Clu-Me-In](#): > > If you have no family, and no heirs, what is the purpose of existence? Your implication seems to be that life obtains value only as it affects others . . . and especially after the life is over. I see it the other way around. Your life, aside from how you affect others, aside from what you leave behind, has whatever value you choose. Even if you live alone on a deserted island, you are just as capable of valuing your life as anyone who is surrounded by friends and heirs. Your life is unique, and just for that reason alone, has value. But it has to be your choice; if you choose not to value your life, then indeed it has no value . . . not to yourself, nor to anyone else. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/34 "2011-03-16T05:20:18Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > So is this thread. I should probably have tacked on a smilie at the end of this. It sounds more harsh than I intended, which was only to riff on your robot remark. My apologies if so, especially if you are questioning the need for your own existence as you seem to be doing. We have a long, long time to be dead, so there’s no need to rush it, whether we can justify our existence at this time or not. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/35 "2011-03-16T05:21:23Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > I did that! I have no idea why I went to college! > > I did that again for grad school! Still don’t know. > > The bigger question for me, then is “why did I commit suicide?” > > 😃 I recieved my high school diploma and I recieved my college degree. I didn’t commit suicide and I won’t commit suicide. I, philosophically, can’t commit sucide. I’m talking about a hypothetical individual who is set on committing suicide. He or she has this intention before high school. (He \*could \*have commited suicide before graduating from high school and people would say, well, high school is mandatory in the United States so it isn’t that out of the ordinary to hear of a high school student committing suicide.) Committing suicide before graduating from college? Thinking people might ask, Why did he go to college? Why did he, exercise, I suppose, his free will to apply to a college of his choice, take the time to write out the application essay, and, once accepted, enroll. Why spend four years on campus if you’re going to commit suicide? Why? ---
**Author:** ![matt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@matt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/36 "2011-03-16T05:21:23Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > The answer I think is God. Who knows for what purposes He may use you for? That’s not so much an answer as un-asking the question. Personally I like the Basil Fawlty answer: “Beat’s me. We’re stuck with it, I suppose.” ---
**Author:** ![SeaDragonTattoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@SeaDragonTattoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeaDragonTattoo)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/37 "2011-03-16T05:34:45Z")
There are a bunch of studies out there (I can’t be soused to look them up and link them, just google “unhappy after children” or somesuch) that show differing levels of happiness in people who have children vs those who don’t. My personal cite is my grandmother who had 10 kids of her own. Why did she have so many kids? Because she wanted to? No. Because she wanted a legacy to pass on? No. She told me, her oldest grandchild (when I was in my 20’s), that she had so many kids because she was a good Catholic and so didn’t use birth control but wished she had. She had so many kids because she loved sex and because she had it with my grandpa every day from before they were married until he died. She left behind a few “normal” kids, and a lot of dysfunctional alcoholic and drug-addicted adult children who barely afforded to bury her next to grandpa when she died. She told me she never liked children. It was her way of telling me my choice to be child-free was cool with her. So, here’s an example of someone with lots of heirs, with nothing to inherit but debt. Did she waste her life? Did she ever even think about her life in that way? Heck no. She kept truckin’ on til’ she was 90. What was the point? She had a helluva good time most of the time. After grandpa died and all the kids were moved out of the house, she had a second life, as an older, sexy, single woman. She had a great time. She took me to Mexico and got me drunk when I was 15. I had the coolest grandma there was. I don’t think she ever pondered a “purpose” or a point to her life. She got married because she was supposed to. She had kids because she was supposed to, and secondarily to being a good wife, at that. She would have been happier from her 20’s to her 50’s if there hadn’t been any kids to get in the way. She was plenty happy from her 50’s until her 80’s. What more is there to ask for? I think most people have kids because they think they’re supposed to. Thank Og my mom doesn’t pressure me like every other woman’s mom I know. I would have to stop talking to her. My choice is my choice. I look around at my life a lot, probably more often than super-busy-with-kids people do, and I feel happiness and contentment. I don’t think there are a lot of people out there who can genuinely say they are happy and content with the way their life is at this moment. They are perhaps working toward that goal, though, and that’s all anyone can do. If I didn’t like my life, I would do something different. So what’s the point? Why do I need one? I do some good things while I’m on this planet, I make myself happy, I do no harm to others and hopefully make an improvement on someone’s life even if it’s in the smallest way. Why does there need to be anything else? What else is there, really? ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/38 "2011-03-16T05:43:04Z")
There is a strong biological imperative for a lot of people, especially for women, to have children. Many relationships have broken up because the man didn’t want kids, and other women have entered into what turned out to be unwise relationships simply to because their biological “clock” was running down and soon they wouldn’t be able to have kids. I would agree that oftentimes people get married and have children simply because it’s expected and because all their friends are doing it too, but I think the desire to have children and start a family is pretty strong in most young marriages. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/39 "2011-03-16T05:52:23Z")
> [@Clu-Me-In](#): > > Is there a reason to continue life if all an individual does is produce wealth, pay taxes and wait for death sometime in the future. If you have no family, and no heirs, what is the purpose of existence? [Because of this\*](http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_gUesY2pcBi8/TTdN8Xkm2cI/AAAAAAAABYs/G3XieZGnVaQ/s1600/guesscampaign1.jpg) No purpose needed. Just enjoy life. I think that most people who are having fun are too busy to stop and ask questions about the meaning of life. People who are unhappy are the ones who start questioning why we are here, what is the meaning of life, etc. The answer is that there is no meaning, there is no purpose, and it is indeed all meaningless. But, if you can enjoy things (like a chocolate cake, sex, music, etc) then it makes sense to continue living to enjoy those things. If you are at a party, but you don’t know what the purpose of the party is, or who drove you there, or why you are there, but are enjoying the music and the people there, why not stay at the party as long as you can? - Assuming you are a heterosexual male ---
**Author:** ![Naxos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/50afbb/32.png) [@Naxos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Naxos)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2011, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865/40 "2011-03-16T06:33:25Z")
> [@Clu-Me-In](#): > > Is there a reason to continue life if all an individual does is produce wealth, pay taxes and wait for death sometime in the future. If you have no family, and no heirs, what is the purpose of existence? When you know how to get rid of the self-absorbed ego-centric idea that life is about gratifying one’s emotional dysfunctions, which seem to be unsatisfied in your case, causing the doubt about life’s purpose, then you’ll know that you can create a purpose for your life yourself. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-continue-life/574865.md?page=3)