AGAINST ‘PURPOSE’ IN OUR LIVES:
What is the meaning of life? Is this the question that we
long to have an answer for? Supposing that meaning and purpose
could exist in such a way, and supposing that humanity then had a
purpose, would we not wish to keep it obscured from our thoughts
and ourselves as much as possible? For if this purpose, and then
meaning, were conferred on us, all motivating mystery and
imagination should soon perish and leave us as nothing but
single-minded robots working toward this goal.
For those to whom this ‘purpose of life’ was not pleasing, a
dilemma would be revealed: they would end themselves in a fit of
emotion, or else be forced to live out a life that was not their
own - perhaps attempting to mask their reality in self-delusion.
Therefore it is desirable that our lives should not have a
purpose, and that such a possibility should not be able to exist.
What is the meaning of life? That is an absurd question that
could only earnestly be asked in an unthoughtful state of mind.
THE IMMORAL:
How inaccurate it is for a person to call another immoral
because that person does not share the moral values of the first!
They would do well to pose themselves the question: what is
morality? Morality cannot be defined by a set of values
advocated by an organization, as it cannot be defined for any
individual by the feelings of others. If morality consists of a
set of values, and to have a traditional morality is to know
right from wrong and to act accordingly, it follows that popular
belief is that a person may only be judged immoral when compared
to the standards set by others. However, there is no objective
law imposing a code of morality upon us, and therefore these
standards have come about only because a majority of people
believed them to be ‘the truth.’ They have been brought into
being by emotion and humanity’s long-lived whims rather than
reason. Popular morality is [at bottom/fundamentally] nothing
more than an encouraged manner by which to avoid guilt - guilt
that we are conditioned to feel by that very same moral urge
which was instilled in order to protect us from it.
If this is the case, morality cannot truly exist at all but
to and for each individual separately. It is founded in truth to
the self, and should logically be defined by this. The
difference then between the moral and the immoral would depend on
the degree to which each person offended their own personal
morality. If a person were to set such high and noble standards
for themselves that they would be unable to abide by them, this
person would be called a hypocrite and a liar. If an apathetic
person were to claim no standards, this also would be false.
This person would unavoidably have habits, and prejudices
affecting his judgements on the world, and by these he would be
making moral judgements; on right and wrong, on the way things
should and should not be. The first of these types of people
would like to believe that they are most moral, while the other
shuns morality, all the while judging that which is all about
him. Both of these types of people have no substantial morality.
They are not true to themselves, but instead set an image of
themselves before themselves and then feed this image.
The truly moral person is the severe intellectual. By their
thoughtful insight into human nature and their own nature, this
person is more true to themselves than any other. They know what
morality they have because they think of such things often, and
therefore they are happy to abide by it - rather because it is
not abiding that they must do - and instead they freely exist.
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