Taylor: The Meaning of Life

In his book, Good and Evil, Richard Taylor (1919-2003) discusses the meaning of life, or rather the dissatisfaction we feel when it is full of meaninglessness. To discuss the essence of meaninglessness, Taylor uses a common example of this tragedy, which is found in Greek Mythology. In short, Sisyphus (King of Ephyra) was found guilty of betraying the divine secrets, thereafter was condemned to an eternity of rolling a heavy stone on the top of a hill. However, the stone never stays put, thus rolling back down the hill, so he spends the rest of eternity rolling the stone up the hill only to watch it tumble down, and so on. Taylor, as most of us would, points out that Sisyphus would be spending the rest of eternity living a meaningless life. This judgment is rather simple to understand: his life would possess no true purpose to it, regardless if the stone was heavy or weightless, beautiful or distasteful, and such.

Further in the chapter, Taylor claims that if an action does not produce an adequate direction in order to satisfy its purpose in your life, then that action (you guessed it) is meaningless. I’m quite certain that we all agree to the claims that he is making, but how many of us actually live according to this simple thought? Not to say everyone is guilty of it, but I would say almost all of us are guilty of meaningless, or rather undetermined, action in our lives. But, I would say spending a short period of each day simply relaxing and not producing any purposeful action isn't a crime, at least in my book. In fact, we would typically see it as quite necessary every now and then. I wouldn't want to speak on behalf of Taylor, but I'm convinced he wouldn't have any disagreement with the idea as well, given that relaxing from responsibility is not a meaningless action, but a necessary one at times. However, Taylor would argue that a life with no particular direction is meaningless: if leisure begins to overwhelm the purpose of your ambitions, then your whole purpose in life is no longer of importance.

Without much effort, we could think of numerous examples that resemble Taylor’s argument — from couch potatoes, to criminals, to those stuck in dead-end jobs. In other words: do you think some people are living a life that resembles Sisyphus’s meaninglessness in eternity? I find it difficult to believe that you would say no. So, if our lives aren't fulfilling a specific purpose (whatever purpose that may be), then can we really say that our life has any meaning to us? On the other hand, if it is, then I would ask, or better yet urge you to ask yourself : what is that purpose?

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