On the meaning of life (Schlick) | The Mind on Fire 13/01/19, 7)49 PM

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On the meaning of life (Schlick)

Moritz Schlick was the founder of a pretty influential group of European intellectuals called the Vienna
Circle, and the father of a now-deceased movement called Logical Positivism, which basically held
that the only route to knowledge was empirical observation (so, if you can’t see, feel, taste, smell, or
hear it, you can’t know it, so no God or morality). Logical Positivism is dead now, and so I would have
assumed that Schlick would only be studied out of some abstract, historical interest, but today I came
across a paper by him entitled On the Meaning of Life, in this excellent book I’m reading on that topic
(http://www.amazon.com/Meaning-Life-E-D-Klemke/dp/0195327306/ref=sr_1_2?
ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232929151&sr=1-2). Here are some excerpts from it that I thought were
worth sharing:

• It is…the characteristic mark of work that it has its purpose outside itself, and is not performed for
its own sake…Human action is work, not because it bears fruit, but only when it proceeds from, and is
governed by, the thoughts of its fruit.

•The core and ultimate value of life can lie only in such states as exist for their own sake and carry
their satisfaction in themselves…There really are such actions…we must call them play.

•”…idleness and indifference [are] the inevitable portions of divinity; merely a more human name for
the sublimest state of being.” (Schiller) Only insofar as man shares in this perfection, only in the hours
when life smiles at him without the stern frown of purpose, is he really a man. And it was sober
consideration that led us to this very truth: the meaning of existence is revealed only in play.

•There is, however, no irreconcilable opposition between play…and work in the economic meaning of
the term. Play, as we see it, is any activity which takes place entirely for its own sake, independently of
its effects and consequences. There is nothing to stop these effects from being of a useful or valuable
kind. If they are, so much the better; the action still remains play, since it already bears its own value
within itself…Play too, in other words, can be creative; its outcome can coincide with that of work…
And that is also true in the end of those actions which engender neither science or art, but the days
necessities, and which are seemingly altogether devoid of spirit. The tilling of the fields, the weaving
of fabrics, the cobbling of shoes, can all become play, and may take on the character of artistic acts. Nor
is it even so uncommon for a man to take so much pleasure in such activities, that he forgets the
purpose of them. Every true craftsman can experience in his own case this transformation of the means
into an end-in-itself, which can take place with almost any activity, and which makes the product into
a work of art… The individual would lead an existence, as in the profound and beautiful saying of the
Bible, like the life of the lilies of the field.

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On the meaning of life (Schlick) | The Mind on Fire 13/01/19, 7)49 PM

•[Yet,] we shall invariably find that…mechanical, brutalizing, degrading forms of work serve
ultimately to produce only trash and empty luxury. So away with them! So long, indeed, as our
economy is focused on mere increase of production, instead of on the true enrichment of life, these
activities cannot diminish, and thus slavery among mankind (for these alone are the true forms of
slave labor) will not be able to decline.

•Unremitting stern fulfillment of duty in the service of an end eventually makes us narrow and takes
away the freedom that everyone requires for self development.

•A life that is constantly focused only on distant goals eventually loses all power of creation
whatsoever. It is like a bow that is always bent: in the end it can no longer loose off the arrow, and with
that its tension becomes pointless.

•The meaning of life is youth. Youth, in fact, is not just a time of growing, learning, ripening and
incompleteness, but primarily a time of play, of doing for its own sake, and hence a true bearer of the
meaning of life. Anyone denying this, and regarding youth as a mere introduction and prelude to real
life, commits the [error of shifting] life’s center of gravity forwards, into the future. Just as the majority
of religions, discontented with earthly life, are wont to transfer the meaning of existence out of this life
and into a hereafter, so man in general is inclined always to regard every state, since none of them is
wholly perfect, as a mere preparation for a more perfect one. [Notice that, even if you believe in an
after life, as I do, and even if you believe that the afterlife will be supremely meaningful compared to
this one, as I am inclined to, you don’t have to disagree with Schlick that this life is also a profound
bearer of meaning, and that it is a mistake to deny that and simply look to the afterlife to find meaning
for one’s existence.]

And, I think for our generation, the most penetrating statement he made in the paper:

•A civilization which [is only an] artificial breeding ground for worthless, idle endeavors by means
of this forced slave labor, must eventually come to grief through its own absurdity.

I doubt many of us will, in the end, totally agree with Schlick here. Think, for instance of a man who
enjoys, for no other reason than the pure love of the act itself, torturing others (perhaps, he especially
enjoys torturing people with the last name Schlick even). I hope even Schlick would say that such a
person is, somehow, missing the mark on living fully. Or maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d just stick to
his guns and say that a person is living a fully meaningful life. I don’t know. Either way, I think he’s
worth hearing. The whole article is definitely worth a read, if you found the above portions interesting.
Here’s the citation for the whole thing:

Moritz Schlick, Philosophical Papers, Vol. 2, D. Reidel, 1979. Translated by Peter Heath.

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#1 by dreams4life on 3.29.09 - 5.30 pm

Deep and thought provoking

1. International Psychoanalysis » Blog Archive » Philosophy Thursday: Moritz Schlick

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