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    eitingham summarises arguments about morality, eel nd so on with clarity he Goardion I Cottingham is brusque he can azo be invigeratng, and he uses vary effectively onthe mest fertile question nthe so ed philosophy of lie: that the "precariousness of human feand happiness” i exactly what makes our fe interesting omanthan Rée, Times Literary Supelement students are often disappointed with contemporary ilasophy for not engaging wit the “big questions”. They ould not be disappointed with this bock..The strength ofthis sk lies nthe way ithandles amass of philosophical, entific, literary ad religious thought. rare Times Legantly written and accessibie..Readers wil apprecits tingharn's clarity an his willingness fo enter some dificult nd complex areas of debate. ye Pilsophers' Magazine ucid and provocative ich with references and ideas inghom takes things remarkably far fr eur day and age senard Prusek, Intemational Philsophical Quarterly strongly recommend this book to philosophers, theologians nd educated readers, Itisa distillation of much experience, holarship and reflection and tis rareto find so much tained in so few pages. Whatever else read inthe coming onths this wil be one of my books ofthe year. in Haldane, The Tobet ys Cotinghamn s Professor of Philosophy atthe University Reading. His many well-known books inelude esate: 706, Tne Ratonaist 4988] and, most recently, "he Good Life (1998), and his work hasbeen translated inte any languages. TED BY SIMON CRITCHLEY AND RICHARO KEARNEY LOSOPHY/RELIOION ervererertas The Meaning of Life NIN ACTION WVHONILLOD NHOF On the Meaning of Life ‘Weiten wih wonder aedy .. Cntnghan gets to ihe “cosmic ot relics” questions wesc ue an tly eat (tage) an agnosie ‘orate ever wool sl be wing ha an exelent bok eps Hers, ki Oa Praise for the series "deserves high praice’ The Independent "Thisis clearly an important serie, | 00k forward to reading suture volumes” Frank Kermode ‘oth rigorous and accessible” ‘Huan Nes as new series, Thinking in Action, Brings philosophers The Evening Standard “a welcome new series by Routledge’ “ule of Stenve, Tecvaogy al Sotery “allows a space for distinguished thinkers to write about their passions’ The Philosopher! Mogacine ADQUIsicion {Obtencion COM i; A 2OUBT, acuiiad (1 . We =| Provevsor fA 07 9 “seo $64 YE = eae ; JOHN COTTINGHAM the Meaning of Life On Routledge yiektentomey yenage henna gn nay srutmouy babel nn Aan as Borat New ob MF 16 oui san note ater ae ose arson Dale 05 ‘epnduced or sen ayer abaya mech Bri ay ancy mba ae rao Congas Cateping mPa te For Preface The Question One “The Question dat Won't Go Away Science and Meaning. Something Rather than Nothing ‘A Religious Question? Meaning after Goa Man, the Measure of All Things? ‘Variety, Meaning and Evaluation, ‘What Meaningfulness implies Meaning and Morality Humanity and Openness Meaning TWo The Void The Challenge of Modemity The Shadow of Darwin Science, Religion and Meaning Evolution and “Blind” Forces ‘The 'Nastinest' ofthe Evolutionary Mechanism Matter and Surplus Suffering The Character of she Gosmos Meaning, Vulnerability and Hope Three Morality and Achievement Futility and Fragility Religion and che Buoyancy af the Gaod 32 32 36 39 oh ar “a 53 58 6 “7 73 2 2 Yalaersbility and Finitude spirituality and taner Change Doctrine and Praxis roo Praxis to Faith, (Cod Intimations of Meaning Notes Index % ” 92 99 105 121 Pretace Questions about the meaning of life are losely incerewined wath religious questions, and so there isan automatic risk of giving offence. Many religious adherents may he pur off if the answers offered do not start from the doctrines they hold 25 cental fo any account of life and its meaning, Many athe- Jsts, by connast, may be irrtared that religious ideas should be allowed to intrude at al into our human struggle to find ‘meaning in our lives, While I dare not presume © have avoided giving such annoyance on either side, itis my hope that by sidestepping a dogmatic stand-off on matcers chat ‘may be beyond the horizon of rationally determinable know: ledge, we can find space for a productive inquiry into what may broadly be called the ‘spiritual’ dimension of the quest for meaning, Among che book’s eventual aims are 10 dis close something of the importance and preciousness of that dimension, to reveal how it connects with values and ‘commitments that we all share, and to find a way of accommodating it without the sicnifce of sclentfic or philosophical integrity. My strategy is (delberately) a gradual ‘one, so I have to request the reader's patience if the goals are not placed fully in view until the final ehapker; since the book is a shore one, and alms to avoid technicality and philo- sophical jargon, T hope this request will not be 90 bbardensome, ix On the teeing of Lite a Pretace ‘An eater versio of some portions of Chapter Three vas presented at a