The Explanation of Life

By Mysterio448

What is the meaning of life? Why are we here? What is all of this about? If you have ever contemplated these questions, "The Explanation of Life" may hold the answer that you are looking for. This book does not present the kind of facile, feel-good answer that you may have heard before. The answer is not something stylish, sexy, or trendy. It is straightforward, honest and real.

Not everyone who asks why we exist really wants the answer. Many people are only concerned with the gratification of their senses, their feelings, and their ego, and apart from these things such people don’t really care why they exist. This book takes a different approach. It cuts right to the chase. It offers an original, comprehensive and unorthodox theory, drawing from science and logic, as to why we exist, why anything exists, and why things exist in the way they exist. This is not some self-indulgent philosophy book filled with groundless abstractions and speculations; whenever possible, it bases its ideas on examples and hard facts. This theory summarizes and explains the world as it is, rather than imagining it as we want it to be. This book presents thoughtful answers to deep and relevant questions, many of the questions you may never have thought to ask.

Be warned: The Explanation of Life is probably unlike anything you have ever read before. It may forever change the way you look at your life and the world around you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mysterio448
• Release date: Sep 24, 2016
• ISBN: 9781370980796

Book preview

PREFACE

I am an amateur philosopher. I do not identify myself by any particular philosophical labels, perhaps with the exception that I am an atheist. I admit to not being particularly well-read in academic philosophical literature, however I devote myself continually to introspection and contemplation. Some time around 2008, my philosophical musings yielded a certain idea which I found intriguing and which concerned the origin of existence and its underlying nature. This idea has since slowly developed to such complexity and volume that it surpassed the ability of my memory to contain it. As a result, it became necessary for me to write the idea down, the purpose being as much to clarify and organize it for myself as much as to communicate it to others. I originally intended to write an essay of about ten pages or so, but as I began writing, it became clear that more content would be necessary to convey the concept faithfully and intelligibly.

My aim in this book, in a nutshell, is to explore the reason why we exist, as well as why everything exists, why anything exists, and why things exists in the way they exist. Many people ask such questions; however I feel that most people are not really looking for an honest, straightforward answer so much as they are looking for something to comfort them, or to make them feel happy or important, or perhaps to help them resolve some of their practical problems or affairs. Many people are only motivated by and concerned with their senses, their feelings, and their ego. Apart from these things, such people don't really care why they exist. Others may not be mentally prepared to know it. In contrast, my path of inquiry has been, I feel, more genuine. My goal has simply been to obtain the true answer, and with this attitude I have prepared myself to accept the answer whatever it might be, whether or not it is practical or useful, whether or not it is pleasant or makes me feel good about myself. I believe I have found the answer to the question that so many have been asking, and this book is my attempt to share it with you.

The answer that I have come to is founded upon a certain core concept. The concept is actually quite simple in principle, and an explanation of it could probably be condensed into a single paragraph. However, I have allowed myself to freely elaborate on the concept in order to discuss the numerous implications and applications of it in our lives, and to attempt to build an argument for the idea that is strong enough to sway even the most stubborn skeptics. The idea, although simple, can seem rather strange and perplexing. It is a rather abstract idea and it may be different from anything else you have heard before, so I implore you to read this book with an open mind and a sense of imagination. Although the idea is unusual, I will attempt to explain it in the most accessible way I know how.

This book will try to formulate thoughtful answers to deep questions; some of the questions will be ones that most people don't even bother to ask. This is not a self-help book; it is not designed to make you feel good or to help you solve personal problems, though it could possibly have those effects. Some things in this book you may even find somewhat unpleasant. My goal is not to elicit any emotional response one way or the other; I simply seek the truth for truth's sake. This book is not for someone looking for a fun, light read; it is for a mature, deep thinker and a genuine seeker of truth, and someone who is willing and able to think outside the box. It is for the person who is like me in that he or she wants an honest proposal for the meaning of life and not something merely self-serving. It is meant to be an objective evaluation of reality as it is, not what we would like it to be. This book may cause you to begin seeing the world in a very different way.

In elucidating my idea, I will not rely simply on my own words and thoughts. I will also draw information from the sciences – such as biology, astronomy, physics, quantum mechanics, mathematics, and others – in order to illustrate and corroborate my ideas. This is not a philosophy book of groundless abstractions and speculations; this is a book that whenever possible will attempt to base its ideas on examples or hard facts. Another aim of this book is to take the various findings from the aforementioned scientific fields and integrate them into a single, coherent model. This may seem like an impossible undertaking, but I think that the core concept of this book can accomplish it.

