Why am I here?

At some point in our existence, virtually all thinking humans ask themselves that question—“Why am I here?” As theoretical physicist Michio Kaku notes in this brief video, when we ask, we will not get some booming voice or email from heaven answering this question for us. We can look to the writings of our early bronze age tribal ancestors. They asked this question too, and like us, they didn’t get any direct answer. But unlike some of us, they turned to the explanation they gave for everything they didn’t understand, the supernatural. Some great spiritual force created the Heavens and the Earth, that spirit holds the Earth and Heavens in their appointed realms, that spirit makes lightning, and carries the Sun across the sky each day. When natural disasters or disease strike, it is because our burnt offerings to that spirit were not given in a way perfect enough to please the spirit, or because an evil neighbor has made a pact with the anti-spirit, the great force of evil, to curse us with demons. And our purpose in the Universe is to please and glorify that spirit.

To some today, the answer of the ancients still holds, even though we now know that virtually everything else that they assigned to that great spirit is actually not controlled by the supernatural but by natural laws, the laws governing the Universe itself. Knowing this, some say there is no answer to “Why am I here?”. Life is meaningless, they say. When you ask, “Why am I here?” what answer satisfies you?