Talk:Meaning of life/Archive 1

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Archive 1

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The Meaning of life

The meaning of life, for life Well I will write about truth not lies, about a God that is not strait-laced or boring, who is not going to kill you, or send you into hell unless you meant to. And refuse goodness, well let me tell you what is goodness, it is not a big “no”, if you want to follow the great, God “do not change” stop doing the stuff that do not give you enough pleasure, let me break another illusion, if Jesus came to the great majority of churches called christian, today. He would make out a whip, a nice one and whip those guys out of there, and say something as, shape up or what are you doing in my house. Look gays are not less of a person, or even worse than me, if I think what they are doing is right or wrong is out of the question, but that they are as good as me in virtue. Well why did I say God is not strait-laced, only because we are not strait-laced and he is like us, he likes what we like, well check on bible go to americanbiblesociety.com do a bible search do your thing, if want to stop reading who cares, I have my life made, and I do trust my God. Also let me tell you some more good news churches do not know but they should, sex is not wrong and as long as you do not desire another person’s wife you are free to think about it, or whatever you can search the whole bible as I did and the only thing you are going to find denying something about sex is “not to lust” which means intensively desiring sex which in a simpler way means not to want the want of sex, or desire the desire and (not to have pre-marital sex, unless you ask her to marry right after) but sex should be celebrated , do not misconfuse anything about the bible, have your own thought about it truthfully search if you want with normal critical thinking you are not going to find anything to say against what I am saying and intensive study of it will prove it to be so. God is not a big no, in Jew history we see a God who allowed many wives and for at the time allowed thousands of non-belivers to be massacred and also is the same God who had his son, who is himself die for you so you will find a way to have better pleasure in life, truth to God I tell you so.You are not going to hell unless you want to live for pleasure blindly, but if you want the most pleasure in a life you live now, and not doing something as being abusing to have pleasure or humiliate someone to feel well, you will find the best pleasure which is to have tough love, words that look mean sometimes but means good or whatever it is that makes you feel better together with a community that wants to do you good; touched by your own goodness. Basicly if you want to act blindly you are already dead or as I say, you act as if not a human but someone who loses oneself, loses its soul awareness, but I think most of humans in earth today are bound to heaven they just need to know that, and live well. Why for sure churches would be whipped out of it, only because a third of humanity call themselves christians and they are not drawn to churches which they should, because there are children who intuitively know they are going to die of hunger, or heard about it. And church goers where are they well maybe having tea coffee and trying to weep, smile and have a good time while praising, as if knowing that they want to do something about the bad but not doing it warms their heart into a heart softning good feeling. I know it is tough to hear that maybe some church goers are reading this, but in my case my fellow church goers deeply insulted my family, physically harassed me by trying to hold my arm and yell at me, and told me I am not welcome there only the two of them (high-up in church, deacon and leader of young people), have one say I am sorry because he was obviously insulting my family and the other to say I am sorry much later. Being that I only gave a suggestion about a hole the son of one of them made on a wall, and he asked me who did it and I did not want to be rude and tell him it was his son, also while they were yelling at me after complaining of why he harassed me, I said, leadership is not about telling people what to do, but to serve. As Jesus showed what is it to be a leader when he was saying the same thing and washing his apostles feet. Well story said, being that I did preach in my church a little while before the occurring a little bit before there was a church division and I guess I stayed with the worst half. But this said it is not even that, if all the church goers were Jesus disguised as one church goer, or even maybe those third of humanity there would be no hunger, in Africa or in my home country Brazil, or in India or in every country, also there would not be the mistreating of animals which the bible not the church comdemns, or the abusing of so much people, and all of us do know what is bad and what is good, it is a simple message, I will die trying, I promise, to change things, never allow by omission poverty of five years year olds, unto hunger disease or even old people with countries so rich why do the poor have to suffer. Why?

Every time that I did things completely for God and acted rightfully, I was immensely happy as if I was having the drug ecstasy, but that 24/7 with no side effects, and I give you my word if you do things correctly and try your heart completely to it you will also. As I am "now".

December 23, 2006

I deleted Ayn Rand from the list of great philosophers because unlike the others she is not uncontroversially a great philosopher.

I suggest that the section re Wittgenstein does need work. Surely the point about Wittgenstein (and I am not sure he is the most relevant person to be referring to in this context) is that he believed that language had its limits and specifically that language was out of its depth when discussing some subjects eg the meaning of life. Of course Ludwig valued eg music and sculpture highly....and doubtless valued life highly....so he undoubtedly thought that life had relevance, importance, value...dare I say meaning. He was talking about the limitations of language.

King Brosby

LMS: I originally wrote "it is one that professional philosophers comparatively tend to avoid." I still think thats true. Certaintly professional philosophers have had plently to say about the meaning of life, but it is less important than the popular image of philosophy would have it. And even some of the philosophers you pointed to as addressing it, tended to avoid phrasing the question as "what is the meaning of life?". (Which isn't to say that no philosopher has ever considered that question, phrased that way; some have.) -- SJK

This much is true: philosophers do not ask the question, specifically, "What is the meaning of life?" nearly as much as someone without a college education might expect. Re "it is one that professional philosophers comparatively tend to avoid." I don't really quite know what that's supposed to mean: compared to whom? The average person? That would be quite obviously false. Anyway, the rest of what you say here is true enough, but that wasn't in the original article. Don't save the details for the talk page! :-) --LMS

Someone added "Unfortunately, the actual question itself remains unknown despite much effort by the mice to calculate it." IIRC, the mice knew what the question was, and then built planet Earth to calculate it, but then by the time it came up with the answer 42, they couldn't remember what the question was... -- SJK

afraid not. They built the computer Deep Thought to calculate the answer, and after working on it for 7.5 million years Deep Thought grandly pronounced that the answer was 42 - and it was only _then_ that the mice realized that they didn't know what the actual question was in the first place, since the answer didn't make any sense on its own. They built the Earth to calculate the question, so that the answer would make sense.

Earth was destroyed by a Vogon demolition ship fifteen minutes before it was supposed to output the question. An early readout of the almost-complete question was "what do you get if you multiply six by nine," but it's not known how close this would have been to the actual question had Earth been able to finish its computation as planned. The arrival of the Golgafrincham colonists on Earth may have corrupted its program in unforseen ways too.

Unfortunately, LMS is probably right that this is too "serious" an article to mention these particular deep truths here. Perhaps a "the exploration of the meaning of life has been the subject of a number of many works of fiction, including..." :)

In reference to the popular comedy book series The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the meaning of life is sometimes said to be 42, but this is not actually correct. Rather, 42 is the answer to the ultimate question about life, the universe and everything. Unfortunately, the actual question itself remains unknown despite much effort by the mice to calculate it.

I removed the above; no offense intended, but this is not a humor website, and references to the wisdom of one work of fiction on this question are, basically, not justified here. --Larry Sanger

Also note that Douglas Adams stated in an interview that the number 42 was the first thing that popped into his head. --Thoric 20:14, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Damn it! Why'd you have to spoil the fun? :)

Could it not be that the ultimate question about life, the universe and everything to which the answer is 42 is: "At what age will Douglas Adams first become a father?"?

One might also mention the Monty Python movie of the same title.

Monty Python's The Meaning of Life--mercifully, the movie title is different from the title of the page... --Humorlessly, LMS

It has been recently postulated from the laws of thermodynamics that life has been created in an attempt for the universe to achieve thermodynamic equilibrium more quickly by expending more energy, i.e. to bring about the heat death of the universe more quickly.

I think this needs support or rewording. The laws of thermodynamics don't imply that the universe somehow "wants" to convert all its energy into entropic forms, they just describe the fact that it does. In any case, life isn't exactly contributing in any significant way to the process; you might as well say that stars were created for this reason instead. Bryan

I agree. My (probably flawed) understanding of science's answer to the question is that life wasn't "create", it just "happened", and so it has no particular meaning at all; there is no overarching objective goal or purpose. Wesley

OK. I'll remove that last part until I (or someone else) comes up with a better way to rephrase it. Drew

You could perhaps say that life is a consequence of the laws of thermodynamics. Life tends to form into energy dissipating structures, "feeding" off of an environmental entropy gradient, which might be what you were after. But you should also note that science doesn't actually have anything to say on the "meaning" of life, one way or the other; that's outside of its subject area. It just describes and models it. Bryan

"Science is sometimes criticized for not providing an answer to "the meaning for life", but it does not attempt to do so. Science addresses questions of "what" and "how", but does not attempt to answer "why"." -- I'm not thrilled with this myself - what do y'all think?

I'm more thrilled with it than the previous version, and I think it's accurate to boot. :) Bryan

It's a good start. The word "why" needs some explanation; it must be distinguished from the "why" in "why do apples fall". FvdP 22:44 Oct 8, 2002 (UTC)

Well...I don't have a particular predisposition for or against scientific answers to the meaning of life. If there's a theory about it based on science instead of religion, then I'll treat it with the same amount of scepticism and such as a religious theory. However, I did notice this written in a science journal and thought it would make a worthy addition - if worked into the article properly. Drew

42 section shortened, and "It has been noted that 42 when read upside down is "2b", or "to be"." removed: 2 is 2 upside down only in the typical digital watch font, and the 4=b is too much of a stretch, especially with the digital watch font. I am Jack's username

I lengthened it a bit, because the answer WAS found in the end! --there_is_no_spoon 13:00, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Insert contents from The meaning of life: (by snoyes 18:34 Mar 1, 2003 (UTC))

The meaning of life is a philosophical question.

Some psychologists consider it a mental illness.

Arthur Dent's Scrabble letters

I've added a comment pointing out that Arthur Dent could not have drawn "What do you get when you multiply six by nine" from a standard English Scrabble set as there are not enough letters (for example, there are only two Y's, and the sentence contains four). However, this sentence (or any other English sentence, for that matter) is possible if each tile is returned to the bag after it has been drawn and noted. Does anyone know if this is what Arthur Dent did, or did Douglas Adams use a bit of artistic licence here? — Paul G 16:30, 8 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I seem to recall (I don't have the book with me) that Arthur's scrabble set was a self-made one. Afterall, he was stranded in prehistoric earth at the time. Therefore it is quite possible that he might have remembered the number of letters incorrectly. YY, 14:35, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Would the Real Meaning of Life Please Stand Up?

Seems there's more on The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy here than anything else ;)

Anyways, the meaning of life is simple...

The purpose of life is, and I quote, "To better oneself through forming mutually beneficial relationships". The actual meaning of life is a personal thing, and is for each individual to discover.

If an eight word summary is too wordy for you, it can be summed up with a single word -- live. Think of this not just as a simple verb, but as a command (either from God, for those who are religious, or from the entire Universe for the atheists). The all important will to live that drives all forms of life.

The statement on the purpose of life is obvious, and based completely on how life exists and evolved on this planet.

