The Origin of Meaning, Part 1: Fear of Living in an Uncaring and Alien World
Most people’s lives revolve around seeking the meaning of life. Meaning is such a central preoccupation for us that it makes up much of what we think and talk about (directly or indirectly).1 Countless books have been written about the subject throughout history, and to this day, it is one of the most discussed topics. However, we are so preoccupied with figuring out what the meaning of life is that we rarely stop to ask why we seek meaning in the first place. Why are we so eager and desperate to find meaning and live for it?
This meta-question about the question of the meaning of life is crucial because virtually all our major problems and conflicts are caused by our restless pursuit of meaning. As we will see, our meaning-pursuit is the very thing that keeps us from what we seek. This does not mean the pursuit is pointless—far from it. However, it will eventually lead us to go beyond it to find what we have been seeking all along.
Our Biggest Fear
Imagine that you lose your meaning of life. What thoughts and feelings arise in you? These thoughts and feelings are your biggest fear, and you create meaning to protect yourself from it.
There is a well-known theory in psychology that deals with the origin of meaning: terror management theory (Greenberg et al., 1986). According to this theory, death—more precisely, mortality—is our biggest fear, and we create meaning to defend ourselves against the fear.2 However, the theory has been called into question (e.g., Hart, 2019; Treger et al., 2023).3 So let us begin by examining why the fear of mortality is unlikely to be our biggest fear and the origin of our meaning.
Survival is our most basic concern. Since meaning is what we believe to be the most important thing in life, it may seem that concern for survival underlies our pursuit of meaning. However, our most basic concern rarely translates into our most important concern. This kind of reductionistic confusion has been common (see Wilber, 2000).
Our needs initially evolved for survival and reproduction. However, we place importance on the satisfaction of needs, so that it becomes valuable for its own sake, independently of its survival and reproductive benefits. In fact, our concern for satisfaction (especially the satisfaction of the need to which we attach special importance; i.e., our meaning) often conflicts with and overrides our concern for survival and reproduction.4 For example, the need for social approval serves survival and reproduction, but those who make social approval their meaning often risk and sometimes even sacrifice their lives to get it.5 For such people, nothing is more important and compelling than the feeling of receiving social approval.
Still, some might argue that some people risk or sacrifice their lives for their meaning because they believe meaning-achievement will grant them an afterlife. However, even here it is questionable whether immortality is what they are really after. It is unlikely that what they have in mind when they risk or sacrifice their lives is an image of themselves merely existing forever in the afterlife. Instead, they are likely imagining themselves enjoying some happy and fulfilling afterlife.
No one desires immortality or permanence per se. If those who believe in an afterlife were purely concerned with living forever, they would not care whether their afterlife would be eternally pleasant (heaven) or eternally unpleasant (hell). But they all wish for heaven. In fact, they would rather not have an afterlife than go to hell and suffer for eternity. The quality of life is our primary concern, and the quantity or duration of life secondary. Only when we consider life, real or imagined, to be enjoyable and desirable, do we wish to have more of it. So the reality of mortality—life having an inevitable end—is not our worst fear. Dissatisfaction and unhappiness in life is.6
We greatly fear dissatisfaction and unhappiness because of our evolved cognition. Cognitive evolution has deepened sensations and enhanced survival and reproduction. However, when cognition is fairly evolved, it makes sensations so intense (i.e., feelings and emotions, as distinguished from sensations) as to begin overriding survival and reproduction. If you examine the pattern of human development (e.g., Loevinger, 1976), you will notice that it is characterized by a better way to live a happy and fulfilling life rather than to survive and reproduce (i.e., we are driven primarily by the desire for happiness and fulfillment).7
Our deep sensitivity causes us to avoid unpleasant feelings and seek pleasant ones. We do all sorts of things that can shorten our lives (e.g., excessive drinking) to escape unpleasant feelings. Some people even commit suicide to escape once and for all.8 When we get stuck in dissatisfaction and unhappiness, we find life meaningless and start questioning whether it is worth continuing. Unless we find a way out of unhappiness (e.g., meaning), our motivation for life will die out.9
Human Unhappiness: What Dissatisfaction Means to Us
So we seek meaning because of our intense fear of dissatisfaction and unhappiness, which results from the deepening of sensations by our evolved cognition. The question is, how does our cognition deepen and amplify sensations, so that dissatisfaction and unhappiness become dreadful?
Human cognition is remarkable for its ability to associate and structure memories, symbols, and concepts in hierarchical and meaningful organization (Bickerton, 1995; Bor, 2012).10 This ability enables us to build a vast and complex yet coherent conception of reality, which acts as an interpretive context or frame that enriches and deepens sensations.11 So we do not experience satisfaction and dissatisfaction as simple sensations of pleasure and pain in the immediate context. We experience them imbued with broad and intricate meanings or implications.12 Thus, we can even experience them imbued with implications for the nature of reality or existence, the implication that we exist in a caring and congenial world or an uncaring and alien world.
