Ah yes, the meaning of life ... There are many paraphrases this seemingly profound question - Where do we come from, where are we going? - Or, to put it to Douglas Adams: "The Question of Life, the Universe and Everything". I as a follower of prose Answers to questions poetic think the question is in this form first, and were ambiguous and, secondly, a touch of megalomania out. Miss course because "meaning" mostly implies that the something whose meaning we seek, was created by someone in an intention out for anything, so has a purpose. "What is the meaning (and purpose) of a computer?" Is thus a valid question. The "sense of the weather," one looks in vain, however. The weather is just there. It is a natural phenomenon, as we are. No one has been created us or we are, even if it sounds disappointing, the product of a process of random selection Mutations of a complex carbon-based molecule. All the miracles accomplished man so far, the symphonies of Beethoven, the relativity theory, the landing on the Moon, to the words of Carl Sagan, "things that hydrogen atoms do when you give them 15 billion years time .
But where does the question of the meaning of life in general? - Well, for thousands of years it was not questioning taken for granted that we were created but somehow, by one or more gods. Created - oh, then surely for a purpose! Life was filled with a mysterious sense, because such a God is not for nothing that makes the effort. And then suddenly - I give the floor here at Steven Weinberg, who puts it excellently added:
"The people considered themselves characters in a cosmic drama: We were created to have sinned, to be redeemed - a very large remember history. Now we know that we are more like actors standing around with no stage directions on a stage, and that nothing else is left here as a bit of drama to improvise there a little comedy. "
Sigmund Freud had already had a similar epiphany, and developed the theory of the "insults to humanity . After that the first (Copernicus) the humiliation that people suddenly had to realize, not the Earth was the center of the universe, but an insignificant bits of stone somewhere on the outskirts of the Milky Way. The second insult came from Darwin, who made us clear how the man could arise naturally, without divine breath from a common ape-like ancestors. I think, therefore, is the eternal question of the meaning of life: the past, the sense because of the religious influence of course available and easy to find at the pastor / priest / shaman of your trust. Is man but disenchanted as a mere upgrade of the monkey, so it looks (perhaps unconsciously) - For a replacement for the lost throne - and invents a meaning of life, is not there, because there is nobody who can give us this "objective" sense.
What does not prevent us to live the life meaningful, to try to understand the world and to do good. This sense - or rather content - we must give life but even so he is solely in our hands.