Meaning cannot truly be imposed upon the masses. There will always be someone who doesn't agree. The purpose, however is clear. If society fails to establish and maintain a mutually beneficial relationship with each other and the entire planet, then we will go the way of the dinosaur. --Thoric 20:14, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Hmmm. Purpose is just as subjective as Meaning when it comes to life. While I would agree that the sentiment expressed in your purpose is fine and upstanding, I couldn't possibly agree that it applies to myself (or anyone else for that matter). The world is full of examples of people who clearly don't subscribe to it. Furthermore, speaking as a biologist, your purpose is very anthropocentric. What about all those other living creatures for whom mutually beneficial relationships with other living creatures play no part in their lives? Let alone "bettering oneself". Anyway, just felt I couldn't let you get away with the above. ;) --Plumbago 13:14, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

P.S. Of course, now reading your posting properly, I realise that it was posted in 2004, not 2005. And here was me thinking I was hot on your trail. Doh!

I beg to differ, and being a biologist you should clearly realize that no forms of life can exist solely on their own. Even predators rely on the existence of prey. It is to the advantage of predators not to hunt their prey to extinction, otherwise they will also become extinct. No man is an island, and neither is any other form of life. We are all connected. There are no living creatures for whom mutually beneficial relationships with other living creations play no part in their lives. Please provide some examples of said creatures which do not consume nutrients provided by some other lifeform in even an indirect way. You must be talking of some sort of toxic sludge consuming bacterium... but was this sludge not provided by humans? Do we not benefit from them? --Thoric 21:44, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Biologists are aware that there's no teleology -- purpose -- in biology. And they know that predators (with the occasional exception of humans) are not conscious that hunting prey to extinction will lead to their own extinction, don't care about such things, and certainly don't act upon them. Many populations (including human) and even species have in fact become extinct due to exhausting their food supply (the dinosaurs are not among them -- most dinosaur species became extinct primarily due to a meteor plowing into the Yucatan peninsula 65 million years ago, but at least one branch survives, having evolved into birds). As for the fact that all living things function within a dynamic ecology -- of course, but this has no bearing whatsoever on either the "purpose" or "meaning" of life. These phrases are in fact incoherent or malformed (which is one of the reasons why analytical philosophers generally have nothing to do with them). "life" is the object, but "purpose" and "meaning" require subjects to have the purpose or intend the meaning, and no such subject has been specified. The phrase "the meaning of life" is literally meaningless. -- 68.6.40.203 22:34, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

The will to live is evidence enough of a purpose. I know full well that the reason that current predators did not become extinct is due to natural selection. That does not negate the fact that their existence is codependent on a mutually beneficial relationship with other life within their habitat. Biology may not provide an answer to the questions of meaning and purpose, but it does provide evidence to support that a purpose exists. One must make observations to come to conclusions, and provide evidence to back up claims. Basically what I'm saying is that observation of natural selection draws the conclusion that the purpose of life is to better oneself through forming mutually beneficial relationships. Life that evolves and survives is life that follows said purpose. Life that is completely destructive without limits will eventually become extinct. What is incoherent about that? --Thoric 16:52, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

This is very confused. "Life that evolves and survives is life that follows said purpose." -- no, all life evolves, and that which survives is that which happened to have survivable traits relative to its environment; it was "fit" in biological terms. Dinosaurs dominated the world for 150 million years but gave way to mammals 65 million years ago not because mammals were better, but because they were much smaller and happened to be able to survive the consequences of a massive meteor strike. "bettering oneself" is a concept foreign to modern evolutionary biology, which rejects teleology (purpose, goals). -- 68.6.40.203 02:35, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

To evolve is to better oneself. It may not be conscious or intentional, but it is consequential. One trait necessary to survival of a species is some form of cooperation -- a mutually beneficial relationship with others. My argument is that to better oneself through forming mutually beneficial relationships best sums up our observation of evolution, and to take that statement further, I propose that it is also a hint to the original purpose of life. --Thoric 16:35, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

As I have already noted, in biology "to evolve" does not mean to better oneself. Your "argument" is an unsubstantiated claim that has no support from biological science, and in fact has been explicitly rejected by evolutionary biologists. -- 68.6.40.203 07:32, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

To evolve does imply improvement -- betterment. Evolution is the change from lower/worse state, to a higher/better state. How is that not bettering oneself, or one's species? I never said it was a conscious effort, but it certainly is the end result -- that species who evolve cooperativeness are the species that survive in the long run. --Thoric 19:26, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

HHGTTG

(Douglas Adams' answer was "42").

True, but that was not the answer to the question "What is the meaning of life?", which the current first paragraph implies. Those who have read the book knows that the question remains unknown, and 42 is NOT the meaning of life, but the "answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything".

Suppose someone was looking for an investigation of the question...

I included a 'see also' to 3 starting points in wikipedia. Each of these contains 'see also' connections to any other 'see also' that anyone could want. I would be against expanding the 'see also' beyond 3 entries Loxley 12:42, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC).

There Can Ultimately Be Only One True Meaning To Life

I think the most realistic meaning of life comes from science. It is to replicate our DNA as much as possible and to try to spread the human race throughout our solar system and then possibly the universe through the pursuit of technology. If humans remain here on earth then in about 6 billion years (if we're not extinct) our sun will begin to die and our planet would become uninhabitable. Therefore, if the meaning of life isn't the pursuit of scientific knowledge then it ultimately becomes the pursuit of death and extinction (assuming there's no afterlife).

G.Savva

6 Mar 2005 edit

I re-wrote the following paragraph to be less "sure of itself." That is, "science" doesn't 'tell' us this, but some theories 'suggest' it. I also updated the theory to cover some more recent theories regarding what the event was (i.e. a comet rather than lightning bolt?), and IMO improved the flow substantially. --Jacius 03:52, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Science tells us that life on earth was created by a lightning bolt that electrified a mix of molecules and turned them into a very primitive cell. This cell was capable of copying itself, and by that, life had started. The elements these molecules consisted of, (by us named "organic") are the only elements that could create such complex objects. Thus, life started with a coincidence, and also developed by coincidences, and it will continue this way, unless we fumble with genes too much. Since everything which has got to do with life is based on accidental circumstances, there is reason to believe that life has no reason at all, from a scientific point of view.

Science doesn't even suggest it; the notion that a lightning bolt (or comet? good grief -- perhaps you're thinking of panspermia, which is a different hypothesis for the origin of life) could turn a mix of molecules into a cell is ludicrous; it took millions or billions of years from the time the first self-replicating molecule arose until the first cell developed. And there's no reason to think that there was an "event" -- it was an ongoing process. The language in the article is still ignorant nonsense that reduces our current scientific knowledge to something below the level found on a cereal box. See the Origin of life article for a far more accurate discussion. But really, none of this is relevant to "meaning", and it quite mixes up things that are orthogonal -- there are plenty of scientists who are religious and whose views on meaning and purpose run the spectrum; science itself is mute on such issues. -- 68.6.40.203 22:44, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

It's about 4 things

For most people the Meaning of Life is fundamentally about 4 things: love, sex, money and happiness. Here's why:

Love because, among other things, it drives parents to care for their children
Sex because it drives us to spread our DNA and propagate the species.
Money because so much of our time and energy is devoted to earning it or spending it.
Happiness because even if you have love, sex and money, that doesn't necessarily make you happy. Happiness, spirituality and a sense of well being is something we all strive for.

--Peter 02:43, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

These may be what most people value (although I think that's a very truncated view), but value and meaning are two very different things, and neither have much to do with "life", per se. The problem with "the meaning of life" is that it's a ludicrous grammatical construct, as ludicrous as "the meaning of height" or "the meaning of snow". Words and sentences are the sorts of things that can have meaning; life, height, snow, and most other things are not. -- 68.6.40.203 23:08, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

-- People have to find their own meaning in in life.

I do not know if others share my oncerns, but I believe that this article trivalizes the actual philosophical roots and implications of the issue at hand. There are countless works that present their perspective on this issue and I believe that they are understated in exchange for what is ulimately trivial 21st century media. I would definitely vote for multiple amaendments to this particular article and welcome more insightful pieces.

j.bancroft

I do not know if others share my concerns, but I believe that this article trivalizes the actual philosophical roots and implications of the issue at hand. There are countless works that present their perspective on this issue and I believe that they are understated in exchange for what is ulimately trivial 21st century media. I would definitely vote for multiple amaendments to this particular article and welcome more insightful pieces.

j.bancroft

Is this article really necessary in this dimensions?

I just did quite some shortenings in the article - mainly I removed the attempts to analytically devide the question into its components, as well as any parts that attempted to give a conclusive answer.

While it might be an interesting idea to do pioneer research on the wiki platform, that is not the purpose of wikipedia. Instead an encyclopedia should try to summarize the knowledge which is already accepted as such by large portions of humanity. As I wrote in the introduction to the changed article, the question of the "meaning of life" as an attempt to answer the basic question of ethics. Most of the content of this article should thus, imho, be integrated in the article about ethics and related.

--Ados 08:20, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

It's not clear /what/ "the meaning of life" is meant to address, because the phrase is literally meaningless. What many people seem to mean by it is "why was life (specifically, the questioner's life) created?", which a) has nothing to do with ethics and b) radically begs the question c) can only be answered by further question begging. -- 68.6.40.203 23:26, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

An emerging but yet unclassified school of thought in philosophy addresses the quandary in a humanistic manner. Rather than seeing it as a deterministic quest for the entire humanity, it treats the MOL or the Meaning of Life at an individual level. The MOL simply is a meaning that one derives from getting between A and B, and the essence is the journey itself. The criteria to the understanding of this simplified philosophy is to come up individually, what one believes to be one's starting point "A", and what are one's goals "B". The process one goes through will become the meaning of life for this individual. Naturally within this reasoning it is predicated that all of us must be protagonistic and positive about life to begin with, to be able to view carpe diem, or carpe vivere about one's destiny.

This sounds like existential philosophy - sort of. It seems like someone has put their own theory up here. Better to put 'existential philosophers beleive the individual must find their own meaning in life' or whatever.

Undefined question

It's a dumb question because it lacks definition. If you're asking why you were called into existence, your parents just wanted to show each other a good time. If you're asking what you're expected to do while you're living, you should first ask who would care. Just relax, get naked once in a while, live a little. It isn't as difficult as some try to make it seem.

To ask the meaning of something assumes it has meaning. On the other hand, it could just be a cry for help to understand something. An idiom for "I'm confused, somebody please sort this out for me." 24.18.171.99 05:23, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Simple Explanation

The meaning of life is growth. Life is preservation of energy given off by the sun. We're here becuase of complexity being a form of storage. That complexity led to sentience. Sentience is meaning. Meaning is a bunch of patterns, which brain cells form to each other as we interact with our environment through our senses.

The above offers three different claims as to what meaning is, none of which are correct. The meaning of something is that which is signified by it. But life is not a signifier, so the question is meaningless. The above also makes several other erroneous claims; for instance, solar cells and cow dung preserve energy given off by the sun, but they aren't alive. And complexity is not a form of storage; the complexity of something is usually defined in terms of the information required to describe it, which has nothing to do with solar energy. -- 68.6.40.203 23:38, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

42

I question why 42 is listed under "Popular views". One, it is listed already under "Humorous and miscellaneous views". Two, it is only one man's POV (i.e. Douglas Adam's) and a joke at that (I agree it is quite funny). Three, if we are to list all significant numbers which individuals interpret as the meaning of life then the list would be endless; 2012, 33, 666 for instance are not listed. I have deleted the reference. --nirvana2013 11:36, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

I think he was just trying to be being funny, like me and that slogan from the old Superman TV show. 24.18.171.99 05:17, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Sorry about listing '42' under popular views-- had not made it around to the discussion page. --Valve 18:10, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

"Attention"

The article is in desperate need of a thorough overhaul. I've made a (largely negative, though including a copy-edit) start, but oh dear... The section science was obscure, and anyway largely irrelevant. The section on philosophy is almost as bad, covering some of the most important philosophers who actually wroote something interesting on the issue in a single sentence. The section on religion is also thin, and the section on "spirituality" was three paragraphs devoted to popular writers of new-age/spiritualist books. The section humour, though a bit bloated, is the fullest. I'll try to attract attention from other editors, and will (when I can) start work on the bits about which I'm knowledgeable: science, philosophy, and religion. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 22:59, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Plenty of Attention

This article has been and is still getting plenty of attention. One look at the history reveals that. As the interested editors become more familiar with this subject, the article continues to improve. I believe it has been a learning experience for all of us.

