To ask the question: what is the meaning of life - is to ask why can we ask what the meaning of life is. It is a question regarding self awareness and self actualization. Without the ability to contemplate this question we are simply existing, without realizing our existence, and therefore without the ability to conjure the question of why as it relates to our own existence. We recognize that there is something special about our ability to question existentially. If there is something special about our existence then we are led to believe that there is a reason (a meaning) for this special existence which is self aware. The answer to the question then is inextricable from the question itself. To be able to ask what is the meaning of life is the answer to what the meaning of life is. But this feels somewhat incomplete. I propose that in asking the question we are in fact opening the door to free will. By asking this question you have created a space, a void which is undefined - a place which can only be defined by you. As the master of this domain and the captain of your ship you must answer this question for yourself through the exercise of free will. If you agree to let another individual define the answer to this internal question then you necessarily forfeit your free will ... And thus are ceding any meaning that there might be in your life. But perhaps this post-modern subjective answer is not broad enough to encompass the question. Are we not asking instead - what is the meaning of life itself in comparison to non-life. We are able to easily identify the existence of both living and non living substances. This where I propose an idea which you may not yet have contemplate: since the difference between life is merely chemical composition I suggest that the meaning of life is purely chemical in nature. There is in fact no purpose to our life, it is purely coincidental. Where we find meaning we have found only illusion. Abstraction exists only within our self actualizing- self realizing lives due to a complex arrangement of chemicals which in the grand scheme of chemical composites is happenstance. A single enzyme or elemental structure has a certain ionic pattern which determines by accident whether it ca be joined to another element. Some molecules are hydrophobic for example and cannot be joined to hydrogen or oxygen. When we look at molecules under a microscope we see them rejecting some molecules while joining with others and this movement can appear as though motivated by desire, but in actuality the non living molecules are merely bumping into each other and coming to rest where there is room to rest. As organisms we are much more complex sets of molecules which are interacting in a certain way by virtue of the fact that the non living molecules that make us whole happen to fit in this certain arrangement which we can identify as living and as human, but these constituent parts could just as easily be rearranged into another whole which could be identified as a rock, a tree, or a bird. And in fact these parts do rearrange themselves - and that is what we call death - when our molecular parts cease being arranged in the form we recognize and can classify as ourselves. The meaning of our lives is really nothing more than the meaning of non living molecules - we are moving through space bumping into things until we find a place where we fit. It is not as simple as it sounds. the molecular arrangement that creates an identifiable human is a special arrangement that at its base is simple, but increasingly becomes more complex as the specific arrangement of molecules and elements begin to interact with each other. Certain masses of combined molecules begin to react together in a way that creates a function that operates by virtue of the grouping which is different than the individuals which make that group. And what we call life is a very complex arrangements of these very complex groups which have interacting functions. We find that we are not just bumping around in space - but rather we find the we are bumping around with a purpose - we tend to find groups of other humans with whom we fit. These groups then function in a way that is unique to the group and different than the individuals that make the group. On a complex level, the whole of our groups adds up to what we can identify as a society. The society appears to be the highest functioning organization in all of existence. Knowing this we can identify the meaning of our individual lives is to function in service to society. The meaning of life in general is to organize in a way which creates the highest functioning level possible - at this point a society. We might at this point ask the next logical question: what is the meaning of society?-Kenneth Casper 7-21-2013
