Jean Kazez Philosophy Department SMU Prelude A few words about solidarity vs agreement Alex Rosenbergs cheerful nihilism Is he right that life is meaningless Professor of Philosophy Duke University ID: 547837
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Slide1
Is Life Meaningless?
Jean Kazez
Philosophy Department, SMUSlide2
Prelude
A few words about
solidarity vs. agreementSlide3
Alex Rosenberg’s
cheerful nihilism
Is he right that life is meaningless??
Professor of Philosophy, Duke UniversitySlide4
Background
The debate about God and
the meaning of lifeSlide5
An existential crisis
Everything comes to an end … my life is meaningless …
I may as well be dead!
Tolstoy, age 51, 1879Slide6
Tolstoy’s Conversion
“As
I looked around at people, at humanity as a whole
,
I
saw that they lived
and
affirmed that they knew
the
meaning of life.
”
Tolstoy,
A Confession
(1879)Slide7
Tolstoy on the
necessity of faith
“… only
in faith can we find the meaning and possibility of life.
”
Faith gives “an infinite meaning to the finite existence of man; a meaning that is not destroyed by suffering, deprivation or death.
Tolstoy,
A Confession (1879)Slide8
∞Slide9
Standard Atheist
ResponseSlide10
NO, NO
No God
No necessity of God for meaningfulness
Meaning OF life
cosmic purpose
[need God]
Meaning IN life
having your own plans, goals, ultimate aims
[don’t need God]Slide11
My primary goal is
to be a great climber
MEANING IN LIFESlide12
My primary goal is
to raise my daughters
MEANING IN LIFESlide13
I’m working on world peace,
thank you very much
MEANING IN LIFESlide14
∞
Needed more fulfilling goals, not faithSlide15
For meaning
in life
God is not necessarySlide16
Enter: Trouble
Can there really be meaning IN life?Slide17
Meaning
IN
life
is only possible if…
Hillary has thoughts
ABOUT
peaceMichelle has thoughts ABOUT
her daughtersMountain climber has thoughts ABOUT mountainsSlide18
ABOUTNESS
IS PROBLEMATIC!
My brain weighs 2 pounds
I
t’s spongy
It’s wet
It has electric charge
And it has aboutness. ABOUTNESS?Slide19
Are these things possible
in natural, physical world?
Souls
The self
Free will
Objective morality
AboutnessSlide20
Philosophy of
aboutness
(aka “intentionality”)
Franz Brentano
Edmund Husserl
Jerry Fodor
Daniel DennettRuth MillikanFred Dretske
Paul & Patricia
Churchland
John SearleSlide21
Rosenberg:
ABOUTNESS
DOESN’T EXIST
Like souls, fairies, witches,
ESP, heaven, destiny, etc. don’t existSlide22
Can’t think about
mountains
Can’t think about
daughters
Can’t think about
w
orld peaceSlide23
Life is meaningless!
NO MEANING
OF
LIFE
Because no God
NO MEANING
IN
LIFE
Because no
aboutnessSlide24
Rosenberg:
life is meaningless? What me worry?Slide25
∞
Rosenberg:
Tolstoy just needed ProzacSlide26
Why no aboutness
?
Rosenberg’s argument why
aboutness
doesn’t existSlide27
Aboutness
is unreal because
1) Paris
too diffuse—what are the boundaries?
Neurons
too
simple—even sea slugs, rats, frogs have them;
just “circuitry”.Slide28
Aboutness
is unreal because
3) Piling up doesn’t help—
“Piling up a lot of neural circuits that are not about anything at all can’t turn them into a thought about stuff out there in the world.”
Rosenberg, p. 184Slide29
W
hy should
atheists
pay attention?
SCIENTISM*
– “The physical facts fix all of the facts.” What “floats” free of physical facts is unreal, illusory.
NO GOD
NO ABOUTNESS
* Not a dirty word in Rosenberg’s viewSlide30
How should we respond?Slide31
1. Dismiss Rosenberg
as a nutSlide32
2
. Agree, but secretly
Vote for me, even though I think God doesn’t exist, life is meaningless, and nobody has thoughts about anything.Slide33
3
.
D
ismiss Rosenberg’s view as “self-defeating”
I am not thinking about anything or talking about anything!Slide34
4. Reject scientism
Come to atheism by another route—e.g. argument from evil
Say there are genuine facts that float free of physical facts.
Accept
aboutness
as “floater”Slide35
5. Rebut his arguments
HE SAID
LIKE SAYING
“Piling up a lot of neural circuits that are not about anything at all can’t turn them into a thought about stuff out there in the world.”
Rosenberg, p. 184
Piling up a lot of atoms that aren’t conscious can’t make me conscious.Slide36
6
. Explain how
aboutness
arises from physical factsSlide37
How can there be aboutness
in physical world?
hard question,
piles of literatureSlide38
Fly detector
A fly-detector has physical states ABOUT flies. Slide39
Paris detector
That’s Paris!Slide40
Paris detector
Let’s go to Paris!Slide41
Mountain detector
Daughter detector
World peace detectorSlide42
Mission accomplished
Aboutness
and meaning in life defendedSlide43
Meaning in Life
Expanding on ideaSlide44
1) Love
“Love saves us … from squandering our lives in vacuous activity that is fundamentally pointless”
“Love makes it possible … for us to engage wholeheartedly in activity that is meaningful”
-- Harry Frankfurt,
The Reasons of Love Slide45
2) Objective attractiveness
“Meaning arises from loving objects worthy of love and engaging with them in a positive way.”
“
Meaning arises when subjective attraction meets objective attractiveness
.”
-
- Susan Wolf,
Meaning in Life and Why it Matters (2010)Slide46
2) Objective attractiveness
An activity is objectively attractive when—
Benefit is not received only by me—
but
shared
by others too
Benefit is not seen only by me— but
real, factualSusan
Wolf,
Meaning in Life and Why it Matters
(2010)Slide47
3) A meaningful
life
Not just lots of different meaningful
activities
, but goals that give shape to life as a wholeSlide48
What is meaningless?
(some examples from online life)
Checking email and Twitter endlessly
(you don’t
love
it)Malicious online bullying
(not objectively attractive)Endless chatter at blogs (gives no shape to life
)Slide49
What adds meaning
to our lives?
Three examples
Raising children
Working for social justice
Skilled X-
ingSlide50
Had all the elements of meaning but didn’t know it
Blinded by … religion? Sexism?
∞Slide51
Bibliography
Alex Rosenberg,
The Atheist’s Guide to Life: Enjoying Life without Illusions
Jean Kazez, Review of Rosenberg in
Free Inquiry
(August/September 2012)
Leo Tolstoy, A ConfessionHarry Frankfurt, The Reasons of Love
Susan Wolf, Meaning in Life and Why it MattersStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy – look up Intentionality; Causal theories of mental contentNicholas Carr, The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains
Links at my blog—
kazez.blogspot.com