Does the Universe Have a Purpose?
Does the universe have a purpose? The psychonauts vs. the scientists
A common experience for psychonauts is of feeling as though they have discovered some previously hidden meaning and purpose in the universe. Many who undergo psychedelic experiences come away feeling as if everything happens for a reason, that there is a grand logic underlying existence. This is an idea that philosophy and religions have explored for millenia. Modern science, however, sees the universe differently, as an impersonal machine that is slowly running to a stop. Which of these worldviews is correct and what does it mean for our place in existence?
Explaining existence through religion
All cultures tell stories to make sense of the universe. Many of these take the form of creation stories that offer an explanation of how we got here. Many also attempt to explain why we are here and where we are going. In doing so they suggests that there is a purpose to our existence. A common theme in Abrahamic religions is that we were created by an all powerful God who will ultimately end the world and will judge whether we lived in a way that sufficiently abided by its rules. In multiple eastern religions there is the idea that we live through multiple lifetimes with the goal being to develop ourselves spiritually and ultimately break this cycle. According to science there is no meaningful goal that we’re heading towards. With so many different claims about the nature of existence, how are we to decide which is correct?
The scientific perspective
In the modern world, most of us are exposed to these mutually contradictory stories from the world’s relgions and begin to doubt whether tradition alone is really a reliable route to finding out the truth. Many who find they can no longer have blind faith in the stories their elders tell them turn to a secular, scientific approach for answers. According to the mainstream scientific narrative, the universe has no purpose. We find ourselves here by chance and there is no grand scheme behind it all that would provide a satisfying narrative. Science has come to this conclusion after repeatedly finding a lack of evidence for any purpose on the one hand and, on the other, finding that those theories that assume no purpose appear to fit the data best.
Psychedelic revelations
Another potential route to truth is direct experience. This is where psychedelics come into the picture. There are countless stories of people who believed fully in the mainstream scientific narrative only to have that belief blown apart in an instant in the midst of a psychedelic experience. Given the prevalence of sacred sacraments in world religions, the origins of religious stories about existence may actually have their roots in such experiences.
The mind of the universe
After a mind blowing psychedelic experience that shatters your entire worldview, what do you replace it with? A common perspective in the psychedelic community is that rather than being made of matter, the universe is made of consciousness. Reality consists of a single perfect mind that chose to lose itself in the illusion of being separate creatures so that it could discover itself again. Psychedelics can present you with the impression of your connection to this single divine mind, they can show you deities from world religions and seemingly take you on journeys through the entire cosmos. This perspective can be found in strands of Hinduism which hold that we are the play of the creator God and the point of existence is to discover our unity with this God, the source of everything.
Can we trust psychedelic insight?
The main question we have to ask ourselves is whether we can trust the information we receive in the psychedelic state. Experiences of this kind often have what psychologist William James called a “noetic” quality, they feel like deep insights into undoubtable truths. As convincing as they seem, however, they could just be drug-induced fantasies. It’s safest to trust these insights when they involve seeing through previously held delusions. This could include discovering that you are not the ego but existence itself. Experiences of new information being downloaded into your mind are more likely to be untrustworthy, however, especially when we consider the vast array of mutually contradictory insights people come away from such experiences with.
Terence McKenna’s Timewave Zero theory
After his extensive experimentation with psychedelics, one psychonaut in particular was left with the conviction that the universe is indeed heading towards a particular goal. Ethnobotanist Terence McKenna developed a theory of the evolution of the universe that he called “Timewave Zero”. McKenna argued that the universe is being pulled through time towards a “strange attractor” and that as a result of this the progression of novel events would accelerate up until a moment of culmination where we meet with this transcendental object. McKenna used a numerical progression based on the I-Ching to predict the occurrence of novel events and the end of time in 2012 which, as you may have noticed, didn't happen.
Teleology - does the universe have a goal?
Change is a defining feature of our universe. When we think about whether the universe has a purpose, at the most fundamental level we’re asking what the nature of this change is. Aristotle argued that things changed because everything has its own natural state and they will transform in order to reach that state. The natural place of water is down low while the natural state of air is up high. This way of thinking is known as teleology. Teleological explanations attribute changes to the goal of the process, rather than its causes. While Aristotle’s thinking laid the foundation for modern physics, the following two millennia reshaped these ideas to the point that teleology was abandoned altogether. By the time Newton decelovepd the mechanisms that for the basis of classical physics, science had come to the conclusion that the universe is a machine that is not driving towards a particular, meaningful endpoint. Modern physics tells us that there is a particular state that the universe will end up in, but it is not one in which we can find much meaning. Ultimately, we are told the universe will be a homogeneous soup that has reached equilibrium and, at that point, nothing of interest will ever happen again.
Why does purpose not fit with science?
Why would we believe such a thing? After millennia of telling stories that give some meaning to our existence, why would we accept that the universe could be purposeless? When we look at the physical world, we see little signs of a meaningful narrative that could account for our existence. It appears that the universe began in a state of order and is moving to a state of disorder and, along the way, complex interesting things happen. We are some of those complex interesting things, we’re like the tendrils of a beautiful firework that exists for a while but eventually dies out. Darwin’s theory of evolution presents the greatest challenge for anyone who wants to believe in a meaningful purpose for our existence. When we realise that we ourselves are apes, we realise that any purpose that could apply to us should also apply to other animals. If we are the mind of God lost in the play of self discovery, it’s feasible that that is also the case for all animals, from humans to slugs. Most nararitves about the purpose of existence are antrophopenctirc, howebver. In these stories humans play an inexplicable special role. Such beliefs are explainable, however, when we consider the possibility that they are reassuring stories that humans tell themselves.
Could the universe be purposeless?
If existence has no grand meaning, if the universe has no purpose, what does it mean for us? While humans typically make sense of the world in terms of things having a purpose, some cultures have embraced purposelessness. Purposelessness is actually a core concept in Taoism. To Taoists, the universe is a dance with no ultimate meaning. Realising this can be liberating, we can move beyond our egoic concerns with goals and purpose and can instead just exist, flowing with the universe. This is also an insight that can be gained through psychedelics. Psychedelic-induced mystical experiences are often characterised by such realisations. These can be experiences in which the individual is confronted with the fact that reality juist exists, beyond all of our personal concerns and thoughts about it. Embracing this fact can lead to people being transformed, overcoming depression, trauma and fear of death. These transcendent insights depend on there not being a single ultimate point to existence. Perhaps the universe has no purpose and perhaps we should be glad that it is that way.