This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
The Nine Mistakes [about ways to think about the meaning of life]: (1) Only the infinite has meaning; the finite can only have meaning insofar as it participates in the infinite. (2) The meaning of life consists in some goal or purpose. (3) The meaning of life is happiness. (4) The meaning of life must be invented. (5) Life cannot have a meaning if the universe is entirely composed of matter, as science teaches us. (6) The sole or primary purpose of evaluations is to guide our choice of actions, and value judgments are reducible to reasons for action. (7) The meaning of a person’s life cannot extend to things beyond the boundaries of his or her mode of living. (8) A person’s life does not having meaning because only linguistic items can be meaningful. (9) The meaning of our lives consists in our living in accordance with a self-determined life-plan.
Action | Choice | Life | Life | Meaning | Plan | Purpose | Purpose | Science | Self | Universe | Think | Value |
Leo Tolstoy, aka Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy or Tolstoi
Do you believe in a future life? Asked Pierre… If I see, and see clearly, the ladder rising from plant to man, why should I suppose that it breaks off with me, and does not lead further and further? I feel not only that I cannot perish, since nothing in the universe is annihilated, but that I always shall exist and always have existed.
Frances Wright, known as Fanny Wright
I am not going to question your opinions. I am not going to meddle with your belief. I am not going to dictate to you mine. All that I say is, examine, inquire. Look into the nature of things. Search out the grounds of your opinions, the for and against. Know why you believe, understand what you believe, and possess a reason for the faith that is in you.
Belief | Faith | Nature | Question | Reason | Search | Understand |
Jacques Barzun, fully Jacques Martin Barzun
Man is simply here; he has to make what he can of a universe that is not even hostile but strange and uncertain. Man is never given a purpose or mission; he must devise them for himself, knowing that their fulfillment has no external justification or reward - altogether and absurd situation.
Absurd | Fulfillment | Justification | Knowing | Man | Mission | Purpose | Purpose | Reward | Universe |
Without free speech no search for truth is possible... no discovery of truth is useful. Better a thousand fold abuse of free speech than denial of free speech. The abuse dies in a day, but the denial slays the life of the people.
Abuse | Better | Day | Discovery | Free speech | Life | Life | People | Search | Speech | Truth | Discovery |
Healing depends on listening with the inner ear - stopping the incessant blather, and listening.
I have deep faith that the principle of the universe will be beautiful and simple.