Available Light

Play of light
A photograph
The way I used to be
Some half-forgotten stranger
Doesn't mean that much to me

Trick of light
Moving picture
Moments caught in flight
Make the shadows darker
Or the colors shine too bright

Oh the light can carry
All the visions of the sea
Oh the light can carry
All the images to me

Run to light from shadow
Sun gives me no rest
Promise offered in the east
Broken in the west
Chase the sun around the world
I want to look at life
In the available light

-RUSH - Available Light - Presto (1989)


Nevertheless, I'm certain that man will never give up true suffering, that is, chaos and destruction. Why, suffering is the only cause of consciousness
. . . The meaning of man's life consists in proving to himself every minute that he's a man and not a piano key.

- Dostoevsky


Last Book Read: What's It All About - Philosophy & The Meaning of Life - Julian Baggini



There are some who say reading a book like this is a waste of time. Beyond asking what someone knows about the particular book (nothing), I would argue that there is no more important question in all of human experience. There is no point to philosophy or anything else without addressing this question. As Socrates said, "the unexamined life is not worth living." The first consideration is to determine if there is a meaning to life. If there isn't, we are left in a Schoepenhauer-esque world of nihilism, contemplating Camus' question - why don't we just commit suicide? Of course, nihilism doesn't hold up very well, and I doubt it has many adherents. Therefore, we are left with the question of what it is, or where it derives from. Bagginni presents the meaning of life from a humanist point of view, and he argues that this is really the only possibility. Even if we are the creations of a God, we still have to find this meaning for ourselves. His whole point is that this endeavor can be done without the need to rely on the spiritual. Secondly, he reduces the vagueness of this large question, into specific areas.

Baggini anticipates that some regard this as a waste of time, as they think the answer is simple. He replies by showing that the concept of Carpe Diem is not as simple as these "pub philosophers" think it is. He basically equates these people with those found in Kierkegaard's aesthetic stage. Living in the moment becomes unsatisfying because it is made up of unconnected moments. Life is a tragedy because it contains "the inevitability that even the most wonderful experiences cannot be held in our grasp but rather run through our fingers like water. Life is ultimately sad because we are doomed to lose the most valuable of times." He continues on to suggest "that the most intense aesthetic experiences actually have their power precisely because they remind us of our mortality [and they] make the transitory nature of existence evident and thus bring home to us the fact the very possibility of experience itself will come to an end." This profound version of Carpe Diem "draws a necessary link between the joy of the moment and the pain of its passing." So these moments show us the value of life, because moments of experience do have value, but in themselves they contain an emptiness and require a more substantial viewpoint to provide overall meaning.

There are others who think the search for meaning is a waste of time because it cannot be known, it is "opaque." Baggini concludes that even an unexamined life can be meaningful - it may contain elements of meaning - authenticity, love, aesthetic experience, happiness, altruism and success - without the person having actually thought about it. I believe that he is too generous to those who are non-philosophical about life. He even states that this shows "how unreflective much of humanity is." It may be true that they are living meaningful lives, at least on appearance. On the surface they may be, but if they haven't thought about it - have they done the work? It could just as easily be an accident. Without thinking about it, they haven't made the choices to reach their goals. Like doing anything else they may have a finished product, but without doing the construction of it, it seems somewhat empty. Of course the only missing piece is the simple attempt to think about it- to contemplate the possible alternatives. And to do this, Baggini has provided anyone with a good start by reviewing this book.

I'm not sure what viewpoint Baggini comes from, other than humanist. He references much from Sartre, although this is probably because it represents the best humanist viewpoints. However, he only sees authenticity as one of many components to a meaningful life. He also warns against"existential snobbery" of brooding too much over angst, and he downplays the significance of philosophy in examining life as "intellectual arrogance." He concludes, as others have, that meaning and morality are inseparable, and then claims that this is a problem for existentialists, because they "do not provide any guidance on what kinds of moral choices are morally acceptable." First, I think this is a flaw in the development of Existentialism, and it is unfortunate that Sartre did not deliver his promised Ethics before abandoning Existentialism, although, we are left with Beauvoir's Ethics of Ambiguity. But, I would argue that the concept of authenticity entails morally justified behavior through responsibility, where integrity of the self is defined and developed through the awareness of freedom, both of the self and of the other. Therefore authenticity/morality/meaning are all intertwined. This is an area where Existentialism makes a break from other radical viewpoints and continues as a sustainable, coherent and justifiable philosophy. Individual relativists and rebels like Norman Mailer are the ones who are in this indefensible position, where anything can become one's project - even if it is evil and destructive. The arguments against transcendence rely on the historic wealth of thought from Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Sartre, and Camus. So, it would seem to me that Existentialism has the most thorough of all humanistic viewpoints, and has yet to be superceded.