Just because one opinionated viewer freaks out about what he sees is no reason to muck up the article with a useless template. It detracts from the article. I'm removing it.

I welcome recruiting efforts to bring more editors to this article. But the article already does a pretty good job of that on its own.

24.18.171.99 02:07, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

although i'm too lazy to change it myself, i'd be wary of leaving the only mention of Nietzsche under "Nihilism", when that's clearly not any accurate descriptor for what his philosophies ASSERTED. While he did talk much of Nihilism, he was warning us against it, not promoting it. Besides, IMO, Nietzsche was an existentialist.

Removed Large Section 11/29/05

I removed the following:

But atheism is also a relative term. Most people would consider themselves atheists with respect to the ancient Babylonian, Egyptian, Greek and Roman Gods. Most Christians, Jews, and Muslims are atheists with respect to the eastern religions Buddhism, Hinduism, and Taoism for this very same reason, and vice versa for the Buddhists, Hindus, and Taoists in relation to the western religions. Though “atheist” is most commonly applied to those who do not believe in the God nor Gods represented in any of these religions, even though they also claim that these “mythos” are just as silly and were just as obviously made up. Though many atheists who disbelieve the contempory religions, consider themselves agnostics with respect to the issue of the existence of a superbeing in general, arguing that the existence or non-existence of such a being cannot be verified, while you can see the obvious influence of the hand of man throughout history on the creation and development of the various mythoi (contemporary religions included).
It can be observed that, because atheism is defined by the absence of a god, atheists are defined by what they do not believe rather than what they do believe. In this context, many non-believers see atheism as a derogatory label applied to them by theists. Many atheists, therefore, consider their atheism secondary to their primary philosophical position, whatever that may be, preferring to be defined by what they do believe. Atheism is a component of many other philosophies and origin theories, including evolutionism, existentialism, Darwinism, humanism, nihilism, and transhumanism, to name but a few. After all, if there is no God, then the meaning of life is left up to Man, to discover or define.

I removed these two paragraphs because while they may be fairly accurate and well-written, they are strictly the philosophy of atheism -- not the philosophy of atheism with respect to the meaning of life, which is what belongs in the article. The preceding paragraph (which remains in the article) covers all the ground that these paragraphs talk about. --Michael ^(talk) 16:10, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

But Those paragraphs were correct as to what atheism is, whereas the current article is not.

--Above comment unsigned by 68.6.40.203 (talk)

The article is not describing atheism, it's describing atheists' views on the meaning of life. Even the paragraph that remains talks too much about what atheism is and too little about what atheists have said in verifiable sources on the meaning of life. It's just uncited conjecture at the moment, and pretty bad conjecture at that. For describing atheism, the article should just defer to the atheism article. For describing atheistic views on the meaning of life, the article should cite sources. Right now it does neither...but adding those paragraphs back in certainly won't help. --Michael ^(talk) 02:42, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I wasn't suggesting that they should be added back, but removing them and leaving an inaccurate paragraph was even worse. As for "uncited conjecture", I fear that that's what the whole article mostly is. It starts out with "Many people believe that the meaning of life is:", but that already begs the question; it's not clear to me that anyone believes that any of those things is "the meaning of life"; the meaning of something cannot be to do something -- that's a category mistake. -- 68.6.40.203 02:43, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Nice article

Just want to say that his article is pleasant to read:-) dan

Science section needs attn

Thx for the work on this good article. I made a couple easy edits to the science section, but IMO it needs an overhaul and i'm not the person to do it. The 1st par sounds like philosophers agree on mechanism, which isn't true. There are general flow/clarity problems about whether and how science addresses the m o l, and the 2nd par seems pretty contradictory to other par's. The 3rd paragraph ended in total confusion for me -- hope my change expresses the intended point. Perhaps par 4-7 could be much shorter, simply telling/linking what fields of science address what aspects of m o l questions. No need for (incomplete) lists of theories, as in par 5, which privileges physics. And i think the semiotics connection is too much of a stretch; lots of other areas (linguistics, neurology) address aspects of how we perceive our world and make 'meaning' of it in very general ways, but thats more than needs to be addressed in an article about the philosophical m o l. Hope that helps, "alyosha" 21:51, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Wait a minute!

nobody knows the meaning of life. I think there should be more emphasis on this.

How do you know "nobody knows the meaning of life"? --nirvana2013 11:42, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, OK, but there is no way of ascertaining if anyone knows the meaning of life. So perhaps more could be made of the fact that some people believe there isn't one, and the related observation that there appears to be no objective criteria for discerning if anyone knows the meaning? Or something ... ;) --Plumbago 12:07, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

That's just silly. Everyone knows the meaning of life. Some people just don't know it. -Silence 07:40, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Dictionary

You wanna know the meaning of life? Just look it up at wikt:Life! lol

FLaRN2005 03:22, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

a little help...?

Hey all, interesting page. A bit busy, perhaps, but considering the SCOPE...anyway, I felt compelled to tinker a bit with esoteric/other, (the phrase "to have purpose" struck me as somehow, well, lacking) Having done this I went back to the first paragraph, as something there had caught my eye. It was the claim that "the vagueness of the query is inherent in the word meaning". It seems to me that the word is may be an equally, perhaps even more likely culprit for any vaguery (not to mention the definition of vaguery!). I thought about making a note, and linking it, but this required...finagling. (see talk:is) Now, having arranged for that, I came back and found the word in the next half-dozen or so questions in the paragraph, and, well, I think I can see why the page needs trimming. However, being a newbie I ain't about to hack up the intro, though I'm certain it needs clarification, so, little help? I am just curious, 'cause this may really be the first opportunity this world has had to conceivably come to an actual concensus on this subject, and I for one would love to see this article whittled down to one sentence,(Not likely, I know, but I for one also like to see ALL concepts whittled down to single statements, or aphorisms, if you will) and, well...I'm curious. Awaiting a reply, TLM posted 01/29/06

I agree with you the dissection of the question does not really help the article. It is very much a philosophers way of going about the meaning of a question or word (see the article truth, for example, and their 8 archive talk pages!!?). Philosophers have been forcibly airing their complicated theories on truth for over 6,000 years and still have not got anywhere. Anyway, one of the interpretations of the question "What is the meaning of life?" should be, as pointed out by FLaRN2005 above, what is the meaning of "life"? (i.e. wikt:Life). I know this is simple and obvious, but we should cover this basic question in the article. After all some things are alive (humans, plants, animals etc) and some are dead (a corpse, petroleum, rocks etc). With an afterlife, the explanation would have to go into greater depth. --nirvana2013 12:16, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Personal Appeal

I removed the personal appeal of Alan MacDonald, how interesting it may be: wikipedia is clear, do not publish own research: here is what it read:

PLEASE READ - [I am Alan MacDonald, a 6th year student at Wick High School, I have thought deeply about this question and contery to the protests by a physics teacher, i believe the meaning of life is X (X meaning nothing or emptiness). This sounds stupid, but if you think aboiut it, every piece of MATTER has an ANTI-MATTER, when antimatter and matter meet, they anihilate each other, therefore every thing can be destroyed including theories. so X and anti X meet and anihilate each other leaving nothing. Life is just a lucky chance that can be taken away at any time.Dont take it for granted.]

a little help, please

I expounded on the "purpose" thing again, but could someone please tell me why the word is posesses less potential for confusing the question than meaning. I can tell at first glance what meaning "means", but is "is " a silly word, and largely serves to render the question unanswerable, no? TLM

GOD

THE MEANING OF LIFE IS TO BE A GOOD HUMBLE CATHOLIC AND MAKE SURE YOU ALL OTHER DENOMINATIONS AND RELIGIONS CAUSE THEY ARE WRONG AND BE GOOD AND KIND AND BELIEVE IN JESUS IVE BEEN A GOOD CATHOLIC GIRL FOR 17 YEARS AND THEN I FIND THIS PAGE QUESTIONING LIFE

If you are Catholic, which I doubt, you are not being the greatest advertisement for your faith. But I suppose you never thought of that. Here are some good promoters: Philip Berrigan, Dorothy Day and John Dear. --nirvana2013 13:22, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't think the purpose of this page is to promote your own faith... Encyclopedic articles must maintain an air of neutrality and skepticism. If you want to come and share what your perspective is, being catholic, that is perfectly fine. For myself, being a member of the LDS church, we have taught that the purpose of life is to come to earth, gain a body, gain experience in choosing the good from the evil, and reap the fruits of our faith and our works in the next life. BUT that is only one side of the story. There being a million different religions out there, we all have our beliefs, doubts, and questions. - user jpagel

Grammatical Approach

I see a couple of statements approximating this, but I believe this is worth adding.

Grammar and our question? One might use the term "meaning" in various ways but in the case of "What is the meaning of shoes?" meaning must refer to something outside the sentence. Most sentences or their context supply redundencies which aid in their intrepretation, thus, " Shoes allow us to keep from hurting our feet, people will think us strange barefoot, cats like to poop in them etc"; these statement don't express meaning directly ( any comments anybody???, is there an indirect 'meaning'), but the q, "what is the meaning of life" is silly unless we assign an external object to "meaning". "Meaning" in this case Requires A Grammatical Object, without which we only have a phrase and no question At All. Add such an object and The Q becomes trivial indeed.

Of course by reversing time we might say the meaning of life is in the sacrifice and struggle of our ancestors, but this is tricky logically too but immensely satisfying to me. I'm sorry I'm no logician or grammarian on this and I would be grateful for any serious or interested comments. Wouldn't it be nice to put this one to bed for ever!? Wblakesx 17:28, 14 August 2006 (UTC)wblakesx

I think it (Meaning of Life) is a non question theoretically but seemingly the most important question emotionally! Asking the question seems to imply that there IS a meaning EXTERNAL to human existence but if that meaning IS truly external to human experience, it cannot be understood by humans! Gary

This article doesn't belong for 2 reasons... 1. The meaning of life is opinion not fact which has no use in an encyclopedia 2. I'm not going to lie to you, I find some parts of this article very offensive

1. I disagree. Stating that some people think this, others think that *is* stating facts, albeit facts about people's opinions. I think this is useful.

2. Which parts? What offends you about them?

Edit

I edited the 'replish' bit in the Genesis quote, that theory has been mostly discredited.

Copyright violation?

Under "Spiritual views", there are two long paragraphs labeled "The designed Universe", which are apparently quoted directly from The Science of Soulmates by William Henderson. Besides not making much sense, I worry that they may be too long to qualify as "fair use" and suspect that they ought to be removed.

