In Part 1 of the meaning of life, I worked to establish the reason that I think that having a meaning of life is important. Nothing I can say right now will likely convince you that I’m not crazy or joking even to suggest that there is such a thing or that mine makes any sense. That is for you and time to judge.
In Part 2, I talked about the ultimate nature of nature or of reality. I wanted to establish my idea on this before going on to the meaning of life. I think that the underlying nature of reality is not only an interesting problem, but it has direct bearing on the meaning of life and that has a direct bearing on everything in our life.
Now I want to plunge into the actual meaning of life – my BMOL.
BMOL = Big Picture Meaning of Life
My motivation to get this out now is to make my blog make more sense. My BMOL is the central idea behind all my thinking here and really, all the thinking in my life. I do have an agenda and it is not to change minds, but it is to stimulate thinking. Your mind is not mine to change. Your own independent thoughts and ideas are as much a part of my BMOL as my own.
But as I talked about in my blog manifesto, the world needs changing and I am exploring these ideas as I try to change my own world.
So without further ado, my big picture meaning of life, my BMOL is… evolution.
That’s it? You’re probably asking yourself. I warned you at the beginning that the answer may seem underwhelming at first. It may seem too general, or too scientific, or not useful in terms of guiding you in your own life. Au contraire. Anything this big has to be non-obvious at first. Stick with me and I think you’ll start to see the value. It may take a while, but give it a chance.
With apologies to John Lennon – “All I am saying is give evolution a chance.”
I’ll be answering these objections, briefly, in this piece. And I’ll be expanding on the power and the usefulness of evolution in the weeks, months and yes, years to come. I am convinced that evolution is absolutely central to understanding our lives and making the decisions that will lead to more fulfilling lives. Recognizing evolution as the central hub of life will ultimately lead to happier lives, although fun and happiness are secondary effects of evolution. Evolution is not always easy or fun or happy in the earlier stages. And almost never in the earliest stages. And sometimes not until you’ve come out the other side of a major evolutionary step. But this knowledge and perspective should enliven the journey.
A major problem with evolution is that it’s a cool word and idea, but it doesn’t seem to apply to our lives in any significant way. Evolution seems to happen on a giant time scale – millions of years for a species and maybe decades for a city.
Ask a lot of people – “How’s it going?” “Same – same” is often the reply. “What are you up to?” “Nothing much – the usual.” To often we see our lives largely as flat meaningless landscapes of unchanging sameness. Evolution? Relevant? Hell yeah! But why evolution?
I’ll start with the metaphysical – the ultimate nature of reality as a continuation from part 2.
As I discussed in part 2, I think that the ultimate nature of reality starts with consciousness. Call it what you will. That consciousness is ultimately the source of everything – of all the physical matter and all of us conscious beings in this universe. As I discussed in Part 2, you have to start somewhere, with something – either matter or consciousness and I have chosen mind or consciousness for the reasons I outlined. It just makes the most sense to me.
So just think of yourself as this one consciousness sitting around by yourself, it’s boring – you’re bored. There is nothing to be aware of since you’re it – everything. At some point you divide into smaller bits of consciousness and these smaller bits can be aware of the other bits. You can now have relationships and interactions and you can evolve – you can change and grow. As more and more little bits of consciousness are spun off, the interactions and relationships can become much more complicated and much more interesting. It’s a lot more fun than sitting around as one big blob of consciousness. Evolution is the fundamental gig – the prime job of this consciousness. Dividing and relating in new ways – that is the essence of evolution.
As part of this evolution you can make games for your little bits of consciousness. These games limit the conditions under which those little bits operate. Games are determined by limits. Soccer is a great example.
In soccer you kick and move a ball into a goal without using your hands to touch the ball. There are eleven players on each side etc. etc. Now the rules of soccer limit the actions of the players. You can’t pick up the ball and run with it. You can’t play with more than eleven players. The field and the goal is of a certain size etc. etc.
Human beings do have arms and hands, yet the rules place limitations on how the soccer game is played. With those limitations, people have developed the ability to do amazing things with their feet and the ball. I bet that no one would have developed the amazing skills of manipulating the ball with their feet without those limitations imposed by soccer. And every year more people develop more amazing skills
Think of all the amazing skills that humans have developed because they’ve had to work within the limitations of a game, or a job, or a hobby. Basketball, snowboarding, magic tricks, brick laying, painting, sculpting, singing, dancing, acting– and a bunch of things we haven’t even dreamed up – yet.
Think of games that are new and just starting out – chess boxing – yes boxing and playing chess together.
So my analysis of our situation is that we are tiny bits of consciousness playing a giant and very complex game in this physical universe. This physical universe is our game board or field and we are playing the game and interacting with everyone else. The laws of physics ultimately determine how we can interact, but the scope is huge. Until about a hundred years ago, people couldn’t fly in anything heavier than air. Now we do it without even thinking.
At one time air travel was reserved for the wealthy – it’s now affordable for a huge part of the planet.
This is evolution and that evolution began when the big single consciousness split up into smaller multiple bits of consciousness, ultimately to make us and everything else. And there is no question that process is still going on. It’s evolution and that evolution is facilitated by many things and one of them is constraints – limitations. Gravity on our planet and you can’t touch the ball with your hands in soccer. But evolution is working within constraints to produce more evolution – not stasis. Those limitations make useful interactions possible and valuable in the service of evolution. You couldn’t play soccer and develop those amazing skills if you could pick up the ball, but you can in North American football – different game – different rules – different evolutionary paths.
When most of us think of evolution, we think of Darwin and the origin of the species. But evolution, as I see it, is much more complex, much broader, and even more fundamental than that limited view. Darwinian evolution is an important part of any notion of evolution, but it’s really only a tiny part.
Biological evolution as Darwin theorized and discussed, works over many generations. Humans have now moved way beyond those genetic and biologic limitations, which are still undoubtedly occurring. That form of evolution is dwarfed by the evolution we’re now experiencing in terms of our cultures, our art, our technologies, our knowledge, our personal lives, our thoughts and our ideas.
Heraclitus, an ancient Greek philosopher, said that change was fundamental to existence and I agree. Evolution is fundamental. Its our number one gig. It is really both the fabric and the weaver in this universe of ours.
My working concept of evolution right now is the growth in complexity and relationships of things in the universe towards greater diversity, connection, and suitability to the environment. I hope that gives you the scope of what I am considering here. This is monstrously huge, but it all begins within each of us, in small and big ways.
None of these ideas are unique with me. I don’t claim to have discovered anything on my own, but I have never found the meaning and significance of human life set out in just this way. I’ve spent a great deal of time considering the applicability of evolution to our lives. It all makes sense to me and it has since I started thinking about life in this way.
I’ll be talking a lot more about those people and ideas that have led to my thinking in this. There are a large number of sources, but there are a few people who stand out for me. They will be important for the future as I develop my ideas. The more I consider the general notion of evolution, the more useful and the more valuable I see it. It is everywhere. It is us. We are it.
My original idea for this blog was to be a mashup of ideas that point to an evolutionary jump in human consciousness. I hope that the focus of my ideas and writing in the blog will be more clear now as we explore this enormous idea of evolution. I had to get that elephant in the room.
My blog has evolved – what do you know?