66%
Confidence
Belief overview
Immanent meaning of life
Meaning can be found in the human and natural world, without obligatory transcendence.
2
Supportive
0
Contrary
1
Neutral
What it is: Naturalism usually affirms that the meaning of life can be built within human existence and the natural world itself.
How the position understands it: Relationships, knowledge, creation, care, justice, pleasure, contemplation, and responsibility can constitute meaning without need for reference to a supernatural plan.
Basis and context: The theme appears in secular humanism, non-theist existentialism, and contemporary practical philosophy.
Debates and variations: Some naturalists speak of constructed meaning; others prefer the language of human flourishing or good living.
Documentary evidence
Supportive
John Dewey, A Common Faith
A naturalist rereading of religious and ethical themes.
Reference: John Dewey, A Common Faith.
Content: Dewey proposes understanding values, ideality, and human experience without dependence on the classical supernatural.
Use in debate: It is relevant for immanent morality and an immanent sense of life.
Owen Flanagan, The Really Hard Problem
The meaning of life in a naturalistic key.
Reference: Owen Flanagan, The Really Hard Problem.
Content: The author discusses how to live well and find meaning within a naturalistic framework, without strong transcendence.
Use in debate: It is important for an immanent meaning of life.
Neutral
Charles Taylor, A Secular Age
An analysis of secular modernity and the naturalistic social imaginary.
Reference: Charles Taylor, A Secular Age.
Content: Taylor examines how modernity made an immanent and often naturalistic view of the world plausible.
Use in debate: It is useful as a neutral interpretive source on the cultural place of naturalism.