Section "William Henderson" moved to talk page for discussion

The following big section moved from the article for discussion:

The designed Universe.

Science has theorised ways in which the universe can generate all its complexity by pure accident, but since the odds against these accidents occurring are unbelievably huge, science has therefore revealed that there is an enormous probability that the universe is non- accidental. Or, simply put, science has shown overwhelming statistical evidence that the universe is designed. Because of this, scientists have conceded that there seems to be some sort of underlying order, meaning that there is a non-accidental system at work. To take this further, once we accommodate the notion of some sort of non-accidental order we cannot escape applying rationality to that order and this leads to the conclusion of perfection. That is, if the universe is ordered it must be ordered for a purpose, and logically it must be perfectly capable of carrying out that purpose.

We can’t have it both ways. Science’s methods have revealed that the probability that the universe is unfolding according to some underlying order or design is enormous. Once conceded, scientists must not avoid applying rationality to this order; the same rationality that exposed the order in the first place. Once we admit to order we are saying that the universe is non-accidental. So, boom! We have existence - ordered existence. A non-accidental system! Order can’t come about by accident; therefore it must have already been there. This order, which underlies all existence, cannot be flawed. Therefore this order must be perfectly capable of organising the universe.

This order also must have a reason for existing. It makes no sense at all to have an ordered system for no reason. If there is no reason or necessity for the order, we would have no order. Now if, for clarification, we call the reason for the order meaning, then we can see that that the universe is a system whose purpose is to fulfil that meaning. We should then be able to find the meaning through deduction by looking at what is going on in the universe, remembering that absolutely everything must be a part of the design, including us!

Scientists and researchers who have admitted to the overwhelming evidence for a design have reasoned that the design seems to be geared around bringing consciousness into existence. And this makes sense, because if the living universe is to be fulfilled then it would need to be self-aware. To be properly aware of its Self, the universe would have to be an intimate part of its own awareness. In other words, to be self-aware is not the same as other aware beings gazing upon you. You must be that awareness. Therefore the Self of the universe must be the highly aware beings within the universe. Since we are self-aware, aware of the universe and aware that we are aware of it all we must be the Self of the universe, the self of existence. Since we are capable of knowing, feeling and understanding all of existence then we are the awareness of existence. Existence, therefore, must be two, because we are two distinct beings: male and female. This argument may seem circular, but it’s not; the argument has a source and a deduction. The source is the order that underlies all existence that logic tells us must be perfectly capable of organising the universe, and the deduction is that all that is around us must be the result of the design.

If we are the awareness of the Self of existence then the beings or source of this Self must be non-aware, or asleep The need of the two to awaken answers the endless regress question which asks that there be a reason for an ultimate being’s or a god’s existence. What’s more is that we know that this is a valid self-contained reason because it is also our own reason for existence. And this is the final confirmation: if the universe is capable of reflecting its meaning perfectly, then we should, as the consciousness of the universe, be the perfect reflection of this meaning, and we are.

[P129 The Science of Soulmates, By William Henderson, Booksurge NewYork 2002]

Concerns:

Assuming this is all a copy from that book, it seems a huge copy/paste and could (or should) be summarized, wikipedia is not normally a place for huge copy/pastes. It is capable of being summarized as "William Henderson the author of ___ gives his view as....."
It seems either highly POV or simply mistaken. It states: "the odds against these accidents occurring are unbelievably huge, science has therefore revealed that there is an enormous probability that the universe is non-accidental... science has shown overwhelming statistical evidence that the universe is designed... scientists have conceded that there seems to be some sort of... non-accidental system at work... Once conceded, scientists must not avoid applying rationality to this order... A non-accidental system! Order can’t come about by accident... Existence, therefore, must be two, because we are two distinct beings: male and female..." As best I can tell this is not representative of the views of "sceince" or "most scientists" nor is there "generally accepted overwhelming statistical evidence", nor is it "mostly" interpreted this way.
Likewise the statements that assert order "cannot" come from chaos, what scientists "must not" do, and that there must be "two" and so on, slip into personal belief of the editor or author and in this context probably misrepresent science and scientists' majority views.
The section is too long a copy/paste to be apppropriate usage.

This section needs summarizing into an "Author X's view is", and reflect both views, that most of the above facts stated by the author are not representative in fact of science or scientists views, and are strongly contested by many. FT2 (Talk) 21:23, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

the notion of a designer is attributed to the notion of god, and hence understainding the meaning through relgion. this has already been disccused, and so it adds nothing to the article but the author's name.--84.228.165.214 08:47, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Haisch cite

It seems that Bernard Haisch added a citation to his own book to this and many other articles. See also

for other edits apparently pushing the scientifically highly controversial POV of Haisch. ---CH 10:37, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

47 in Star Trek

You mention the appearance of 47 in Star Trek:

This is an obvious reference to the "Star Trek" series where the number 47 is heavily featured (It does for example occur in every single episode of "Star Trek: The Next Generation").

I did not know about this until I read your article. However, some sources suggest 47 did not begin to appear regularly in "Star Trek: The Next Generation" until season 4. See here: The 47s --La Loir Noir 09:26, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Moved this paragraph from the talk page to here for discussion...

A lateral view of the problem, 'The Meaning of Life', may result in the following explanation - Death. From a philosophical point of view, the end result - for which no alternative exists - of life is but death. Every person is born into this world, and will inevitably die irrespective of what life they lived; rich, poor, upper class, clever, disabled etc. There is only one constant in the existence of a human being.

The above paragraph is very poorly written, and under closer observation doesn't make much sense. Here's my take on this hunk of text:

First of all, the position isn't any more prevelant than those contained in the body of the article, and therefore it doesn't belong in the lead section of the page any more than any other position presented on the page. If this philosophical musing is to be included, it should go in the Philosophical views section.
How is it a lateral view, are we looking at it sideways? That death goes hand-in-hand with, or is side-by-side with life is figurative poetry; it conveys no message, it's just art. Death comes after life, and therefore is either behind it (because it follows it), or is in front of it (because if you are alive death is in the future, ahead of you, waiting), depending how you look at it. But sideways? (Shakes head slowly).
The opening paragraph doesn't present the meaning of life as a problem, but as a question. The paragraph above refers to it as a problem, but doesn't explain how it is a problem. "Meaning of life" is just a phrase. That we don't necessarily know what the meaning of life is, could be a problem, but the writer doesn't say this. And if that's what the writer meant, then we're simply back to the question "What is the meaning of life?"
Then the writer poses death as the explanation, or answer?, to the problem/quesiton. But there's no clarification as to which context of the question he is answering. The queston itself is vague and subject to a number of interpretations (all of which are presented in the opening paragraph). Which way is he interpretting it?
He points out that from a philosophical point of view the end of life is death, and that no alternatives exist, framing life as invariable. But life is variable, some lives are much longer than others, opening up an alternative to death: death later instead of death now.
Is death the only constant? Isn't that "everyone lives" also a constant? Even though people live differently, and for different lengths of time, the very fact that they all existed is the same for everyone. Another constant. Therefore, that "death is the only constant" is blatantly erroneous.
The author doesn't explain how his observations constitute the meaning of life. How can the mere end of something be the entire meaning of it? He leaves this issue totally untouched.
Just an important thing to note: Life at first was never meant for death. The bacteria and even some of the simplest animals you see in the world today are directly related to ancestors billions of years ago. These organisms are biologically immortal and so have never died. Most of them continue dividing and dividing over and over again. They can thus be said to be billions of years old, and have not yet died. It is only in the evolutionary chain of more complex plants and animals that death becomes present. Therefore it is not truly correct to say that the meaning of life is death.

Because the passage makes little if any sense, I'm for removing it altogether. If it can be rewritten (or its source citation provided), then it should be moved to the Philosophical views section, since it poses itself as a philosophical point of view. --Medulla oblongata 19:23, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Unified Theory of Human Existence

I moved the following extract here, because complete source information was not provided, and because I couldn't track down where it came from.

What if human beings were simply animals? Then by observing other animals it might be possible to uncover meaning from their life patterns. Such as the requirement to ensure the survival of their particular species. An objective pursued through the unwitting deployment of individual variation and aptitude. In an endeavour to counter each threat to their collective existence. Such an observation might imply that the meaning of life is life itself, ensuring continuity toward attainment of an ultimate formation. In other words, the subconscious quest for an entity-form or organization, which no eventuality could annihilate.

Yet surely, the meaning of human life could not be so rudimentary? Since humans and animals differ in a vast number of respects. For example, in the ability to exchange complex information. The examination of which quickly establishes, that no two of our kind experience the nature of shared existence in an identical fashion. However, unless reality can exist in multiple states simultaneously, the majority of such perceived variation must be introduced by individuals themselves. Currently, each feels confident in maintaining a belief, that their evaluation of life derives from personal experience of actual reality. That they are wholly justified, in claiming their assessment as correct while dismissing conflicting appraisals as incorrect. But how could such a massive contradiction be plausible? Perhaps, if not a single human being experienced true reality.

Because everything that we term “experience” originates in an organ, totally encased within a sealed protective enclosure. Inside a detached device, remote from any form of tangible involvement with that which it purports to know intimately and comprehend effectively. Yet, any notion formed in isolation can be individual in nature and subjective in content. In effect then, any genuine similarity between an inner recreation of reality and the outer true reality, would be restricted. Limited to those portions of entire actual reality which our external sensory sensors were capable of accurately detecting, encoding, and re-transmitting. In addition to that dexterity which the brain would need to apply in order to interpret these transformed signals. Utilising the utmost quality of memory-maintained comparative material, required to perform a necessarily precise interpolation.

Regrettably, a lack of exactness in any of these sequential operations would tend toward the creation of erroneous conclusions. Accordingly, all manner of illogical opinion, confused conviction, or fanciful explanation concerning anything, including the meaning of life, could then result. Permitting, for instance, one to classify certain acts as either good or evil, the incontrovertible proof of a complex struggle between opposing supernatural forces. While also allowing another to categorize those same events, as the simple manifestation of diverse survival strategies. Ultimately however, selection of any alternate, in preference to continuity of life as the primary objective of our kind, risks incurring a common fatal consequence. That our species will not endure for long enough, to discover which hypothesis if any was correct. (Condensed extract from a unified theory of human existence, omitting detailed analogies, examples, explanations, and reasoning.)

Before this can be reinserted into the article, we should determine its copyright status. Also, it is a bit long. Should it go in the article, or in an article of its own? But first, we really need to resolve the copyright issue. Does anybody know where this came from, who the original author is, when it was published, and when and by whom? --Medulla oblongata 21:07, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Ethics vs. Spirituality

Some of the popular beliefs on the meaning of life seem to be in the wrong category, rather, is it more ethical or spiritual to become one with god? Reasons such as that are listed under ethical. "To work for justice and democracy" is listed under spiritual. Granted it can get ambiguous depending on your interpretation of the words ethical and spiritual, but considering that such beliefs should only be put into one category or the other in this article, perhaps choosing the one that is more accurate is a better idea.

