Captain Nansen of Envoy:
"'Our whole aim, our pledge to our race, who gave much to send us, has been to try to find meaning in the universe.'" (p. 351)
Has it? Can governments seek meaning? Governments administer public affairs while individuals, groups and communities have different ideas about meaning. What does "meaning" mean? Value? But we already value life unless we feel suicidal. The universe, all that is, cannot mean or refer to anything other than itself in the way that both "house" and "maison" refer to a building to dwell in.
I know that, if I, as I now am, were to be subjected to a long period of extreme pain, then I would want my life at least to end without pausing to reflect that life in general was a Good Thing. Maybe if I had realized supreme enlightenment in the Buddhist sense, then my attitude would somehow be different but I have not realized it yet.
Envoy seeks communication with a starfaring civilization. We can certainly attempt to learn the values and meanings of other intelligent beings. That plus scientific knowledge is more than enough for an interstellar expedition.
5 comments:
I'd say meaning exists, but only in minds -- that is, it's an electrochemical event in a brain (at least, so far; other modes are possible).
So nothing has "meaning" in and of itself; only as perceived by conscious minds.
So you don't have to go interstellar to find the meaning of the universe; it's simply whatever you think it is... for you. Interstellar travel may change the meaning you attach to things, but the meaning continues to reside in your mind and nowhere else.
It's rather like the relationship between "data" and "fact". A fact is also an event in a mind; it's how the mind interprets data. Data itself (which most people conflate with fact) has no meaning; it just is. By interpretation, minds give it meaning, which makes it accessible to us.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I've also been thinking about the Japanese immortal from THE BOAT OF A MILLION YEARS. She was obsessed with trying to find "meaning" in the universe, of finding something that would make the universe make sense to her. I seriously doubt that Lady in Waiting would have been satisfied that the universe had meaning only because of what she projected onto it.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: true, but I think this is simply an evolutionary by-product of the human tendency to project intentionality even when it isn’t there.
Most of our intelligence evolved to deal with other human beings, who do have intentionality and meaning-craving minds.
Our minds are very good hammers for that particular nail, but have a tendency to malfunction when it’s applied more broadly. It is, however, the only hammer we’ve got in the box.
Correcting this tendency — and thus avoiding waste effort — requires an uncomfortable degree of self scrutiny. Like many evolutionary developments, it’s a kludge.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
That human tendency for searching for meaning is not necessarily all mere wasted effort. That desire for meaning is probably what lies behind the works of the greatest philosophers, theologians, writers, and artists thrown up by the human race.
Ad astra! Sean
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