Is that a cucumber in my stir-fry or a zucchini?
Or maybe both...
Such philosophical questions.
Speaking of philosophical questions, I got to thinking the other night about LIFE. I've been sitting through a lot of biology lectures lately and life is a pretty funny thing.
It's easy to acknowledge the fact that organisms have evolved to best fit their environments (thanks, Darwin). But at what point does an organism get this inherent desire to live?
The number one goal of any species is to reproduce. Reproduction is the means by which the organism guarantees the continuation of life. So this means that living creatures are just the tools by which life is perpetuated. So living things are tools of LIFE in general. Different species have evolved different mechanisms, befitting to their environments, to maintain life, but they are, themselves, just tools to that end. Humans exist to perpetuate human-kind, but we're just one set of tools through which life itself is guaranteed.
So, if you accept this so far, what's the point of life? What makes the general idea of life so important? I ask again, why does an organism have this inherent desire to live? I understand continuation of the species in the face of extinction. But no matter what species go extinct, barring some giant disaster or SERIOUS nuclear holocaust, some form of life will survive. Why do we care? In the giant-big-huge-picture of things, what difference does it make if this big rock in space has some form of life on it?
It becomes necessary to define life at this point. Taking a basic textbook definition, we see that life is the following: Organization, Energy Use and Metabolism, Homeostasis (i.e. regulating internal consistency), Replication/Reproduction, and Response to Environmental Stimuli. We also say that the cell is the smallest unit of life (as viruses are NOT living things). Common to all life are certain organic compounds, the synthesis of proteins from about 20 amino acids and the carrying of genetic information in RNA or DNA. Ok, you with me? So a cell takes in some sort of resource (light energy, certain chemicals) and gets the energy to organize and fix itself. So even at this level, the cell knows that it has to work to keep itself alive. It doesn't have a CONSCIOUS idea of life, but it inherently knows that it must breakdown compounds here and rebuild other compounds there to survive. It perpetuates life.
So the goal of life is to perpetuate its own existence. The reason why things exist at all, is to make sure that things keep existing. To what end? To what purpose?
There are concrete realities, there IS life. There IS matter. There IS light. Life has evolved eyes to perceive light, but light itself DOES exist. Why do these things even EXIST if not to serve some purpose?
I used this really dumb analogy when I first explained this, but I think it works. Life is a tool. Like a hammer. And the hammer has no goal other than being a hammer. The hammer doesn't care about nails and wood, it just wants to be a hammer. It wants to perpetuate its own existence as a hammer. So when the hammer, working with other tools in the hands of some higher life form, builds a house, it doesn't care. The same is true of life. Life, by existing, is accomplishing something. Instead of life perpetuating itself for some GOAL in the future, something is being accomplished by our existence NOW. Life only cares about perpetuating life, it doesn't care about the life-nails or life-wood. The other tools working with life are, matter, light, energy, etc. When the life-house is built by some higher life form (call it GOD), life won't even know. And so when you ask, what is the purpose of life, why do we have an inherent desire to keep living--- you really are wanting to know what is accomplished by things being alive in the first place. Life, light, energy; we're all just gears and levers in a machine that is working toward some higher purpose. Why else would we be here? Why else would life exist at all if not to serve some purpose? Since when am I trying to link theology and biology?
