"Simple" is an interesting word to use when describing our existence. But we are completely incapable of comprehending anything outside of our experience, which is necessarily a subset of all things that exist (our experience can't include things that don't exist because then how would we experience them?). So how would I extend my personal "meaning" beyond the realm of "simple" existence?
If i follow correctly, you imply that "God" would be outside of our experience, and thus we cannot know and find any meaning in its existence. I do not agree. "God", the supernatural, that which exists of its own accord outside of "Nature", in creating the world, but be an integral part of the world. "God" would then not be outside of our comprehension.
The argument for the supernatural, meaning that which goes beyond our perception of Nature as the total system, is a complex one. You should, if you wanted, read the book "Miracles" by CS Lewis. The basic premise is that our human reason cannot be valid by a cause and effect mentality. You mention this later on, that emotions are constructs of your mind, biological happenstance that is useful, as it is still present in us after a supposed long evolution (i suppose this is what you meant?).
Reason cannot be valid given a cause and effect reality, which is what we would have according to predominant theory on the origin of Nature. Reason is valid through the usage of ground/consequent reasoning. Thought cannot be limited to its biological manifestation in the movement of ions across axons to produce a nerve impulse, as reason would no longer be valid. If Reason is limited to the movement of ions, then Reason is not valid, and thus i do not know that it is due to the movement of ions.
In essence, human reason, to even be valid, is due to the supernatural, as it is not part of the system of Nature, as cause and effect cannot produce valid Reason.
Hmm.. I've strayed...
Back to your above argument, i would not believe that we are incapable of comprehending that which is outside of our experience (by the way, whose experience, personal or the total of humanity?). When scientists use theories that have no ground in experience, only in math and logic, to send space shuttles into orbit, they are comprehending something that doesn't fall into anyone's experience.
If anything, I'm contemplating "emotions" or "feelings" which clearly exist, or we wouldn't be feeling them. They exist as a function of our human brains, for whatever reason... I am quite sure they exist as a material process at some level, but whether or not we will ever be able to model them theoretically is irrelevant to this discussion because we at least know they exist.
That emotions are a material process is obvious, because how else would be feel them? The matter in this is defining cause and effect. I have always held the belief that emotions cannot be reduced into their biological manifestation, because that would be a reductive fallacy. The cause of love, anger, sorrow, are not the chemicals coursing through your veins, those are the physical manifestation of the cause, which would be the person, the ego.
When I use the functions of abstraction inherent to my brain to concoct an idea of "meaning", I am still firmly within the realm of material human existence... these functions exist in my brain, and are part of what makes me exist as a human being and not as something else. When I use them in this way, nobody can debate that I am finding meaning in existence because "meaning" is a human construct too, and it has a finite human meaning my brain can easily deal with. Like I said, it doesn't have some divine stamp of importance on it.
Very interesting point. I do not agree that meaning is a human construct however, i believe that it is a human feeling. If it is merely a human construct, it is (oooh, lookout for some hardcore wordplay) meaningless. The thought of meaning does not grant meaning, though the reasoning of it would. However, to reason it, it must have a source. Meaning exists as an outside construct, whether in Nature, that which supposedly exists of its own accord and formed us, or in the supernatural, "God", that which created Nature and exists of its own accord.
The debate for meaning then falls into of of Natural vs Supernatural. Because, if we are constructs of Nature, then meaning exists from Nature, because any musing on the nature of meaning would be inherently issued from this system. If we are constructs of "God", then meaning exists from it.
Besides, imagine for a second that some god created us for a purpose. By what mandate can he just go around handing out cosmic purpose like trick-or-treat candy? Does he have a purpose too? Is that purpose produced by him, or by some other creator responsible for him? And what of that higher creator? What's his purpose, and where did it come from?
We all agree that something must exist of its own accord, independently from anything else. Thus, if "God" exists and created the world and IS that which exists of its own accord, then its purpose is that of being that which exists of its own accord. The bucks stops with God. Hence, all meaning and purpose would be derived from it, and all meaning would be attributed to it, as that which exists.
As for a mandate for comsic purpose, the fact of being the source of purpose is a sufficient one, i would assume.
In the end, the original "purpose" either has to pop out of a void, or always have existed somewhere. So it's not worth much, is it? It seems like it would have to be a bit arbitrary.