My core concept is not a provable fact; it is essentially a kind of theory, and thus I am not able to conclusively prove it nor do I think it is possible to prove it. However, as with any good theory, there is an abundance of objective data that seems to support it. I feel confident that the idea is fully-matured and complete, however the idea also has room for further growth and clarification.

Which leads me to another purpose of this book. The idea herein sheds light on an aspect of reality that is being discussed very little if at all in society. And furthermore, I am but one man, and I can see things only from a limited perspective. In delineating this idea, I hope to inspire further discussion and further contemplation in others in order that more can be learned about this important topic.

CHAPTER ONE:

INTRODUCTION

What is the meaning of life? What is the purpose of life? Why do I exist? These are questions that have haunted me my entire life, but for a long time I never found a satisfactory answer. I have heard various ideas from others who have asked the same kinds of questions. But I wasn't just looking for a meaning of life, I was looking for the meaning of life – the absolute, objective, definitive meaning.

As I contemplate this inquiry into life's meaning, I find that the path to the answer is a slippery one. I look for an answer that is final, complete and unqualified, yet all I seem to find are explanations that require further explanations, one answer merely raises another question. Say, I proposed that the meaning of life is to better ourselves as a species. Someone could ask, What is the purpose of bettering ourselves? I might answer, So that we will acquire a peaceful, utopian society. The other asks, But why should we acquire a peaceful, utopian society? I might say, Because it would make everyone happy. The other asks, But what is the end goal of being happy? I might say, Because it will achieve the ideal condition for any living being. The other asks, But how do you know that this is the ideal condition for any living being? I say, Because happiness is what everyone seeks after. The other asks, But how do you know that that which everyone seeks after is the ideal condition for any living being? – The chain of questions and answers could go on forever without any definitive resolution.

Perhaps the meaning of life is not to be found from the bottom-up but from the top-down. In other words, perhaps instead of trying to deduce our purpose based on experience, there is some higher power beyond our experience that bestows our life with meaning. Maybe we were created by a powerful cosmic being or a super-intelligent alien race. But even if that were the case, the questions don't stop. For what purpose did they create humankind? What role did they need us to fill? If we were created to fulfill a role, then this raises the question of why was the role empty to begin with? And what happens once we’ve fulfilled that role? – does our existence then become worthless and superfluous, like soiled tissue paper? It seems one could never propose an answer for which someone could not ask another question. This line of inquiry is like an infinite array of Russian stacking dolls (pictured below). Every time you find what seems to be a final reason you find that there is something arbitrary and unsatisfying about that reason, necessitating there being an even deeper reason underneath.

Nevertheless, let's analyze some of the more commonly proposed answers.

THEISM

I grew up a Christian, and I was told by the church that the purpose of life is to worship God and build a personal relationship with him. A part of me was satisfied with this simple, apparently self-sufficient answer. However, another part still had more questions: If God is the ultimate object of my life's purpose, what is the purpose of God's life? Why does he exist? Who created him? It seemed that the Christian answer did not so much provide an answer as shift the question back a notch. If my existence requires a purpose, doesn't God's existence require a purpose as well? And whatever reason there was for God's existence would presumably also require an explanation. There seemed to be a troublesome infinite regress of reasons: one reason which requires another reason which requires another, ad infinitum.

Some people promote the idea of divine creation by using some manifestation of the watchmaker analogy. So its goes, complex, orderly things do not simply appear out of nowhere; the watch must have been designed by a watchmaker – this intricate world in which we live must have been created by an intelligent designer. However, there is a fundamental fallacy in this argument. If we assume that every complex mechanism must have originated from an intelligent mind, then considering that a mind is itself a complex mechanism we must then ask what intelligent mind created that intelligent mind? It seems like a classic catch-22.

God is considered to be the prime mover, the first cause, the uncaused cause, that which causes everything but is not itself caused by anything or anyone. However, the problem with this idea is that God is complex, a whole made up of many parts. Even if one were to assume that the anatomy of a spirit is some kind of indivisible whole, and as such cannot be reduced to constituent parts such as organs or cells, we can still divide God up into his constituent attributes and faculties: his power, his benevolence, his emotions and intellect, his anger and mercy, his desire and satisfaction – these can all be considered separate parts of his nature. Each attribute is a discrete part of the very substance – the body – of God. Thereby, God is in fact a composite being rather than a simple one.

