Christmas In The Good Old Days
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Irrelevance Of A Meaningful Existence Due To Predicted Eventuality Of The Universe - Or Not?
46 Answers
Hi ABers,
Not been on for a while, been off reading and expanding my knowledge about my deepest troubles. And I return with a stonker for you, which I hope even the most hardened experimental science buffs will have a crack at, despite it's proximity to being a philosophical question. So... lengthy title that demands further explanation.
I'm an incredibly deep thinker and I use my cognitive abilities to tackle The question... The meaning life, the universe and everything (as Douglas put it.) I've thus exposed my mind to the unimaginable durations of time yet to come and the fate of humanity in it's wake.
IF we assume mankind never manages to colonise any other planetary body outside our own solar system, then come 5 billions years or so, our star will exhaust it's supply of nuclear fuel and enter it's death phases, swallowing up Earth along the way.
Otherwise, IF we assume mankind has managed to colonise and breed successful generations on a world around another star in our galaxy, therefore avoiding the destruction of Earth, and can repeat this process from star to star, mankind will inevitably suffer the ultimate fate of the rest of the matter in our galaxy and fall victim to the gravity of the super massive black hole in it's centre.
Further more, IF we assume humans have sufficient research and technology to allow them to travel to another galaxy and repeat this process, we can prolong mankind's existence exponentially and conclude they might thrive until the end of the last shining star, hundreds of billions of years from now...
However... scientist are grouped (mainly) in to two camps for the theory of how the universe evolves and ends. One argument is for the 'big crunch', where the Universe stops expanding and under the force of gravity retracts, becoming smaller and smaller until it reaches it's starting point. A singularity. (This theory necessarily condemns Humanity to a squashed end and erasure from existence.) The other camp argues the universe will keep expanding, ever after increasing the distances between the galaxies, making each galaxy an island of matter in the void. Once all the hydrogen is burned up by star formation and death, heavier elements ejected by super nova will eventually be swallowed up by the galactic black hole which (it is believed) the only way it will lose mass and dissipate is by slowly radiating energy , x-rays and such like.
VERY long winded I do apologise but here's my point... If the fate of the universe is either of those two theorised conclusions, man kind will be destroyed, even if the survive to see the last sun bun out. All of human history gone, genetic information from parent to child gone, all of mankind's great research and achievements, inventions and constructions will be gone...
If you, as I have, expose your mind to the vast time frame involved and contemplate our believed fate of our species, doesn't it strike you as pointless to do anything useful with life? Might not it be more logical to be minimal instead of maximum? Do you believe your life will have ANY meaning of relevance to a universe that's seen humanity wiped from it's space?
If I were to be a great orator and progressive politician or I was a Heroin addict living on the streets, once human memory of me or written record of me is lost/deleted/corrupted or damaged beyond salvation, my life and it's achievements would amount to ZERO, especially when mankind ceases to exist and all matter in the universe is either squashed or swallowed up and evaporated into pure energy....
Very sorry for long question, if you've laboured your way through that block of words, might I encourage you to add your own thought below?
IHI
Not been on for a while, been off reading and expanding my knowledge about my deepest troubles. And I return with a stonker for you, which I hope even the most hardened experimental science buffs will have a crack at, despite it's proximity to being a philosophical question. So... lengthy title that demands further explanation.
I'm an incredibly deep thinker and I use my cognitive abilities to tackle The question... The meaning life, the universe and everything (as Douglas put it.) I've thus exposed my mind to the unimaginable durations of time yet to come and the fate of humanity in it's wake.
IF we assume mankind never manages to colonise any other planetary body outside our own solar system, then come 5 billions years or so, our star will exhaust it's supply of nuclear fuel and enter it's death phases, swallowing up Earth along the way.
Otherwise, IF we assume mankind has managed to colonise and breed successful generations on a world around another star in our galaxy, therefore avoiding the destruction of Earth, and can repeat this process from star to star, mankind will inevitably suffer the ultimate fate of the rest of the matter in our galaxy and fall victim to the gravity of the super massive black hole in it's centre.
Further more, IF we assume humans have sufficient research and technology to allow them to travel to another galaxy and repeat this process, we can prolong mankind's existence exponentially and conclude they might thrive until the end of the last shining star, hundreds of billions of years from now...
However... scientist are grouped (mainly) in to two camps for the theory of how the universe evolves and ends. One argument is for the 'big crunch', where the Universe stops expanding and under the force of gravity retracts, becoming smaller and smaller until it reaches it's starting point. A singularity. (This theory necessarily condemns Humanity to a squashed end and erasure from existence.) The other camp argues the universe will keep expanding, ever after increasing the distances between the galaxies, making each galaxy an island of matter in the void. Once all the hydrogen is burned up by star formation and death, heavier elements ejected by super nova will eventually be swallowed up by the galactic black hole which (it is believed) the only way it will lose mass and dissipate is by slowly radiating energy , x-rays and such like.
VERY long winded I do apologise but here's my point... If the fate of the universe is either of those two theorised conclusions, man kind will be destroyed, even if the survive to see the last sun bun out. All of human history gone, genetic information from parent to child gone, all of mankind's great research and achievements, inventions and constructions will be gone...
If you, as I have, expose your mind to the vast time frame involved and contemplate our believed fate of our species, doesn't it strike you as pointless to do anything useful with life? Might not it be more logical to be minimal instead of maximum? Do you believe your life will have ANY meaning of relevance to a universe that's seen humanity wiped from it's space?
If I were to be a great orator and progressive politician or I was a Heroin addict living on the streets, once human memory of me or written record of me is lost/deleted/corrupted or damaged beyond salvation, my life and it's achievements would amount to ZERO, especially when mankind ceases to exist and all matter in the universe is either squashed or swallowed up and evaporated into pure energy....
Very sorry for long question, if you've laboured your way through that block of words, might I encourage you to add your own thought below?
IHI
Answers
I don't see that this question should be confined to life alone. There seems to be little point to a lifeless universe either. Little point in anything. I guess with intelligent life comes the ability to conceive of something outside of the physical realm, a non-
13:51 Mon 15th Apr 2013
I think there is little point on theorising on how the world will end. First reason is that it will not affect you, or any of us here on earth right now and you will not know if you are right or wrong. We should, in my opinion, all live our lives to the very best we can. Achieve as much as we want to. Help others. Have children or not as suits you etc. Then if you believe in life beyond death, which I do, then maybe (and none of us know for sure) eternal life will follow. As life on earth is so transient it would be a huge pity if this stage is all there is for each of us.
Hi IFI, you have considered all future outcomes based on continuing time. should anyone or anything have survived so far in the future we could assume their understandings and knowledge far far superior to us and they may guarantee their existence by knowing how to move into dimensions where there is, at least in that realm, no time restrictions or if there is, continually move. bearing this in mind therefore we just may be part of an unending chain of dna or carbon based life. i'd like to think that will be the case provided we don't cause our own demise first by war, disease pandemics etc. I'm not a deep thinker obviously, but that's how I see it. just a shame our lives are short in the grand scale of things. and because life is finite, i do my best to enjoy it, see as much as i can, try not to worry about things, care for my family, and laugh a lot. oh, and drink the odd beer or two!
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