I think I solved the purpose of life
I don’t believe in God.
Or at least, I don’t believe in the traditional deity in the sky who has decided my fate in life, is watching my every move and is waiting to pass judgement on my soul when I meet Him/Her/It. I do believe in the concept of a supreme consciousness or intelligent design or (insert any vague pop culture reference).
The reason is pretty simple — there is compelling evidence or logical arguments against the existence of a deity as defined in the sacred religions of the world (those are what I call man-made Gods). At the same time, science has not been able to definitively satisfy the age old questions about life — why are we here, where do we come from and where do we go after death, why are the laws of physics what they are and not something else, what was before the big bang, what led to the birth of the first conscious organism from the primordial soup, what is the nature of reality, does reality shape us or do we shape reality by observing it and so on.
By the way, this little write up is not about your or my purpose in life, it is about the purpose of life. This is not going to help you find your passion and live a meaningful life or any of the usual motivational spiel. I just want to make that little distinction so you can set expectations.
And we are back..
For ease of discussion, and because this is the first time I am writing about this topic, I will club all of the above questions into one primary all encompassing question — What is the purpose of life? And today, after giving this a lot of thought, I have come to a conclusion which seems logically sound and stands the test of reason in so far as I was able to test it.
Yes, I believe I have found the purpose of life. Or it would be more precise to say, I have found the interim purpose of life, while the true purpose is yet to be revealed. Stay with me for a while.
If we rise above the individual struggles of humans in everyday life and think of all of this from a higher perspective — from the point of view of nature or mother earth or Gaea — it should be clear that the only demonstrable goal of life seems to be to ensure the continued survival of itself. This is primarily done by reproduction in the short term and by evolution in the longer term. Every other biological and societal construct (no matter what species) is designed to feed this one single minded focus of life — survival.
Why is life so hell bent on survival?
As I thought about this question in the larger context of ‘what is the purpose of life’, one possibility began to present itself which seemed to withstand logical scrutiny.
The purpose of life, in the interim, is to survive long enough, to reach a point in time where the true purpose of life will be revealed. Its a little cyclical, but take a moment to think about it. I will rephrase it — in the absence of knowledge about the true purpose of life, the only worthwhile purpose in the interim, is to reach a point where that true purpose will be revealed. And the only way to reach that point of revelation is — you guessed it, SURVIVAL!
Good! You are still here.
So if we are in agreement so far, then the next question is — what does this mean for you and me? Does it change anything in the here and now? What does our day to day mundane life have to do with the grand schemes of Life itself?
Well, I don’t have this part fleshed out completely. The future is uncertain and there are wildly different schools of thought on this but I am going to take a stab at it. Consider the latest advances in science and technology. The giant leaps mankind has made in the fields of space travel, quantum computing, materials science, genetics, stem cell research, cryogenics, bio-robotics, nano technology, renewable energy, artificial intelligence and even social media — all seem to be leading to one inevitable future. A future of seemingly miraculous possibilities. What the heck am I talking about now?
… one giant leap for mankind.
Humans or more specifically, homo sapiens are considered the pinnacle of evolution. Top of the food chain. Created in God’s own image and such. I largely believe it to be true. Humans are without a doubt, the most successful species that nature has brought forward. No other species could possibly have made the leap from the stone age of thousands of years ago to the information age of today, in the way and with the speed that man has. I sense an intelligent design at work even here. The advances in the fields that I have listed above, in my mind, all lead to one inevitable future of mankind.
I am talking about a future where we humans have developed the technology to transfer human consciousness into machines. The ability to meld individual genetic information with an artificial yet organic body run by quantum computing and nano tech. Or the ability to discard the physical body altogether and exist simply as a consciousness with an individual and/or a hive identity. And this future is not too far. According to futurist Ray Kurzweil, in the year 2045, true artificial intelligence will appear (the Singularity). It is conceivable that somewhere near that same time, the mind meld technology will also be achieved. Or to put it all simply, humans (or Life) will achieve immortality.
Immortal body and mind, endless energy, space travel — combine these 3 and the chances of life’s survival go up exponentially — no meteor strike or solar flare or nuclear war or climate change will be able to wipe out life. And then life can wait it out for the Revelation!
Don’t throw me in the looney bin yet!!
I will address one last question before signing off — what does all this mean for you and me in the here and now? Well, I am running searches for cryogenics companies who can freeze my DNA, stem cells and brain till the birth of AI. I am also going to sell this article as an advert copy to them in future — someone’s gotta pay for all that liquid nitrogen. But just in case they try to pull a fast one, remember you read it here first ;)
But before I do any of that, tomorrow is Monday morning, and I have a quarterly review meeting to prepare for. Back to life!!
