Immer Wieder
I got home from work early last night, and had finished eating dinner by about 8. So I got my guitar out, just to play for pleasure, for the first time in what felt like ages. Came up with a pretty little riff, and next thing I knew, I had dragged out the keyboard and spent the rest of the evening arranging some sort of Massive Attack Goes Dronerock epic.
But then, after spending hours coccooned in my headphones, I was gripped with a sudden attack of utter existential dread. It's not like a focused depression, with a thoughtworm you can work your way through. It's more like an overwhelming sense of "there is no point, the sole ultimate purpose of all life from viruses to humans is to propell one's DNA into the next generation, and since I'm not going to do that, then why exist at all?"
These "meaning of life" conversations drive me to science, but I don't know if this is brought on by, or ameliorated by reading so many books about science. On the one hand, things like Chaos Theory are comforting, in that the tiniest event can have far-reaching consequences in the grand scheme of existence, so you don't ever know what your purpose is, but it may be something huge you have no idea that triggered.
But, as a friend pointed out, consequences are not the same as purpose.
This brings up discussion of Art, of creation, as substitute for the procreative act. "Ars longa, vita breva" and all that. But I think that's bollocks invented by men to make up for the fact that they have no wombs and do not physically bear children.
...and this morning, I logged onto ILX, a long-running internet community of which I am a member, and found that there have been some issues with server hosting and the whole thing either has to move or shut down. I've been on ILX longer than anything else in my life - longer than any job, or school, or relationship, or even band. So put that into perspective when I say that the potential Death Of ILX would affect me as seriously as the death of a loved one, the end of a relationship or being sacked from a job.
I feel bereft, I feel like crying.
But then, after spending hours coccooned in my headphones, I was gripped with a sudden attack of utter existential dread. It's not like a focused depression, with a thoughtworm you can work your way through. It's more like an overwhelming sense of "there is no point, the sole ultimate purpose of all life from viruses to humans is to propell one's DNA into the next generation, and since I'm not going to do that, then why exist at all?"
These "meaning of life" conversations drive me to science, but I don't know if this is brought on by, or ameliorated by reading so many books about science. On the one hand, things like Chaos Theory are comforting, in that the tiniest event can have far-reaching consequences in the grand scheme of existence, so you don't ever know what your purpose is, but it may be something huge you have no idea that triggered.
But, as a friend pointed out, consequences are not the same as purpose.
This brings up discussion of Art, of creation, as substitute for the procreative act. "Ars longa, vita breva" and all that. But I think that's bollocks invented by men to make up for the fact that they have no wombs and do not physically bear children.
...and this morning, I logged onto ILX, a long-running internet community of which I am a member, and found that there have been some issues with server hosting and the whole thing either has to move or shut down. I've been on ILX longer than anything else in my life - longer than any job, or school, or relationship, or even band. So put that into perspective when I say that the potential Death Of ILX would affect me as seriously as the death of a loved one, the end of a relationship or being sacked from a job.
I feel bereft, I feel like crying.
posted by Masonic Boom | 11:03 am
5 Comments:
People have about a kajillion instincts driving them, and there are only ten or eleven of those for baby-making. For once, I kind of agree with the wombless excusists. We're here for the propagation of our own DNA, yeah, but in a wider sense for the propagation of our race, and if that propagation didn't involve creating art and the steady increase in our knowledge of ourselves and of the world around us, we'd just be a bunch of dirty, overgrown violent bees. And we're not. We're people, whatever that is.
I've been wondering this myself because beyond existing as a species, what is the point of humanity? What does it do that benefits the planet, the universe? Why do humans in and of themselves exist? What is the point of that? We can propel our DNA into the next generation, but what's the point? Why?
Sigh.
It's like that old WWI trench song... (to the tune of Auld Lang Syne) "We're here, because we're here, because we're here, because we're here.... we're here, because we're here, because we're here, because we're here."
The weird thing about ILX is that I find those 'what do you look like in August' threads fascinating. I've been reading it so long, those threads are snapshots from distant family members.
I think there shoud be an ILX arranged marriaged service for long time single readers.
I think a tiny point of humans existing is so they can sit in a warm car on a bleak day, in yorkshire, drinking coffee from a flask and watching sheep.
Thinking "look at those sheep, they're nice".
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