The one thing that fascinates me about the human being, is his/her ability to find or search for reason, logic and order in everything. We seem to have this almost child-like fascination for things that have no evident order governing them. This fascination has embodied itself time and time again over the course of history. From the likes of Archimedes, Newton and Aristotle to name a few, mankind's obsession with order seems to show itself time and time again. This obsession sometimes puts a smile on my face as I think of it as almost a show of contempt for the thermodynamic quantity of entropy.
Everyday we go about our lives pretending we have everything in order. And why not? All we ever know is what we've been told. From the time we are born, we are indoctrinated with the notion that we must do as we are told. Little toddlers, innocence personified, we are absorbed into the system when we don't have a chance.
I don't intend to criticize our way of life, and I certainly don't mean to go on a pointless rant that
denigrates our society and the systems we go by. I will just use the age old defense and say that I am merely expressing my opinion.
Before I digress any further, let me get back to the matter at hand.
From the time we are born, we are, as I mentioned before, absorbed into the system that is - the modern way of life. As children, we are told that we must study hard and do well to end up in some job helping somebody else get their work done quickly. Well not in those words, but thats what they 'usually' do intend to mean. My point is, we have no choice in this issue. We are born, we conform and we die. That sums up the life of almost everyone alive today.
I wont question the working of this system. No. I'm only going to question its establishment in the first place.
You're probably wondering by now, what my initial discussion about the human obsession with order has to do with all of this. Here is where it all comes together. I believe that it is our search for order and our need to become masters of all we see, that has led to the establishment of such a system in the first place. We aren't the way we are because of the system. The system is the way it is, because of who we are. Or to put it rather poetically, the system that I question now, the system that I accuse of robbing us of our basic human qualities, exists by the virtue of our enjoying a human existence in the first place!
Before I go on, let me define this 'system'. The system that I refer to, is a system of existence. A system that encompasses our systems of education, social behavior and professional careers. This system I refer to, refers to the very moral fibre that we live by. The system of existence I refer to, encompasses everything we assimilate and conform to every day of our natural lives.
I believe this system is a direct result of our futile attempt to find a general purpose to life. In fact, I think the very invention of this system is a work of sheer brilliance. At some point in history, well into the search for a purpose to our existence, somewhere amidst the frustration at the mere thought that like the animals, we merely exist to procreate (which again brings about the question of the purpose of existence of other animals too, but lets not get into that now, shall we?), mankind found an ingenious way to invent a purpose of life! Yes, I used the word invent. If the true purpose of life was to climb the corporate ladder or amass an obscene amount of wealth, then surely our ancestors' very existence was obsolete? This system, and this way of life is not the work of some divine hand that asks us to study well and make a good living. It is the work of some people in the past who believed that this would be an ideal 'distraction'. Now, I don't mean that word in the sense that this system was invented as part of a ploy to keep us from the ultimate truth. I mean to imply that the formation of this system is a result of a group of individuals and societies, over a gradual period of time, losing sight and losing hope in their search for the true purpose of life.
Everything we see around us, every fragment of this so called moral code is a product of the human mind. Why then, do these 'postulates of existence' acquire an almost untouchable status? I don't want to imply that the moral code or the system of existence is wrong. I am only trying to ask a simple question. Why do we take it for granted? Where is the innate human faculty of thought and reason when it comes to the very way of our existence? Even science, which is deemed to question everything around us, finds itself oblivious to the very existence that brought about science in the first place.
I believe that the human race is at its tipping point. I believe that we are at that point in our existence, where we can choose our fate. Will we rekindle that lost spirit of skepticism and scrutiny that has gotten us this far already? Or will we blindly fall into the hands of our predecessors, utterly oblivious to the prospects of a world run by thought and reason? Will there ever be an Aristotle in our age? I'd like to think so, but to put on my pessimist's hat and predict, I'd have to say no. The only change I see happening, is for the worst. I believe every day we stray from the faculty of reason and thought. That does not mean we're not applying them, it only means we aren't applying reason and thought to the one place that it is most needed - the purpose of existence. Until there is some sort of mass intellectual revolution, I believe the true purpose of life will forever remain a myth. A myth, compensated for by a system of existence that aims to please a large majority of people, if not everyone bonded to it.