Assuming that God created the world, and is also that which exists of its own accord, and thus that which is source of purpose, then being a creature of God would imply purpose out the whazzoo.
That's all i think i have to say. I may have some other things to say, depending on what you respond, that's pretty much as far as i have thought on this one...
I look forward to your response, but at this point, i think i don't much else to say...
Interesting topic...
hahaha ok this is a tough one to quote but i will do my best.
For the first few paragraphs, I would simply say that I think reason is, in fact, due to cause and effect, as you put it. I think our ability to reason is another function of our brains that has evolved over time.
Whether or not that's "valid" is an interesting question, but I think a meaningless one... if we can reason, and that reason is due to a material process in our brains, who's to say that it isn't valid?
As for the whole "experience" thing, I thought you might take it that way... in the case of the scientist, I would say he is working from his experience of math teachers telling him 1+1=2 all the way up through whatever physics subject he happens to be using to build his rocket. This information comes from human experience too- physics (and even math) is built on the observation of nature, and from that come laws and theories that the scientist learns and uses to allow his spaceship to blast off to wherever it's going.
Without experience in the field of physics, he would have no chance of constructing even the simplest spacecraft. And physics, again, is based on observation and experimentation. Reason allows him to suppose that the laws of gravity, etc. still hold outside the earth's atmosphere and that he could put a spaceship up there by using the knowledge he already has. In that way, it is definitely within his experience.
And concerning emotions- exactly why they happen is not my concern. I'm willing to bet that they exist. I experience them. I experience human emotions because I am human. I believe they are a material process that is inherent to our brains because it was beneficial for our ancestors to feel them. Whether or not we understand them is not really of interest to me (in fact, I'd rather we didn't) but just because we can't currently model them in theory is not enough to convince me that they are a manifestation of some supernatural component of one's self. Occam's razor tells me that the simplest explanation tends to be the best one.
Onwards to "meaning"... I think to say that meaning is meaningless if it is a human construct follows a somewhat tautological line of reasoning. I fail to see any reason why that is so, anyway. All we know about our relationship to the cosmos is that we are human. So if my humanity furnishes me with a concept of "meaning" and my mind tells me that it is something my life has, or something I should work towards, how is that wrong?
Nature is incapable of providing me with meaning unless it can somehow communicate that meaning to me in human terms. In this case, it has produced me, a result of a long chain of causality, has given me a concept of meaning, and has given me the tools to pursue that meaning. That is the only meaning humans can get from nature. The elementary particles that make us up are exactly the same as those one might find in matter anywhere else in the universe. There is nothing special about our building blocks. Only in the complexity and uniqueness of our human structure can we find our meaning.
If our universe was "supernatural" in origin, and somehow God himself has your "true" meaning, then yes, we have meaning as a consequence of being part of that system. But if you can't tell me why God gets to have meaning and we don't without reverting to "because he's god, lol" then I don't see why I should see that argument as a valid one.
If God is that which exists of its own accord, then He is in violation of causality. That cannot happen in our universe. If we try to imagine a world where causality does not apply, we run into a lot of problems. Basically, this world makes no sense to us. Furthermore, I don't necessarily agree that something must exist of its own accord, because I DO agree with you that we don't understand the universe or its origins and that necessarily means that we can't really speculate on what seeded reality based on our limited human knowledge. Who knows what happened.
But if there was a God at the root of all causality, who existed of His own accord, in a strange and utterly alien reality, and if he did imbue our universe with cosmic purpose, then it sure as hell isn't a purpose we can ever understand as human beings. So why is it relevant to us? If we take on a purpose for ourselves, it has to be something we can understand. If we believe in a purpose that we cannot comprehend, then what's our purpose? What's our meaning? You can't tell me, and you never will be able to.
God can either A) be incomprehensible to us and never mean anything to us either or B) be something we can understand and therefore something that is open to our questioning based on the laws of the reality we inhabit. He can't be both. We as humans are incapable of thinking outside our reality. It is neither within the realm of our experience nor within the bounds of everything we could ever hope to experience in the future.
Again, Occam's razor. The universe could either have inherent meaning, or not. We have not observed concrete proof either way, so we could not say that the universe would change at all if we were to flip that switch. Therefore, I'm inclined to believe that there is not some flag of supernatural meaning attached to some objects because there is no reason we know of for that to be true, and the "meaningless" case is much simpler.
