Come my dancing little advice monkeys, how do you define Life? To you, what is your definition of a good life or a bad one? What is it that motivates you to continue living and not rotting into dust and decay? Are you guided by the sturdy foundation of religion or are you a brave creator of values? Do you believe in free will or fate? Who are you? How do you define yourself? What do you hold to be your ideals? Do you follow any school of philosophical thought? What abstract concepts do you honour? Come now, this "religion" board has little discussion as it is.

Here is my simple answer to "life".

Life is life; it is neutral. It can be good or bad based on your preference and your environment. What keeps me living and not rotting away? I simply do not want to pass away at this particular moment in time. I do follow my religion and study what it says and base how I act on it. I believe in free will in which I can determine my future. Who am I? I am a human being and I define myself as a person. My ideals seems to be the best of me that I could possibly reach. A philosophical thought I follow is that one determines one's own future and that wealth does not necessarily gain you everything you desire in life. I don't seem to honor any abstract concepts.

Yes, my answers do seem to be simple but if you think about it, why complicate life? What about you, Arntor?

You forgot to ask "why?". And why what you think is life, is life. Also to share your values, but define what makes them a value. And why that is important, or why is matters. And does it matter to anyone else?

I don't know what life is. But I hope to figure it out sometime before I die. As to what my life is, I am just going to keep on going. As to why? Because I don't see why I should stop. And I've done the whole decay thing before and I hate it. I want to keep on doing what it is I'm doing, but I don't know why.

I don't believe there is a good or bad life. Why? I have a firm belief in not forcing my beliefs on others. If you are happy then that is all that matters. Though I caveat, that you shouldn't violate anyone else right to life to make your 'good'.

I don't have religion... Or religion doesn't have me. I don't have any problems with any of the religions out there though.
I do not believe in fate. I believe that you get what you give. I won't wait for something to happen, I will make it happen.

I don't really know who I am. Though I do know why I have been many of the things I've been in the past, and I'm trying to use that to my advantage everyday. But I take things one day at a time. I've been trying not to define myself lately. I don't want to feel stuck. And I don't want to freak out the people I see daily if things get weird. I am my own harshest judge. I don't like it when people make me feel worse about myself then I manage to daily.

I don't know what my ideals are right now. At least, not fully. Ideally I would like to be in better shape. I've been working on that and am proud to say that I've lost 12lbs. I would like to have a larger data bank at my disposal, if you know what I mean. And I'm in school for that. So I'm working to make the things I idealize a reality.

As of right now I'm trying to answer all of your questions honestly and in the form of a famous philosopher. Though I must say that I try to keep up with Enlightenment thought. It's a pleasant frame of mind to be in, but its hard because I have a tendency toward cynicism.

My definition of life is thus: life in itself is meaningless, not to say it isn't worthwhile, but that it lacks any inherent meaning. Life can be cold and certainly, life can be cruel but I view this lack of essence as a blessing. It leaves us as those who give it meaning and value. I see life as but a blank canvas for us to paint our art.

Likewise, I do not believe in a God, because I would prefer to make up my own values rather than adopting an absolute set of values. While I see it as a hindrance, I have nothing against any practitioners of religion. I merely place my faith in a world without a divine being or absolute values.

I consider a good life one full of activity, light-hearted but challenging, whereas the one I will avoid is one that lacks any enthusiasm, merely striving for comfort. Obviously, I believe in free will to its highest degree. Life in itself is simple, we make it complicated and I prefer it that way. Although I'm always seeking to improve my ideals I know that I honour an individual who is not only strong, proud, and passionate in spirit, but rational and can feel compassion. While I do not claim to follow any philosophical movement, I have analysed my thinking and the one that comes closest to my view is probably existentialism.

Meaningless?! LOL! Fool how could you say life is meaningless. I think your life is meaningless. Every single living organism has a purpose in the universe. That purpose my ignorant friend is to create order within the universe. God created us for a reason, and that was to prevent equilibrium from being achieved. Without order there would be utter chaos. Objects in chaos tend to shift to a state of equilibrium.

This can be proved on this site: http://books.google.com/books?id=DV2Ad3 ... &ct=result

So now, how can you say life is meaningless? God brought us here so we can create order within this universal system. LOL!

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se batson

How can you necessarily say that his life is meaningless if you would say that there is a meaning in life? Is that not a contradiction when you accused his life to be meaningless?

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Listen, I'm not saying that laws of nature and science do not exist, I'm saying they are without one inherent value.

Where did God come from?

Take, for example, that a God exists, that the idea of omniscience is plausible. I have always imagined a scenario, in which I have encountered such a being. In all the times that I have conjured this scenario within my mind, there are two questions I will ask, the first being "From where did you come from?" and so the God answers. It is not enough for me. I continue, "And from where did that originate?". Another answer, but it does not satisfy me, I repeat the same question, and given that God is omniscient, our conversation will go on without end, lest I commit a leap of faith and believe.

However, I want to know and I want an explanation. All that can be achieved is a clearer description and it never truly answers anything. It is here that I realise that the pursuit of knowledge in itself, is not what I want. What I, what every human on Earth, desires is personal value, but we can not find the value. Thus, I have decided to place my faith in the belief that life is valueless (meaningless) and that there is no code of morality. If "God" wanted us to follow his code of morality, then he would not have "programmed" us with free will and self-awareness. "God" left morality for us to define and in doing so, he has given us the opportunity to become Gods by creating our own code of order.

Now, this is where the line between humanity and God begins to blur together. In the end, there is only an infinite stream of creators and there is not one "God", but many. Look back at history and see how the Greeks viewed their "Gods", are they not projections of humanity? Of their ideals? Do they not possess certain traits of humanity also?

However, along came a spider thumping its chest claiming "There is only one absolute being and we must follow that one absolute being's code!"

But I ask, Mr. Spider, who are you to impose your morality upon me? Why should I?

He replies,
"If you shall not, then forever will you be damned to eternal suffering in Hell!"

Where is Hell?

...

Exactly.

I don't believe in "God", I believe in humanity.

Given the definition of "God" being:
-The one Supreme Being, the creator and ruler of the universe.

I believe in the creator, I refuse the ruler, because if God created Man to be the vessel of his morality, then his gravest mistake was in giving Man free will. It's the equivalent of the Master saying to his Slave, "I order you to be free! I condemn you to give your own life value! Take responsibility for your own actions!"

By doing that, God has allowed us to be on the same level that he is.
What is called "God" should have been called "Ideals"! It is then our individual choice whether to follow the old ideals or invent our own ideals!

Though this does bring up the question, if one has become their ideal, then have they not transcended themselves?
Maybe we are looking for something that is "more" than ourselves, but in the end we can only find ourselves.

Edit: Yes, I realise I must have repeated some things quite a few times.

My meaning of life is that we have to continue to discover and improve our world in general. Look back in the past and see how far we have come. We have come a long way, but I strongly do believe there is much out there for us to discover. I think that we are here to make life easier for others and to improve our society and world while we live here.