For your own well-being, make wise decisions when choosing friends and acquaintances. Be especially aware of how your personal beliefs affect others, and how their personal beliefs have the potential to affect you.
To illustrate this, I introduce you to three fictional people you may find familiar: Bob, Janet, and Susan.
Bob considers himself to be a realist and a no-nonsense person. He doesn’t spend any time thinking about whether life has “purpose or meaning”; he just lives it day to day as best he can. Bob’s circle of friends, in general, are very much like him.
Bob scoffs at the idea there might be such a thing as “cosmic purpose”, the theory that things are somehow slowly progressing from lesser value to greater value. Bob’s universe is “born” (the big bang), lasts a very long time, and eventually dies a physical death. People are born, live a much shorter life, and then die. For Bob, there is no discernible purpose or meaning in any of this.
Bob is a self-described atheist; he is neither proud nor ashamed of this. The idea that there might exist a being who is somehow “superior” to humans and has been, in some way, responsible for the fact that we’re here is nothing more than childish wishful thinking.
Bob is not a “bad” person – he has his own personal sense of morality. He believes the only moral responsibility he has relative to other people is to leave no one worse off than the way he found them.
Bob does not typically talk about his personal beliefs. And neither do his friends.
Note Bob chooses to hold his beliefs; no one forced them on him, he could have chosen other beliefs.
Janet is what Charlie Munger (Warren Buffett’s partner and lifelong friend) might have referred to as a “toxic” person, a person to be avoided. Toxic people are highly judgmental and convinced they are mostly, if not always, right, about everything.
Janet reads a lot, but unfortunately her reading is limited to web sites. She frequently latches onto the latest conspiracy theories, and is quick to form conclusions that may vary from week to week. She doesn’t think of herself as a “negative” person, but she is quick to focus on the negative attributes of individuals.
Janet is more than willing to talk about her beliefs whether or not she is asked.
Note Janet chooses to hold her beliefs; no one forced them on her, she could have chosen other beliefs.
Susan considers herself to be inquisitive and open-minded, but not so open-minded that her brains fall out.
Susan has always been interested in science. She tries to imagine herself “outside” our universe as an objective observer. She notes, as others have noted, that over billions of years the appearance of life, consciousness, reason, and moral awareness have followed in a seemingly logical order. She wonders if this could be characterized as some sort of evolution applied not to living things, but to the physical universe itself. She has never heard the term “cosmic purpose” before.
Susan does not consider herself to be an atheist, an agnostic, or a believer. While mulling over the concept of cosmic purpose and human evolution, she does not believe a Creator is necessary for the existence of either one as there could be something intrinsic in both the universe and in our human existence that could be driving this progression. While she does not believe a Creator is necessary for this progression, she does not rule out the possibility entirely.
Because Susan allows for the possibility that humans may be part of an evolutionary process for living things and that the physical universe may be undergoing its own evolutionary process, she sometimes wonders whether she might play a role in all of this.
This causes her to examine her personal beliefs, her life, and her relationships with her family and friends. She considers whether she can make a positive contribution to this and, if so, what that contribution might be.
Susan is always willing to talk about her beliefs, but only when asked and with people she believes are sincerely interested in hearing them.
Note Susan chooses to hold her beliefs; no one forced them on her, she could have chosen other beliefs.
Now, given a choice, who would you choose to invite over for dinner – Bob, Janet, or Susan?
Like the rest of us, Susan has beliefs. She neither ignores them nor spends excessive amounts of effort dwelling on them. She is however acutely aware of how her personal beliefs can affect everyone she knows.
Susan’s beliefs and attitudes towards life are, for me, the essence of what is necessary to sustain and improve the human condition – hope, and curiosity. She carries those qualities with her everywhere she goes, willingly sharing them with everyone she meets.
Susan has an ongoing invitation for dinner because she’s a person I admire.
Best wishes for the new year.