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Once more into the breech, Salon.
To start with, a little lesson in Madison Avenue: To sell somone something, convince them they have a problem and the product you're selling is the solution.
So. Religion pushes the idea that without meaning and awe and agape-ness you have "problem" and lo! They have the solution-- their religion.
Honestly, people! Where are you getting this idea that you are entitled to meaning in your life? It comes from the religious snake-oil salesmen that you encounter in your childhood, most likely. Day-to-day, people don't think about their "meaning" and "awe", they don't get depressed about it, they don't give a thin sh*t out of a rat's ass about it. Most people only care about their meaning and awe quota when someone (usually a religious person) is pestering them about it.
Thus, meaningless universe leads to meaningless life, leads to my own personal meaninglessness. I happen to be fine with that. Most people, the VAST majority of humanity has little problem with that. A tiny minoriy of people, whose livlihoods depend on it, do, and a tinier minority, who have bought way to much into the advertising.
As to Kauffman's arguments, they seem to fall into the standard deserate-believer boxes. Start with something completely obvious (some chemicals make copies of themselves), yet personal (we're made of those chemicals!), pick at it (or reduce it) 'til you get a gap in the knowledge (but why do those chemicals make copies in the first place?), give it a funny name (self-organization emergence), and then throw in a little magic (or in the terms of someone who really wants to believe, but doesn't want to look crazy-- "Quantum mechanics"). And hey! God's back in the game! And you get your meaning and awe back!
I'm afriad that I'm just not convinced!
And yep, still happy with the meaninglessness.
