A life without purpose

In those surveys that explore what the greatest concerns of citizens are, teleology never appears.

It is logical, since no one has heard of it, but the truth is that teleology constitutes one of the biggest problems of our time.

It is precisely the common cause of creationism,

conspiracy

and, by extension, much of the irrationality that circulates in spurts through social, or antisocial, networks.

Teleology, from the Greek

telos

(end), consists of explaining things by their purpose, their purpose, their objective, in believing that our life is endowed with a project, and that life as a whole is also, that everything What happens is part of a higher plan that we do not understand, but that we preach as a revealed truth.

The easy thing would be to blame all this on Aristotle, who distinguished between efficient causes—those that cause something—and final causes—those that are directed toward a goal.

If you walk to a bakery, the efficient cause is that you are moving your legs, and the final cause is that you want to eat a loaf of bread and half a dozen muffins.

We humans always believe we are doing things for something, guided by a purpose, even when we suspect that deep down this is not the case.

Does that second beer have a purpose?

Does it mean giving vent to your anger, insulting people for X, ignoring an argument for the simple reason that it doesn't fit your prejudices?

Oh, come on.

Let's not take it with Aristotle either, for man had enough with the failure that occurred with his gravitational theory, which Galileo had to refute 15 centuries later.

With the theme of the final cause, the poor Greek did nothing more than codify one of the greatest automatisms with which we are born burdened.

We all carry teleology burned into our skulls.

Giving purpose to living beings and other people is surely a useful way to navigate the world, especially when you are stalked by lions, snakes, lovers and the enemy army.

But that does not at all mean that teleology, Aristotle's final cause, is a correct idea.

Psychologist Pascal Wagner-Egger and his colleagues at the universities of Freiburg, Rennes and Paris empirically examined the question a few years ago.

Studying more than 2,000 volunteers, they showed that teleological thinking—explaining things by their purpose—not only underlies creationism, as might be expected after two millennia of Christian theology, but also conspiracy

,

the tendency to explain social events, political, economic and historical through a secret and perverse conspiracy.

Conspiracy theories also have something to do with religion, political affiliation, age, education, and lack of analytical thinking, but their correlation with teleology is the most significant and robust.

Wagner-Egger argues that teleology is a primitive form of thought, one that we carry in our heads “by default.”

Attributing anything to the fact that God has created it, and any social or political phenomenon to a black hand that governs our destinies from its luxurious dark hiding place are two manifestations of the same style of teleological thinking, which seeks to reduce a complex world to a simple cause. like a Creator, a banker or a pharmaceutical laboratory.

To think that nonsense, it is better not to think at all.

Does our life have a purpose?

Since we are a product of evolution, and since evolution has none, it may be doubted.

There are those who seek to achieve immortality through his work, but as Woody Allen said: “I don't want to be immortal through my work, but through not dying.”

Bad times for Aristotle.

Subscribe to continue reading

Read without limits

Keep reading

I am already a subscriber

_