What do we know about our EXISTENCE? what is it?

Answer 1

I love that question, I've wondered that same thing! I feel that we exist due to the way most any other animal is born, intercourse. We create our own reasons for staying alive and our lives eventually intertwine with others. We try to cause as little "pain" and as much "pleasure" as we can (though there is no true right or wrong, we reason what it is from various sources), trying to make up for our errors as well as trying to learn as much as possible. We eventually perish, as all creatures do, and life goes on, our lives carry some impact, though it is small. Life is a series of trial and error, from the Big Bang, the dinos, to the homo sapiens winning the evolutionary race. Other creatures rise up and surpass the others, and this Earth, this oasis of the Milky Way, will eventually be gone (not for awhile, though). Existence is.......I assume being aware, breathing, experiencing, and following the 8 (I think 8) scientific regulations for being an organism. Then again, we could all just think we're living, though I doubt that

Answer 2

This, in my view, is the deepest philosophical question... I mean what our existence is rather than what it is for. While the purpose of our existence itself is a question to which there seems no clear-cut answer, the more basic and tougher question is as to what signifies our existence as opposed to a non-existence. Obviously what we do or should do arises only because we exist. How is it ascertained whether we exist or not is a different key question.

I believe that our existence is determined by our will..... the fact that we can have a will and do have lots of will, is what proves that we exist as a separate entity in this great universe. We are obviously a part of the vast universe and the space-time span, but what truly defines us as an independent identity is our will. Our will may well be influenced in several ways by the whole of which we are a part, but in the final analysis it appears to be the only sure sign and proof that we do have a distinguishable existence as well, distinct from the whole of which we are a part.

I therefore believe that it is our will that signifies as well as defines our existence. It is through our will that we determine whatever purposes we would choose while we exist. Without our unique will, we would not have an independent existence with its own purposes.

Answer 3

What we KNOW about our existence is too often confused with what we want to believe about our existence. For instance, many humans like to think that they are the favored species of their creator god. Humans claim their god created them in his image. Many humans think their god is infinite in power and knowledge and yet still sets humans apart from other life forms, even though logically humans are just as infinitely below their god as any amoeba.

So what do we KNOW? Not a whole lot. We know that we DO exist, otherwise we wouldn't be around to ponder it. We _should_ know that we occupy a very tiny favorable niche in a vast universe that is otherwise extremely inhospitable to life.

We, at least some of us, know that consciousness is an emergent process of the complex neural nets we call our brains. We, at least some of us, know that everything that makes us individuals--our memories, experiences, tastes, personalities--are encoded in the connections of our neurons, and that minutes after we die, these neurons shrivel up, forever destroying the information that was us.

There are some interesting cosmological explanations for how and why our universe came into existence. Such explanations are a bit too long and complex for this forum, but involve natural processes and are quite logical and credible. If you can find it at a local library, you may want to check out "The Inflationary Universe" by Alan Guth.

In your question you didn't state whether "our" existence referred to humanity's existence, or to that of the larger universe. The two are actually quite different questions, unless you're of the belief that the whole wide universe was built just for us humans, which all the available evidence would seem to strongly point against.

Answer 4

What we think we know about our EXISTENCE is what we think we know. In other words our limited thinking creates an idea that it believes answers the question but will we ever really know. As we are constantly changing our ideas from one day to the next. There are so many uncharted territories for the mind to discover, it's an infinite subject.

Answer 5

I personally think that we are here to learn from our experiences. And possibly for someone else, to gain knowledge from us. There isn't really any for sure answer about our existence, how we got here, or anything else for that matter. Have you ever just spent countless moments just imagining what it would be like if we were just here as someones biology experiment?

Answer 6

"We" as a race know what e.g. Jesus said: "I and the Father are One," what the philosopher Plotinus said: "One Mind Soul, and what Gautama Buddha said: "I (am) Atman."

What these Words (capitalized to indicate higher Being/Oneness) import is a level of Being beyond materialistic ex-istence.

On the other side of things, physics finds fields of coalesced, geometrized Energy supported by virtual Light. "Psychoenergetic Science" and (and the related book, "The Reincarnation of Edgar Cayce?") are two examples of understanding existence as more than mere atoms, as are "The Masters and Their Retreats" (Mark L. Prophet) and "Watch Your Dreams" (Ann Ree Colton) awareness.

To claim to know "God is not" is to reason illogically, as no one can prove that negative. Hence, evidence as to "God is," is both miracle-based (Host of Light at Garabandal, Spain, early 1960s) and interior self-awareness (Saint Teresa of Avila, "Interior Castle," Paramahansa Yogananda, "Autobiography of a Yogi" , "The Master of Lucid Dreams," Olga Kharitidi, M.D., "Toward a Solar Civilization," O. M. Aivanhov), often with signs following (e.g., "Mary Baker Eddy: Christian Healer," Yvonne von Fettweis).

So, in fine, there are many states-specific vis a vis "existence"--i.e., not one person's description necessarily fits/describes all person's states of existence, nor all possible/claimed levels.

A. N. Whitehead described the major error of philosophy as a tendency to overgeneralize--i.e., the tendency of a single thinker to believe that her mentation/awareness is (or should be) the standard for all mankind. (The "Vienna Circle" and 19th century physicists who belived all major physics was accomplished are two examples of this;) Dr. Elizabeth Mayer's "Extraordinary Knowing," Dr. Carol Dweck's "Mindsets," and Dr. Martha Beck's "Expecting Adam" are all very worthwhile examples of scientists who've realized this, to their benefit.

All of the above volumes are worthwhile re "what is existence," as you may prove by sampling any 2-3 of them.

cordially,

j.

Answer 7

We do not "know" that we exist or are the playthings of some "other's" manifestation of imagination.