But the problem with this idea is that things do not tend to develop from the complex to the simple or from the grand to the modest. Things work in the opposite way: things start simple then become complex, things start primitive and crude then become sophisticated, things start insignificant then become significant, as an atom to a molecule, an embryo to an adult, a seed to a tree, a construction site to a skyscraper. For everything to start from something innately complex is illogical. God is far too complex and grandiose to have been the first cause; the first cause must have been something supremely simple and supremely insignificant (to use an oxymoron).

Furthermore, I have heard of philosophies and theories suggesting that the universe itself is alive, conscious, and intelligent. These ideas suggest that this intelligent universe is itself responsible for creating life for some reason of its own. I have also heard of an idea called the biocentric hypothesis which suggests that biology (rather than physics) is the fundamental science of the cosmos and that life and consciousness are at the core of reality as we know it. It is suggested that the universe has conditioned itself to facilitate the existence of life, rather than the reverse: life adapting itself to survive in the universe. It's my belief that these kinds of ideas – in addition to being strangely anthropomorphic and anthropocentric – essentially commit the same fallacy as theism: the starting point of reality that they postulate is much too complex to be tenable. Intelligence and life are innately complex and thus cannot be the first cause.

Moreover, I have heard some Christians suggest that this life on Earth, stuck in this mortal coil, is not the true fulfillment of our existence, but that our true destiny is in heaven. In heaven, we will be at peace, free of suffering, and we will live for eternity. But this only evokes more questions. Is heaven the end, or is there something else that comes after it? How is the afterlife any more meaningful than this life; doesn't this only push back the question of existence? If my true purpose is in heaven, then why was I created here on Earth in the first place?

Do you really want to live for eternity? How long is eternity, exactly? Many people say they want to live forever, but they don't think about what it actually means to live forever. Eternal life is actually a pretty weighty prospect. To put things into perspective, I can pick an arbitrarily huge amount of time, say, 350 trillion trillion years –is that eternity? Shall you live that long? Why would you want to live that long? What will you be doing with all that time? At some point, after having lived for countless eons, you will lament to yourself, What is the point of this? Existence is a mystery, and extending existence to infinity merely extends the mystery to infinity. Perpetuating the mystery does not resolve it.

Heaven appeals to people because it is full of happiness, and people like happiness. But the problem is, although happiness is an understandable pursuit within the context of one's existence, it is not itself a reason to exist; these two concepts – happiness and meaning – should not be conflated. As satisfying as it might be, an eternal endorphin-rush in heaven is ultimately no more meaningful than eternal pain in hell.

The Christian model of reality puts the universe in a strange light. God created the universe for some unknown motivation; he resides in a place called heaven surrounded by legions of angels; he is described as a male, but there is no indication as to whether he puts this status to any use, such as for sexual reproduction; he has a son, yet there is no mother to speak of; he created me to worship him, but for what reason? – why can't he just worship himself? God is going to judge everyone according to their actions in life, but for what ultimate purpose? – what is the point of bringing a life into existence merely to give it a test and judge it on its performance? What does this accomplish? God is described as omnipotent and benevolent, yet he allows absurd amounts of suffering and tragedy to occur as a matter of routine, and despite his infinite power does nothing to thwart it. And apparently the ultimate destiny of all human beings consists of two options: to either cower at God's feet and flatter him for eternity or else be subjected to constant, soul-crushing torture for all eternity. The Christian model of reality ultimately seems strange and arbitrary (and in some ways unpleasant), with apparently no underlying necessity or logic behind it. This answer only raises more questions.

The Christian answer is insufficient. Not only that, but we can also deduce that neither God nor any other kind of complex super-being could have been the first cause of reality, and the meaning of life does not descend from such a being. Furthermore, whatever the meaning of life is, it cannot be anything arbitrary. It must be something self-explanatory, an explanation that requires no further explanation and evokes no further questions. The explanation should comply with Occam's razor (i.e., involving the fewest amount of assumptions possible).

ALTRUISM

Some people say that the meaning of life concerns one's fellow man. Our purpose is to treat others well and live together in harmony. But this explanation seems insufficient as well. For how can the purpose of my existence be found in relation to beings whose existence apparently contains no more innate purpose than my own? If the lives of others have no innate purpose, how do I derive purpose from my interaction with them? And if their lives do have innate purpose, from whence does it come? The reasoning here just seems circular. This answer is insufficient.

