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Philosophy Through the Year offers and lively and welcoming space in which to learn about philosophy – and start to ask and explore philosophical questions with others. In each instalment, we will look at one set of big philosophical issues – the problem s and questions that have been puzzling people for well over two thousand years. Tutors will give short introductions to some of the most important ideas and arguments in each topic, and provide short philosophical texts for participants to read, think about, and discuss together.
The Meaning of Life
Tell someone at a party that you’re a philosopher, and they might well assume that you’re interested in something called ‘the meaning of life’. But what does it mean, exactly, for life to have ‘meaning’? Even though it’s quite hard to be clear about this, many philosophers have reflected on what life’s meaning might consist in. Does life have a goal, and can this goal be said to be life’s ‘meaning’. Or, if life doesn’t really have a goal, does this mean that life must be meaningless (as many have thought; or, that life, in its passing, is just intrinsically meaningful? What do God, or the moral life, have to do with the meaning of life? Would life be meaningful if there were no God, no life after death, nothing beyond the physical world? This course explores a range of thinkers who have wrestled with these questions, from famous atheists like Friedrich Nietzsche, to religious pessimists like Arthur Schopenhauer, and Christians who have proposed radically new answers, like Simone Weil. We will also see how religious teachings – especially those of Jesus of Nazareth –might connect to philosophical questions.
In our seminars, we will focus on fairly recent pieces of writing (essays, journal articles, interviews, etc.) that have taken up the topic, with the thought of some of the great canonical philosophers there in the background. Hopefully this will help to give a sense of how and why the topic of ‘the meaning of life’ has re-entered mainstream philosophy.
Note: readings are available either via the embedded links, or by scrolling to the bottom of the page to find the pdfs. Where there are two or more readings listed, the first will be the primary focus of discussion.
We will begin by considering why it might be that the question of ‘the meaning of life’ arises. Why are we able to ask this question; what does it mean that we do, in fact, ask it? Richard Taylor’s essay is an accessible reflection on the image of Sisyphus, whilst Thomas Nagel’s article is a rather more rigorous account of what it could mean to find absurd, and what this may say about humanity.
Seminar readings:
- Richard Taylor, ‘The meaning of life’
- Thomas Nagel, ‘The absurd’
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Stuart is the Theology Lead at LJC. He graduated with a degree in Literature and Theology from the University of Hull in 2000. From 2003-9 he studied Philosophical Theology part-time at the University of Nottingham, whilst continuing to work in the third sector with vulnerably-housed or homeless people, and young asylum seekers (as well as pulling pints in a pub). He was Lecturer at York St John University for almost a decade, before moving to London Jesuit Centre in 2021. He now lives in South East London, and spends as much time as he can in the woods.