conference on Spirituality at the University of 51 Andrews in March 2001, and T should lke to thank the Participants for much stimulating discussion, [am very grate Fal to Max de Gaynesford and to Jim Stone, who were kind ‘enough to read the whole manuscript before publication and to make many acute and helpful suggestions and comments. I Should aso ike ro record my gratitude vo my colleagues in the Philosophy Department at the University of Reading, whose friendship and support over the yeas bas been a great source ‘of strength. am also grestly indebted o che administrators oF ‘the University's Research Endowment Trust Fund for & grant {hat provided an important measure of teaching relief while this book was being completed. My greatest debt is to my Immediate family, for sharing with me their reflections on ‘many of the hemes found inthis book, and for enriching my life in more ways than could ever be put into words. 4c Reading, England April 2002, | The Question One ‘Avi, sald Deep Though. The Answer tothe Great Quston (file the Universe and verthing sat Deep Thought 1 said Deep Thought, nd pause. Friptwo, sid Dep Thought, th inne majesty and cla Fortwo! yelled Loonquan stat allyouve goto show tor seven and a all mion years wor? eneckeditvery thorough’ sid the computer. think the problem, tobe quite Honest with you,'sthat youve never actualy known what the cuss tit was the Great ustont The Ultinate Question of ifthe LUnnesse and Everything’ Rowe Laan quai ‘Yes anid Deep Thaught th he sir fare whe aller feos lay, ut what atu? ‘show tupetied sence crot ovr the men asthey stared at the computer and then a eachother “Wel you know i's ust Everything Everything." oferes Pousti eahy ‘THE QUESTION THAT WON'T GO AWAY Not all important sounding questions make sense, For a fair prt of dhe twentieth century it was common in much of the anglophone world to dismiss many of the traditional grand nthe Meaning of Life 1 2 On the Meaning of questions of philosophy as psendo-questions, People who fele perplexed by the ancient purde of the meaning of life ‘were firmly reminded that mesning was « notion propetly confined to the arena of language: words oF sentences 0 propositions covld he sald to have meaning, but not objects fr events in the world, lke the ives of tees, of lobsters, of So the very idea that philosophy could inguire into ng of life was taken as a sign of conceptual confi sion. The solution to the problem, as Ludwig Wiageascein ‘once remarked, would lie in its disappearance." ‘But somebow the problem does not go away the search for meaning, confused oF not, retains as powerful a hold on us as ever The characters ia Douglas Adams’ Hihbier saga ‘may scm absurd in their ith that a supercomputer could wrap it up for them, and hopelesty vague about how to formulate the problem in the fist place, but 2 strong sense remains thatthe ancient quest that has held so many in thrall {s more than just a philosopher's muddle. For our human existence is mysteriovs ~ something strange, frightening, 10 be wondered at. Philosophy, said Aristotle, isthe child of wonder; and the capacity to be dis- turbed by what is ordinarily taken for granted is dhe hallmark of that questioning spirit that is inseparable from human nature itself The human being is unique in that, as Heidegger pu it, i is an entity for whom its own being is an ise. Or again: "Man alone ofall beings, when addressed hy the woice of | Being, experiences the marvel ofall marvels: that whats." What are we elly asking when we ask about the meaning of Hie? Pary, it seems, we are asking about our relationship ‘ith the rest ofthe universe ~ who we are and how we came tobe here. One aspect of this ia scientific question about our origins. To which the answer, only recently discovered, is Dreathraking: we came from the stars. If we manage (che experience is rarer and harder naw) to find a spot faraway from the city, where no seepage of noise and dazzle pollutes the night, and lock up in wonder atthe vast and silent black- ness of space from which nummberless brilliant points of light shine down upon us, then what we see isthe same material from which we, and everything ese on this fragile planet, were onee formed, We humans are part of the cosmos: not just asa pebble is part ofa miscellaneous heap, not just as an item on a haphazard inventory that happens to include what fever the universe contains: bat oly one with it, sharing ls ‘common origin, built of ts stuff: We are formed of stardust, ‘Of, yet alienated from i? Te may be so, The anctent Stoies thought that our human rationality was a microcosm of @ governing principle of Reason, the spiritual substance pervad- ing the whole cosmos; cenruries later, dhe rationalist pil- bsopher Leibniz declared that ‘there s nothing waste, nothing sterile, nothing dead in the universe But she dominant view nowadays is that life and rationality are, cosmically speaking, local and