Spoiler Warning

I laughed so hard, I hit my head on my desk. Beliefs in the meaning of life are a SPOILER that GIVE AWAY THE ENDING? AAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA.. Okay... I'm going to leave it in there without editing it out because it's just too classic. I'll let other wikipedians decide if they see fit to leave it a spoiler. ---Thoughtfix

Argh! Which idiot put a spoiler warning UNDER where it says mice are the hyper intelligent creatures? Thanks for ruining my bloody book.

Mathematical Approach

The mathematical approach involves formal methods of optimization whereby the probability of death is the determining factor of the cost function. The optimization used for living organisms is the evolution strategy. The desire to live is an inherent aspect of living, for if a species did not have the desire to live they would most likely be killed off by random natural events, and would thereby cease to live. This results in all living organisms, that exist in a volatile region of space, having a strong desire to live. Extending this logic can result in explaining the existence of intelligence, cooperative group working, relationships, and numerous other human emotions. --ANONYMOUS COWARD0xC0DE 04:33, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Neutrality

The paragraph on atheistic views seems to create an us-them view which might be interpreted as not maintaining a NPOV. Maybe using "them" less often will improve this.

Moved this section from the article page to here for discussion

This reads like an essay, and if very hard to follow. It even prompted someone to add a clean-up tag, which I highly agree with. I don't think it fits in the article, at least not in this form. --Chram 03:13, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree that this is too complicated. The first sentence stumps me. What is the trial of unification? There's not a Wikipedia article on it. Yes, it does sound like an essay - like there was a fear of using past tense verbs. Also, I don't understand what spacetime has to do with the meaning of life. There does seem to be some good information in there though. For example, "People are inquisitive and unconsciously motivated to increase the knowledge and technological abilities. It enables them to develop…," and also "the ultimate goal of people is to…" That stuff sounds relavent to the meaning of life. Maybe it could be cleaned up. Jecowa 07:10, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Here's the section:

Cosmological meaning of the human life

Recently the trial of the unification and generalization of cosmological, physical and biological concepts leads to the " Theory of necessity of people's participation in reoccurrence of sub - Universe". Its thesis, in another words is.: " People will create new sub- Universe " or "People go to be the new Demiurge".

The formulation of this theory is incited by the need to interpretation of the occurrence of the self-awareness ( consciousness ) of people, just 13 billion years after the so called Big Bang and the observed fast and permanent progress in the understanding of everything and fast technological progress. The authors of the theory argue that this consciousness as new neuro -physiological phenomenon is not random. They maintain that any of us is indispensable for the realization of an extremely important task.: " We are indispensable to succeed to reproduce the new real world ". In details, the authors of the theory argue that.:

The actual phase of the development of the Universe, characterized by occurrence of the self-awareness of people should be presented in the context of the evolving Universe. The contemporary cosmologists maintain that the Universe comes out from primary singularity, it means from a very dense bunch of matter or rather ' quantum foam '. The singularity existed above time. During the first cosmologic era the primary physical particles appeared. The early Universe was composed from Hydrogen and Helium. More heavy elements occurred inside of the older stars. We know already that many stellar systems are characterized by the presence of planets.

At the surface of the planets ( at least on our planet ) so called biological life has emerged . Recently, after 13 billion years of cosmic evolution the Homo sapiens sapiens appeared. Human beings ( as well as dolphins ) are characterized by the self-awareness. It is almost improbable that the occurrence of biological life and consciousness was random. It is rather a cosmic necessity. The existence of a galaxy is probably the indispensable condition. It would be difficult to imagine a planetary stellar system with the biological life on the surface of the planet existing in the intergalactic cosmic void . If we will admit that the biological life is a cosmic necessity the quick formation of galaxies in the expanding universe should be comprehended as an important step in the creation of the elementary conditions for the occurrence of the biological life. Probably the massive centers of Bose-Einsteincondensates existing in the spiral galaxy are indispensable for the promotion of the phenomena of life and consciousness ( see the chapter " 11.1.3. Cosmology of consciousness " in Matti Pitkanen's on line book [1]

The appearance of human self- awareness is indispensable to take decisions about important acts related to the fate of human beings. People are inquisitive and unconsciously motivated to increase the knowledge and technological abilities. It enables them to develop the communication and memorizing systems. They quickly transforms our planet in a kind of a huge global brain. It is only first step to much more far reaching goals. Just now people want to analyze, record and understand the genetic code. In fact they want to understand the code representation of everything.

Frank Tipler, the author of so called Anthropic Principle ( John D. Barrow, Frank J. Tipler: The Antropic Cosmological Principle. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1986.) [2] and the author of " The physics of immortality ", who postulate in it probably unique other similar trial to search the meaning of the human life in cosmological development foresees that the descendants of people will build, in the far future, the huge macro - computer based on the matter of collapsing universe. It will enable the emulation ( reconstruction, in fact resurrection ) of all people who lived before.

Frank Tipler' s theory works good only on the assumption that the time space of the Universe is closed and that it will collapse in the future. On 1998, just after the formulation of Tipler's theory ( 1995 ) the astronomers found strong arguments that our Universe is " open " and that its time space will expand endlessly.

So, the " Theory of necessity of people's participation in reoccurrence of sub - Universe" takes into account this settlement, however the theory acknowledge the same drive to build the macro-computer and to implement the essence, especially brains and human psyche on so called second level of implementation. The development of the global Internet, the urge to construct so called virtual reality, the main postulate of all religions about further existence in ' other world ' and the recent vision of many science fiction writers ( Greg Egan, Vernon Vinge ), what give usually a good insights push us to postulate that really people will ' scan ' themselves and emulate in the cyberspace. It seems that it is necessary to obtain a much faster and intense development of the thinking and cognition.

Thus the ultimate goal of people is to do something with the sad vision of cooling, dilatating, infinitely expanded time-space of our Universe. Probably the descendant of us will try to utilize a massive black hole as a tool appropriate to begin the next offspring Universe [3] The mighty knowledge, technology and power is necessary however to program and tune the characteristics of the " next Big ( Little ) Bang in such a manner that the offspring Universe will obey also the Anthropic Principle. It would cause the similar evolution of the offspring Universe, who should lead to the occurrence of human beings, what will signify in fact the 'reincarnation' of the human species.

Thus people and their descendant of the present Universe will want to master the ability to tune the next Big Bang: Therefore they need to decode apart of the genomic information also the patterns for all reality, including the pattern of the physical and chemical characteristics of the matter. The code representation of all objects should be determined. People, who know the scientific endeavors will agree that in fact the trial of the understanding of everything have already began.

The presented theory restore the meaning of the human life. It explain why the effort of people is valuable and that this effort will be rewarded by the possibility of reoccurrence.

Does this page belong?

I'm not really sure this page is encyclopedic, as it just enumerates different groups' views on the subject. Maybe sections in the articles on Atheism, Christianity, and the other groups that explain that group's viewpoint, as well as a section at life would be better.--Grand Slam 7 23:41, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

why ask the meaning of life?

Since the the word 'meaning' is too vaguely used in the sentence; its quite possible the the question "what is the meaning of life?" is a more lamen term to ask something more complicated? Therefore can't the question be first created so that it could ask for something more specific? Henceforth, it cannot. becuase everybody does not mean the same when they ask "what is the meaning of life?", one can ask for the meaning of thier life and the other for the meaning of the human race. plus if the answer is given, would the person be trusted enough or reveered enough to be accounted for? So, here's another question, ( in a simple term) "Who can give us the answer?".
And since that would lead into more greater research and more knowledge required, the one who can give an answer will not be found.

Yet not one has brought up the notion that 'life' is a noun, why cant the question be changed into "What is the meaning to live?" That could also be interpreted into, " why do we live?"...

Moreover, everyone who seeks for an answer, wont be satisified until it's found. So when you do find he answer, you'll accept it or deny it. Then that means everybody will search for an answer that will suite them anyways.

there should be a section included on the singularitarian veiw (where the 'meaning of life' meand the supergoal). From theis article http://sysopmind.com/tmol-faq/tmol-faq.html. Basically it goes something like this: 1)We must assume there is a meaning of life (not to do so woul be self defeating - and in abscense of certainty it is illogical to go with a self defeating possbility(one that gives no information on 'good actions". 2)We do not have enougth informaton to make a good guess at what it is yet. 3)Assumeing there is a meaning of life(a supergoal) and we do not know it. it is logical that the interim meaning of life is to find the "meaning of life"(supergoal) 4)The reason humans havn't found the meaning of life may be lack of inteligence or information. Therefore we should create superhuman inteligence(via enchancement, the singularity, AI etc) and more information (science).

(this page really needs to be protected). Douglas Adams wrote that the answer was 42. Whilst driving in central north Wales I stoped at an old tower/horse shelter which had been turned into a museum. Sure enough in the museum there was an artifact that said the meaning of the univers was 42. Can anyone refresh my memory as to the name of the town? It was on a major ( well for Wales!) road going from Hay on Wye towards the north east.

Should this article even exist?

It isn't encyclopedic at all. The entire premise of the article is based on an extremely vague ponderance of a nature probably only common in the English language or the western world. It is a pointless mish-mash of popular views, completely NPOV, and not representing a world-wide perspective. It is too long and opinionated and should be split up into seperate articles or removed altogether.

--Weldingfish 12:30, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

The meaning of life is not "an extremely vague ponderance of a nature." It is the ultimate concept and has not been answered completely. In laymans terms, no facts, but this does not mean it should be removed! It is difficult to form facts on this topic for obvious reasons. This is not a fact book. It's an encyclopedia. Look up the definition of encyclopedia.

At best, it seems to me that it needs to be entirely re-written - and probably included as a subarticle to Philosophy. It rambles, it's ill-organized, and it's extremely difficult to understand. As far as the definition of encyclopedia, try "A work containing factual articles on subjects in every field of knowledge, usually arranged alphabetically". --MatthewDBA 21:44, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree. this needs some attention if this is going to stay-serious modifications need to be done to at least the 'Popular beliefs' section. It was so upsetting [just reading that section] that I couldn't bear to read the rest of the article. An article of this quality (or lack thereof) doesn't belong in any encyclopedia-especially Wikipedia. Here is a list of things wrong with the part of this article that I could (barely) bear to read.

The "Popular beliefs" section needs serious review, of at least three different types.

1.Format
This is a list. Shouldn't it be prose? [Would that be considered part of formal tone?]
2.Redundancies
Even in list form, which is extremely bad enough, there are several redundancies: e.g.

"for sex, drugs, and rock and roll" [emph. added]
"to survive and reproduce" [emph. added]
"to have sex"
"to produce offspring through sexual reproduction"
"to attempt to have many sexual conquests (as in Arthur Schopenhauer's will to procreate)"
"to get laid"

3.Almost everything wikipedia ISN'T
original research/unverified claims
see also:"Wikipedia is not a crystal ball [and] Wikipedia is not a collection of unverifiable speculation."
NPOV? and "Wikipedia is not a soapbox" -even if you could say these lists have a reasonably able-to-be-picked-out point of view
see also:"Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information"
"When you wonder what should or should not be in an article, ask yourself what a reader would expect to find under the same heading in an encyclopedia."

