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Life can't literally have meaning. It's not an expression. But when a lot of the things you're doing have a common purpose, they form a pattern similar to the
by pg 13y ago
Life can't literally have meaning. It's not an expression. But when a lot of the things you're doing have a common purpose, they form a pattern similar to the pattern that indicates signal rather than noise.
So when you have a sense of purpose, it will feel as if your life has meaning.
- kirubakaran 13y agoThat's a beautiful answer. But it feels like since noise is less compressible than signal, a sufficiently rich life has to look more like noise than signal when looking forward in time.
- chacham15 13y ago> Life can't literally have meaning. I dont understand this. Why not? What about the lives of animals? For example, couldnt you say that the meaning of the life of certain ants is to serve their queen? That is the reason that they exist. The main difference I see is that there doesnt exist an entity which we are born to serve, but many have deities that can fill that role. Some atheists instead use the collective human condition to fill that role.
- tprice7 13y ago"couldnt you say that the meaning of the life of certain ants is to serve their queen" You could say that, but the word "meaning" in this context is not used in a literal sense, it's expressing something closer to "purpose". The word "meaning", when used literally, applies to communications. It's the thing the communication is supposed to express. An ant's life is not a communication and therefore the word meaning does not apply in a literal sense.
- eah13 13y agothis.