On the Meaning of Life

by John Cottingham

Book Overview

The question 'What is the meaning of life?' is one of the oldest and most difficult questions we have ever asked ourselves. John Cottingham asks why we are so preoccupied with this question and assesses some attempts to answer it.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0092J13ME
• ISBN13: 9780415248006
• Release Date: November 2002
• Publisher: Routledge
• Length: 136 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.1" x 7.9"

Customer Reviews

I liked it

I was surprised to find these negative reviews. Cottingham is indeed a secular humanist, however he sees belief in God as a good way to attain meaning, and supports this with several of his own ideas. This may not go over well with atheists and agnostics though, since, in his mind, that kind of life-style doesn't make much sense when you consider life in the cosmos... In any event I think the best benefit of this book is the range of ideas covered in so few pages; he does it in a coherent and open manner. I didn't think he came off as completely disregarding the secular lifestyle but I do think he has an opinion which he does not refuse to express. This book is worth reading because it covers a wide range of issues such as science, morality, evolution, sociology, religion, etc. to attempt to explore the idea of what we mean by meaning and how we seek to acheive it.

One stab at "the meaning of it all"...

Say the word "philosophy" and most people conjure up images of old dusty sages leaning on Corinthian columns and rhapsodizing about "the meaning of it all". That's the 'romantic' view (if it can be called that). Anyone who has spent time in the philosophy departments of academic institutions knows better. You won't see any togas, and few, if any, people discussing "life philosophy" or "the meaning of life". Perhaps a course on ethics might include a section on "the value of life" or on "leading an ethical life", but probably not on "the meaning of life." Asking a career-minded philosophy professor "so when do we get to 'the meaning of it all?'" will likely yield a brusque lecture on the harsh, Hobbesian realities of academia, or at least a blank stare. Of course questions and issues concerning "the meaning of life" infuse philosophic discourse of all kinds, but not in a blatantly obvious way. Academia can only focus on minute details of such tidal wave issues. Ater all, analytic epistemology still hasn't explained satisfactorily how or why we know what we know (and who knows if it ever will or can), much less why "we're here".Regardless of everything above, this book takes on the intimidating topic of "the meaning of it all". It does so in about 100 pages, so the issue of scope creeps in. How could anyone decide what to include or exclude from such a discussion? Not to mention how anyone could even conceive of covering "the meaning of it all" in this amount of space. Taking this into account, the author does a good job of keeping the discussion focused and forming an argument around "the meaning of it all". Of course anyone could querulously quibble the details of this book to dust. Many doubtless have and will. Getting caught up in the copious minutiae of the book will only lead to frustration and stalemate. The overreaching argument of the book provides most of the rewards here, not the nitpicky details.The book divides the issue into three sections. Each one argues relatively simple points. Following a very appropriate citation from "The Hitchhiker's Guide To the Galaxy" that inaugurates the first section, the author points out that even the heady and militantly empirical Logical Positivists of the early twentieth century could not obliterate "the question that won't go away". Modern Science has not helped by depicting the universe as a cold, barren place devoid of any meaning above mathematical interpretations. Does religion offer any hope? Not on the surface, since grand figures such as Nietzsche have deconstructed it intellectually almost beyond the point of value. Nietzsche's concepts of the "Death of God" and the "will to power" get subsumed under the same arrogant mistake of Protagoras' proclamation that "Man is the measure of all things". The author concludes that we cannot create our own values, which begs the question, in the face of this, of what meaningfulness itself implies. After discussing why Nazi torturers could not have meani