A bit of an illusion. A common one. Say we lived “in nature,” what do most creatures do? You wake up to gather food, so that you can have the strength to gather food tomorrow if you’re lucky.
You avoid predators and danger just to have another day of gathering food.
If you’re lucky you get a chance to mate or reproduce, to continue your genetic lineage so that your offspring can maybe gather food to have the strength to gather food and then reproduce… repeat?
We can analyze it all to no end and find no singular universally accepted “purpose” or “meaning.” In our society you don’t generally forage and hunt your meals and patrol your territory for threats and such daily. Instead you generally can get food someone else worked to make or grow or kill and preparation doesn’t have to take hours or all day or months. It can be ready to eat as you like.
Others patrol and watch for danger while you do other things. Instead of hunting and such to get food and essentials to live, you probably go to work etc. if you’re relatively independent.
Same thing. A routine with stress and dangers of failure, generally less dangers and lighter consequences than the “wild.”
You generally don’t beat your cheat and howl and wrestle (in the literal sense) for mating rights and social position and resources, instead we have complex social and economic and legal and other systems to navigate and master to gain dominance and the rights to claim what you want.
There are subtle differences but ultimately it is the same. If you weren’t working 8+ hours to secure your essentials for survival you’d still likely be toiling in repetition to secure what you needed to survive.
In most developed nations it is pretty difficult to die of scarcity. We wouldn’t have growing “tent cities” and such if it were so hard to get basic things to survive without employment.
But I mean- what’s stopping you? Can you afford a place to sleep and be out of the weather? Can you pay for running water and gas and electricity? Internet or cell phone? Streaming video? A night out here and there? A car?
Because polar bears and pigeons can’t. Most “unhomed” people can’t. Yet- they survive just fine and most live complete and natural life spans. If you get critically injured and go for medical care, will they let you die? Generally not in a developed country. Even america where healthcare is paid but they can’t deny life saving care because you can’t pay and they can’t put you in prison for owing them. You can owe a billion dollars to the hospital and still go get care. Can any random bear do that?
The thing is that usually these sentiments are exaggerated. Most people are grateful for their lives. Grateful enough to continue living and grateful enough that there are plenty of people they wouldn’t trade lives with.
The real sort of take away from this sort of thought experiment is that we CHOOSE to live this way.
You avoid predators and danger just to have another day of gathering food.
If you’re lucky you get a chance to mate or reproduce, to continue your genetic lineage so that your offspring can maybe gather food to have the strength to gather food and then reproduce… repeat?
Others patrol and watch for danger while you do other things. Instead of hunting and such to get food and essentials to live, you probably go to work etc. if you’re relatively independent.
You generally don’t beat your cheat and howl and wrestle (in the literal sense) for mating rights and social position and resources, instead we have complex social and economic and legal and other systems to navigate and master to gain dominance and the rights to claim what you want.
In most developed nations it is pretty difficult to die of scarcity. We wouldn’t have growing “tent cities” and such if it were so hard to get basic things to survive without employment.
But I mean- what’s stopping you? Can you afford a place to sleep and be out of the weather? Can you pay for running water and gas and electricity? Internet or cell phone? Streaming video? A night out here and there? A car?
The real sort of take away from this sort of thought experiment is that we CHOOSE to live this way.