HAPPINESS

Some say the meaning of life is to find happiness in this life. This explanation initially appears satisfying; after all, who doesn't want to be happy? Yet this answer doesn't so much explain the purpose of life as it explains what one's personal objective/ideal should be in life – I feel that these are actually two different questions. Being happy is nice, but it is not in itself a reason to exist. I am looking for the reason why I was brought here in the first place, not how I should feel now that I am here. To give an analogy, if I have just committed a string of bank robberies and then I get caught and go to prison, I fully understand why I am in prison, but that doesn't mean I have to be happy about it. My feelings toward being in a certain place have no relevance to the reason why I am in that place. Even if everyone's life was like heaven on Earth, it would not make people's lives any more meaningful; don't confuse happiness for meaning. Being happy is a reward and end in itself; it is not a means to finding the meaning of life. Knowing the meaning of life does not imply happiness, and happiness does not imply knowing the meaning of life; they are two separate pursuits. And furthermore, whatever the meaning of life is, we should be willing to accept it, regardless of whether it makes us happy or not.

Finding happiness is not why I am here. This answer is insufficient.

SCIENCE

From more scientifically-minded people I have heard the explanation that the meaning of life is to simply follow the pattern that all life forms in nature seem to follow: survive, reproduce, and spread ones genes. This seems somewhat more cogent than the previous explanations. But are we here to survive purely for the sake of surviving? Are we here simply to live and to perpetuate life through reproduction, in an endless cycle? What is the ultimate purpose of this cycle?

Reproduction does not seem to be a very meaningful goal on its own. Life on this planet presumably began as simple, microscopic organisms. The kinds of these organisms that did not somehow make copies of themselves have since died and are no longer among us. On the other hand, other organisms did begin to make copies of themselves, likely by way of chance (or otherwise unintelligent) circumstances. Subsequently, organisms with the proclivity for reproduction are the only kinds of organisms that still exist today. Thus, the case could be made that we do not live to reproduce but rather we reproduce because we are necessarily the descendants of beings that reproduced, and from those ancestors we have inherited the urge to reproduce – a rather circular state of affairs, to be sure. From a species perspective, existing and reproducing are one and the same, simply two different sides of the same coin. It can be argued that there is no actual reason why humans reproduce; it is merely a perpetuation of an old habit that was set in motion by chance occurrences.

It seems clear to me that reproduction is not the purpose of life. Reproduction is a necessity of life on the species scale. In essence, reproducing is to a species what breathing is to an individual. It is necessary for a species' survival; but to say that the purpose of a species is to reproduce is like saying that the purpose of an individual's life is to breathe. It is fallacious thinking to assume that the means to an end is itself the purpose of that end.

Furthermore, reproduction is the creation of new life. Therefore, just as immortality merely extends the mystery of life rather than resolves it, to reproduce is not to resolve the mystery of life, but to re-create it anew.

Some people see ourselves as merely survival vehicles to do the bidding of our genes, to serve as a protective vessel for them and assist them in replicating themselves. This view sees the organism as merely a means and genes as the end. However, it is helpful to remember that genes are little more than instructions on how to build the organism. So essentially, this view is saying that the organism exists to protect the genes which exist to build the organism which exists to protect the genes, and so on ad infinitum. This too seems like circular thinking.

And what about the anomalies of life? What about the life forms that do not survive to reproduce, or the ones that never have the opportunity to reproduce, or are infertile, or ones that have debilitating genetic disorders that make them unfit to spread their genes —what is their purpose? We cannot simply ignore cases such as these. Surely they play some part in the overall equation of things. It is too convenient to just dismiss them as negligible outliers or mistakes. Whatever the meaning of life is, it must be something that is complete in its ability to explain all observed phenomena. It must, in its logic, incorporate both norm and anomaly together into a harmonious whole. The meaning of life, whatever it is, must be found through observing life as it is, and extrapolating from that data. We will not find a satisfactory answer by simply inventing an ideal that is pleasant to us and then shoehorning life into that mold.

Some would say that we are here because we evolved. As our ancestors walked this earth, they struggled to survive and, through natural selection, those most fit to survive passed on their genes, making stronger, more well-adapted offspring. Through a series of mutations, species gradually changed, giving rise to new species until, somewhere down the line, Homo sapiens appeared. However, the problem with this explanation is that it really only tells us how we came to be, not why. To give an analogy, if you go to the grocery store, your reason for being there is that you need groceries. But the cause – the how – of your being at the store is presumably the vehicle you drove to get to the store. Evolution is the cause of our existence, that which drove us to our current state, but it is not the reason for our existence. Evolution is how we are here but not why we are here.