I agree to a large extent...this article should not try to document the "meaning of life" as that is not fact, but opinion. The article should be an objective and brief sociological analysis of the quest for the meaning of life, with a few various beliefs that have occurred in different parts of history(must be referenced and well supported). The "popular beliefs" section should be removed...i will do my best to clean it up, but I have no expertise in this this area of history. Will someone help? The emphasis is on being shorter!--Vox Rationis 03:19, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

i've taken the liberty of largely cleaning the popular beliefs section... however, much work still needs to be done, and this article still needs to be shortened...--Vox Rationis 04:05, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I think the article as a whole is legitimate, but the "popular beliefs" section is not at all encyclopedic. As entertaining as it is, I think it should be removed. Are there any objections to doing so?

If the section needs to be retained, I would change the title to "popular ideas." (The word "beliefs" implies that there is factual material involved.) I would also cut it down to a handful of examples in each category, with the notation that these are merely examples, not a comprehensive list to be expanded. Joel Justiss 02:19, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Singularitarian view of the meaning of life

there should be a section included on the singularitarian veiw (where the 'meaning of life' meand the supergoal). From theis article http://sysopmind.com/tmol-faq/tmol-faq.html. Basically it goes something like this:

We must assume there is a meaning of life (not to do so woul be self defeating - and in abscense of certainty it is illogical to go with a self defeating possbility(one that gives no information on 'good actions".
We do not have enougth informaton to make a good guess at what it is yet.
Assumeing there is a meaning of life(a supergoal) and we do not know it. it is logical that the interim meaning of life is to find the "meaning of life"(supergoal)
The reason humans havn't found the meaning of life may be lack of inteligence or information. Therefore we should create superhuman inteligence(via enchancement, the singularity, AI etc) and more information (science). (Michael)

(Reply): Singularitarianism is a subcomponent of transhumanism, which is covered in the article. The whole philosophy section had been blanked by someone, but I've restored it. — The Transhumanist 15:21, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

I'll take a crack at your points above, in the context that you are referring to "meaning of life" as "purpose in life":

The question "What is the meaning of life?" implies that we assume there is a meaning, and that we simply don't know what it is! (If we did, we wouldn't have asked the question). On the other hand, humans are born ignorant, and will eventually get to this question if someone hasn't taken the time to fill them in. But, if you assume that knowing the answer to the question entails that the entire human race know it (and believe it), well in that context, the question will probably remain unanswered forever. But if it only takes one to know the answer for the answer to be known, there are over 6 billion chances for the answer to be known right now, and therefore it probably is (known, that is). And it might encourage you to know that...
...we've had enough information on this issue since the time of Aristotle. He and his contemporaries concluded that the concern and purpose of each of us should be the common welfare of all. This makes sense, because if we all cared about one another and helped each other, most of the problems of the world would disappear. No more violence, no more war, no more crime, no more starvation, etc.
The purpose, being open-ended, can and should be refined over time. Contributing to the common welfare is as much a skill as it is a goal, and as such can be improved.
Your question model above parallels the "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". But the assumption that we don't know what it is all about may be false. Or it may be that we did at one time know the answer, but merely forgot it. That was Mortimer J. Adler's conclusion in his book Ten Philosophical Mistakes: on the philosophical level, the ancient greek philosophers figured out the answer, but it was lost during the Dark Ages, and modern philosophers missed it when reconstructing philosophy. The tools you mentioned could be applied toward improving the common welfare, which would simultaneously improve the answer (the set of instructions on how).

I hope this helps. — The Transhumanist 16:16, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Yeah that does help. "Transhumanists argue that improved people will necessarily have improved capabilities to seek out and answer questions regarding "the meaning of life" as they see it, more so than even humans do currently." Already sums the above up nicely.

Since the purpose of knowing the meaning of life is to implement it. I suppose one person knowing it could be enough. But the ideal would be where enough people know (and believe it) to implement whatever it requires. We do not know how many this happens to be, so we should find out (along with implementing all the possible meanings of life, hopefully using some system to discriminate between the likely and unlikely answers)
I must admit I haven’t much knowledge on how the Greek philosopher conclusions. But I am of the understanding that they used intuitions as a basis for their philosophy, which are an arbitrary (although widely shared) assumption. The conclusion of the common welfare relies upon the 'badness' of the world problems. But how are the 'badness' worlds problems justified? After all doesn’t this badness rely on the meaning of life in the end, and so using badness to justify a meaning of life would be circular logic.
And 4 These make complete sense to me, after taking the assumption of the common welfare as the meaning of life.

(Michael)

Section blanking lacks consensus

DimitriRU, your removal of the original science section lacks consensus. If you'd like to remove large sections of an article, you should propose it on that article's talk page first, and express your reasons for desiring the removal. Please refrain from blanking it again until consensus has been reached. Personally, I'm against removing it, as it is geared towards beginners, whereas the Schrödinger stuff is quite advanced and may leave younger readers (or those new to philosophy and science) scratching their heads. The passage also complements the article's lead section by treating each of the five questions presented there. Note that I've left your additions in place, for the sake of more advanced readers. Please don't unilaterally chop articles down without prior discussion. Keep in mind that other people on Wikipedia have put in a great deal of time and effort on the various articles here. None of us like to see our work erased unless there is good reason to do so, determined by the wisdom of the community. — The Transhumanist 11:12, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Listing of "42" as an meaning is from Adam's book

If there is some commonly held joke or reference among philosophers please explain. Chivista 19:10, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

In The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy the Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything is 42. by the end the mice decide that the Question for Life, the Universe and Everything is "how many roads must a man walk down". I think it should be included somewhere as it is very well known.--ANDY+MCI=Andy Mci 19:24, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't matter, it's mentioned anyway.--ANDY+MCI=Andy Mci 19:26, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Erich Schneider section

A couple of criticisms:

This entire section, and much of the Schrodinger section as well, are lifted directly from a book by Erich Schneider. There is a copyright notice on the page linked at the end of the Schneider section, so this appears to be a violation of copyright. The section should probably be removed entirely, though I wanted to give people a chance to discuss that before doing it myself.

Also, assuming the section does stay, it comes across as unreasonably POV to me, particularly the first sentence. "Linking our purposeful behavior to life's function as a gradient-reducing complex system is another move in the scientific tradition of increasing our knowledge while deflating our arrogance." Whether or not "the scientific tradition" deflates human arrogance is a matter of opinion, not objective fact. If the section stays, it needs to be reworded from an NPOV, not simply a direct quote from Schneider. 74.114.148.69 00:01, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Be bold. Remove it!Migdejong 04:06, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I presume that most people expect to see philosophy not creative musings merely; please justify why this "Eric Snyder" fits the category? There are sections of pop culture as a concession to the popularity of the topic. :) Chivista 14:43, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Section removed, for the reasons stated above. 74.114.148.69 03:43, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism

Not really sure how to get rid of the "MEANING OF LIFE IS GLORIOUS COMRADE STALIN," which, while mildly amusing, doesn't belong here. --StarKruzr 10:46, 21 February 2007 (UTC)\

Meaning of life

I find this article 'Meaningless'. It once again expounds the philosophical opinions of the many people who have pondered it. It should be renamed ‘Meaning of life philosophy’ or similar until an actual meaning is found.

I could add that the meaning of life is knowledge or the pursuit of knowledge. Be it for God or the endless universe that surrounds us. However this would indeed be yet another answer to an otherwise pointless question. The meaning of life is LIFE.

This site is, and should be based on facts or fiction. And be separated by some kind of mark identifying such.

It is clear that the meaning of life will not be answered any day soon.

Although I hasten to add that it may never be answered if we don't all put our heads together to expand our understanding of an infinite universe with endless possibilities as to what we are and why we may be here.

Beginner;) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Johnmcmaster (talk • contribs) 13:07, 21 March 2007 (UTC).

SmarterChild bot

Due to the apparently overwhelming "knowledge" of the MSN Messenger chat bot SmarterChild, its creators have claimed that the meaning of life is one of the most common requests from its users. The algorithm has since been tweaked so that instead of responding with a generic message, it replies with a humorous "ask Ken Ma" and a smiling emoticon. There has been speculation as to whether or not Ken Ma is a real person, whilst one common theory is that the name is an inside joke amongst the developers of the chat bot.

Nope, doesn't work.

blip: what's the meaning of life? SmarterChild: GeekHelper can give you helpful computer tips and play fun games. Add GeekHelper as a buddy!
I don't know. What do you think?

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 129.252.73.101 (talk) 20:12, 10 April 2007 (UTC).

Popular Beliefs

I added {{cleanup-section}} to popular beliefs because it is in need of pruning. This section seems to be the beliefs of Wikipedia users, not the public. Some truly are popular beliefs, but many ("...to be a magician"? Where's that from?) are not. I suggest citations are added, and those without citations be deleted.P.L.A.R. 00:54, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

New page - 'Meaning of life (philosophy)'

If anyone has a strong objection to the philosophical section of this page being used as the start of a new page, please express that objection and give reasons for it here. Anarchia 21:17, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Clean this page up!

I'm sorry, but the begining of this article is terrible. Instead of making a lis, why not actually write a decent paragraph, and cut out all the nonsense and redundancy of the list.

I deleted the Conan the Barbarian quotation. I somehow felt that Conan's views were not the precisely most important or relevant in this context. I love the film.

No spoiler warning because of plot details?

Hey, as a determinist, I think plot details are very relevant to the meaning of life. Jussen 02:46, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Popular beliefs.

Do NOT continue to add this. It is impossible to make it encyclopedic under WP:N WP:RS WP:SOAP WP:NOT#INFO List Criteria, and I'm sure I could find even more if I wanted to. There is the pop culture section for references in entertainment media, but ANYONE could add their opinion to that section and it would be equally important as the others. If I said that the meaning of life was to see how far you could kick babies, there's no reason that wouldn't be included compared to the other ones. Beyond that, it adds NOTHING to the actual content of the article, which is sketchy enough as it is. There's NOTHING in it that it adds to the article, be it showing what certain groups believe, showing the history of the question, or anything else that would make it encyclopedic.--L^augh! 22:00, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Please don't bark orders. Please stop removing it. It's been a part of the article for a long time (over a year), and now that there is an objection to it's removal, your removal of it lacks consensus. To go against consensus is disruptive to Wikipedia. By the way, it took a lot of people to build it, and removing it does not have consensus. The list does not violate the guidelines you cited, including RS, as it is a work in progress. Most of those life purposes can easily be resourced. It makes no sense to remove them, when we can simply rally the editors who wrote the list or who work on this article to assist in looking up references. As for meeting the criteria for inclusion, the items in the list are on-topic. They are all meanings of life. — The Transhumanist 22:09, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Consensus does not appropriate make. Hundreds of vandals have added "are hiding something" to Librarians, that doesn't make it true, nor appropriate. Works in progress are not appropriate for wikipedia, nor are things made up one day. If they can be referenced, they belong in another section, be it philosophical, or pop culture. They completely lack any valid reason why they should be included. If you cannot come up with a good reason why they DO NOT violate the above policies AND they HELP THE ARTICLE, I will consider, but until then, you're just saying "well it's been around, so it's not that bad", which is untrue- we've had plenty of cases where vandalism goes unnoticed for huge amounts of time, not to mention consensus changes --L^augh! 22:16, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

