The Purpose of Existence

By Hugh Hagen

The purpose of existence is something that humans have wondered for millennia. The question I seek to answer with this article is “Must Existence (as opposed to Nothingness or other possible versions of Existence) have a purpose?”

Explaining how to answer the question

There are three possible explanations for Existence: it is there for a reason; it is there for a purpose; or it is there for no reason and for no purpose. I will consider time nonexistent for this examination—Existence will be understood as the present state of the universe, with no regard to past or future. As was explained in my previous article, time does not objectively exist, so dealing with such fundamental truths with the dimension of time can quickly become problematic.

Any given person exists as a result of the fertilization of an ovum cell by a sperm cell, so that would be the reason for a person’s existence. In comparison, a hammer exists to fulfill the purpose given to it by its user, otherwise it is only a stick with metal attached to it. Something that exists neither for a reason nor with a purpose must have come into existence randomly or it must simply exist randomly, as opposed to any other of the infinite things that could possibly exist. The first explanation is not satisfactory; any reason for Existence must also be considered a part of Existence, otherwise it would not exist. The second explanation is also not satisfactory for the same reason as if we think about purpose as being intended by a greater mind. The existence of a greater mind requires a being outside and separate from Existence itself, hence it is unreasonable. However, if we redefine purpose to mean a rational reason as would be given by a greater mind, it does not necessarily have to be given by a greater mind. The third explanation and this new fourth explanation will require a more in-depth exploration.

If Existence has a purpose in this case; that purpose would have to be a rational reason that Existence is the way it is, rather than in one of the infinite other possible states. Therefore, the factor that allows us to determine whether or not Existence has a purpose is the possibility of pure randomness of a state.

Is a state that exists by pure randomness possible?

A simple theoretical situation that could help show if a state can exist by pure randomness is this: there is a single sphere in an infinite space; absolutely nothing exists except this single sphere; it is not made of matter, nor does it have a definite radius, nor does it have color, nor does it have mass; time does not exist, therefore all of Existence is static; there is no God or supernatural force of any kind, nothing created the sphere, it simply is the only thing that exists for absolutely no reason and no purpose. The question is: is this situation theoretically possible? Is it possible that this sphere simply exists, as opposed to the infinite other possible versions of Existence (including ours) or the one other version of “Existence” which is Nothingness? The answer is no, it is impossible for it to exist rather than all other possible versions of Existence because that would require a decision to be made based on absolutely nothing, outside of time, which is impossible.

What this means in the context of the original question

What this means is that Existence must have some purpose, or at least a rational reason as to why it is in such a fashion as it is. What can be deduced with great certainty is that our universe is no coincidence. However, since a God that exists likely must be a part of Existence, it also likely cannot be the giver of purpose. Therefore, there must be some rational reason why the universe exists in the state that it does, apart from what any God may decide. In other words, there must be some reason why this version of existence is the best. On the other hand, there may be a God who somehow exists outside of Existence and has given purpose based on something indiscernible. The latter case is unlikely, but cannot be discounted. In the former case, observed qualities such as “total amount of energy” or “total number of lives” seem to be arbitrary. There is no apparent reason why one state of Existence would be preferable to another, therefore there must be some objective measure of goodness that is beyond our perception as of yet.

Now, what should we do with these conclusions? At the moment, I do not believe it possible to find what this “greater purpose” or “greater good” is exactly. Thus, I advise any readers first to explore this topic to the best of their ability, and then if they yield no further conclusions, simply trust in whatever this “greater good” is that exists in our universe.