uncypical features of reality: nature is predominantly ‘blind, rational, dead, As the poet A. E, Housman lamented: nature, heartless, witness nature, Will neither care nor know ‘What stranger's eer may cross the meadow And trespass there, and go. [Nor ask amid the dews of morning they are mine, or no! We humans may pride ourselves on our intellectual and cultural achievements, but against the backdrop of unimagin= able aeons of time through which clouds of incandescent lhydrogen expand withour limit, we area strange temporary 5 aceldens, no more significant than a slime or mould «hat forms for a few years or decades ow a barren rocklace and ‘hen is seen no more Assessments of this kind may seem Iinked to 2 modern scientific understanding of our origins, bat in an important sense they plainly go beyond science: they do not just report the ‘fiers’, bu talk abour what those supposed facts ‘mean for us, for our sense of ourselves and our self-worth, And its hard fo sce how such judgements about the significance of ur lives can be established by scientific inquley alone, To quote Wittgenstein again, this time sounding rather more hospitable to our grand question, “we fee} that even when all possible scientific problems have been answered, the problems of life have not been put to zest.’ Why exaclly should this be so? SCIENCE AND MEANING Science has advanced so spectacularly and with such an accelerated pace in the last century or so that we may be Tempted to suppose that given a bit longer it could even succeed in explaining why we are here and what our exist ‘ence means. This appears 1 be the view of one of our most isinguished contemporary scients, Stephen Hawking Upto now sce eienits have been to occupied with he development of new theories that describe war the universe eto ask the question why. However, fwe discover orate [ane uniee theory feombsning quantum physics with general relatity)..we shall ll. sb to tke part Inthe discussion ef the question of why is that we andthe universe ent Ie ind the answer to that it tould Bethe ‘ultimate triumph of aman reason. * ‘The distinction between wiut something is and why its has Dpecome something ofa cliché; in similar vein, people often sy science tackles how questions but not wly questions. But i ft the distinction i not particularly helpal in sorting out ‘what scientists characteristically do. Aristotle was rather more perspcuous in distinguishing four types of anewer relevant to scientific mquiry: (1) Answers indicating the component materials of which an object is made (ts ‘material case) (2) Answers specifying the essence or kind of thing it s (ts formal’ cause); (3) Answers pointing to the motive force dat got it into is present sae (its ‘ficient cause) and (8) Answers citing the end or gosl towards which it tends (1s fina” cause)” Explanations ofall four kinds ean be good scientific answers to the question ‘why? (a) “Why was the bridge strong” “Because [material] it was made of steel (2) ‘Why do you dassify that ice cube as water?” “Because [formal] it is frozen H,0 (3) ‘Why did the billiard ball move?" “Because [efficient] it was struck with a cue, (4) "Why do tees have roots?" "Because [final] in order to grow they need to take up water and nutrients” ‘The last type of answer was particularly important in Aristotle's work, since he maintained that all things tend towards some natural end-state; but although modern Ssclentists, especially biologists, stil Frequendy use such goal- related or teleological explanations of phenomena, it has been 5 The Question 6 Onthe Mesning ol Lite 4 guiding principle since che seventeenth century tat such teleology must always eventually be explained in terms of underlying microstructres of an encirely mechanical nature Ik is im this sense that the great seventeenth-century philosopher-scentist René Descartes is often said to have banished teleology fiom science. He envisaged 2 unified style fof explanation based ukimately on the universal laws of mathematical physics that governed the behaviour of all patural phenomena, celestial and terrestrial alike. There was xo room far any iereducible purposiveness or goal-secking ‘deep down in nature. The job ofthe scientist was 1 subsume all observable events under the relevant mathematical cover ing laws; and in respect ofthese ultimate laws there was no attainable answer to the question “why?” One could say ~ and Descartes did say ~ thar God had decreed that it should be so; ‘but he immediately added that the rationale for God's decrees was not for human scientists to discover: it was ‘forever locked up in the inscrutable abyss of His wisdom’."" David Hume, writing a century after Descartes, took an essendally parallel line, chough couched in entirely secular anguage: the Job of science was to map the observable natural world, bat any supposed “ultimate springs and principles’ of nature were ‘beyond human power to fathom." Although this