[Fsf-friends] Meaning of Life

[Ramanraj K]

A long post; for a very long term plan :)

The following is a quote from the "Meaning of Life" by John Walker[1]

<quote>

The meaning of life is to live. To live is to expand the scope of life
itself, by replicating, by adapting, by modifying the environment, and
by evolving  into other forms of  life. We are the  inheritors of more
than   three    billion   years   of    ceaseless   global   molecular
experimentation, of  competition among  individuals and species,  of a
relentless expansion  of life into  new environments and  emergence of
new  capabilities.  How  can  we  have the  arrogance  to believe,  so
recently evolved  ourselves to a  stage that we  can truly be  said to
think, that  we are unique--that  no other intelligent beings  see our
Sun as  a star  in their sky  and, as arrogantly,  consider themselves
unique? ...

"If they existed, they would be  here", says Fermi. So where are they?
Nowhere in evidence. Intelligent  beings with technologies millions of
years beyond our own, spread to the far ends of the galaxy, should not
be difficult  to detect. We already  possess the means  to detect even
primitive technological  civilisations like our  own at a  distance of
hundreds of light years.

If they existed, they--the first intelligent species to expand outward
among  the stars--would  be here.  And since  we look  around  and see
nobody but ourselves, then it  is only reasonable to conclude, "We are
here, so we  are them." We evolved  here and we have not  yet begun to
sow  the seeds  of life  among the  stars, but  surely we  will. Three
billion years ago,  one planet, the Home Planet,  came to life. Slowly
life spread  across the Home Planet, gaining  complexity and diversity
until it could think of going yet further.

In a short time on the cosmic scale, beings throughout the galaxy will
gaze at the  friendly stars in their skies. They  will look upward and
see, not a hostile and lifeless galaxy, but one teeming with life--the
legacy of  the planet  that came to  life and  then brought life  to a
galaxy. They will  not be human, no more  than we are australopithecus
or fish or bacteria, yet they, in their number and diversity trillions
of times  beyond the  scope of  life on Earth,  will be  our children,
heritors of our coming to understand  the meaning of life and the rôle
humans are to play in its grand pageant.



I am sure there are many others  who have the same views as above, but
now, with free software,  super computers, globalisation and our other
resources, it is time to think seriously on the above lines.

Cosmology is  central to  Indian traditions and  many of our  Gods are
also symbols for the whole  Cosmos, and having a "darshan/view" of the
whole Cosmos is often the highest blessing.  To have a rich experience
of the  cosmos is  very fundamental to  probably many cultures,  and a
very worthwhile goal.

We  do not  seriously get  started until  the vision  enters  into the
preambles of  the constitutions  of many key  countries of  the world,
starting with  US, Russia, China, UK, France,  Germany, Brazil, India,
etc. and the majority of the people at a global scale.

Many of the present day constitutions have very narrower objectives:

For eg, the US Constition begins this way:

    "We  the People  of the  United States,  in Order  to form  a more
    perfect  Union, establish  Justice,  insure domestic  Tranquility,
    provide for  the common defense, promote the  general Welfare, and
    secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do
    ordain and  establish this Constitution  for the United  States of
    America"

These are  certainly very ambitious  goals for the 1780's  but, today,
they could  be taken for  granted, and need  to be updated  to setting
goals that make the meaning  of life more relevant.  That would result
in resources being spent on a global scale to build better space ships
instead of wasting  them on F-16's and a lot of  other crap.  The same
equally  applies to  India: we  too have  a constitution  that extolls
justice,  liberty, equality and  fraternity.  Now  that the  world has
become a single global village, means to unify all the ambitious goals
should take us closer to the true meaning of life.

The free software  movement, is a truly global  organisation, that has
already  made  life a  lot  more easier  with  free  software, and  is
probably the only movement that  could firmly lead in giving life more
meaning, so  that the tools  that have been produced  are productively
and constructively used with  optimum efficiency towards achieving the
highest goal that  we could ever dream and achieve.

If  the leader  of the  free software  movement does  get to  lead US,
probably "software  patents" would  be the first  debris in  this long
quest for space :)

Regards,
Ramanraj.


[1] The  Home  Planet  Help  file,  available  at  http://fourmilab.ch
    HPLANET.HLP is a  Windows help file, but it  could be viewed using
    winhelpcgi=>http://www.herdsoft.com/ftp/winhelpcgi_1.0rc3-1.tar.gz
    that is available at http://www.herdsoft.com/ftp/downloads.html