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This week, we asked another good friend and regular collaborator of Etternal to talk to us about the meaning of life from the perspective of death and to choose a funerary work of art that he considers representative of this blog. This is what he answered:
Question: What meaning can life have if it is predetermined by death?
Answer: The reflection you propose seems to lead us down a difficult path if the aim is to save the life from absurdity and prevent all meaning from being irretrievably compromised by death. Two solutions have traditionally been proposed to address the question of the meaning of life. The first solution is no secret and simply resorts to the easy expedient of denying death, at least as radical (definitive) death. Death ceases to be a term to become a transition to another form of existence, in virtue of which earthly life would be justified in one way or another (depending on each of the modalities this solution has adopted). Needless to say, this has been the way in which the problem has usually been posed by the various religions that have existed (and still exist) in the world.
Question: And what has been the second alternative?
Answer: For the second path, characteristic of the Marxist school, the experience of the anxiety of death and everything that surrounds it (pain, injustice, absurdity, etc.) is nothing more than the result of an alienating social structure, in which the individual does not find recognition as such or the opportunities for the full development of their being. Nonsense has its place and origin in material existence, and its causes are, therefore, of a social nature.
Question: For this more materialistic approach, is it possible to overcome the absurdity of physical disappearance after death?
Answer: From this perspective, the door to the meaning of existence opens through collaboration in a project aimed at eliminating sources of alienation, and removing causes of injustice, with the hope of being able to illuminate a future in which death no longer appears as a threat, as arbitrariness. In the active and militant exercise of solidarity with our contemporaries and descendants, man can find a genuine reason to live.
Question: So, we have a spiritual-religious version and a Marxist-materialistic one. Do they share any common ground?
Answer: Yes, they do. And the most interesting thing is to highlight a common characteristic these two proposals share. In one case, this meaning rests on the possibility of a life beyond the one we have experienced; in the other, the meaning refers to the promise of a better future in history.
Question: Transcendence is the axis of meaning.
Answer: It is curious how, when asked about the meaning of life, both proposals end up placing it beyond life itself. This is the main limitation of both approaches.
Question: Does philosophy have a definitive answer?
Answer: Perhaps philosophy is too serious a matter to justify life itself as something whose mere enjoyment (as a bet, a challenge, an opening to the possibility) makes it worthy of being lived. However, one could ask to what extent any source of meaning placed beyond this life (our life) serves to give it content, significantly if that question, instead of being raised from philosophy, is presented by the existing human being. The question is to decide to what extent meaning placed in the beyond (whatever it may be) is psychologically effective as a consolation (and perhaps the search for the meaning of life is nothing more than the search for consolation).
Question: And what is the answer to this more pragmatic conception?
Answer: Well, I'm afraid the answer to such a question must be negative, as I have severe doubts that, both in confidence in a progress project and in the belief in immortality, the death of a loved one stops compromising the meaning of existence.
Question: Does this close the door to meaning?
Answer: A way to hope (meaning) remains open; that way is the experience of the other, for which no certainty is necessary. In that experience, the other presents himself to me as an ambiguous object; on the one hand, as a source of pleasure and satisfaction (in play, laughter, love). On the other hand, as a cause of pain (resulting from contemplating their misery). And that experience has the privilege of remaining beyond all epoché (phenomenological or of any order): the suffering of the other (hunger, oppression, etc.) so radically appeals to my solidarity (to its meaning) that its mere possibility demands it.
And since philosophy raises more questions than answers, our friend suggests that each person find out and decide why they have chosen this 18th-century statue to illustrate this small but profound reflection that he has given us in this enjoyable interview.