I think you're the outlier here. I think you are coming to terms with the notion of the universe not having an undercurrent of purpose, and you feel it pushing your thoughts in a particular direction, but to me it is an unusual direction. If anything, most people respond to this information by taking it as *justification* for pursuing whatever interests them, whatever they want to pursue, whatever they *would* have pursued if they didn't think they were supposed to follow someone else's plan for them.
What he’s referring to is that all of those uncomfortable existential facts that I continually reiterate on this blog – that I am a primate who descended from a fish, that I live in an incidental universe, that my goals and strivings and hopes are arbitrary, that I have a lot less control over the universe and myself than I like to believe, that I and all the people I love are moments away from being dead, etc. etc. – have led me to what might be an unusual conclusion: More uncomfortable facts, please.
Xan thinks that the typical response is just the opposite, and I’m going to put it much more bluntly than him: “welp, better live it up while I still have a chance.” I.e., More pleasure, please.
That’s probably right, but what seems even more typical is avoiding the uncomfortable facts altogether. The one that people do seem to regularly address is the imminence of death, but even then it is almost always done by packaging it inside an inspirational narrative punctuated with a pleasant moral like “So savor the day!,” or “So say I love you while you still can!,” or “So don’t be bashful about going for that girl/promotion/funky outfit!”
At this point, I am tempted to take this post in several different directions. I could try to elevate my conclusion above theirs. I could try to twist this into a flattering statement about how unique and outlier-y I am. I could try to make you feel pity for me by expressing how lonely and confusing it is to be in a universe where so few others think like me. Or I could try to make you like me by expressing how I’m just one of the guys and that I’m really no different from anyone else.
Instead, I’m going to let choice paralysis get me and I’m going to end this post right here.