But consensus is the way Wikipedia operates, as it helps to PREVENT EDIT WARS which wastes everyones' time. And Wikipedia is itself a work in progress, as is every page it contains. The reason the list is valid and should be included is because it includes meanings of life (life purposes), which is entirely on-topic for this article. Also, you have failed to show how the section violates the policies which you cited. The section is not vandalism, as it was constructed in good faith by many editors. Sure, there have been joke additions to it from time to time, but those have been deleted in due course, also by editors in good faith (who would likely delete your "kicking babies" entry as it doesn't fit the inclusion criteria presented in the section title). — The Transhumanist 20:11, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Uh huh. Like I said, consensus changes. Right now, there is no consensus on it, and it violates many policies. I haven't shown how, because it's obvious as day. The additions aren't notable- there are NO guidelines for inclusions, so it either must accept any belief (unencyclopedic) or none (be deleted). There is no interpretation that WOULD be notable that could not go into another section. The thing is though, there is NO INCLUSION CRITERIA. I didn't say the section was vandalism, but that it was unencyclopedic, which is blatantly is. --L^augh! 22:29, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Another strong argument for the retention of the section is the links it provides. Most if not all of those links are highly relevant as they help to illuminate various common life purposes, such as survival, the pursuit of happiness, serving God, doing good, accumulating wealth, fame, power, etc., and they help to answer one of the interpretations of the meaning of life, namely "What is the purpose of (or within one's) life?" A better approach to axing the section would be to refine it, or better yet, allow editors to continue refining it as they have been doing for the past year or so. — The Transhumanist

It isn't being "refined", it's "adding what I think". WP:NFT and WP:OR both say these are very bad things. While you have added reasons why the list might be good, you have added no reason why it doesn't violate WP:OR, WP:N, WP:NOT#INFO, or any other number of policies. When would ANY of these beliefs be notable or from a reliable source (scientific study, celebrity, anyone notable enough to deserve an article who we can pin a name on) not go into another section (science, pop culture)? In the mean time, please do not try to incite an edit war by adding it when there is no consensus to do so --L^augh! 22:29, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Let me get this straight, and correct me if I'm mistaken: your position is that the editors of the section simply made up the various entries, providing their personal opinion rather than material they've learned from worthy sources, and that the entries themselves do not represent common life objectives? Such as getting rich? Getting fame? Getting happiness? Get real. Just because they aren't sourced yet doen't make them original research. — The Transhumanist

Above, User:The Transhumanist writes:

"Most of those life purposes can easily be resourced."

I'd suggest that this might indicate a way to proceed. Find reasonable references for the more notable entries (there are supposed to be referenced after all). Build the list back up by having it properly referenced by a source that can be defended as worthy of mention in an encyclopedia. Editors may then decide whether a particular entry fits more naturally in a different section on a case-by-case basis.

In any case, it would seem that the entries have to be sourced. -Do c t orW 04:53, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Exactly my point. Anything that CAN be sourced would belong in another section- be it philosophical, scientific, or pop culture --L^augh! 05:47, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

If that was your point, the list wouldn't have been removed, but redistributed throughout the article. But you didn't do that, you simply deleted it. But all this doesn't preclude the existence of a structured list. This particular list organizes the purposes by activity/lifestyle rather than merely by approach, which is another useful way of exploring life purposes. There are scientific, religious, and philosophically-derived goals under each category in the list. Also, the items in the list don't easily fall under the other subsections of the article. — The Transhumanist 17:57, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

It was all deleted because I didn't see anything that would be notable enough or cited for another section. If you disagree, feel free to add them to a place where they are appropriate. Just because they fall into a certain category doesn't make them able to be cited- and if we don't enforce citations on this article, it has no choice but to become a free for all. If I were to add "To see how long you can stand on one foot" to your list, how would you be able to justify removing it, without the rest of the list? If you can think of one of your 'popular beliefs' that wouldn't fit into another section, then we can make a new, encyclopedic section --L^augh! 00:02, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I would suggest adding the list, possibly on the end of the page above "See also" and not in the beginning, and deleting/merging things which are actually synonymous and if there are small differences in their meanings, to make this clear, for example: "...to have sex, just for the joy of it." and "...to have sex to reproduce and more specifically to spread your own genes." Any reference would be great, but it should remain optional, not obligatory. Tuganax 13:59, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Tuganax, I agree with you that the list should be retained. I'm working on cleaning up the list as you suggested, but I'm not sure the end of the article is the best place for it. But that would be better than not being in the article at all. It's been at the top for over a year with no complaints until now, so that seems like a pretty good place for it. — The Transhumanist 20:58, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Transhumanist, do not continue to add this section until there is a consensus on what should be done about it. I firmly believe that you are intelligent and sane enough to solve this without forcing one of us to go to WP:DR. There is a consensus to have any APPROPRIATE matter from that list included- in a place where it would be appropriate to place it. So far, you have not shown that ANY material on that list meets our guidelines for WP:V WP:N WP:OR, etc. etc. In addition, you have not even come up with ideas for criteria for inclusion, which I have asked for. At this point, like I have said above, adding that "the meaning of life is to vandalize wikipedia." would be just as worthy of being on the list as "to live."- and if you cannot offer any solutions to that, I simply cannot allow this indiscriminate collection of information to exist here. --L^augh! 00:52, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

The consensus is to keep it, not to remove it. The section was already here, and to remove it in the face of opposition requires you to build a consensus to remove it. This you have not done. Therefore, the list stays, as per the pre-existing and present consensus. See WP:CONSENSUS for clarification on this matter. As for the criteria of inclusion, the section title and the section description, coupled with Wikipedia's policies on notability and verification makes it quite clear what the requirements for inclusion of the list are. I'm in the process of refining the list, and I would appreciate it if you would stop removing it in defiance of consensus. — The Transhumanist 02:35, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

When I removed it, plenty of people edited it after me before you replaced it. Remember that consensus changes- given that you're the only one who has put it back in, right now consensus to delete it is in my favor, not consensus to keep it in yours. See Seigenthaler controversy - just because something has been in a state of disrepair for a long time does not make it a suitable part of an article. The list itself ignores N,V, and there are no requirements. You admit this yourself by not sourcing the list properly --L^augh! 03:37, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

User:The Transhumanist stated that sources could easily be found for most of the items. That seems like a positive direction to move, and one required by Wikipedia guidelines. After finding sources a decision can be made to determine the most appropriate section for an entry. User:L makes a strong argument with regard to WP:RS. Entries should be based on reliable sources. Otherwise, not only is there no way to make a distinction between an acceptable entry and an unacceptable (even ridiculous) one, but the whole enterprise would become a free-for-all, not at all encyclopedic.

I suggest that the section be moved here to the talk page, and entries put back in the 5th section (moved down) as sources are found. -Do c t orW 01:15, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I second that suggestion, with one reservation. I agree with L that the list as it stands is not suitable for an encyclopedia - but perhaps Transhumanist is correct that it can be made suitable. Finding references is one step to establishing suitability, but noteworthiness and relevance to the topic also matters. Anarchia 03:26, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. I have no problems with any of the specific items on the list- and if they can be referenced, I'd be happy to help work them into whatever parts of the article they would fit best in- which will normally be pop culture, but could be a new section. It's the list as a whole, criteria-less, lack of notability, verifibility, sources, or anything else which forms the basis of Wikipedia. I don't mind working with The Transhumanist, as long as he's willing to remain civil and stop edit warring --L^augh! 03:37, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

As a note, I have set up a sandbox for us at Talk:Meaning_of_life/Popular_Beliefs, so please edit there instead of restoring it and saying you will "Work on it". If it isn't ready for Wikipedia, it shouldn't be in mainspace, where people will actually read it, as that just compromises our image. --L^augh! 04:11, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Stepping in with size nines... I applaud that you are both moving away from edit-warring and looking to build a consensual piece of copy. However, under the terms of the GFDL, I believe that the cut-and-paste job to the sandbox page is inappropriate, to the extent that I considered speedying it unilaterally. I'd prefer it if L would request this deletion. I agree with L that there are elements there that are redolent of OR issues and also with The Transhumanist that L could have trodden more daintily in a large piece of text that's long been in an article. I suggest:

The section is restored to the article and worked on there, with issues debated here, or on a dedicated talk page of this talk page.
The section is appropriately tagged as unreferenced
I further suggest that as a start to editing the piece, The Transhumanist begins by "commenting out" (rather than deleting) the wilder or more difficult to source claims, in the hope that later in the process they can be sourced... or removed.

I hope that this process will quickly deliver a better article and editor harmony, without causing problems with the GFDL. --Dweller 13:28, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

This is a very, very minor problem with GFDL. It's almost WP:POINT to suggest that we hamper a good solution that could work because of a minor copyright bit, which isn't even really effective (it's a work in progress, it's just somewhere to put it. It's not permanent, and It would be deleted once it is sorted out. Imagine you have a GFDL newspaper on your desk. We're just copying part of it onto another piece of paper, and playing with white out and pens, we aren't duplicating the newspaper without acknowledging the authors) Like I've said, I'm willing to work on the list, the problem is that right now there is absolutely nothing encyclopedic about it, and thus it deserves no place on Wikipedia. Placing this into the article is not only incredibly inappropriate, but it would also cause a lot of problems by having to sort things out in mainspace instead of a sandbox. --L^augh! 13:46, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I accept the frustration with this (!) However, I'm not sure why it's so inappropriate... it was in the article for a very long time, and if its worst excesses are made invisible, it overcomes some of your reasonable worries over OR etc. I agree that it's deeply flawed, but think you're being hyperbolic by claiming that there is nothing encyclopedic about it at all. A usable (ie accurate) list would be highly encyclopedic. --Dweller 16:02, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

The verifiability policy clearly states that all editors, regardless of how long they have edited can remove unsourced material. I would suggest restoring the deleted material, including {{or}} tags, waiting a week, and then deleting unless reliable sources are included. Addhoc 16:12, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Yep. I like your suggestion- it cuts out any opportunity to complain about sources existing (although the sandbox would do the same thing without compromising wikipedia's integrity) and gets to the bottom of it. If Transhumanist doesn't want to try to work it out in a sandbox, I'm all for the above suggestion --L^augh! 16:15, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Excellent. Best of all, it avoids baby-with-bathwater syndrome. Good luck with the changes. --Dweller 16:55, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the sandbox approach should not be used, as it would fragment the edit history of the article, and that the section should be improved in place. Since there seems to be consensus on repairing the section (or the content within it), I suggest we discuss the specifics of the repair in a new topic post. I've started one below. — The Transhumanist 19:52, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Repairing popular belief section

Items need to be referenced. No prob.

But where will the items go once they're referenced? Many seem to fall under more than one category, especially ethics and religion, with some items fitting both science and philosophy. What would be done with those? — The Transhumanist 19:52, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

As far as I can determine from the list in its last incarnation, this will not be a problem. It would lead to a couple of minor duplications of content, but the duplications would be explained/included for different reasons. Almost nothing on the list is included in any philosophical works on 'ethics and the meaning of life' that I have seen, and the few things that could be included under this heading would not seriously overlap with anything in the 'religion' section. Similarly, while philosophers should take some account of science in some approaches to understanding the meaning of life, the real overlap, that is the overlap in terms of use of content, is small.Anarchia 20:43, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Once we see what items can be sourced and which ones can't, we can take the list to the talk page and just talk about what section each one would fit into best --L^augh! 03:12, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Lack of citations & attributions, and overabundance of attribution & citation tags

The article is in serious need of cleaning up...

There are so many attribution and citation tags that they make the article almost unreadable.

