Teleology is the philosophical exploration of purpose, and for many of us, finding purpose is elusive. Is purpose inherent or found, and can it be both?
The business of being human often feels like a test, but if we are being tested, by whom and for what? Some people complain that life is tougher than it used to be, but human life has always been tough. Our experience of life and death is itself challenging. Pain and suffering have always been our lot, and how we cope tests us constantly. Teleologically, nature is always testing us in its search for durable organisms. We are, inherently, nature’s lab rats.
Inherent purpose implies that life itself has purpose and that includes human life. A dispassionate examination might conclude our inherent purpose is to observe and record phenomena. Our senses of sight and hearing are waveform receptors, and what they observe gets received and recorded by the brain. Our sense of touch perceives heat, cold, texture, shape, size, weight, wetness, dryness, and sharpness, and those sensations are recorded too. Taste registers sweetness, saltiness, bitterness, sourness and smell registers molecular odors that are acrid, decayed, fragrant, resinous, sweet, minty, pungent and the pleasant and unpleasant variations thereof.
These capacities may be emergent; our survival depended upon them, and they developed through natural selection over millions of years. Even brainless amoebas respond to taste and touch. And yet, people can detect only a small fraction of the many waveforms available, and our senses are quite poor when compared with many other animals. Human consciousness adds expanded capacities, but consciousness itself may also be inherent, and as quantum theory implies, might even be non-local.
Life may be ubiquitous, not specifically in our tiny speck of a solar system, but universally as a way for nature to observe itself. This implies that the universe itself may be conscious, not in a human way embodying a self-identity, but in a cosmic way completely beyond our understanding. Such a possibility engenders varied and diverse spiritual and religious beliefs ranging from a single, monotheistic, all-knowing and powerful God to multiple gods, spirits, and entities. Some traditions do not personify the universe and simply accept the idea of all-pervading cosmic forces instead. It is in this arena that science converges with spirituality.
Quantum Field Theory is one such convergence, that all and everything we perceive is the scaled-up manifestation of a far deeper, non-obstructing, all-pervading reality. The Hwa-Yen Buddhists of Ancient China came to this very conclusion thousands of years ago as they described the existence of multiple hidden dimensions so tiny and “curled up” deeply within the reality we do perceive that we cannot directly observe them. This is not mere science fiction or spiritual hocus-pocus; we can now test and even manipulate quantum entanglement, the “spooky action at a distance” that so unnerved Albert Einstein. We are developing quantum computer technology based upon this phenomenon that will make today’s advancements of Artificial Intelligence look downright puny and portend the possibility of teleportation.
Personally, I found great purpose in being a good husband and caring for my late wife; now my purpose is found elsewhere. If we manage to survive our own greed and inventiveness, and I hope we do, as a species we might discover a greater purpose. In the meantime, helping each other cope with life’s inevitable hardships is purpose enough.
