What is the meaning of life?

Question

i told my g/f u could find the answer to any question on here so she told me to ask this.

Answer 1

The philosophical question "What is the meaning of life?" means different things to different people. The vagueness of the query is inherent in the word "meaning", which opens the question to many interpretations, such as: "What is the origin of life?", "What is the nature of life (and of the universe in which we live)?", "What is the significance of life?", "What is valuable in life?", and "What is the purpose of, or in, (one's) life?". These questions have resulted in a wide range of competing answers and arguments, from scientific theories, to philosophical, theological, and spiritual explanations.

These questions are separate from the scientific issue of the boundary between things with life and inanimate objects.
Popular beliefs
"What is the meaning of life?" is a question many people ask themselves at some point during their lives, most in the context "What is the purpose of life?" Here are some of the many potential answers to this perplexing question. The responses are shown to overlap in many ways but may be grouped into the following categories:

Survival and temporal success
...to live every day like it is your last and to do your best at everything that comes before you
...to be always satisfied
...to live, go to school, work, and die
...to participate in natural human evolution, or to contribute to the gene pool of the human race
...to advance technological evolution, or to actively develop the future of intelligent life
...to compete or co-operate with others
...to destroy others who harm you, or to practice nonviolence and nonresistance
...to gain and exercise power
...to leave a legacy, such as a work of art or a book
...to eat
...to prepare for death
...to spend life in the pursuit of happiness, maybe not to obtain it, but to pursue it relentlessly.
...to produce offspring through sexual reproduction (alike to participating in evolution)
...to protect and preserve one's kin, clan, or tribe (akin to participating in evolution)
...to seek freedom, either physically, mentally or financially
...to observe the ultimate fate of humanity to the furthest possible extent
...to seek happiness and flourish, experience pleasure or celebrate
...to survive, including the pursuit of immortality through scientific means
...to attempt to have many sexual conquests (as in Arthur Schopenhauer's will to procreate)
...to find and take over all free space in this "game" called life
...to seek and find beauty
...to kill or be killed
...No point. Since having a point is a condition of living human consciousness. Animals do not need a point to live or exist. It is more of an affliction of consciousness that there are such things as points, a negative side to evolutionary development for lack of better words.

Wisdom and knowledge
...to master and know everything
...to be without questions, or to keep asking questions
...to expand one's perception of the world
...to explore, to expand beyond our frontiers
...to learn from one's own and others' mistakes
...to seek truth, knowledge, understanding, or wisdom
...to understand and be mindful of creation or the cosmos
...to lead the world towards a desired situation
...to satisfy the natural curiosity felt by humans about life

Ethical
...to express compassion
...to follow the "Golden Rule"
...to give and receive love
...to work for justice and freedom
...to live in peace with yourself and each other, and in harmony with our natural environment
...to protect humanity, or more generally the environment
...to serve others, or do good deeds

Religious and spiritual
...to find perfect love and a complete expression of one's humanness in a relationship with God
...to achieve a supernatural connection within the natural context
...to achieve enlightenment and inner peace
...to become like God, or divine
...to glorify God
...to experience personal justice (i.e. to be rewarded for goodness)
...to experience existence from an infinite number of perspectives in order to expand the consciousness of all there is (i.e. to seek objectivity)
...to be a filter of creation between heaven and hell
...to produce useful structure in the universe over and above consumption (see net creativity)
...to reach Heaven in the afterlife
...to seek and acquire virtue, to live a virtuous life
...to turn fear into joy at a constant rate achieving on literal and metaphorical levels: immortality, enlightenment, and atonement
...to understand and follow the "Word of God"
...to discover who you are
...to resolve all problems that one faces, or to ignore them and attempt to fully continue life without them, or to detach oneself from all problems faced

Philosophical
...to give life meaning
...to participate in the chain of events which has led from the creation of the universe until its possible end (either freely chosen or determined, this is a subject widely debated amongst philosophers)
...to know the meaning of life
...to achieve self-actualisation
...all possible meanings have some validity
...life in itself has no meaning, for its purpose is an opportunity to create that meaning, therefore:
...to die
...to simply live until one dies (there is no universal or celestial purpose)
...nature taking its course (the wheel of time keeps on turning)
...whatever you see you see, as in "projection makes perception"
...there is no purpose or meaning whatsoever
...life may actually not exist, or may be illusory )
...to contemplate "the meaning of the end of life"

Other
...to contribute to collective meaning ("we" or "us") without having individual meaning ("I" or "me")
...to find a purpose, a "reason" for living that hopefully raises the quality of one's experience of life, or even life in general
...to participate in the inevitable increase in entropy of the universe
...to make conformists' lives miserable
...to make life as difficult as possible for others (i.e. to compete)

Answer 2

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Answer 3

I personally believe that the meaning of life is to somehow change the world and make it better. Even if its in the smallest way. Donating old clothes to charity instead of throwing them away, making sure you dont litter, or getting a dog at the pound instead of an expensive pet shop. Any of those things helps someone else and makes their life just a little bit better because of you.

Answer 4

Dear Darth

I'm guessing you're new to Yahoo Answers. Otherwise you'd know this stultifyingly tedious question is asked every other day. If you really think you can find an answer to impress your girlfriend, please refer to the previous 2,307,846 variations on this theme posed in Yahoo Answers, where you'll find at least... ooh, six different possibilities.

Best wishes

Tyler's Mate

Answer 5

the meaning of life has different meanings for starters god created everything for a purpose in humans animals everything even trees and plants and you are on the planet to behave respctfully and do gods will, he gave you life to enjoy everything around you and not to abuse your life by smoking,taking drugs. etc your body has a soul it is much alive as you so look after it and it will look after you. your body is a temple

Answer 6

Live life, you never know whats comming next, if we were made from the ground, as bacteria, then we were composed by solar system, then we came from the big bang, then where are we going next? Mutation?

Answer 7

it is depens for everybody. For me, the meaning of life is to relief my self from any suffering and be happy, enjoy any second of your life and always try to do good things.

Answer 8

i just now answerd to that question asked by someone else,,
i don't mind answering it again,,

ur parents gave birth to u,,so u owe ur one whole life to them,,
loving them is what ur meaning of ur life,,
if u don't,,ur next life would be worse than this,,
and thats all that i have read,,heard and known about,,
so i hope i made myself clear that,,

loving ur parents,,serving them,,making offerings to them is ur meaning of ur life,,

Answer 9

life is to live a meaningful one by enjoying evryday by making others happy . ' live let live'. we must b good&do-gooders .lol

Answer 10

To prepare yourself for your eternal state of being.

Answer 11

Death. After life, everything comes down to death. (Enjoy life while you can!)