May I start off by saying this is an idea in progress. That said this is a short essay regarding the state of our modern, godless, mindset. And how to see our world with purpose, if not some more purpose than is currently available.
Concreate Gods
*http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-0115-zuckerman-secular-parenting-20150115-story.html#page=1
To live in a godless world is by no doubt a difficult place to live.For one to thrive in a world without the will of god one must find an internal will. An internal drive that is capable of creating purpose. A will that is capable of seeing the world as a sacred place. I would like to argue that one can achieve purpose with out the need of free will or control, if that is even physically possible, over ones mind.
In the contemporary age the idea of a Judeo-Christian god is slowly dying out, being replaced by a growing secular population, its up to 23%* for adults and 30%* in young adults. And with that a growing nihilistic population, by assumption I may add. Although according to current research that I read in the LA Times* this has been shown to be a false, or partially wrong, assumption . The assumption that if you are godless means you have no values, no meaning, and therefore have no morals. This study flies right In the face of Wallace's statement, "This is a generation that has an inheritance of absolutely nothing as far as meaningful moral values" (Wallace ATS 25). But I digress from the topic at hand. God is not the only religious idea to begin its death in these modern times. The idea of free will is also slowly dying out as well. It is evident in our everyday lives, our industry and our medical fields. Advertisers take advantage of our underlying behaviors all the time, tricking our psyches into wanting material objects that we would other wise have no desire for. Using flashy advertisements of celebrities using devices and other products which make it seem as though everyone wants these products. So people follow suite and want what others have. That is a natural, subconscious reaction that most people are unaware of and are not in control of. When people become addicted to drugs it takes a lot of patience and perseverance to stop the cravings for more drugs, even though the individual is aware that the drugs are bad for them. People that suffering from depression, just as David Foster Wallace had, or other mental illnesses (like manic-depression, schizophrenia, ADHD, Autism and personality disorders to name a few) need to take prescription drugs in order to function. No good doctor would recommend one to will ones way out of the mental illness, because it is not possible. Although training using therapy is effective, it still takes grueling years to master even the slightest improvement. And even then people can break down and revert back to how they were in the beginning. None of these examples support the idea of free will. If one were to be drugged it is nearly impossible, or completely impossible, to will ones way into to sobriety. We are physical, mechanical beings, or machines, to use a more accurate term than "beings", and we adhere to our programing and our internal mechanisms just as any other machine does. This is not to say though that we are completely unchangeable and have no options to what our behavior is. People can learn new behaviors, new skills, and do so all the time. When one is confronted with a challenge the mind may present you with many possible routes of action that one then "chooses" to act with (this statement is a bit contradictory, and although I do not believe it is really up to "us" to "decide" which option to go with [next time you do make a decision ask your self how you came to the decision, I'm sure your process is not understood on a cellular level] it sure seems as though, if not thought about, we are making a free decision). The death of free will is not the death of humanity though. For free will has always been dead and that "fact" has not effected humanity in any way when it was unaware of its nonexistence. So why should it make any difference now that we know it is just an illusion. It is just another fact of life that isn't that motivating, and when it really comes down to it that is the only reason people don't want to believe this to be true. Because it demotivates them, makes them feel caged, trapped in a predetermined world. "Then what's the point of even trying" one might say, assuming that the out come to a predetermined world is negative as well as assuming that because they don't have free will the entire world is locked on a pair of tracks. And that they are as well. But as I have stated, there are options, there are many possible tracks to take. Just because we are machines doesn't mean there are not options or that there is nothing to live for.
If free will is dead then where can humanity turn to to power its self into the future? As Nietzsche and Wallace have put it humanity needs an internal drive or will to accomplish this new way of meaningfully viewing the world. I say it is still a manner of an internal will but it is not a matter of free will. It will take a kind of will that I'd like to call pseudo-free will; this is a kind of will that to the best of my knowledge has not yet been described. It is an internal force that is not driven by conscious or controlled acts but are of the subconscious, programmed, mind. This is similar to Gilbert's idea of when " the God of writing shines upon her..-the [external] genius- who comes to tell her what to write" (ATS 54). But this is an uncontrolled internal force, not unlike "God's grace... [That dictates to our] passive [bodies]" (ATS 54) but internal as I have said." To put the full quote in for good measure, it goes, "God's grace is literally nothing over which the individual has control. [We are] passive recipients of it [gods grace]" (ATS 54). This new internal "will" is the "will" of our genes and of our unconscious minds. For our waking minds might not be able to logically deduce a reason or a method to stay invigorated, nor able to see meaning or value, but our emotional, programmed, responses to our environment can. Our emotions are a programmed, genetically induced, phenomenon. It is the will, the values, the meaning, the "intended" purpose of our modern gods. Our genes. Even though our minds can not find purpose. Our genes have already achieved a goal and "purpose" that has lasted for billions of years, and will continue to last until the sun explodes. No matter how we feel about it, genes have found our/their purpose. To thrive and evolve, where others have failed, to live, to last, to survive. This "will", to me, can possibly, maybe, power humanity through its journey.
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