Furthermore, as any biologist knows, there is no teleological objective to evolution. A horse, for example, has a long face which enables it to hold its mouth to the ground to graze while keeping its eyes above grass level in order to watch out for predators. However, it would be a fallacy to think that horses evolved long faces in order to help them survive by grazing with their eyes above the grass. More accurately, horses evolved long faces because long-faced horses who could keep their eyes above the grass statistically tended to survive more often than short-faced horses. The physical constitution of an organism says less about the organism than it does about the habitat in which the organism lives and what it takes to survive in it. Hence, evolution is not so much a means of aiding survival as it is a passive end-product of survival. So how then can evolution, an effect of life itself, be the cause or purpose of life? Thinking that we live in order to evolve is putting the cart before the horse, so to speak. In a manner of speaking, we do not live to evolve; we evolve because we live. Therefore, the evolutionary answer is insufficient.

NIHILISM

Then there is the nihilist view. The nihilist resolves the question by claiming that the question itself is invalid. According to them, life is absurd; there is no ultimate explanation or logic behind our existence, and hence there is no objective purpose or value to this life. We are relatively insignificant creatures living in an enormous universe run by cold, impersonal mathematics and laws – a universe that has no concern for our happiness or well-being. In this view, the only purpose or value that exists or can exist is the subjective purpose or value that the individual attributes to his own life. Many philosophers seem to be satisfied with this answer. However, I am not one of those philosophers.

Some nihilists might say that life is a cosmic mistake or accident of some kind. But the existence of a mistake assumes a certain context, that is, a certain system from which that mistake emerges and which the mistake inherently defies. And different kinds of systems make different kinds of mistakes. The mistakes made by a computer program are different from those made by a printing press, which are different from those made by a record player, or a vending machine, etc. So the question is: What kind of system makes mistakes such as the one we call life?

The nihilist might say that the system is the impersonal forces of the universe. Then I might ask, So what exactly are the impersonal forces of the universe trying to do? The nihilist might answer, "They are not trying to do anything. They just exist. Then I would say, If they are not trying to do anything in particular, then how can they make a mistake?" I doubt the nihilist would have an answer.

But the main problem I have with the nihilist view is that it is ignoring the elephant in the room: the underlying complexity that makes life possible. The truth about life is that life is not a thing or object; rather life is a process. This process lies on a razor's edge, relying on a delicate balance of intricate biological processes. Our bodies are a densely packed interweaving of purposeful systems: skeletal, muscular, circulatory, nervous, digestive, immune, respiratory, endocrine, lymphatic, integumentary, and so on. The human body is a unified whole made up of a dizzying amount of cooperating parts, such as cells, organs, and glands. Our bodies are not simple vessels only serving to house our thoughts and aspirations; each of us is an intricately and brilliantly engineered machine. If you have ever studied biology or human physiology, it should be apparent that the human body is just not the kind of thing that could just pop into existence in a universe completely devoid of objective purposefulness. The heart pumps blood through the veins with a sense of purpose. When leukocytes attack infectious pathogens that invade the body, they do so with a sense of purpose. The idea that there is not some objective impetus of purpose or logic in this universe would appear an untenable position.

Personally, I have always been fascinated by a process that occurs in cellular mitochondria that is called oxidative phosphorylation. This is a complex process that uses the synthesis of water molecules as a driving force behind the transport of electrons along a chain of proteins that in turn pumps protons outside of the mitochondrial membrane. This creates a concentration gradient between both sides of the membrane, which creates the potential energy needed to drive a particularly ingenious machine, a protein called ATP synthase. This protein looks and acts a bit like a machine that you might see in a manufacturing line, receiving protons and sending them through the mitochondrial membrane with an intermittent circular motion, all the while using the energy derived from this passage to mechanically bond ADP with inorganic phosphate to form ATP, a molecule vital for life.

Such ingenious processes like this and so many others occurring in the body represent the aforementioned elephant in the room, and the gaping hole in the nihilist's logic. How does a nihilist reconcile the concept of a universe devoid of objective purpose or meaning with the reality of oxidative phosphorylation? If life itself is objectively meaningless, then why does such a meaningful process exist to maintain life? The nihilist would say that meaning only exists in the subjective realm; however, oxidative phosphorylation is not some mental construct – there is nothing subjective about it. It is physical machinery that we all have inside of us, yet we did not imagine it, engineer it, nor build it. So the question is: Where did it come from? Why does it exist?

When the nihilist says that life has no inherent purpose, this response merely dismisses the proposed question rather than actually answering it. Saying life has no purpose does not tell us why oxidative phosphorylation exists, nor does it tell us why we exist. Saying life has no purpose tells us nothing. The nihilist answer is insufficient.

QUESTIONS

So what is the meaning of life? I think in order to facilitate finding the answer we may need to re-evaluate the question. What exactly do we mean when we ask, "What is