position was first established by the philo sophers of the Enlightenment, ir has remained pretty much swnshaken ever since; fortis hard co see how science, however ix may develop, could addvess such “ultimate” questions. So although modern scientists may often 2sk various kinds of “why?” questions about particular structures or evens, the ‘ultimate and most general principles taken to underlie all phenomena are not regarded as admitting of the question “why is ic so?” I'we were 10 achieve a complete and unified theory of the universe (fulfilling che grand philosophical- ‘cum-sclennfic wsion tha links Descartes and Hume, Newton and Finstein, right down © present-day cosmologists such as Hawking), such a theory would subsume all observable phenomena in the universe under the fewest and most com> prebensive laws or principles; but as to wiy these principles bain, ehis would have to remain, in Erume’s graphic phrase, ‘coully shot up from human cnriosity and inquiry’ ‘So we have a problem about the modern hope for « grand comprebensive physics that would be the “ultimate eiuzmph ‘of human reason’ tis an inspiring aim, but one which leaves ic very unclear why it should be supposed that a super theory lusking gravity and quanram physics might enable us to tackle the uldmate question of ‘why i is thar we and dhe universe evant’ I is sometimes suggested that such unified dheory sight turm out to be the ony possible theory. in view of the severe constraints that must govern any model tht is ta be consistent and capable accounting forthe universe as we find it But even if these were to be only one such candidate, it ‘would still be merely the only posible dheory gin thatthe ‘universe is as tie ~ which would stil fall short of explaining why there shold he a universe at all. Some cosmollgists (including Hawking) hive speculated thatthe grand unified theory ‘might be so compeling that it brings abot its own existence’) but i is hard to take this seriously. A cheory cannot generate a universe. SSOMETHING RATHER THAN NOTHING ‘The position we have reached is that while science aims 10 provide as complete and comprehensive a description as it ‘an of the universe, no matter how successful and unified the theory itends up with, it cannot explain why there should be 7 The Question onthe Meaning ct a universe chere to be explained, We collide with dhe ancient Philosophical question ‘Why is there something rather than nothing” and it seems clear on reflection that nothing within the observable universe could realy answer cls. IPthere isa solution to the “riddle of fe im space and time’, it ould have to lie outside space and time." Here we run into another ‘lank wall: if any such solution mus lie beyond the limits of| the temporal and spatial universe, outside the ‘plinomenal ‘world’ as Immanuel Kant called i tien may it not be beyond the Horizon of what i humanly knowable? I there ie a tran scendent realm of the ‘noumenal’ ~ something beyond the phenomena, which explains why we and the universe are There then there isa risk dhat there will be nothing whatever ‘we can coherently say about it ‘We may have reached te limits of science here, but perhaps swe have not necessarily reached the Lnnuts of human dis- ‘course, There is rich radition of religious language, both in cour Westera culture and elsewhere, that grapples with the tak of addresing what cannot be fully captured by even the most complete scientific account of the phenomenal world, One smiglit say that tis the task of religious discourse to stain at the limits ofthe sayabe, Some kinds of theology, to be sre, hhave aimed at keeping entirely within the boundaries of observable evidence and rational demonstration, invoking God as an explanatory hypothesis to account for certain aspects of reality (sich as order, design, motion, and so on), rather in the manner ofa scientist looking forthe best explan- ation of the data, That enduring strand of nararal theology has appealed to many philosophers over the centuries, chotgh it has suffered serious erosion in modern age from the success of rival non-theistic explanations of the relevant phenomena (Ga particular the triumph of Darwinism). But alongside this 7 | quast- scientific strand in theology, there is also a vast vange of | religious language that invokes symbol, metaphor, poetry, narrative, and other elements valued for their supposed revelatory power rather than for der stict demonstrative force religious discourse is here aimed at addressing what «cannot filly be put into words, at east ito che words of our rational scientific culture, but whieh ean sill somehow be shown, disclosed, made manifest." Such religious discourse gropes towards something beyond the phenomenal world that may give meaning tothe ‘universe, and to our human lives. tt may not provide aratonal scientific solution tothe old puzale of why there is something rather than nothing, for, as we have