Yea, nature says we exist simply to exist, but being human we try to come up with some beautiful reason for why we are here, wether it be God or something else. At this moment in time it is raining methane on titan, whole galaxies are colliding, stars are imploding and black holes are devouring even light, yet some of us like to sit here on your pock marked planet, a beautiful gem formed from billions of years of chaos, and we sit here with our inhalers in your pockets, glasses on our faces and braces on our teeth, and we like to wonder at the order of it all, but I don’t see it, and that does not make me sad, because in the infinite cosmos, with all the odds stacked against us, we are here, together, we have loved and lost in this split second of time, amid all the turmoil, we found shelter, shelter enough to survive on this rock, and be at peace, and thats beautiful enough for me, and reason enough to exist.
One interesting theory I heard a while ago is this: Humans subconsciously all want to become immortal. It's part of our nature, to live forever. The way we can currently do this is by passing our genes on, having kids, and around goes the cycle in the hope that we will eventually discover how to become immortal. It's just a theory I thought I'd share, even thought I don't believe it. I think we're here to mess about and have a good time.
There is no why, sorry to disappoint. It was all happenstance set in motion by the original formation of the universe.
As for the how. Sorry, that's not philosophical either, but here's how it happened anyway...
I could sit here and type out the chain of events from the big bang to the formation of the first generation of stars to the supernovas that created the heavy elements to the birth of our own star and planet to the collision between the proto-earth and a mars-sized body that created the moon which in it's early days orbited much closer to the earth causing massively high tides the churning of which combined with large electrical storms created by the excess heat energy stored in the oceans created the first amino acids, which are unique for the fact that they are self replicating.
From there it's a matter of the first self-replicating amino acid randomly forming a molecular membrane around itself which proved to be an evolutionary advantage leading to the first single celled organisms and more and more complex amino acid strands that would later become what we recognize as DNA. The next evolutionary step was the random formation of binding molecules that allowed a single-celled organism to bifurcate during its normal reproduction and then stick to the new cell, creating the first multi-celled organism. These multi-celled organisms became more and more complex due to random mutations in the aforementioned DNA molecules until individual cells within the same organism became physically differentiated from the others in order to be used for different purposes. From there organisms evolved defined structures within themselves such as bones, protective outer skin, and even cells that existed solely to network with each other to process sensory input, leading to the first brains.
Over time other things such as eyes, fins, etc. evolved to create the fish and amphibian like creatures. Some of these creatures got bored of swimming and scooched out onto the beaches where there were- at the time- no predators to eat them. They immediately evolved into predators to eat smaller things that scooched onto the beach behind them, making them the first douchebags. In turn the new prey animals developed legs of their own to run the fuck away from the douchebags. The douchebags in turn developed bigger brains to outsmart them, and their eyes moved closer together in order to judge distances better when chasing them.
This evolutionary arms race peaked when one of the animals that was both predator and prey began to spend more and more time standing up on its rear legs to look over the tall grass, because if god existed he forgot to mow that shit, I bet the home owner's association is pissed at him, why can't he just mow his damn lawn? He's ruining my property values.
Some of these monkey like animals developed mutations that allowed their rear knees to lock so they could stand up indefinitely. They were able to reproduce more than the non-locking-knee monkeys because chicks dig tall guys. These shallow unions produced the first proto-humans.
Because they only needed two legs to walk, the proto-humans started wondering what the hell they could use these hands for. After they got sick of masturbating, they banged some rocks together until one broke, forming a sharp edge. One of the proto-humans cut himself on the sharp rock and thought "damn, that hurt" only they didn't have language yet, so it probably sounded more like "ook ook eek" in his head. After that he stabbed one of his fellow humans to death because he wouldn't shut up. The news quickly spread about this new rock that had been developed capable of cuttin' bitches up, and eventually one of the humans had the genius idea to try cutting up all those animals that they normally had to headbutt to death.
This sudden lack of headbutting prevented the humans from damaging their brains over time, allowing them to come up with more and more complex tools, which required more and more intelligence to use effectively. This created a positive feedback loop of innovation until suddenly the humans were building houses and wearing clothes and writing horrible love poetry to each other in an attempt to get laid, while missing the days that all it took to get some nooky standing upright, or at worst beating a sabre-toothed tiger to death.
And that's how you came to be.
Yeah, I could sit here and explain all that, but damn that would take a lot of effort.
It's one of life's great mysteries, isn't it? Why are we here? I mean, are we the product of some...cosmic coincidence? Or is there really a God, watching everything, you know, with a plan for us and stuff. I don't know man, but it keeps me up at night.
It's one off those mysteries that will never have a solid answer. But personally I believe life just happened, but It's up to us what we do with our life, and up to use, to make the most off it and enjoy it.
If we are to trust our natural instincts, we are here to explore the limits of our world and our minds. From the earliest days of mankind we've been a species that is curious. Going out into the unknown just to find out what's there. When we reached the limits of where we could go on ground, we invented devices like boats, airplanes, and space shuttles, to go even farther. Even when faces with at the time a certainty that the Earth was flat and you could sail off the edge, we went anyway. When faced with something that is impossible under our current knowledge set, we hack away at it with sometimes silly ideas to get around it.
