Initialize existential questions at Null

philosophy

When people don’t have the answers to questions that they need urgent answers to, they tend to default to their environment’s consensus. It’s a part of our human nature. We don’t like uncertainty, and we prefer holding into any answer rather than accepting our ignorance. The greater the question the more clear this pattern becomes. And more sacrifices are made to come up with a satisfactory answer at all costs. Over the next few paragraphs we will examine the shortcomings of the most common categories of answers, and in the end I’ll propose what I find to be the most honest one.

Let’s look at an example, one of the most recurring questions in history: “Does God exist?” All of the major cultures try providing and are convinced of their answers for it. But why should we assume that it exists? And which answer should we favor? Is this a question that we can even try to find an answer to through reason? I’d argue that most likely not. If we’re assuming something like God exists, why should we arrive at that decision logically? Isn’t the whole point of the religions around faith? If there was demonstrable evidence, what would be the purpose of faith?

Maybe the question of the existence of God is a bit too multi-faceted to examine properly, so let’s look at another of the big ones: “What’s the meaning of life?” This is a more approachable query, although yet again, it’s one of the questions that has tormented the minds of the greatest thinkers of history without any coming up with a conclusive answer. If we examine both questions, we will see that they both try looking into something that even though is related to our lives, isn’t material, quantifiable, observable or interactive. It’s a thought, an abstract idea, or something existing in a different plane than that of our minds and experiences, it’s metaphysical. Trying to figure out an answer is not bad, in fact there’s lessons to be learnt from asking, the problem, un-intuitively, lies in answering these questions. Regarding concepts so alien and so grandiose, how would any human be able to figure out an answer? What reason, no matter how brilliant, can bridge the two worlds?

The second problem arises for giving predilection for any answer. After all, all of them lack any completely robust reasoning behind them, as they require logical leaps or assumptions to bridge the two separate dimensions. The preference is usually given to the answer provided by your community, but just because you belong to that group doesn’t make their arguments any better than the others.

One tempting answer then is to assume it’s inexistence. If we can’t agree if there is a God, or which one it is; or we cannot figure out the meaning of life, it must be because they cannot exist. To some degree, this answer is practical. After all, if there is no way to corroborate the existence of something, why would we care if we’re wrong in it’s assumption of it existing? It has no impact on us, and in fact, we’ll never know, we could even go so far as to dismiss the question as pointless. If we’re wrong, we’ll never know nor have any way of knowing. The only problem with this answer is that it became the sole thing it swore to destroy, a dogma that relies on a logical leap. Asserting with confidence the inexistence of something just because you can’t decipher it, is like saying that there is no life in the universe, just because you have no way of knowing. For most people that agree that there are unanswerable questions, not caring will probably be their most satisfactory answer, which is, for all intents and purposes refuting the existence of whatever may be questioned.

The third option and what I’m proposing here, is when faced with these questions to which we have no answer, and probably won’t ever, to initialize them at Null. In programming languages when you initialize a variable without providing it any value it adopts the state of Null. There is memory reserved for it but no value has been assigned. At its core, it’s coming to terms with our ignorance and not any answer, yet using that as our response. It’s leaving the question unanswered as we found it, and allowing for a stance that isn’t either accepting pre-existing dogmas nor denials. It is actively acknowledging that the question is unanswerable. Not giving it any answer without dismissing it, allows for further exploration of the question. It’s not an easy conclusion to reach as it doesn’t provide any value beyond the reflection itself. But that is where its value resides, in its logical integrity for rebelling against our very own instincts.

So, for deep questions which we may not know the meaning of now or in the future, I propose that we accept with humility the limitations of our nature, and we understand that jumping into logical fallacies just to fill a void is insincere. No matter whether you are the ones that quickly jump to conclusions, or the ones that refute them all altogether, you should realize that there are missing steps in such reasoning. If you decide to persist in your beliefs for either peace of mind, or for following a defined guidance, at least be aware of the logical leap that brought you there. Hence, to leave the questions at Null is ultimately to be sincere with ourselves.