seen, this is a question which may lie beyond the limits of systematic knowledge. Butts advocates would urge that it none th less asuages the verngo, the ‘nausea, as Jean-Paul Sartre cle it, dat we feel fn confronting the blank mystery of existence, The religious answer ~ one of several responses to the problem of life’s ‘meaning 10 be examined in the pages that follow ~ aims to locate our lives in a context chat will provide them with significance and value, Instead of our feeling thrown nwo a arbitrty alien world where nothing ultimately matters, i offers the hope that we can find a home." ARELIGIOUS OUESTION? Religion is clearly one way in which humans have found a ‘meaning and puxpose 10 their lies. But is i€ the only way? Albert instein asserted bluntly that “to know an answer © ‘he question "What is the meaning of human life?” mas to bre religious’. That other giant of the twentieth century, Sigmund Freud, also insisted. that ‘the idea of life having a purpose stands and fills with the religious system’. Yer of | 9 The Ouestion Meaning ati 10 ont course it by n0 means automascally follows from this linkage thar the religious stance is therefore something ¢o be advo cated. Freud hitnself regarded the solution offered by religion as pandering f0 something unhealthy and disordered in the dhuman psyche: ‘he moment a man questions the masning aval ofl, he is sick ‘0. sore of unsatistied lida to which something else must By asking ths question one is mefly admitting hove happened, kind ol ermentationeading to sadness nd depression." Uelief in God, according to Freud’s view in Chiltation and its Dion, is based on an infantile response: the terrifying ecling of helplessness in childhood aroused the ‘need for protection’ ~ for proiection through lore ~ which was provided by the father; and the recognition that cis elpless- ness lasts throughout life made it necessary 0 eing to the existence ofa Father, but this ime a more powerful one.” ‘This Freudian diagnosis has been highly influential, and fan offen be seen as Informing the idea, voiced by many comtemporary atheists, that Gad is merely a. projection {formed in response to our human insecurities. But there are at least two problems with this way of dismissing the religious impulse. First, hough the abject helplessness of the infantis amapt image of dhe faplity ofthe hurnan plight, that fagity, as Freud's own analysis confirms, is leary not confined to infancy. Our vulnerability, and that of our loved ones, to death, disease and accident is an inescapable part of the Jbuman condition; and this being so, to be appropriately aware of I seems precisely what a normal rational human ght to be even granted that constantly dyelling on it may be 4 sign of neurosis)" tn the second place, talk of God as a projection does not in the end advance the debave beaween theists and atheists very much, since I€ cannot sete dhe ‘quession of whether the impulse to project our longings ‘outwards to an external source does or does not have an ‘objective counterpart, It is cerainly plausible that frail and insecure humans Would want to project their need for secur- ity onto a procective heavenly Father: bu a religious believer can equally maincin that since our true destiny lies in union with our creator, we will naturally fel insecure and resless vuntl we find Him, Indeed, precisely this latter theme turns cout to be the refrain of many ancient writers om theistic spini- tuality ata et anime ad peseipicnum Boum init, ued Des es; ie nes dee quis fui~"the soul is born to perceive the infinite good that is God, and accordingly it must find Its zestand contentment in Him alone’. The result of the debate ‘over projection Is thus a stand-off the fact chat humans feel a posvenful need for God's loving protection logically says nothing either way abour whether that protection isa reat. or the sake of this phase of dhe argument, however, lt us assume for dhe moment that there is n0 sueh divine weality ~ zo objective correlative that could ground our search for life's significance, Would hurnan life in that case, be empey and pointless? If God 1s dead, one of Dastoevsky’s characters famously declares, everything is permitted"? in similar vein, if there is no God, would everything be meaningless? MEANING AFTER GOD Depression, 0 say the experts, is of rwo Kinds, exogenous and endogenous: it can either be tiggered by some painful extemal clgcumstance, like job loss or bereavement, or it can >be apparently spontaneous, presenting as an internal malaise for whieh there is no immediate ouside cause. Ina somewhat a 8 2 12 Onthe Meaning of analogous way, perhaps, 1 seems that meaning ah be father exogenous oF endogenous someone might find their life meaningful in so fr as it conformed wo the will of a transcendent Creatr ‘out there’ who was tbe ultimate source of value and significance: bu they might instead find mea ing “witin’ 5 wers, constructing