In The Meaning of Life, I explain how ethics are complex, situational, and subject to evolution over time. A good example of an evolving ethic is if children were ethically obligated to go into the business of their parents hundreds of years ago due to the difficulty of earning a living for a large family back then, while in more recent times it h...
Read MoreA Unified Theory of Meaning can't truly be unified if it isn't aligned or compatible with most philosophies. In this blog post, I thought I'd start to show how all philosophies have the eight core concepts of meaning embedded into their ideologies. Let's begin with Christianity, which has a lot of relevant concepts. Here are five ideas from the...
Read MoreLife can be very difficult to understand or figure out. Why do bad things happen to good people? Why does evil exist? What is the right thing to do in no-win situations? Questions like these can eat up your time in deep philosophical thought trying to find the best way to either live optimally or understand why the world works the way it does.
Read MoreNote: I intentionally use contentious issues in this post to dial up your emotional state so you can feel the pull yourself that people get to change others' beliefs. I made sure to include both sides of issues so as to not inject my own views or influence anyone's beliefs but also to ensure that I triggered the emotional response of seeing a pers...
Read MoreIn my 30 years of studying psychology, philosophy, religion, and how the world works, one thing always bothered me: every system that exists to give you a comprehensive view of how life works or how you should live always lays it all out as one complete package without explaining how the concepts relate to each other. For example, if you believe t...
Read MoreAfter researching philosophy, psychology, behavioral economics, religion, and related fields for over 20 years, I began to notice patterns in the recommendations. The universal concepts that determined meaning became The Meaning of Life: A guide to finding your life's purpose, but there were also common assumptions made that anyone delving into se...
Read MoreReciprocity is one of the three near-universal societal ethics (the others being fairness and minimal harm; they are near-universal since they sometimes conflict with each other). Reciprocity has evolved in social animals over millions of years—cooperative behavior increases survivability, while anti-social behavior hinders it. Therefore, groups...
Read MoreBecause the meaning of life has been asked by billions of people, dozens and dozens of conclusions have been drawn about what it is for them and for society. While meaning is personal and unique to each individual, many people have come to conclusions about what the meaning of life is for all humans or all life on Earth. The Meaning of Life: A guid...
Read MoreYou know the situation: you do everything you're supposed to do, you do everything the right way...and then bad things happen to you. How is that fair? Why do bad things happen to good people? This is a tough one to answer since it requires giving what might seem to be bad news (does that make me the bad thing happening to a good person reading thi...
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