What is the point of human existence?

Question

Nature has a set of checks and balances, where all creatures have a purpose. The predators exist to make sure the prey does not get overpopulated; bees and some birds exist to help pollinate flowers and other plants. All things seem to have a purpose, what is the purpose to human life? Are we here as predators to make sure our prey do not become overpopulated? If so, we are doing a horrible job, as humans have successfully hunted many species into complete extinction.

Answer 1

The predators do NOT exist to make sure the prey don't overpopulate! LOL!

You might as well say that rain exists so that the clouds don't get too big.

The purpose of living things is to live and they are doing that just fine.

There have always been extinctions. Almost all of the species that lived on the earth a 100 million years ago are gone now.

A 100 million years from today the world will be populated by a whole new set of life forms and mankind will be ancient history.

Answer 2

Well, the way I see it, our ancestors, the interstellar travelers, put us here for a reason: To populate this region of space. That is our mission in life. They placed the moon nearby as a goal, an object of wonderment, a reminder that there is something beyond the earth, visible for all to see. We were supposed to progress, to increase in our numbers, and to advance in the sciences. We learn to survive, to adapt, to build systems.
Eventually, we will colonize the moon, and beyond. We may harness asteroids and combine their mass to create nothing less than a world-ship with which to travel beyond our solar system.

OR, if we're not in the mood to fulfil our destiny, as it were(I mean, that is a pretty tired sci-fi plot straight out of some old pulp magazine, kind of 'blah') then the alternative is we can torch the whole planet in a blaze of glory when it becomes apparent that our growth has put us on a downhill slide...yet, some might live...to begin again...

What's YOUR plan?

Answer 3

All of the reasons for God being real are not "excuses", they are real reasons. God is real, He is everywhere and in everything. The only reason you breathe is because God allows you to do so. Movement.... All of the animals, humans, insects, plants and trees.... all prime example of the existence of God. Why would we need to live, if not for God? What would be the point in an otherwise pointless life? It just wouldn't make sense. We all have a purpose and we are all needed.

Answer 4

Point of human existence would be to preserved and to abuse the earth... some say we only take and not give..but we are trying to preserve our land for us and other living things...but it is true if human did not exist there might not be a problem such as droughts...but we are here to live to serve our purpose that God gave us..and some people who does not choose that life..its suicide...but for the rest of us..we are the preserverance of life within the earth

Answer 5

There are three common questions people ask of philosophy:

1. The meaning of life,
2. The aim or goal of life,
3. The purpose or use of life.

These are not all the same question. What's more, the people who ask them usually neglect to make clear whether they are asking about their or my own personal life, about human life in general, or about all life in general.

So you see that there are nine different things these three questions might be asking. Here are my answers to them:

1. Your own life has only the meaning you give it yourself, there are plenty of alternatives to choose from.
2 & 3. It follows from 1 that there is no meaning common to all human life, nor to life in general.

4. Again, your aims or goals in life are a matter for your own choice. What's the difference between meanings and goals? It is that goals can be reached, but meanings are ideals - they might not be reachable, but their reward is not in being reachable but in being pursuable and worth pursuing.

5. Human life in general might, I suggest, have three main aims: - to defeat death, to maximize knowledge, to maximize happiness.

6. Life in general would have the same ultimate aims as human life (see 5). Naturally, life has to develop human capabilties (or better!!!) to be able to do so.

7. If you want to have a purpose or use in life, that suggests selflessness, and it might be either moral selflessness (being of use to others) or immoral selflessness (self-destructive behaviour is immorally selfless).

8. Is there some use to which some outside power is putting the whole human race? One hopes not, but this is what some religious people claim - that we are all God's instruments, we exist for some inscrutible reason of God's own. Clearly we do not have an ecological purpose - such as keeping other species in check (we are more likely to bring ecology to an end). Human intelligence has been, but need not ultimately be, a disaster for the ecological systems on this planet.

9. Does 8 apply to life in general? Again, one hopes not. And again, some religious beliefs claim so.

We can choose to have several 'purposes' ( I call them aims or goals). I nominate: the defeat of death, the maximization of knowledge, the maximization of happiness. These need not be incompatible.

Answer 6

We're no less a part of the cycle than birds and bees and preditors. We are both hunters and hunted. Or, maybe we're here to destroy the ozone. Not sure, ask Al Gore.

Answer 7

We are here to survive by gaining power our own nature and over the natural world and using those phenomena to our advantage. However, we are not to violate the laws of nature for our survival, such as by destroying a fetus to run tests on it in order to cure diseases.

Basically, we are here as Nietzsche put it, with a will to power, but rather with a principled will to power.

Answer 8

When we look at our being on earth it could be for anything but i like to look at what we have done and still do. And thats evolve, in general people look to learn and grow as a person summing our lives by all that we have done and learned to pass down to the next generation of people so that they can build on what we have done and do more. as a person with faith i also belive that this purpose of growing and learning brings us closer to god.

Cheers
Michael H Flack

Answer 9

Only a temporary meaning is attributed to our existence....to decrease pain and increase pleasure....thereby propagating our species. All else is lost to oblivion. In a thousand years, no one will even know that you were around. All your accomplishments and those of your children and their children will be forgotten..

You bones will be turned to dust and in a billion years, even the earth will be burnt to a crisp by the supernova of our sun....

Answer 10

Yeah, it seems like we've overstayed our welcome. There have been and continue to be some cultures that live mindfully of their environment, unfortunatley the people participating in consumer cultures are abundand and spreading. It takes so much of the worlds resources to keep Western countries going. It's unsustainable. Soon we won't be fighting for oil, we'll be killing each other for water. So go hug your Mom and fly a kite.