I from the inside as a function of their own choices and commitments Friedrich Nicusche, famous for his announcement of the ‘deal of Goa’, was dear that humankind. in the postahesic word, ‘would have to generate significance Grom within iself— and Indeed that this was the ony available source forall value: “Uluimately ma Gnd in things nothing but what he himself bhas imported into them: the Binding we call science, the ‘importing ~ ar, religion, love, pide" This conception of meaning as endogenous ~ the idea of ‘Man as the creator and generator of the meaning of his own life ~ has plainly had a vast influence on our modern and postmodern culture, The Nieraschean vision can be seen as having dhree phases. The fis isthe idea of the ‘death of God which appears in Die Fiche Wosascalt (The Joyful cn, 1882), A madman lights lantern at midday and runs into the marker place ering that he seeks God. He is laughed at by the atheists who are standing around: ‘Did he get lost’, they sneet. ‘Or has he gone ana journey, or emigrated?” At length the madman announces "We have killed him, you and I! And dhe goes off round the churches ofthe cown to sing a requiem one that parodies the taditional text ofthe mass: instead of 4 prayer for God t grant repose to the dead, it becomes “requiem eteram De’ ~ God hinslf is consigned to eternal (Over a century later, the shock salve of Nietsche’s initial proclamadion has faded a hte, Walking round the ancient cities of Wescemn Europe, where cypically less than 10 per cent ‘of the people now attend religious services, one may feel like echoing the madman’s challenge: “What are all these churches now if they age not the tombs and sepalchres of God?" The culture which once made religions observance so central ~ in the rites of bith, mariage and death, in the celebration ofthe changing seasons of sowing and harvest, in the weekly gatherings ofthe community Sunday after Sunday, dn the massive yearly solerities of Nativity and Resurrection each winger and spring ~ the culture underpinning all these elaborate structures, iF not quite extinct, seems in many places ‘have elther vanished, or be fast erumbling away. But here the second phase of Nietzsche's predictions comes into play. Just as, ater she Buddha was desd, “his tremendous, gruesome shadow was sil shown for centuries In a cave’, $0, alicr God is dead, ‘there may still be places for thousands of | years in which his shadow will be shown — and we sil have to vanguish the shadow’ # Taking Jeave of God is nora simple process like abandoning belief in phlogiston once a better scientific account of combustion comes along, Religious faith does not form an isolated corner of our conceprual map that ‘an be tom off without affecting the main picture; instead, {fo change the metaphor) it lies at che centre of a vast web of beliefs and attitudes and feckings that are all subely inter- connected. Unraveling them, and coming to terms with dhe consequences of that unravelling, must involve a radical upheaval, not justin she cognitive sphere, ke adjusting or ‘modifying a scientific hypothesis, but in a way that is far ‘more primicve, implying a shift, often a a pre-rational evel, in fundamental aspects of our moral, social, aesthetic and psychological orientation towards reality. Large numbers of people may have formally abandoned the idea of God as 13. Tae Question 16 Onthe Mecring oi central 10 thelr woeld-view, but it seems dha for relatively few does this feel like having ‘arrived’; many instead are Teft with a sense of vague discomfort, manifested in some by a disqulet about the moral direction of a wholly seculae society, nt others by intermittent alraction 10 fashionable alternative modes of spirituality, in others agaln by a certain melancholic nostalgia for the nourishment and stability of| the faieh which no longer seems an option. In Nietzsche's ‘es, i is as if mankind has acquired a debilitating depen- dency on the accurmulated capital from its religious heritage, and learning to live without the weekly remintance will not be easy. ‘Vanquishing the shadow" requires courage and determination, “Here emerges the third phase of the Nierschean story. For Nietzsche's vision is not'a purely destructive one; sil less (like the brisk, cheerful atheism purveyed by contemporary secular spologists like Richard Dawkins)” is ita plea 1 sweep away all the religious rubble with the vigorous broom of science that is supposed to clean everything up. Instead, the cexy of the madman is imbued with passionate yearning, a fierce lament for the loss of ‘the holiest and most powerful of all that the world has yet owned’, and a determination to attempt the heroic isk of constructing a human surrogate for the defunct God. "Is nor the greamess of this deed too great for us? Must not we ourselves become gods simply to seem ‘worth of it?”