WTHDTQEM [final]

WHAT IS THE MEANING OF LIFE?..WTHDTQEM?..

What is life all about? What is the true purpose of living? How can we live meaningfully? Is that even possible? What is the meaning of life? These are all questions that are just screaming out for complete controversy. Every single human being lives different lives every single day and will all have different answers for that question. Yet does one ever stop to think about the question itself? Does this question alone even make sense? How can one have an answer to a question that they do not understand? Maybe that’s our problem! We have come to understand that we must identify the question before we can identify the answer to it. Many people interpret the meaning of this question very differently from each other, which is why it has become so difficult for determining an answer, and a main reason for why there is so much controversy towards answering it in the first place. Every single human being lives different lives every single day and will all have different answers for that question. Yet does one ever stop to think about the question itself? Does this question alone even make sense? How can one have an answer to a question that they do not understand? There needs to be a certain understanding of the question before we can identify the answer to it.
Many philosophers have written on the idea of life, and have questioned the question, depicted it apart, bringing about each possible point of view of the question, so that when it comes to manufacturing an actual answer, it would make much more sense for more people to relate. Through grasping the varied interpretations of the question of life, one would hope to absorb each of the several aspects of it. Each view of the question will leave a stronger comprehension towards coming to terms with creating an actual answer that will suit us as a whole, rather than individually. Philosopher Irving Singer has brought us closer to our own definition of the question in his unique article, “What is the Meaning of Life?” Singer’s distinct way of recognizing the question was to split the actual question into two concrete ways of viewing it. He recognized that a reason for such controversy and contradiction on answering the question, is that there are two completely different levels of looking at it with two completely different intensities. Either in a more general and universal aspect, compared to specifically to one’s personal and private life. Throughout the article, Singer builds the wall between the two distinct fractions of the question. Singer states, “We long to know the secrets of the universe and what it means, in itself, apart from human interests. At the same time, however, we seek a meaningful way to live our lives, whether or not we can find a separate meaning in the cosmos…” where he then announces that answering the question would be much simpler if we’d just emphasized such difference and took each under some consideration.
Irving Singer makes it clear that people seem to be striving to find the meaning of life for them almost everyday of their life unintentionally, yet when it comes a time where they may be bombarded with actually being asked, “what is the meaning of life?”, almost immediately they are baffled because of the many different ways you can think of the question. Is it finding the meaning of life in its entirety, or for one as an individual?
Irving also questions whether or not one can even find or suddenly discover the meaning to life, or if it is something one creates and generates as they go along and make their journey through life. Irving distinguishes what makes the question so difficult for someone to answer, and shows that by the struggle to just simply answer the question, it in fact is not simply done at all. It actually just brings about other challenging, mind blowing questions alongside with the initial one, What is the meaning of life?
Philosopher John Wisdom also provides the reader with an alternate way of looking at the question. Wisdom introduces the idea that some people believe that the question may just all in all be completely senseless and irrational. He goes deep into clarifying why people believe so, and demonstrates the difference between interpreting the question by what life actually is, compared to what life gives, leads to, or is caused by. Wisdom broadens our minds with a number of examples to compare the logical and rational question, “What is the meaning of life?” with other questions that essentially are nonsensical, such as, “What supports all things?” and “What is bigger than the largest thing in the world?” Many people categorize all three of those questions to be very much illogical and ridiculous, however, it is made clear that the question of life is not at all absurd even if it sometimes seems so.
Much like John Wisdom, Joseph Ellin also acknowledges the fact that some people think of the question as meaningless and absurd and there is no answer to that question. However Ellin explores the idea that there are people in this world who are blinded to believe something so, for the simple fact that when you view the question, What is the meaning of life?, there is no legitimate reason that could prove that this question is senseless with the exception of the thought that there is no answer. However, is there really no answer, or is it that no one knows the answer? Just because a solution is difficult to solve, and may seem impossible, it does not mean that the solution does not exist. When one literally depicts apart the question, each and every word that makes up the question beholds a distinctive meaning much like all the other questions produced in the universe.
While Ellin finds ways of discovering why the question in fact makes complete sense, he seems to struggle to do so because while he tries to make a definite meaning out of the question by referring to the representations of each word used in the question, when looking at it as a whole, life in fact does not represent anything, it just simply is. Ellin compares the meaning of the question with the example of the word, “dog”. When one hears the word dog, there is an immediate visual representation (of a dog) for the word, which gives the word its meaning. Also when dealing with “dog”, one can make connections from that one word to another, which gives it its definition from that as well. To describe the definition of a word, is to express it with other words, making connections with other things, branching off from one meaning to another, which ends up being the way to define the meaning of anything. However, how can one define life to its meaning? What relationship does the meaning of life have with other words or things that could possibly fabricate a definition, the same way “dog” associates with other words and things that produces a definition? Being that one cannot create a range of valid and all around convincing answers to the question, that naturally leaves one to consider the question to be senseless and invalid.
When people search for the meaning of life they automatically compare their own lives to the question, and relates the answer with their personal experience. Yet is that really a good enough definition of life to the rest of the world? Ellin compares the natural instincts of people when answering “What is the meaning of life” to a normal activity like playing sports. When playing any game or any sport, there is a point to it, which gives it its purpose to play it in the first place. On a sports team there are a number of players who all have similar intentions to fulfill the objective of the game. However, what if there was a foreigner watching the game, and had no idea what was going on. What if he were watching the game from the bleachers trying to understand the rationale of the it yet couldn’t. Because that person does not understand the purpose and object of the game, does that mean there is no purpose and object of the game? No. It just simply means that that person does not quite understand it…yet. Compare the game that was being played on the field, to life, and us humans as that one foreigner. Just because we don’t reasonably know the reason and purpose we live, does not mean it has no meaning.
Life is like sitting down and watch a movie, yet you were late, and only caught middle of movie. You are oblivious to what happened in the movie before you sat down to watch it, therefore, during that time you do not know what is going to happen in the end, and you have not found any real profundity to the reason everything is happening at that time, yet there is still a “big picture”, and Joseph Ellin emphasizes that.
In trying to answer such a question, many say it does not make any sense, for the simple fact that one cannot actually come up with any type of legitimate answer for it, especially without going through a series of staggering and self-contradicting thoughts. When it comes to the real groundless questions, much like, “what supports all things?“ they are in fact all meaningless. Those questions are what show us that within every question, there is just another question, and that there is questioning behind everything. However, not to mistaken those real senseless questions with “what is the meaning of life”. In struggling to answer that question, it is not that it has no meaning behind it, it is just that one cannot completely comprehend enough to create a totally satisfying and conclusive answer. Being that no one has yet been able to say, “the meaning of life is…”, many immediately reject it as ever having a meaning and sense to it in the first place, although it has complete potential. What is it about this question that seems so ridiculous? Is it just that words cannot describe? If so, what can?