If the citation tags can't be replaced with actual citations, then the attributions and uncited facts should be removed or commented out. (I prefer the latter, for tracking purposes).

Two weeks should be enough time to replace the citation tags, for those interested in keeping those currently unverified claims/facts in the article. Any objections?

— The Transhumanist 23:12, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

That sounds fine by me. To be honest with you, I'd rather the article reflect the history of the term more than specific beliefs, since everyone will want to get their own opinion on the matter, but then obviously there's not much of a reason to remove all these reasons. Even though it's a bit stretching of policy, it should probably remain. Personally, I'd say we change the deadline from "two weeks" to August 1st (UTC time, of course), since that's about the same time, but easier for everyone to keep track of. --L^augh! 03:16, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Any possiblity that it could be moved to the end of the article while it is being worked on? And, please, can notability be kept in mind when considering whether parts of it should be retained or removed? Anarchia 04:34, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

I moved the section down toward the end of the article, to what seemed like its natural place. I mentioned several days ago that I couldn't think of any rational justification for keeping it as the first section, and there was no response from anyone. -Do c t orW 07:11, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

I was referring to the tagged items throughout the entire article. Someone (User:L?) tagged just about everything, and I've gone through and tagged some of the items he missed. So on August 1st, assuming we are in agreement, anything not citing a reference or an attribution gets removed. I don't have a great deal of time, and my key interest is in the article's lead (main description), so I plan to wait and watch to see what happens to the 5 questions (which define the topic very well but have not been verified, and thus are in blatant violation of Wikipedia policy as original research). I don't have a clue where to find citations for those questions in relation to their representation of the meaning of life issue, so I don't hold a great deal of hope for the current lead section nor for the structure nor current content of this article. Sources for this topic will be especially hard to find because they must link each explanation to the meaning of life issue itself. For example, based on Wikipedia policy, a world view or philosophy can't be presented as a meaning of life, unless there is an explicit statement from a reliable source that says it is a meaning of life; otherwise it is merely the interpretation of a contributor (which makes it original research). The same thing applies to views presented as views of the meaning of life - references are required that state that they are indeed views of the meaning of life, or again it is just the interpretation of a contributor. Every single section of this article, and almost every sentence, therefore must rely on such a reference or build upon a previous sentence that is referenced or be stricken as irrelevant and/or unverified as a view of the meaning of life.

I am not happy with this situation, as the article is an excellent example of the pooling of knowledge, experience, and intuition of contributors. And even though the contributors have broken many of Wikipedia's major policies, the article still explains the meaning of life issue very well, and may not be able to explain it better following those policies. For this reason, I believe an exception should be made. Though I don't have my fingers crossed.

— The Transhumanist 19:24, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I only added one tag, someone else added the rest. --L^augh! 22:31, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Though you reverted the removal of them, thus putting them back into the article. So in fact you did add them to the article, just not the first time they were added. :-) — The Transhumanist 00:39, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I took another look at it since someone has been screwing around with it earlier, why the hell is the science section header tagged for citations? Saying "science and the meaning of life" doesn't need a damn reference. This almost seems more like WP:POINT or template spam/abuse more than a legitimate tagging. If someone doesn't explain how this isn't just adding a citation needed template to every single sentence very soon, I will remove them --L^augh! 22:34, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

No, it's a case of "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em." I removed all the tags but someone reverted my removal (you), so I decided to do the next best thing, which was to join the effort and turn it into a push for featured article status. In Dweller's lesson on Featured Article Candidates, he instructs that all claims made by the article should be tagged, and each tagged item tracked down and provided a reference (or be removed). WP:FAC is pretty tough on unreferenced claims, and this article is chock full of them. I added some tags, including the ones to the headings. Don't we need a reference to assert that science has approaches to the meaning of life? I've never heard of any scientific authority mentioning any scientific "approaches" that discern the meaning of life -- yet the article states in this subheading that it has such approaches. Also, the five questions are in question - are those questions notable interpretations of the "meaning of life"? If so, they need to be referenced. Thus the need for citation tags. If references can't be provided, that means the contributors have interpretted that science has approaches of the meaning of life, and that the questions are implied by the term (as stated in the lead section), and this constitutes original research unless they're referenced. Also, I'm pretty sure we need references to assert that the various philosophies we've included have views on the meaning of life. I noticed that these subheadings were making unreferenced claims, so I tagged them. So far, I haven't been able to find any reliable sources that state that those philosophies have views on the meaning of life, but I'm still looking. — The Transhumanist 00:21, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

How about you check the page history before you go making accusations? This is the only edit I've made since we agreed to restore the article content for sourcing- I haven't reverted any tags, as far as I can see. anyway, I agree with your point of view on this, however the references should be in the paragraphs, not the headers, although I suppose leaving them temporarily is alright. I'm kinda concerned about how much of the content it looks like will be getting the axe, not so much because it's good, but because rewriting the article without it could be quite a chore- and keeping it from sneaking back in will be hard --L^augh! 06:46, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

You're time frame is off. I based my decision on the memory of these events: I removed citation tags here: [4] and you put them back here: [5], and you even shouted at me when you did so: "DO NOT REMOVE SOURCE TAGS UNTIL YOU CAN ADD A SOURCE" (btw, see Wikipedia:Etiquette), which pretty much proved to me that removing citation clutter from the article was futile, which was reinforced later by your stubbornness and willingness to edit war which were demonstrated not long thereafter with respect to your desire to bury the life purpose list. Hence, my decision to follow the old saw "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" and embrace the tag clutter in this article as an impetus to referencing the article's content to prevent its wholesale deletion in the future by axe-happy deletionists! (Whomever they might be). So, WP:FAC, here we come! I hope you are good at finding references. :-) Let the scavenger hunt begin! — The Transhumanist

Ah, that. You said that I reverted, which is why I had no clue what you were talking about. Anyway, I'm just going to ignore about half of that post breaching WP:CIV, and tell you to have fun searching for sources :3 I might look for one or two if I get bored. Personally, I'd try to knock out quotes first, they should be the easiest. If they're not WP:MADEUP --L^augh! 21:06, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Featured article status

I think this is one of the most significant articles on Wikipedia, and think it should be improved to featured article status. But it doesn't have a hope of getting approved until all of its content is properly referenced. — The Transhumanist 20:41, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Cleanup

I hope it's going well and everyone is agreed on the course of action. If I can be of further help (bearing in mind I know nothing about this topic!) please drop me a line at my talk page. --Dweller 16:50, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

It's life, man. Everyone know something about it. :-) Mainly, we need help tracking down citations for the facts and claims included, especially in the life purposes list. — The Transhumanist 00:25, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

References need to about the meaning of life

The latest link put into this page [6] does not connect happiness and the meaning of life. I don't want to delete it without checking first what the link is supposed to be for.

That is correct. It is there to verify that happiness is viewed as a life purpose. The entire study is on the seeking of happiness. — The Transhumanist 21:14, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

This reference does not show that happiness is viewed as a life purpose. Check it out again. Anarchia 00:44, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Re: looking for references, have you checked out Meaning and the Void- it is a psych book rather than a phil one, but it would provide useful references for ideas for the science seciton, and link some of the things on your list to that section of the article. It isn't in the library at my uni (I have had to request it from another library in the past), and I am having problems keeping up at work atm, so I can't do more than wave you towards it. Anarchia 01:47, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip. I'll check the libraries around here. — The Transhumanist 21:16, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

I could only find "Meaning & Void". Who is it by? — The Transhumanist 00:17, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes - "Meaning and Void" is the right one, author: Klinger.

Some of the references that have been added into the article are problematic.

What counts as a reliable source? If someone says something in a newspaper article, like 'the meaning of life is to survive', does this mean that 'some people say that the meaning of life is to survive'? Or do we want the article to reflect considered and peer reviewed attitudes and beliefs? It seems to me that in an encyclopedia the latter is appropriate. Anyone can go around asking their friends and neighbours what they think is the meaning of life - or read a few people's blogs.
Some of the references do not support the claims that they are supposed to support. I am going to delete these soon. I will note in my edit summary that this is why I have acted as I did. Please check out the site before reinstating the deletion.
Relatedly, some of the links in the 'See also' section are to self-published work. This seems inappropriate. Anarchia 00:44, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Remove mediation cabal tag?

Since the dispute has been resolved (thanks to Dweller), does anyone mind if I remove the mediation cabal tag from the top of this page? — The Transhumanist 00:12, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I'd be fine with that. -=-L^augh! 05:15, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Featured article status, here we come!

An obvious first step, is to replace all the citation tags with references. Then the article will probably be ready for WP:PR.

I've gotten started on the life purposes section, as that was under dispute above, and to remain in the article it needs to be referenced as per the solution arrived at above. To find references, Google can be used to search for the entry plus "life purpose"; and/or the entry plus "meaning of life", and any other related phrases you can think of. If you think of any other phrases that work, please report them here, so the rest of us can make use of them. — The Transhumanist 00:12, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Wow. Did a fact tag storm blow through and flood this article?! For my part, I see that references aren't formatted. I'll start tomorrow in formatting the existing ones. I don't have time to track down references to replace the fact tags, but if someone else does, just place the url in brackets and I'll go through and format those as well. Lara Love 05:22, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

As a reminder to myself, book titles which lack an article need to be pipelinked to Special:Booksources. Also need to check for author links and put dashes in ISBNs. Lara ♥Love 03:04, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Some of the fact tags look pretty spurious to me. Surely it is common knowlege that humanists reject "supernatural influence" 1Z 10:56, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Removed. ~ Wikihermit 21:46, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

So where does one look for sources? Bart133 ^{(t) (c)} 00:31, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

What kind of sources are you interested in looking for? There are books on the meaning of life in most libraries (in New ZEaland, anyway). There are occassional articles in philosophy and psychology journals. Give me an idea of what you want to find and I will help you find it. Anarchia 01:25, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Can we, huh, can we?

How about converting these ref tags to section tags. What do ya think. This article is aesthetically absurd. That's right. You heard me ;) the_undertow ^talk 04:19, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

No. We need those tags to know what needs sources or not. Anything without a reliable source is going to be removed beginning in August. --L^augh! 10:14, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

The tags are not telling us that because they have been sprinkled around haphazardly. The addition of a tag can be as flawed as any other edit. 1Z 11:18, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

They were 'sprinked' where people thought they were needed. --L^augh! 11:23, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

People can think incorrectly. These tags are not sacrosanct.1Z 22:41, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

This section does not reflect a sprinkle. It is simply a method of tagging each sentence at the end of said sentence. That could have easily been handled with a template. If everything is to be deleted in August, we are certainly not going to be left with much. the_undertow ^talk 18:14, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Most of this article is unreferenced and not encyclopedic. Deleting inappropriate and unsupported material will, with a little luck, lead to a shorter, more considered, appropriately referenced article.Anarchia 00:44, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the fact tag explosion on this article is absurd. Every sentence in the article is really challenged? Lara ♥Love 18:31, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. They tags are for the most part appropriate. (They might be reduced if the article adopted an historical or biographical structure, rather than the "subject" structure it has at present. That is, if you had a section or paragraph on each of the main contributors to thought on this topic, rather than one for science, one for philosophy, then you might be able to reduce the number of citations needed.) Banno 21:38, 30 July 2007 (UTC)