Conflict over The Meaning of Life
I think that lack of consensus over the meaning of life is problematic.
It faces the same situation as religion where as you could say all religions are false or only one of them is true. they can't all be true due to contradictory claims
The problem then is that even if one religion or atheism is true it means large numbers of people are functioning based on false beliefs. Likewise Life could have no meaning or purpose or one set of meanings could be true but then the majority of people are living on false premises.
An analogy is if you are pushing a mans car to help him get it started but you don't know he has a dead body in the trunk. You are only cooperating with the man because you think you have similar goals when you real don't and if you explored the truth of your motives you would see they clash in which case it seems vital to make sure you have an informed consensus and not compromise on crucial divergent values.
It faces the same situation as religion where as you could say all religions are false or only one of them is true. they can't all be true due to contradictory claims
The problem then is that even if one religion or atheism is true it means large numbers of people are functioning based on false beliefs. Likewise Life could have no meaning or purpose or one set of meanings could be true but then the majority of people are living on false premises.
An analogy is if you are pushing a mans car to help him get it started but you don't know he has a dead body in the trunk. You are only cooperating with the man because you think you have similar goals when you real don't and if you explored the truth of your motives you would see they clash in which case it seems vital to make sure you have an informed consensus and not compromise on crucial divergent values.
Comments (5)
For example if someone says:
"All men are Mortal. Socrates is a man. Socrates is immortal"
You can see the latter doesn't follow. I think the same method may apply when we are analysing peoples meaning claims.
There might be right answer but we don't know it.
I don't think any of the mainstream ideologies I have heard of are right.
I think it is not good to compromise and have a meaning fudge or abandon the truth. I don't think it should of a survival of the fittest idea/ideology.
Here is bad example of compromise. Christian and Muslim groups came together in the UK to oppose gay rights including gay marriage. They forgot their differences temporarily to unite in prejudice. There may be positive examples of similar collaborations however the principle is the same.
It a principle of compromise of integrity and coherence.
The problem is that they can't all simultaneously be true. I suppose any religion or ideology could contain some isolated truths but as a whole belief system they challenge each other.
I am a general agnostic and I think we should acknowledge when we don't know something and look for false beliefs. To me an agnostics stance helps protect against false beliefs and ideologies.
The stronger claims a person makes the more they invite challenge and scrutiny, but not compromise and fudge and appeasement, and political correctness.
I find the idea of pandering to peoples beliefs that you think are false or are even totally opposed to is servile and degrading. (Of course if attacking these beliefs you need you need your own good reasons.)