Back on track, a question for discussion.
What is the point of it all? What meaning do you derive from life if you don't think you're going to live forever? Some people have answered my previous question about why they do good even though they don't believe in an absolute standard of good, but this question is, "why do anything?" Given that you're going to die, what is the point of all this striving?
Is it to make the world a better place for those around you or those who come after you? Why bother? They're not you, so you won't experience that benefit. I guess the molecules that make you will return to the soil, grow up into the grass and be eaten by cows or rabbits and assimilated into a new person someday, but the thing you call "you" just disappears into the void. No matter what great things you accomplish, all the future (and present) people you're benefiting are, just like you, going to wink out of existence in the same way. And after they do all the striving that, granted, you've made a little easier through your work and sacrifice, they'll be gone just like you and all that will amount to nothing. And the other question is why are some things good, and other things bad anyway? If I hurt someone, or even kill them, we all come to the same end anyway, right? What difference does it make how we get there? Whether me in jail for hitting some guy I don't like with a hammer, or him living the rest of his life as a vegetable?
I guess I am getting back to the same question. Why bother to do good if there is no standard of good to begin with? Just the cold hard truth of death and the universe.
What is important about life? When it's gone, nothing you ever did will matter. Even if you accomplish the most important things and leave a legacy that people will remember for generations, (which very few people manage to do), no matter what you do, nothing will save even those future people from coming to the same inevitable end that you come to, (as though that mattered to you). I guess through scientific advancements maybe you might extend their lifespans, but for what purpose? Just so they can strive longer until they die?
I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, that for the most part, Atheists just try to avoid thinking about this question and live life in the present. Throwing their entire body and soul into building sandcastles that are going to be washed away with the next wave. You work so hard, struggle and sacrifice and for what? So that someone else will reap the benefits. I guess if you focus all your attention on the present and never think about the future, maybe you could derive some meaning from the things you do, but for me, if I thought this was all there is, it would drive me mad. Death just makes life absurd and pointless.
