Smith Essential Purpose

Investigating Life's Purpose and Discovering a Definitive Conclusion
1. Auflage 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4835-4468-7
Verlag: BookBaby
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 58 Seiten

Can we ever confidently know the purpose of human life? Absolutely; and with the same level of certainty that we recognise the purpose of a light bulb. This book thoroughly explores the challenging question of purpose, and while doing so, also examines why our purpose is what it is. This very powerfully reinforces what is an already satisfying and convincing conclusion.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Smith, Philip

Leseproben

Section 1: Everything has purpose! (a) Man-made purpose. Wherever people reside, the impressive results of human creativity are clearly manifest, to such an extent that we tend to take much of this output for granted. Nonetheless, human beings have created objects for their own use since time immemorial, and wherever there is a concentration of people, we find evidence of this creative impulse. If we were to reflect on why these objects have been produced, we would recognise that all have been created with a particular end-use in mind. Simply stated, each and every humanly created object has been intentionally constructed to serve a specific purpose. Cups and similar utensils, for example, have been created since early times to serve as drinking vessels. (Obviously cupped hands weren’t ideal, especially for a hot latte from the ‘Coffee Cave’.) When dispassionately considered, a cup is actually a relatively sophisticated invention, because the shape and the material employed in its construction are carefully considered choices. Has any animal ever fashioned a cup? Compared with a highly complex passenger aircraft, the cup fades into insignificance, but both confirm the axiom that humans create things with an end purpose in mind. In order to test this concept, we could try imagining something that might defy the general principle. We know that utilitarian objects such as a table, a knife or a pair of shoes, have obvious and practical applications, with the purpose behind each item being explicit and obvious. But other more abstract examples, works of art for example, are less easily characterised. However, there could be little doubt that any artist would bother devoting time and energy toward the creation of a work, if he or she lacked a sense of intellectual and emotional commitment to the outcome of their efforts. It is also apparent that any piece of artwork, whether original or otherwise, is able to serve any one of several purposes; providing pleasure, serving as an investment, sitting in a museum representing an artistic triumph of the past, or simply featuring as a piece of household furniture, among others. When Newton introduced his Laws of Motion, which described material phenomena, the first stated, ‘An object at rest will remain at rest unless acted upon by an external force’. This ‘cause and effect’ statement has an obvious parallel in our intellectual life, whereby a spark of mental activity frequently precedes an act of creativity. People do not arbitrarily invest time and energy into a venture, if the production and proposed outcome of their plan lacks an obvious purpose. And it may be that a person’s purpose is simply to satisfy a creative urge, or to experience a sense of enjoyment. Whatever the case, purpose is present. To sum up, we can say that all man-made things are created with intention, and for a purpose, whether that purpose be utilitarian, ornamental, recreational, or something of a similar nature. While the intentional component of any deliberation occurs conceptually, the purpose for which an item is created becomes clear with production and use, and was always implicit. The creative process would lack meaning otherwise. (b) Purpose in the Natural World ‘What is a weed? A plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered.’ Ralph Waldo Emerson Having previously discussed the limitations of the scientific method, and how purpose is more the concern of philosophical inquiry, we can now examine the question of whether there is purpose in the natural world, and nature as a whole. When using the term Nature, we are referring to the universal system of visible, physical phenomenon, which my dictionary describes as being: ‘The physical power causing all the phenomena of the natural world’. Nature, while being a power causing all the phenomena of the natural world, none the less operates as a system lacking consciousness, will and intelligence. When we reflect on the workings of nature, we can see that its functions are fixed and unvaried. The sun has no choice but to shine, the planets follow their orbits around a central axis, water flows downhill, while all living beings must eat to live, provides a few illustrations. This means that nature completely lacks the capacity required to change its mode of operation. All activity within the natural system is involuntary and conforms to a general system. No choice is apparent in the natural world, except for that of human activity. This is very clear and repeatedly demonstrated in our everyday actions. Because we possess the faculty of the mind, free from the constraints of nature, we are able to recognise options and to consequently choose between the resulting alternatives. Yet, within this natural system, there are expressions of activity, which, when their results are considered, display a compelling evidence of purpose. The sun for example, warms and lights the earth, which has the effect of nurturing and sustaining life. Is this simply a lucky coincidence or fortuitous set of circumstances? Rain provides another essential factor for growth, and again this action is directed by the sun. Then there is the amazing process of photosynthesis, which provides humans and the planet with renewed supplies of oxygen. Is this another example of random good fortune maybe? Difficult to believe! Another example of purpose in nature, involves the food chain. It is obvious that all natural species owe their survival to the availability of food, which exists in the form of other species, whether vegetable, insect or animal. Species are therefore divided into the consumers and the consumed, with science classifying them into the following four categories: Herbivores, which eat plants, Carnivores, which eat meat, Omnivores, which eat both plants and meat, Insectivores, which eat insects. Were it not for this natural system of predatory behaviour, the emergence and evolution of life on the planet could simply never have eventuated. Lacking a readily available food source, the various species of the planet would not even have got out of the starting blocks. Earth would be desolate, mankind would have never come into existence, and this discussion would be impossible. In other words, and as obscure as it may seem, you and I, along with the rest of humanity, owe our existence to the simple and natural dynamic of supply and demand in the food chain. These examples are just a few of the operations, or causes, within nature that meet, because of their effects, the definition of having purpose. Without their continued impact, life would very rapidly become extinct. Of course these ideas are only valid if we and all other forms of life are not simply the outcome of an extremely improbable cosmic fluke. If that were the case, however, anything would be possible. With the many examples available, we might well wonder why it is that we are able to identify examples of purpose within our natural environment, and yet is so much more difficult to discover such a quality being related to the universe itself. Because we are such an infinitesimal part of the cosmos, identifying any semblance of an underlying purpose for the universal system is a challenging task. Meanwhile, many in the scientific community would have us believe that the idea of purpose in the universe is simply a fiction. However, if the component parts can, and clearly do, demonstrate evidence of serving a purpose, how can it be imagined that the complete system lacks that quality? Once again, the part is dependant on the whole, and it is impossible to imagine the part having qualities that are absent in the whole system. In other words, if the examples already mentioned represent purpose, the cosmos must also possess that quality. Just as we wouldn’t expect to find oranges growing on an apple tree, we can recognise that the above position is intuitively rational and sound. Viewed from this position therefore, it could be argued that the purpose of the material universe is to bring forth a creature capable of rational thought. In like manner, the object of the maturing fruit tree is the appearance of fruit. This actually occurs despite both the tree and the universe, being devoid of consciousness. We are now faced with one of the great quandaries of modern times. If the universe does indeed demonstrate the quality of purpose, is it innate or has it been conferred? Posed another way, is the universe the result of some spontaneous cosmogonical (concerning the origin of the universe) event; in other words an effect without a cause known as the Big Bang, or is there some ‘behind the scenes’ creative impulse at work? In fact, that question has already been answered, by virtue of the fact that we know nature has no will or consciousness. Lacking these fundamental qualities, how could it ever be possible for the universe to come into existence by itself? We could ask the same question about our fruit producing tree. Is this an evidence of purpose? And if it isn’t, does that mean the question about whether or not the natural world demonstrates purpose; is simply a reflection of ones personal preference or philosophical leaning? If we are agreed that the appearance of fruit on the tree is indeed an expression of purpose, then we must accept that the universe holds within it, for the reasons already discussed, this self same quality. Entertaining the...