* Meaning, that vivid sense of purpose without ‘which life slides into Batness and banality, must at all coss be recovered; and to capture this Nietzsche proposes the existential my of the Eternal Recurrence: This ites you now tive it and have ved it you vil have to lie once more an innumerable times mare: an there will be nothing new nf but every pan and every joy and every ‘thought and sigh and everything unutterably small or great in your fe will have to return to you ~ and all inthe same succession and sequence even this spider and this ‘mocnlight between the trees, and even thie moment ond rmysal The eternal houralas of estence is turned over and ver, and you wit it, dst grain of cust.” Fe Is ot that the envisaged eternal reiteraion would somehow bestow objective or enternal meaning ~ for what diflerence could unlimited duration or endless repetition rake t the significance of the spider Tee inthe meonlight? ‘We are indeed alone, in Nietzsche's universe, chrewn entvely ‘on our own resouress, without any of what he regards as the abby comforts of religion designed to console the weak. The darkness is all around us, and the only ching that ean illumin- ate ts our own indomitable wil, a determination to say such 4 passionate "Yes!" each single existential moment of life ‘that even on the condition of eternally repeating ic we would hose no other. The question “Do you want his enee more and innumerable ces more?" would ‘weigh upon your actions as the greatest vest 10 be overcome only by an Mfirmation so power that you would ‘eave nothing moze fercently than this ultimate confirmation and sea’ ‘Meaning, in Nietasche's vision, has to be generated entirely from the inside, The world we have to inhabit following the death of God is a world where, in the poet W.B. Yeas’ celebrated lines, ‘Whatever lames upon the night Man's own resinous heart has fed” 15. The Question 14 On the Meaning of ti MAN, THE MEASURE OF ALL THINGS? ‘Man, said che philosopher Protagors, is the measure of all things: of what, dha itis, and of what isnot, tha its 20." Socrates lad lel trouble refuting that piece of pretentious. ness, Pretentious is, n its arrogance; the Pralmis's cry ‘eis He that hath made us and not we ourselves)? whatever one ‘may think of the underlying cred, at least bas the humility to acknowledge the basic truth that we exist in the universe as ‘wholly contingent beings, dependent on a reality we did not create, And pretentious too, in its pseudo-profundlty, For ‘hough Prougoras’ modern successors never tre of pointing cout that ther is pothing deep dawn inside us except what we have pu there curses, ne criterion that we have no erated i the course of creating a practice, no standard of rattonabty thats notan appeal o such 8 eriterion, norgorous argumentation thatis nt obedience te our one conventions the fact remains that none of these human procedures would have any use or value unless they were conftonted by an independent non-human reality that in the long run allows those procedures that are effective to flourish, and eradicates those that are faulty. Wer mankind, are met the measure of whether a given plant does well in a given soll, or a given ‘engine works more efficiently than another, o the Earth sovolves annually around the Sun or vice versa, We create on theories, certainly, but we can only delay, never alkimately prevent, ther collapse when they fil to measure up to the bar cof actual experience OF course there is a residual truth behind the inflated claims of Protagoras and his more sophisticated modern, successors. Since We cannot jump outside of our human culture, mspeet reality "as telly’, and then jump back and pronounce such and sich a theory te and another fale, we Should acknowledge that we always have © operate within the context ofa continuing dialogue with our peers, with no instant hotine to the truth, no privileged access to a Golden Rule or Procedure that will guarantee that our hypotheses fic realty Yet to abancon the misguided hope for such guar- antees should not lead us to forget that human science aims at Uiscovering (or eliminating) relies that are there (oF not there) feespective of anything we decide, To put it in the more eveative terminology of Yeas! poem, the fuel from ‘our own ‘resinous hears! does not after all feed” realty: it illuminates, but eamst determine, what ts there to be seen upon the night How does this bear on Nietsele's heroic atempt to gener ste meaning from within? By supposing the unaided human wil can create meaning, that st can merely by is own resolute sifirmation bypass the search for objectively sourced truth and value, he seems to risk coming close to the Protagorean fallacy, For meaning and worth cannot reside in raw will alone: they have to involve a ft between our decisions and beliefs andl what grnds chose decisions and belief. That grounding may, as some religious thinkers maintain, be ‘divinely generated; or it may be based on something else — for example cestain fundamental