Some people gaze up at the stars and wonder what it’s all about. Me, I gaze up at the stars and wonder why people wonder what it’s all about. Why do people do this? It’s not at all obvious. We’re animals—specifically, apes—and pondering the meaning of life is a strange thing for an ape to do. It doesn’t get us food or sex. It doesn’t keep us safe from predators. It captures our limited attention without providing any obvious, Darwinian payoff. So maybe the real mystery isn’t the meaning of life, but
I don’t question the meaning of life anymore, because I know the answer. It’s because I’m a curious bastard who likes to understand things and also likes a challenge.
What these types you speak of don’t want to tell you is that you create your own meaning and project it onto the world. They just want you to believe what they believe instead.
Nice post, David. I agree that the meaning of life is bullshit (in that there is no single answer to the question), although I'm not so sure the question is bullshit. I suspect that it's usually an attempt to articulate an actual epistemic problem (basically, wtf should I be doing with my life).
I don't think the distinction is really between intellectuals and the working class, although if there's empirical evidence of that I'd be happy to reconsider. There is evidence that people who are high in trait "positive schizotypy" are more likely to be on a "search for meaning" (see here: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0213456 ) and I put forward an explanation for this finding in the section called "High level tinkering" from my paper last year (here: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35816687/ ), though that explanation probably wouldn't make sense outside of the context of the whole paper.
Thanks, Brett. Appreciate your thoughts. I think you’re right that the meaning of life is often about wtf to do with one’s life. But I see that as complementary with what I’m arguing. When we wonder wtf to do with our lives, we aren’t just looking for something to pass the time or make money; we’re looking for something we can justify to other people—something we can argue for. It’s not so much wtf to do with my life as wtf can I rationalize to my peers. If the social element were taken away, there would be no existential predicament. That’s my claim anyways.
I do acknowledge that the difference between working class and highly educated people is the weakest part of my argument (I have no data, just personal experience), and I could be wrong about that. What I’m more confident about is 1) existential reflection is a byproduct of our reasoning faculty, and 2) our reasoning faculty is way more social/bullshitty than we think (i.e. Hugo Mercier is right). From those two assumptions, it follows that existential reflection must be way more social/bullshitty than we think. I think that’s a really plausible claim. Hopefully I’ve persuaded you to give it more credence.
It’s an interesting finding about positive schizotypy. Maybe it has something to do with people being more delusional when they need more social support. Have you read Ed Hagen’s work on delusions? That stuff is really phenomenal. Highly recommend looking into it. You can check it out here: https://web-archive.southampton.ac.uk/cogprints.org/4134/
We are not only apes. We are very groupish apes. Apes who care about meaning are much better at forming groups than apes who only care about status, fruits and sex.
Good point—agreed. Our meanings are not only designed to rationalize our personal decisions and motives; they’re also designed to rationalize our group’s decisions and motives. That’s an important additional consideration. But it’s still bullshit. :)
interesting post, but the challenge for modern sapiens of meaning remains
what to do with our life once we realize that our deepest tendencies are determined by our genes -to seek status to increase our chances of survival and reproduction etc...
so we play silly or serious status games but with less zest that if we were unawere that we are puppets of our evolved tendencies
and still there is always something interesting about humans... yes we are apes and we have the same deep evolutionary shaped motives but we can hijack our mating mind to engage into other endevours
so the meaning of life question can be framed as
1. we stopped believing in shared fictions/culture/games, we still must play but these deep needs such as craving status, are less strong once we become aware of them
2. we still have a body and a mind and some time on this planet and we have basic necessities taken care of
3. so how do we entertain ourselves?
lets invent a new status game in line with our evolved psychology that may be at least a bit less dumb that accumulating money or be a religious zelot or whatever
and still, there is something deeper than self-deception in being the only creature to realize how strange it is to be alive etc..
Thank you. Maybe a book some day. I don’t if you’ve checked out my post “status is weird” but it gets into a lot of these ideas you’re exploring about what happens when we become aware of our status motives and why we need sacred values. I agree we need to tell some sort of story together. And we should try to figure out which stories are better for the world than others.
Working class people are in survival mode, and don't have mental bandwidth to dwell on meaning of life. After physical basics are satisfied, the mind/consciousness wishes to live + thrive to a limitless realm. I'm guessing.
