My fellow atheists:

meaning is a human concept and so the only way we can have meaning is if we give it to ourselves.

who cares if a meaning lasts only while you live? it's temporary, and so is life! when your dead, no matter what the meaning of life you give, itll not matter anymore caus your dead remember.

atheists should not wallow in a meaningless pit, we need to give our lives our own meanings, goals, and ultimately we should pave our own destinies

but to infringe the least on other people's well being of course!

 

humans have evolved with the ability to give meaning to things, and so everything that didnt have a known meaning would be attributed to spirituality, and religions have grown along these lines and changed as weve known more about the world. Wihtout meaning, humans have a gap, a hole, which can make people sad. why be sad? your a human, you can be happy or sad, happy feels good, so why be sad? find your own meaning!

 

Mr McGee

Agree
[agnostics get by just fine with a neutral "insufficient data" position]

Occam

 

Mother Teresa clearly found the meaning of her life was to serve others, and in particular, those who were living in the worst conditions of all people. She served others with as much focus and selflessness as anyone I have ever known of, and in doing so, served God to the best of her ability. Others, like Aleister Crowley and Friedrich Nietsche proclaimed that the meaning of life was to serve oneself. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, of TM fame, taught that the pursuit of happiness was the meaning of life. Buddha told his students that the pursuit of enlightenment was the goal of life. My feeling is that living in harmony with others, and protecting nature for our descendents is probably what holds the most meaning for me.
"The earth is not inherited from our forebears, it is borrowed from our descendents." Chief Seattle

 

I don't need an Invisible Sky Daddy to give me meaning. I don't need a self-contradiction to make me have a purpose. What makes life meaningful and precious is that we make our own legacy and meaning. We create who we are without preconceived notions of dogma. Life is about freedom and responsiblity to me. What we do with it, our actions, our art, our words. Life is beautiful. We don't need some god or rulebook to give us meaning.

 

invisible sky daddy... nice.. imma have to re member that one

 

Many people who believe in God, live there whole life prepairing for death! They live there whole life for nothing. Just live it, enjoy it, expierience it. Just be happy you have it. When it ends, you wont know its over, because you will be gone. What you did/do in life makes no difference to you when you are gone.

 

day.
by.
day.

 

those of us that know.....do, those who don't.....search for meaning

 

what?
i've never lived thinking all this is meaningless.



sophia

 

Suppose I think that God exists,and I believe that gives life meaning.Then I find that I was wrong.Is the wrong meaning better than no meaning?

In the end we all decide what has meaning for ourselves.I find meaning all around me.Life ,my children, the air I breathe is no less special with or without belief in God. I amm constantly amazed at the complexities we have discovered by asking the questions.Those same questions the religious say God is the answer to.If you think you have the answer you stop looking.If We all assumed that God did all this then we wpould still believe the world was flat,that change was impossible,That medicine and technology was useless.I am thankful everyday that we don't all believe that,and we can continue to explore and make the world better.Religion has had to back down repeatedly throughout history,because they were wrong.It is still wrong about most of it's assumptions,including the one that atheists dont have meaning in their lives.

 

there is just one meaning: be happy.

 

Dude

Thats one...

Occam still finds it a mystery that so many feel there is no meaning/purpose to human existance without a 'god figure'
That is purely a mater of personal opinion..

There is one great meaning few speak of..
Our time on this earth for each of us is not without profound impact on reality. The very existance of sentient beings with choice is a rare thing in
a universe of gross physical determinism.. Each and every one of us changes reality with each choice we make..and that change/choice becomes an embedded part of reality from that moment.

Occam proposses that THAT may be our meaning/purpose.
Anti determanistic elements we are... And occam does what he can
to give a smile here..a greeting there. a helping hand when he can..
For evry such act...results in permanent change to a reality that we
can make of what we wish.

As for the religious gods...[take your pick, there are many]

"I am not in buildings of stone or wood..Lift a stone and there i am,
split a branch and you will find me"

Religious gods are 'acting out of our desires for purpose'

Occam

 

conclusion:
the meaning of your life is what you make it

 

What do you mean?

 

are you serious you read this whole thread and dont understand the first post?

 

the meaning of life is the same for all those organic in nature. and that is satisfaction of all senses, not just the sense of mood.

 

What do YOU think?

Please, go find some truth about all of this and then tell me what I don't understand.

Peace and Love,

 

ok well i can safely say i dont understand what that post means

i think you were merely using a technique of the language to highlight that the idea is one you dont follow by making out that you had not considered it before and therefor you are having trouble understanding the concept since it is so apparently alien, despite you in fact understanding what theyu were assuming.

 

You hit the nail right on the head. I agree completely. The reason we live is to develope relationships with other human beings together as a whole. Being an agnostic as it were, I'm not sure what happens when one breaks through, but I like to think that you should try to make impressions on your friends, so that they will remeber you mor thoughtfully. I hold all of my relationships with everyone I hang with very close. You can make subtle changes in the way people think just by offering your point of view. I try to get people to see as many perspectives as they can. I like to have converstaions that provoke deep serious thought and just talk for hours. Sorry for going so far and such, but things like this just get me going. Just think about it.