faces about our social o biological nature. But it cannot be created by human fat alone, “The Niewschean solution, in short, is untenable; and one may add thats isin any case ibuman, or atleast inbumane. For a philosophy that exalts raw ill as the key to value and ‘meaning, that makes salvation dependent on the kind of hero struggle, the greatest stress that can be endured only by 18 Onthe Mesningst Lite the strong, I 0 ikely simultaneously to respect dhe dais of the tenatse, the scepsteal, she doubt he vailaing, che ‘weak andthe helpless ~ all those who are ill-equipped or disinclined to “become gods”. Niewsche, inthe Kind of rant that sporadically mars his Lterary and philosophical genius Teershly weleomed ‘the signs that a more manly, warlike age fsabout to bey, an aye which above al will ive bonour to valour once agein'* Over a century of die experience Inter, st would be good to hope that mankind i increasingly seeing reson to prefer the more mundane vies of eom- promise and compassion, the es herote bt more democratic ‘alues rooted (historically) i the religious ee of universal ‘rotterhood that Nictsche scorned. But this postscript on ‘Nietzsche wil have tobe left hanging fr the moment, since fc raises general sues about the connection between the quest foe meaning and the foundations of morality eat wal need mote time 6 unravel ‘VARIETY, MEANING AND EVALUATION I human beings cannot create meaning and value merely by an exercise of will, why can't they nevertheless find meaning tm the Various diverse human activites and projects they tandertake? ‘Various’ and“diverse’ are the key words here Pechaps the difficulty in the question that bated the Hich Hiker philosophers Loonquavel and Phonchg was that they were looking forthe meaning ~ a single grand all-encompass- ing answer. That, ofcourse, is the way most religious thinkers have traditionally seen it. But perhaps we need to get away from this spell, and co adopt instead a more modest, plece: ‘meal approach, more in tune with the metaphysically lower key aspirations of what one might call contemporary secular dnumanism. Perhaps, as Isiah Bertin has neatly put it ‘The conwcion that there exists. adiscaverable gol, pattern ot goals, the same for al mankind. is mistaken, and 0100's the notion tha ix bound up witht, ef ssingle teas doctrine carping stvticn foal man everyhers Consider Alan, a golfer. He has resired, has a pension sufficient for his needs, is reasonably healthy, and enjoys above al bs thrice-weekly game of golf. Let us assume that he fs five ftom the selF-deception and social manipulation that blight the lives of some of his fellow members of the local dubs he is noc chere as a social climber, of fo make business contacts, orto shaw off his expensive golfelubs; he just genu- incly enjoys the game, His playing gives his hfe a sucture tach week he looks forward to the coming games, and feels satisfied when they go well. Clearly he has nor found ‘The Meaning of Life’, with capital leters. But why not say, quiedy and in lower-case levers, that he has succeeded in finding a ‘meaning, or some meaning, to his life; and that this, and coundess similar storiet for countless other individuals happily absorbed in their own favoured pursuits, amounts to all hat can be said, or neds to be said, om the mawer? Notice that to reach this seemingly modest conclusion ‘certain things need o be assamed, We've stipulted that lan 1s comfortably off and in this designation is included a whole nest of assumptions about 2 certain easy flow to his life, am absence of too much anxiety and constraint about day-to-day living, an available measure of fice time, and an ability to ‘exercise a degree of choice in the use of that ime. We have ako stipulated chat he plays forthe sheer joy of dhe game ~ ‘uninfluenced by demeaning motives like vain self Importance, ora desire to crawl tothe boss; and there isa host of further presuppositions here, this ime about the extent to 19 The Question Meaning of Li which the chosen pursuic reflects Alan's status a8 an autono- mous agent. Ihe was playing out of abject fear of losing his job, or because of a subeonscious compulsion to surpass his facher’s sporting achievement, then we would be more doubtful in allowing he had found a meaning t his life ~ or at least the favourable implications of that phrase would be pp in question. “This last point brings our ehe fact what talk of ‘meaning in life is inescapably evaluative talk, To describe an activity, or 4 fe, 6 meaningfil is evidently to approve or commend Ik Now there are many people who have come to think of valuing asa matter of subjective preference; Indeed, sentences like "Thar’s just a value judgemend!” are often used to mean something like “That's no more than your arbitrary personal preference!” But in fict, although there may be some things ‘ve just arbitrarily “ake a faney

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