Thanatos Gerroux
There are some things that, by rights, should never be stolen from us. Thomas Jefferson stated in his most famous document that there are three things that should never be taken away from us: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness (I’ll bet you’re tired of hearing that). The first part of this article deals with the first of the “Unalienable Rights”. Life: is it stolen from us?
Think of how much time you get to spend living. Your life belongs to you; no one has the power to walk up and say, “I have the right to steal the most precious thing away from you”. This refers to both murder and “Stealing of Time”. People spend so much time discouraging murder. You turn on the news and you hear about the “terrible, terrible bad guy who just took the life of so and so”*. They say these things, yet the next day, they allow their own life to be stolen.
Forty hours is a customary time to work per-week. This information is outdated, so I’ll “hike it up” a little bit. Let’s just say that people spend fifty hours a week working. This is about seven hours a day (I chose that time because it relates closer to students, and probably the rest of us as well). We spend about twelve hours sleeping. This is slightly too much. Usually, someone (based on a healthy person) would spend eight to ten hours a day sleeping. Let’s add that up. We get seven hours out of twenty-four to do what we want to do. There’s more. Let’s add in “homework” (this applies to adults as well, since some of them have office homework). Then you have your housework (cooking, cleaning, laundry, et al). How much time would you calculate this would give you? I would estimate somewhere in the vicinity of five hours. If you take away sleeping (I can justify this, since it is your choice
Just for kicks, let’s find how much total time on Earth that gives us. Our base number is five hours-per-twenty-four. Multiply that by seven to get our week’s time. That comes out to thirty-five out of one hundred sixty eight. Then multiply that be fifty-two to get your time-per-year. That comes out to 1820 out of 8736 hours. Then multiply that by eighty to get your time-per-life (this is a rough life expectancy). That comes out to a grand total of 145,600 hours out of 698,880 that you actually spend living. That comes out to a rough seventeen years of life that you would actually spend doing things that you enjoy. You have to add in retirement, so I would say you get thirty years of life. You would now give fifty years to them. Do you really want to give that much away? Old Jeff’ would be disheartened with how this turned out. Amidst freedom, we are in bondage.
Another question I would ask about life is “What’s the Point”? This is not my question, but the question of uncountable millions before me. Several times, philosophers dedicate much time in their life to this one question. It’s the one question that is so evasive that it is almost completely unanswerable. People have been asking about it since time began, and now we are going to make their lives worthwhile by answering it.
There are several answers, but sadly, these answers usually hit dead ends. To say that money is the meaning of life is completely foolish. After you die, you will have none of those simple humanistic things, so don’t waste your life on what will soon mean nothing*. Some might argue that wisdom is the meaning of life. Wisdom is a nice thing to have around, and a very good way to make people look at you strangely (try it sometime – they’ll walk away without the foggiest notion of what you’re talking about). Wisdom, after your life is over, will mean nothing. If you follow common religious theory (this is very important to distinguish), then you will be filled with a different kind of wisdom that will make what you learned in life completely outdated. If you follow obliviocal (I think I just made that word up – It means darkness and oblivion), then wisdom will leave completely after death. Some would say that Love is the meaning of life. Quite possible. I would argue that such things are rare today, but if you’ve got it, then you’ve quite possibly found your meaning.
If you are without Love, then you must work with us further to find another meaning. It’s not all that difficult if you think about it. I can think of no better alternative to Love than Joy. There can be nothing better than pure happiness, and (this is my opinion, and strangely, it gets rather obscure) what better source of happiness is there than Joy?
This leads into the next question of “How do I get Joy”? That is something that you will have to find out for yourself. What makes you most happy? That is what you put into the 31 years of complete life to make up for absence. This is the most I can get out of Life, and I am completely satisfied. Think further. If you are religious, then you probably (not always) believe in after-life. Why not make what comes before after-life as enjoyable as possible? If you are obliviocal, then why not just try to make the only thing you have left enjoyable? For once, both Religious purposes and Biological purposes are suited most by the same reason. Rather ironic, if you think about it (and you will do just that, won’t you? It’ll be fun - just try it!).
*. Not to say that I’m justifying murder; nothing can do that, not even the contents of this article. I write this to insure that no one goes out, kills someone, and then comes back and says, “Than’ said it was alright”. Don’t be that stupid.
*2. When you think about it, money really doesn’t mean anything; it’s only paper. Even gold doesn’t hold much – it’s very pretty, but you really can’t do anything constructive with it (save dental work). Do you really want to spend your life on something that stupid?Answering the Unsolvable
