Purpose of human life

BadPokemon said:

The purpose of humans is to serve God, worship Him, and spread the Word of God.

And have babies because if we don't have babies, there will be no humans.

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In the context of when Genesis was written, "be fruitful and multiply" would be considered "moral" in that human populations were small and often communitarian. As a result we have less speciality and production of goods/services. Not having children within small communities would have negative impacts upon these processes of communitarian life. Some might consider doing that which is not in the best interest of others, and indirectly oneself, is morally reprehensible.

"As for you, be fruitful and multiply; Populate the earth abundantly and multiply in it."

I think it's safe to assume that the earth has been populated by humans abundantly, perhaps far past the degree of adequate abundancy. Notice, the bible no where suggests that human reproduction should exceed viability or that humans should continue to overpopulate the Earth despite the popular misconception. So, in that sense, individuals having children is not necessarily affirmed in all circumstances by the text.

That is just one example of context; fixed morality doesn't allow for contextual adaption in order to increase the well-being of society. Though, many religious and non-religious people alike tend to have these fixed-dogmatic rules of morality, what is right/wrong, or the purpose of human life, policy debate and dialectic exchange in respect to factual and well developed theory should form the foundation of social morality (manifested in laws and public policy.) In that way, we are able to shake spurious accounts of morality.

The bible is a well crafted book of morality for the time it was written, containing some tenants that remain relevant in modern society. However, in some, but not all cases, morality should be relative, if, of course, morality and purpose of life are defined as increasing well-being. (subjective well being and measures of objective well being.)

I'm not religious so I don't believe in having a purpose in life. I believe that we are just here and we live our life the way we want to live it. People can disagree all they want and that's fine but they need to realize it's an opinion and everyone on the planet has a different mindset.

The Dark Avenger said:

In the context of when Genesis was written, "be fruitful and multiply" would be considered "moral" in that human populations were small and often communitarian. As a result we have less speciality and production of goods/services. Not having children within small communities would have negative impacts upon these processes of communitarian life. Some might consider doing that which is not in the best interest of others, and indirectly oneself, is morally reprehensible.

"As for you, be fruitful and multiply; Populate the earth abundantly and multiply in it."

I think it's safe to assume that the earth has been populated by humans abundantly, perhaps far past the degree of adequate abundancy. Notice, the bible no where suggests that human reproduction should exceed viability or that humans should continue to overpopulate the Earth despite the popular misconception. So, in that sense, individuals having children is not necessarily affirmed in all circumstances by the text.

That is just one example of context; fixed morality doesn't allow for contextual adaption in order to increase the well-being of society. Though, many religious and non-religious people alike tend to have these fixed-dogmatic rules of morality, what is right/wrong, or the purpose of human life, policy debate and dialectic exchange in respect to factual and well developed theory should form the foundation of social morality (manifested in laws and public policy.) In that way, we are able to shake spurious accounts of morality.

The bible is a well crafted book of morality for the time it was written, containing some tenants that remain relevant in modern society. However, in some, but not all cases, morality should be relative, if, of course, morality and purpose of life are defined as increasing well-being. (subjective well being and measures of objective well being.)

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I would agree that the earth is abundant. However, there is still a lot of unused "living space" outside of India and China, where (most?) of the human population lives. I think it will be a long time before earth will be overpopulated. In my beliefs, God made the earth perfect for human life, so it is large enough to sustain a significant population. Once we are close, I would assume that is when God will start the end of the world.

Back to your point, the earth is abundant, and God said abundant. There have been signs of the end. I don't know if I believe them or not because people have been saying it's the end of the world for years. If it is near, my purpose is to get as many people to follow Christ as possible.

Like a lot of the others here I am of the opinion that our lives don't come with an inherent purpose. Rather I believe our purpose is whatever we choose to make it. If you are extremely passionate about something and work for that every day of your life, you've created your purpose.

I find this idea that a religious entity gives us our purpose outlandish. I believe that any higher power really wouldn't bother controlling such insignificant beings as ourselves to that degree. To God, we probably seem like ants do to us. I don't think we can understand a higher power any more than an ant can us and I think the logic then follows that a higher power probably wouldn't take any more interest in us than the average person sitting their watching an ant colony. Hell, I don't even know if a higher being would consider us as intelligent creatures.

