Scientific approach to life's purpose?
Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2014 8:25 am
Right, so we have a scientifically oriented forum here. Right?
How do we look at the question of an individual's purpose in life?
From other non-scientific viewpoints, there's quite a few to go around. Ted Talks have a lame video on how to know your life purpose in 5 minutes. Sadly the guy doesn't even know the difference between a person's name and who a person is - let alone the big question of the purpose of life.
Another one is by Deepak Chopra. "Are You Living Your True Purpose?" http://www.healyourlife.com/author-deep ... ue-purpose Personally I've found through experience that its pretty hard to tell one's "dharma" even in the midst of what life is throwing at one. For one, I've found that stress and tension can be a sign that one needs to MOVE ON and get off your butt. Other times its a peaceful transition when going through change. I don't think its as simple as his bullet-point list of smooth-sailing being a green light and storms being a red light.
Since I grew up as a fundamentalist christian, I can tell you that most christians believe the purpose of life is to worship God. I never agreed with that, even as a 6-year old kid. What the hell are the billions of angels for that we got told were also created for that purpose? Then came the teaching of "general" AND "individual" life purpose. Turns out the bible has a personality profile in Romans 12 and now we run the same line of thinking as psychology - do what you are good at, that's how you are built so that what you should be doing.
Then you get the other philosophical view that is about "creating" meaning in your life and "creating" purpose in your life.
Now we've covered everything from motivational speakers, to religion, to philosophy. And everyone has a different take on it.
Scientifically speaking, is it accurate to venture into the direction of saying that life's purpose is to... evolve? That might make some sense if we see reincarnation as a scientific fact. And if we include our development not only as genetics but also the evolution of ourselves as "soul" or "spirit" (which I might term our "energetic evolution").
What are your thoughts, how should one approach such a topic scientifically?
How do we look at the question of an individual's purpose in life?
From other non-scientific viewpoints, there's quite a few to go around. Ted Talks have a lame video on how to know your life purpose in 5 minutes. Sadly the guy doesn't even know the difference between a person's name and who a person is - let alone the big question of the purpose of life.
Another one is by Deepak Chopra. "Are You Living Your True Purpose?" http://www.healyourlife.com/author-deep ... ue-purpose Personally I've found through experience that its pretty hard to tell one's "dharma" even in the midst of what life is throwing at one. For one, I've found that stress and tension can be a sign that one needs to MOVE ON and get off your butt. Other times its a peaceful transition when going through change. I don't think its as simple as his bullet-point list of smooth-sailing being a green light and storms being a red light.
Since I grew up as a fundamentalist christian, I can tell you that most christians believe the purpose of life is to worship God. I never agreed with that, even as a 6-year old kid. What the hell are the billions of angels for that we got told were also created for that purpose? Then came the teaching of "general" AND "individual" life purpose. Turns out the bible has a personality profile in Romans 12 and now we run the same line of thinking as psychology - do what you are good at, that's how you are built so that what you should be doing.
Then you get the other philosophical view that is about "creating" meaning in your life and "creating" purpose in your life.
Now we've covered everything from motivational speakers, to religion, to philosophy. And everyone has a different take on it.
Scientifically speaking, is it accurate to venture into the direction of saying that life's purpose is to... evolve? That might make some sense if we see reincarnation as a scientific fact. And if we include our development not only as genetics but also the evolution of ourselves as "soul" or "spirit" (which I might term our "energetic evolution").
What are your thoughts, how should one approach such a topic scientifically?