Since dissatisfaction is a common experience and phenomenon—even if you are relatively free of it, you see it around you and in the world—it is an ever-looming threat. So we are constantly threatened by the realization that we live in an uncaring and alien world. However, this terrifying realization is not the discovery of the nature of reality but a product of our fundamental misconception of reality.
(To be continued.)
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References
Bickerton, D. (1995). Language and human behavior. University of Washington Press.
Bor, D. (2012). The ravenous brain: How the new science of consciousness explains our insatiable search for meaning. Basic Books.
Confer, J. C., Easton, J. A., Fleischman, D. S., Goetz, C. D., Lewis, D. M. G., Perilloux, C., & Buss, D. M. (2010). Evolutionary psychology: Controversies, questions, prospects, and limitations. American Psychologist, 65(2), 110–126. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0018413
Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T., & Solomon, S. (1986). The causes and consequences of a need for self-esteem: A terror management theory. In R. F. Baumeister (Ed.), Public self and private self (pp. 189–212). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-9564-5_10
Hart, J. (2019). What’s death got to do with it? Controversies and alternative theories. In C. Routledge & M. Vess (Eds.), Handbook of terror management theory (pp. 65–83). Elsevier Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-811844-3.00003-2
Loevinger, J. (1976). Ego development: Conceptions and theories. Jossey-Bass.
Treger, S., Benau, E. M., & Timko, C. A. (2023). Not so terrifying after all? A set of failed replications of the mortality salience effects of terror management theory. PLoS ONE, 18(5), Article e0285267. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0285267
Wilber, K. (2000). Sex, ecology, and spirituality: The spirit of evolution (2nd ed.). Shambhala.
The meaning of life is a preoccupation not only of the “philosophical type.” Everyone is deeply concerned with having a life that feels right and makes sense to them, even though it may be uncommon to approach the matter as “the meaning of life.”
I use the term “the fear of mortality” instead of “the fear of death” to refer to the fear discussed in terror management theory because the latter may include fears that are not the fear of stopping existing, such as the fear of the pain accompanying death. Either way, I suggest that the fear of death in general is not the cause of meaning.
Another important limitation of terror management theory, besides the fear of mortality as the origin of meaning, is the assumption that people rely on the conventional or prevailing values of their society for meaning. People create meaning in different ways, and only the people at a certain stage of development adopt prevailing social values as their meaning (Loevinger, 1976).
We attach special importance not only to the satisfaction of a certain need but also to a certain way or method of satisfying that need. These two make up our meaning of life.
Also, some people commit suicide when they lose their meaning. If the function of meaning were to protect people from the fear of death, a loss of meaning would not cause them to commit suicide. On the contrary, it would expose them to the fear and make them avoid death even more.
It is important to note that I am not talking about the kind of adverse experiences mentioned in terror management theory (Greenberg et al., 1986): life-threatening experiences. I am talking about experiences that bring a person the greatest unhappiness (i.e., the frustration of their strongest need and desire), which are rarely fatal.
Human development (i.e., a better way to live a happy and fulfilling life) would still be related to better survival and reproduction, but only to some degree. This is because, given natural selection, people at a developmental stage that matches the stage of their society, rather than those at the highest stage of development, would have the best survival and reproductive success.
Suicide is predominantly a human phenomenon, which is inexplicable in terms of survival or reproduction (Confer et al., 2010).
Our attitudes toward life and death depend on our life satisfaction. When we are happy with life, we view life as an opportunity to experience happiness and despise death for taking the precious opportunity away. In contrast, when we are unhappy with life, we view life as a place for suffering and desire death as an escape from the awful place.
Both Bickerton (1995) and Bor (2012) pointed out that our ability to structure a vast amount of information in hierarchical and meaningful organization underlies our unique consciousness. However, they differed on several points. For example, Bickerton equated the ability with language, whereas Bor considered language to be one form of the ability. Here I agree with Bor. However, Bor drew parallels between human cognition and (advanced) computer information-processing while neglecting their fundamental differences. As Bickerton (1995) noted, computers lack (a) needs and desires and (b) sense organs; thus, “there is nothing for them to have consciousness for and nothing for them to have consciousness with” (p. 153). It is precisely because human cognition is grounded in needs, sensations, and so on that it is not merely information-processing but experience. Lacking the evolutionary bases of consciousness, computer information-processing, no matter how sophisticated, would not be conscious.
At the core of our conception of reality is a concept of the self. As soon as a self-concept is created, sensations become imbued with personal meanings or implications. This will be the main topic of Part 2.
Inferences are concise but not simple. In fact, they are extremely complex. They are based on and enfold vast amounts of memories and concepts.
I wonder if meaning is conflated with a contemporary sense of 'goals' and a narrative sense of self in the world. I am the star of the story in this world I am in. The protagonist may feel they are in the wrong scene or the wrong movie. Perhaps there is no movie?