In saying that though, I find the idea of our purpose being to breed and raise our young equally outlandish (unless of course you decide that's what you're going to do with your life). Why? Two reasons

1. The argument that all creatures reproduce and then care for their young is very flawed. A large number of creatures never care for their young at all. They lay an egg and leave. Hell, microscopic organisms don't have the capacity to act as a parent nor the opportunity since they reproduce via cell-division.

2. There is no purpose in nature. The whole thing about nature is that human logic doesn't have to apply to it. A tree doesn't grow because its purpose is to grow, it grows because that's how biology works. A tiger doesn't hunt because it's purpose is to hunt, it does that because it's hungry. Nature is about occurrences and survival, a purpose never comes into it. Also, see my religious views.

So yes short version.
An inherent purpose does not exist, but one we create for ourselves certainly does.

It seems that humans in general obssess over death. We constantly ask ourseves, "What's the purpose of life?"
Religion serves as a great crutch for people who refuse to believe that there may not be any purpose beyond survival and passing on genes.
However, if we have no purpose, imo, then no mammals (or orgranisms for that matter) have a purpose.
This world feels like a huge experiment, where we evolve biologically and socially to reach some extraneous goal of happiness, whatever THAT may be.
Think about this- we live ~70 years? If you don't make an impact on society, and die, did you really exist?
Also, if you're a civil rights activist and die before equality is achieved, was your purpose to achieve equal rights, or was it to get us closer to equal rights?

To me, it's what you make of it. Using civil rights as example, some people believe that equality is not possible. Therefore, should an activist give up?
I say hell no; this person must do his / her best to achieve equality (or come as close as possible).

Though, with almost 7 billion people on this planet, do we all truly have a purpose? Orare the vast majority meant to fall through the cracks like grains of sand?

I'm more inclined to go with the latter.
But, it doesn't excuse wasted talent. If no one makes the effort, then there really is no purpose to life

There is a purpose in life. If you want your life to. For Christians like myself, our purpose is to convert people to Christanity, to get people to belive in God and spread the gospel. We were given much more intelligence than other animals for a reason. We have shaped, and are shaping the Earth, and I think that each person's purpose is to contribute to society and to make life better not just for humans, but for everyone else on this Earth. It's a cycle.

Obsession over death is in our nature. When we have life, we wonder when we'll lose it and do everything in our power to hold on to it. When we're near death, that's when I assume most people would come to the reliazation that they've got to let everything go.

As a Buddhist, I believe that life is a learning experience that spans many lives, and the end to that is nirvana. Everyone is here to attain enlightenment and apparently a lot of people aren't as on-track as others with that.

Limerent said:

I'm always suspicious of people that say "life is what you make of it". It tends to turn into a hypocritical stance. Sure, do whatever you want with your life, as long as it's something I approve of is the unspoken ending to that position. If my existence has no objective purpose why are you chastising me for being an unemployed, talentless, unpleasant person? If I want to be like that it's none of your business.

"Life is what you make of it" turns into "Life is whatI think you should make of it, that is get a job, have lots of skills and be nice to everyone". It's originally an open ended and technically correct position that is sullied by the limitations placed on us by the expectations of society.

If people 100% believed in that position they would have no objection to taking the lives of others. Life has no purpose, I can be a murderer if I want to. It doesn't matter if I killed someone, their life has no defined meaning either.

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"Life is what you make it" is the most accurate answer to the question, for this reason:

If you present a rational argument as to why life has no purpose, that's what you've made it, according to your understanding. If you say that the purpose is to follow the precepts of a certain religion, based on God's authority, that's what you've made it, according to your understanding (because you've chosen to accept the precepts as true).


According to my understanding, reality is playful, in the sense that it exists because there is no reason for it to do so. There are a multitude of purposes that human beings perceive, all of which have some degree of validity. Personally, my purpose is to grow in awareness and help others to do so where appropriate.

There is no purpose to life. We simply are. And that is beautiful in and of itself. To say there is a purpose is anthropomorphizing how the universe works.