An exercise in futility/ oooh! Gadgetry!
So when I was swimming today I was struck by an enlightening but depressing thought. There is no meaning to life because everything is purely arbitrary. I planned to swim 64 lengths, which is, I believe, a mile. Seems a reasonable goal, doesn't it? That was one of my primary aims for today, and I did it. Yay me. But then I thought why a mile? It is a totally arbitrary distance, 64 lengths is quite a random number, I was swimming for roughly 43 minutes, all random, meaningless numbers, yet it gave me a sense of achievement. What is the point of searching for a meaning in life when one can gain achievement from random numbers like that?
Let's think bigger. What if your goal in life is to, say, have children? It is a natural impulse, to carry on the species, so there is no purely conscious thought there. What if you want to carry on your family name? Arbitrary. Unless you have an entirely unique surname, your family name is a pointless number. If you want to carry on your personal legacy, especially if you are quite well-known, pointless. Your offspring ends up with the stigma of being related to you, so will find it hard to make a name for themself.
See the world? Impossible to see everything, so you pick and choose. Wherever you go there is an element of random- you read about this place, someone you know went to that place- so you could be missing out on an amazing experience elsewhere.
Help others? Who to help? Which charity to give to? Everyone will die in the end anyway, sooner or later.
In other news, I went to the big guitar shop in Anglia Square today and played on one of those funky loop stations. I want one. Now.