Living in the moment

One of the many, many blogs I read during the day (with the help of Google Reader – otherwise I’d never leave the computer) is The Dilbert Blog by the often extremely funny Scott Adams. His post today about the small pleasures in life certainly managed to put a small on my face. (For me: the arrival of a new book from Amazon through the post, the puppyish enthusiasm of my family’s dog when being taken for a walk, that first sip of tea in the morning, etc). However, it was one of the comments left that really got my attention:

Odd that a moist robot can think it's having such a good day. What do you do with your godless, purposless, total lack of freewill having philosophy when you talk like this?

Don't get me wrong I totally believe you are having these feelings and that they are beautiful, but if you believe you are nothing more than a complicated meat puppet what do you do with those sensations?

As this person, “Alex” goes on to explain in a latter comment:

This…leaves me with this question for the Atheists: How do you work around talking about meaning and beauty and purpose? How do you with honesty to your world view strive to do good things, treat people as you’d like to be treated, or try to make a difference in this joint? Please keep in mind that most every Atheist I have met has been generally very thoughtful, kind and concerned about living life “right”. Basically they are better than the world view they claim to hold. But I can’t understand why. The Athistic/Nihilistic world view does not support it.

If we are from nothing, for nothing, to nothing, then nothing matters. The job you have, the hobbies you enjoy, the family you have, the way you treat people. It doesn’t matter at all. Sure, you can say that it does matter because you want to leave a good mark on the world etc... But what does THAT mean? Good? What’s that? It’s nothing! It’s an illusion. Your children will die. Your children’s children will die and they will all forget you. You don’t matter. You mean nothing. You count for nothing. You are an accident. An amazing accident beyond all odds. You think you are self actualized, but you are not. You are complicated chemistry. You are a moist robot responding to complicated stimuli and you will only be here for a little while then you will return to the nothingness that you came from.

Now, while I think the terms “complicated meat puppet” and “moist robot” are absolutely inspired, the idea that unless we have some God-given purpose we might as well not bother with anything is ridiculous.

Personally, whether you think you admire a beautiful sunset because you have a divinely or evolutionarily provided sense of beauty makes very little difference to your appreciation. On one level, perhaps the most important, it’s simply a beautiful sunset and we react to that. I imagine that for most people it’s not the why that counts, it’s what's happening at the time. Most of the relationships we’re in aren’t going to last, but we still try to make the most of them. In 100 years time everyone who reads this post will be dust and this blog long forgotten – but I think it’s worth writing because of the value it has now.

In fact, I could easily flip the question around. “If we are from nothing, for nothing, to nothing” then it means that what happens now is the important thing. However, if you seriously believe that this life is simply the waiting room for paradise, then why should you care what’s going on?