We cannot live forever, so we push beyond that by producing children and stuffing them full of as much knowledge as we can, in hopes that they will pick up the journey where we left off. As the world around us today and the history before us shows, huge problems arise when too many remain stagnant in their exploration. But there is a purpose in that as well, as it motivates others to pick up the slack.
As much as I'd like there to be an actual plan to it all, I will probably have to say that the only reason we're here is because we were born. Beyond that, we make our own reasons.
There is fate, although it consists of the laws of physics; what goes up must come down, all things tend toward entropy, etc.
As for free will, it IS constrained by circumstance. If you are on the edge of a cliff, you can jump, climb up, or climb down. You do not have "go make a sandwich" as one of your immediate choices. The chain of circumstance determines your choices, and each choice creates a new circumstance (called a "consequence").
So, in essence, "free will" is simply an expanded version of chaos theory (sensitive dependence on initial conditions, also known as the "Butterfly effect"), and fate is simply the line of circumstances constraining the choices.
This is true, But IN constrained circumstance, (continuing with the example) you have the choices to go up, down or jump off. whether you choose one over the other based on circumstance and the situation.What I mean by what I said regards the reason to the choices. In psychology, you are taught that every mind is different and only the beholder of said mind could understand it. since all of past variables have been set, someone chooses whether to climb up the cliff or not depends on such. said person has been and always will have those variables were previously determined. let say that society taught him to reach the top, and that makes the person want to climb upwards. (assuming that both are equal distance and this person is unaware of what lies ahead) even though society's lesson is completely irrelevant, It influences his/her decision. i'm starting to get off track (wow now I'm turning into the drunk tank!) the point is that the choices someone makes is determined by their memories and lessons taught to them.all of their influences will always make them choose the same result.
as for the laws of physics, laws can be changes. we will never know every thing about the universe. we do not know all of the "laws" of physics and there could be other "laws" or exceptions that are beyond our perceptions that prove this "law" wrong.
The human mind has a unique ability, in that it is able to perceive complex patterns. Through this perceptual capability, the human mind is capable of abstracting a great many things, and I believe this is the source of what many refer to as the "soul." This pattern-sensing architecture is also responsible for the learning and use of language, and as a result, the basic ability of passing on complex concepts, such as "society," from one person to another without direct observation.
Now that I've described the complex-pattern-sensing capability of the human mind, let's return to our cliffhanger. His choices are determined by his present predicament, and what he knows the outcomes of the three actions are (through understanding of the patterns he has either observed or learned from others in the past). He will act in a way that offers the most beneficial outcome to his understanding. If the top of the cliff is closer, he may climb up. If he chose to climb, this is also an indication of climbing up. If he's on a ledge, and it's nightfall, he may be able to rest for the night. If he happened to have a sandwich in his climbing pack, perhaps he could "go make a sandwich." If he was thrown off the cliff by a giant Freelancer, and hanging on to a Buster Shot that he embedded in the cliff face, while he knew others were at the top, he could call out.
A person will always act to his perceived best interest, whatever it is he perceives it to be. He uses the complex pattern recognition features of his brain to predict possible outcomes, and selects the best one for his goals, but this is still a set-in-stone response, because his experiences and pattern-recognition ability will always select the same path in this same circumstance, unless something external changes the recognized pattern. This is what I mean by constraints brought on by the circumstance, and this is where "fate" is applied to a person's life.
Where free will comes in, however, is the person's priorities list: There is a list of things one values, one above the other, and this list determines what his reaction to circumstances will be. For example, "survival" is on this list, as is "pleasure" and "satisfaction." A person will act to meet these priorities, depending on which order they happen to be in, the higher taking precedence over the lower. So, survival will usually trump satisfaction, which may or may not be higher than pleasure. There are external entities responsible for even this, but since one of those entities IS the pattern recognition feature of the brain, it is at least partially internal, and therefore, legitimately, "free" will.
As for the laws of physics, we don't have to know them. What we know will determine our actions until observation changes our predictions of consequences. More importantly, laws are laws for a reason; if our cliffhanger let go of the cliff face, he doesn't need to know about the law of gravity, it will apply regardless (unless he happens to be a Looney Tunes character). If it applies far enough from the ground, then you can't get any more fated than that.
I think that everyone has asked themselves that question once in their lives, but if we knew the answer, life really wouldn't have much of a purpose anymore. So there is really no answer, just decide for yourself. If it makes you happy and doesn't sacrifice the happiness of others, do it.
I don't think you're asking the right question, but I do know the correct answer is 42.
A more serious answer, perhaps would be fitting to you. Has it occurred to you that questions like, "why are we here?" and "what is the meaning of life?" require some circular logic? Perhaps the answers to these cannot be determined, as they are more existentialist, that each question can only be answered by an individual, there is no universal answer. Perhaps we are here, and the meaning is, to search for these answers, which can only be answered by oneself, and only apply to oneself.
I'm here to eat bacon and drink beer. Life's meaning comes from enjoying myself while simultaneously trying to doing the same for my friends and family.