I don’t question the meaning of life anymore, because I know the answer. It’s because I’m a curious bastard who likes to understand things and also likes a challenge.
What these types you speak of don’t want to tell you is that you create your own meaning and project it onto the world. They just want you to believe what they believe instead.
Nice post, David. I agree that the meaning of life is bullshit (in that there is no single answer to the question), although I'm not so sure the question is bullshit. I suspect that it's usually an attempt to articulate an actual epistemic problem (basically, wtf should I be doing with my life).
I don't think the distinction is really between intellectuals and the working class, although if there's empirical evidence of that I'd be happy to reconsider. There is evidence that people who are high in trait "positive schizotypy" are more likely to be on a "search for meaning" (see here: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0213456 ) and I put forward an explanation for this finding in the section called "High level tinkering" from my paper last year (here: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35816687/ ), though that explanation probably wouldn't make sense outside of the context of the whole paper.
Thanks, Brett. Appreciate your thoughts. I think you’re right that the meaning of life is often about wtf to do with one’s life. But I see that as complementary with what I’m arguing. When we wonder wtf to do with our lives, we aren’t just looking for something to pass the time or make money; we’re looking for something we can justify to other people—something we can argue for. It’s not so much wtf to do with my life as wtf can I rationalize to my peers. If the social element were taken away, there would be no existential predicament. That’s my claim anyways.
I do acknowledge that the difference between working class and highly educated people is the weakest part of my argument (I have no data, just personal experience), and I could be wrong about that. What I’m more confident about is 1) existential reflection is a byproduct of our reasoning faculty, and 2) our reasoning faculty is way more social/bullshitty than we think (i.e. Hugo Mercier is right). From those two assumptions, it follows that existential reflection must be way more social/bullshitty than we think. I think that’s a really plausible claim. Hopefully I’ve persuaded you to give it more credence.
It’s an interesting finding about positive schizotypy. Maybe it has something to do with people being more delusional when they need more social support. Have you read Ed Hagen’s work on delusions? That stuff is really phenomenal. Highly recommend looking into it. You can check it out here: https://web-archive.southampton.ac.uk/cogprints.org/4134/
This was so edgy I shaved with it. Fun to read, though.
Must have been Occam's razor.
See? Now THAT'S cerebral stuff. Subscribed.
We are not only apes. We are very groupish apes. Apes who care about meaning are much better at forming groups than apes who only care about status, fruits and sex.
Good point—agreed. Our meanings are not only designed to rationalize our personal decisions and motives; they’re also designed to rationalize our group’s decisions and motives. That’s an important additional consideration. But it’s still bullshit. :)
interesting post, but the challenge for modern sapiens of meaning remains
what to do with our life once we realize that our deepest tendencies are determined by our genes -to seek status to increase our chances of survival and reproduction etc...
so we play silly or serious status games but with less zest that if we were unawere that we are puppets of our evolved tendencies
and still there is always something interesting about humans... yes we are apes and we have the same deep evolutionary shaped motives but we can hijack our mating mind to engage into other endevours
so the meaning of life question can be framed as
1. we stopped believing in shared fictions/culture/games, we still must play but these deep needs such as craving status, are less strong once we become aware of them
2. we still have a body and a mind and some time on this planet and we have basic necessities taken care of
3. so how do we entertain ourselves?
lets invent a new status game in line with our evolved psychology that may be at least a bit less dumb that accumulating money or be a religious zelot or whatever
and still, there is something deeper than self-deception in being the only creature to realize how strange it is to be alive etc..
PS
GREAT POSTS
TIME TO WRITE A BOOK!
looking forwards to it!!
Thank you. Maybe a book some day. I don’t if you’ve checked out my post “status is weird” but it gets into a lot of these ideas you’re exploring about what happens when we become aware of our status motives and why we need sacred values. I agree we need to tell some sort of story together. And we should try to figure out which stories are better for the world than others.
Working class people are in survival mode, and don't have mental bandwidth to dwell on meaning of life. After physical basics are satisfied, the mind/consciousness wishes to live + thrive to a limitless realm. I'm guessing.
https://markelliottmd.substack.com/p/the-meaning-of-life