What’s it all about?

Self-proclaimed rationalist and humanist Julian Baggini chooses to answer the ultimate question of life’s meaning by limiting himself to rational, secular inquiry and the assumption that human life contains the source and measure of its own value. He rejects “any supposed revealed truths, religious doctrines or sacred texts, claiming they possess no “credibility” because of “the great diversity of faiths in the world” (2). (Strangely enough, he doesn’t seem bothered by the great diversity of philosophical opinions.)

According to Baggini, we must look for the source of life’s meaning outside of religion or any transcendent reality. We are responsible to create meaning for ourselves. We do not “discover” meaning – for there really is no meaning to be discovered. In fact, the category of meaning is literally meaningless in regard to life. Instead, we “create” meaning. We make it up ourselves, for ourselves, by ourselves.

God is Unnecessary – Faith is Foolish

But Baggini is a bright man. Because he recognizes that a “made-up” meaning rings hollow for most people, he spends the first half of the book attempting to prove that God is unnecessary to answer the question of life’s meaning, and that faith is a completely irrational response to life’s ultimate question.

Baggini begins by defining faith in such a way that only a fool would have it. He contrasts faith with reason so sharply that it means nothing more than irrationality to him: “Faith... has to be seen in contrast to reason or else it loses its distinctive character” (48).

Baggini makes a few comments about faith that demonstrate how simplistic and narrow his perception of faith really is. For Baggini, faith is “faith that a God we cannot know to exist has a purpose we cannot discern for an afterlife we have no evidence is to come” (19). Few believers – even those with little theological training or philosophical knowledge – would state something so inane and preposterous. Elsewhere he makes a strange comment about trusting God: “The idea that God’s purpose is something we just have to trust is an admission that we have no answer to the question of why we are here and must leave everything to the unknown” (19-20). In other words, faith is nothing more than throwing up one’s hands in resignation, proving one’s ignorance, and ending one’s search for meaning: “[F]aith involves giving up the search for, rather than discovering the meaning of life, and should be the cause of some anxiety rather than reassurance” (43).[1]

What the unsophisticated reader may fail to recognize is that Baggini’s own stated positions (rationalism and humanism) leave him no other choice than to reject faith and revelation. His philosophical methodology and presuppositions will not allow it. His rejection is clear in statements like the following: “This reliance on faith is not supported by reason, but by unreliable mechanisms for finding truth: mainly personal conviction and the testimony of others” (51).[2] Or again: “The rational arguments seem to stack up against faith” (56). Of course they do, when one has, from the start, defined faith as unreasonable, irrational, and irrelevant!

Baggini’s unwavering commitment to rationalism leads him to some interesting conclusions. I have to admit I admire how he is able to take many of the common philosophical arguments used to support the need for a transcendent source of meaning and turn them on their head, spinning them to the atheist’s advantage.

For example, Baggini argues that meaning is not discovered – because transcendent meaning does not exist – but created. We choose our meaning, and our lives mean nothing more than what we choose them to mean. For some philosophers this conclusion leads to despair. Baggini suggests that an optimistic existentialism interprets this as the freedom to determine our own purposes, apart from any assigned by a deity.

Baggini asks the question, “Is it better to be slaves with a role in the universe or to be free people left to create a role for ourselves?” Baggini enthusiastically prefers the latter. Indeed, the question is stated in a way to make the former possibility appear cruel and heartless. For Baggini, the “view that we are created to serve God is... objectionable on the grounds that it robs humanity of its dignity” (17). Baggini fails to admit the possibility that serving God may be the most freeing act that fully embraces our individual uniqueness. Is serving ourselves and our own perceived and limited conclusions really that liberating? (By the way, it is nearly impossible not to notice the similarity between Baggini’s question and the devil’s statement in John Milton’s Paradise Lost, “Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.” This is not to draw a comparison – merely an observation.)

Baggini even twists Pascal’s wager to the atheist’s advantage: “If there is an afterlife, at least the atheist has a second chance, assuming God is not the petty vindictive being often portrayed, who punishes people simply for not believing in it. But religious believers who risk all on there being an afterlife get no second chance if they are wrong” (50). I’m certainly against pettiness and vindictiveness, but I do believe, like Baggini, that our lives, choices, and character matter in the present, and for the believer, beyond this life. Because our behavior matters, we shouldn’t demand God be so flippant about how we lived our lives if they completely went against the grain of reality and influenced others to do the same, especially if a crucial aspect of reality is the existence of God.

Obviously, I’ve been hard on Baggini. But there would be no need to if Baggini did not make such a big deal about this himself. His antipathy to religion is so strong he can’t even let Mother Teresa’s comment about serving God by serving humanity go by without a cynical comment: “Who or what she really did serve is, of course, contested” (59).

I give him credit for consistency and for creatively twisting arguments to his advantage, but as a guide to the meaning of life, he is certainly narrow and unhelpful. The first half of the book reads more like a polemic against God and faith than it does a helpful introduction to the challenge of determining life’s meaning.

Thankfully, the second half of the book is very helpful. In it, Baggini highlights a few possible meanings of life – serving others, happiness, success, and others – showing the strengths and weakness of each one. He suggests that each possesses some truth, but not the whole truth. I found this section full of insights, especially in regard to the insufficiency of happiness as a full and final meaning of life, and the observation that many who seek to lose their selves through contemplation or religious practices are actually engaged in a subtle form of self-gratification.

The Meaning of Life is To Live

Baggini’s conclusion is that “all roads lead back to meaning residing in the simple living of life itself” (69). Contrary to those who seek life’s meaning in a higher power or purpose, “life can be meaningful if we find it worth living for its own sake, without recourse to further aims, goals or purposes” (160). Indeed, to Baggini, meaning is not a category that should be applied to life: “So just as ‘the colour of a symphony’ is literally meaningless... so ‘the meaning of life’ is literally meaningless” (166). Life

doesn’t have meaning in itself… But it means something to us. The question “What is the meaning of life?” may well not fit comfortably with this interpretation, but the question “How can or does life mean something to us?” certainly does. The question is thus one about why life is of value to us, why we think it to be important and worth living. (166)

Slipping In a Transcendent, Transrational Piece

In the end, Baggini, the rationalist must resort to love – a reality that transcends reason – to explain life’s meaning, even if it is reduced to mere personal categories. He admits that altruism cannot be motivated by pure reason alone. “The desire to do good is rooted not in reason but in the varieties of love: the love for a partner, familial love or a kind of general love or fellow feeling for others. Without such love, all the rational reasons in the world would not be enough to motivate us to do good” (182). And Baggini freely admits “[l]ove is, if not irrational, then at least not driven by rationality” (184).

If this is true – and I believe it is – why can’t Baggini admit that life itself cannot truly be explained by reason alone? If love is not reasonable, but yet so crucial for a sense of meaning, is it a great stretch to see that the meaning of life may elude merely rational and humanistic searches?

It is tragic that Baggini so flippantly writes off faith, sacred texts, and revealed truths. In the final pages of his book, he admits that “love is best described not in the language of forensic philosophy, but in literature, poetry and song” (194). This is the language of personal conviction and testimony, of sacred texts and revelation – language which he previously rejected because of his commitment to rationalism. And yet, he admits that these are the best languages by which to speak of love, and by default, true meaning.

After an entire book committed to the methodologies of rationalism to speak of life’s meaning, it is interesting that Baggini must abandon his rationalism in order to provide a satisfying answer to the meaning of life. 

Quotes excerpted from What's It All About? Philosophy and the Meaning of Life by Julian Baggini
© Richard J. Vincent, 2007