Friday, January 29, 2010

thought of the day.385

All natural occurrences—from an earthquake to an exploding star in a distant galaxy— are completely meaningless. All human actions in and of themselves are also meaningless. Only when we give something meaning does it have one.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

How does one attribute meaning to an event?

john evans said...

My point is that meaning does not exist outside of our minds. We can’t point to meaning. Nothing has meaning unless there is someone to perceive it and make meaning of it.

To Peyton Manning, the Super Bowl has all kinds of meaning. To me it means much less. A tree falls. It means something quite different to the logger and the tree-hugger. The logger perceives the event as more or less money and the tree-hugger as a tragedy, but in and of itself, the falling tree is meaningless.

homesicksooner said...

So, let me get this straight.

You are telling us that human action has no meaning through a human action?

Self-refutes. You are attempting to communicate meaning to us through an action.

john evans said...

Two people are having sex. What does that mean? You can’t answer it because the physical act itself is meaningless. It takes a mind to make or project meaning upon the act.