

Does the Universe Have a Purpose? - frisco
http://www.templeton.org/questions/purpose/index.html

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mynameishere
Do ultravague questions have a purpose? There's a question I can answer.

Define "purpose".

I'm going to the store to buy some eggs. There's a purpose. Is the universe
trying to get some eggs? If so, mission accomplished.

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jjs
That's quite a heavy burden for one person. What if the store is closed?

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shaunxcode
Luckily the universe has a meta-object-protocol and an ability to modify it's
own abstract snytax, so to speak.. thus it's purpose can be dynamically
redefined at run time. While creating much confusion it's also really freaking
cool. I personally don't believe in an afterlife beyond garbage collection but
who's to say what that freed memory will make room for??

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pohl
I take 'purpose' to be a 'reason' or 'justification' for being. Therefore the
question presupposes a reasoner or justifier, which one might assume to be a
creator who needs a reason or justification.

So 'no'. ;-)

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rms
The uni/muiltiverse is a computer, I believe that our universe is a subset of
higher dimensional universes populated with matter and energy, so it seems
very possible that the computational capacity of our universe is of some use
to whatever matter and/or energy is populating the higher dimensional
universe. I refer to these entities as our Higher Dimensional Overlords.

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dryicerx
In other words, our universe is a map-reduce... it explains everything!

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anigbrowl
¯\\(º_o)/¯

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russell
The physical scientists lean towards maybe, maybe not, while the
humanitarians, theologians, and life sciences types lean towards yes.

Personally, I think multiple universes explain everything.

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ekiru
Physicists, astronomers, and astrophysicists - 3 Yes or most likely yes(the
link to Paul Davies' essay lists his answer as "Perhaps", but in the essay, he
consistently argues in favor of the universe having purpose), 2 No or most
likely no.

Chemists - 2 No, although de Duve's essay does not seem to disagree with
finding a greater meaning in the universe, but merely with the terminology of
the question.

Humanities and social sciences - 2 Yes.

Theologians - 2 Yes.

Computer scientist - 1 Yes.

It seems to me to be inaccurate to claim that the physical scientists tend
towards uncertainty. None of them express uncertainty in their essays
answering the question. They are fairly evenly split between belief in purpose
for the universe and lack of such belief, however.

Your judgment about the theologians, social scientists, etc. leaning towards
yes is much more supported by their answers, since they all did say something
which is equivalent to yes.

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vinutheraj
I don't think a sample space of 12 people, however eminent they are, isn't
enough to make a general statement like this. Sorry!

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ekiru
Of course not, but if one does make a generalization based on this small
sample as the person I was replying to did, one's generalization should agree
with the data.

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noonespecial
If the universe is entirely defined within its own context (which I believe it
is) then it is its own purpose.

