Who are you? Who am I? | Week 49

December | Meaning of Life | Week 49 | 12/10/2023
What is the meaning of life? Part 2 

Rummaging through the file cabinets in my cognitive landscape, a panoply of concepts have reference strings to this question. I find the teleology argument compelling - the idea that there is a natural telos, or pattern of meaning in the world that's capable of investigation. This aligns with religious thinking, that natural meaning is ordained and orchestrated by an external source. The idea of scientific exploration builds on this structure arguing that we can investigate the natural world and understand it - which in fact is implicitly religious, for there is a "goodness" or virtue to this exploration. The way I understand it, this chain of concepts runs counter to the idea of hedonism, that the meaning of the world is subjective and is to be found in the pursuit of our whims, not the exploration of the natural world, which follows some set of laws. Also contrary to hedonism is the idea that caring for others and being a "productive citizen" is a mode of being which is both good and sustaining. 

Jordan Peterson adopts this philosophy, arguing that the meaning to be found in life is found at the point of maximal adoption of responsibility for one's own life and the lives around them. In other words, what arises here is a fundamental debate whether we create the meaning of our life or whether we're endowed with the meaning of our life and we discover it. The religious thinkers stand completely in one camp, aligned with the scientists - nature has order, we can investigate that order, take responsibility for that order, and live in truth and it is there that we will feel meaning in life. 

Ben Shapiro makes an argument, based in religion but not relegated to it - that the meaning to be found in life is found in the roles we play relative to others: father, son, husband, brother, citizen, teacher, etc. Our duties give us meaning, not far off from Jordan Peterson's philosophy. Service to others and service to God are the chief sources of meaning - the combatting of evil, the protection of life, the civil participation in society, the creation of family, these are the sources of meaning where Peterson and Shapiro's philosophies intersect.