The Big Whimper

I have been thinking about the meaning, purpose, and perhaps the function of my existence. Today, I read an article on the website The Universe Today, titled "The End of Everything" by Fraser Cain , and according to the website Dark Energy is constant, and based on the models the best estimate is that it will remain constant and this means the universe will, approximately 100 Trillion years from now, be one big lifeless, cold, and energy-free nothing, it is called the Big Freeze. In other words, the universe started with a bang but will end in a whimper. Therefore I ask; if the universe will end, why should I care of what I am doing now, it is all for nothing, as Ecclesiastes states in Ecclesiastes 1:2 “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher.“Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” However whoever wrote this book concluded in Ecclesiastes 12:13 "Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind" but how can this be our duty, how is this a point or give us a meaning? What if a person for instance, like when she was six years old a girl name Rosanna (now 11 years old) was shot by Charles Roberts IV when he shot 10 Amish girls at a school five years ago, in which five died. Rosanna survived but as her father Christ King states, "She cannot walk, talk or eat, yet Rosanna is aware of her surroundings and attends an Amish school" how can she fulfill her "duty" if she is in a vegetative state? Additionally, there are some kids who are born in vegetative states from the womb; how will they too fulfill their "duty"? I think the so-called teacher's conclusion is bullsh!t, a big whimper! How is god going to judge someone who has been in a vegetative state most of their lives through no fault of their own, she happen to be in the wrong f@cking place at the wrong f@cking time or this the way people are born, and there isn't a d@mn thing you can do about it! Yes, we can have improvements in science and have societies without guns, yet there will be people who are sociopaths and psychopaths who will kill and not everyone in the world will have access to these discoveries in science or live in a gun free society. Why should we care if it ends in nothing? I think the reply in the Power of the Myth by Joseph Campbell put it best when Bill Moyer stated Zorba says, "Trouble?" Life is Trouble" Campbell replied "Only death is no trouble. People ask me "Do you have optimism about the world?" And I say, "Yes, it's great just the way it is. And you are not going to fix it up. Nobody has ever made it any better. This is it, so take it or leave it. You are not going to correct it or improve it." Campbell goes on to state " It is joyful just as it is. I don't believe there was anybody who intended it, but this is the way it is. James Joyce has a memorable line: "History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake," And the way to wake from it is not to be afraid, and to recognize that all of this, is a manifestation of the horrendous power that is of all creation. The ends of things are always painful. But pain is part of there being a world at all." To me it means, I care because this world as flawed as it is, it is all we have; take it or leave it, and my participation in life is my affirmation of it even though it ends in a whimper, it's my whimper. As meaningless as it is, it is still my meaning! Think about it! John D. Socrates a.k.a. The African Socrates.

Thinking about the absurd and Myth

As I have previously posted, "The Absurd" is when we rational humans try to find meaning in what appears to be an irrational or at least indifferent world. In the past there have been two traditional philosophical responses to this human condition, hope in something or someone that transcends the absurd or suicide which means you agree with the universe as being absurd but not worth living in, I think both are escapes from the absurd. Albert Camus offers a third approach of agreeing that the absurd exist and is true but instead of running away from it to face it by your revolt, your freedom, and your passion. In other words, as I have felt for long time life is its own point and you cannot improve or transcend it you can only add to what you have or to what it is. The way I like to say it "it is what it is". In other words, in spite of the world's indifference we should live our lives anyway and live it well. Another aspect of what Albert Camus calls Absurd Reasoning and what it amounts to is his argument against Rationalism. Rationalism as he presents it; is thinking that our human reason can make sense or give an explanation of this universe, this too he feel is absurd. Upon reflecting on this I learn something new, which is good, I learn that I am guilty of trying to think I can understand or use reason or rationalism to understand something that is indifferent or doesn't care to answer what my reason or rational mind begs an answer to. This is the absurd it is the confrontation or my desire for unity, clarity, for meaning, for a reason in a cold silent universe and my illusion that the universe will relent and answer. From this, I agree I should not take life too seriously because until proven otherwise, life is impermanent or temporal, and is the only one I know of, and I should live with what I know this life is, instead of what I don’t know, an unknowable afterlife. I think Joseph Campbell alluded on these themes in his writings that life is about the experience of being alive and myths are a way of describing or helping us get that experience of being alive and so the myth of Sisyphus informs me.