The Meaning of Life

Philosophy is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence, especially when considered as an academic discipline. Philosophy is applied through every single breathing soul in this planet every second of the day. Every individual sees the world differently and create different perceptions about existence, right from wrong, meaning in life, if death is really the end? Therefore the book “What does it all mean?” by Thomas Nagel gives the reader thoughts to these questions so the reader can still question him or herself point of view about the world. Nagel does a very good job at this because he presents common views from well known philosophers and gives his point of view, then later contradicts the philosophers views and make the reader think if they agree with the view or not. Or perhaps make the reader have a completely different way of changing their philosophical thoughts. The three views that I will point out and analyze from this novel are, “How do we know anything?”, “Free will”, and “The meaning of life.”

How Do We Know Anything?

Where is the sky? That may be an easy question to answer. But how de we know? In this chapter Thomas Nagel is asking, is there a physical world? He tells the reader that everything we see or feel are experiences and thoughts that we create in our mind. Everything we touch or feel is a stimulus in the brain that we create which makes us see reality or physical world, it depends how we see the concept. But Nagel said “the inside of your mind is the only thing you can be sure of”. He mentions the view of the external world that we live in everyday are projections in our minds. The concept referred to this view is called solipsism.

Nagel continues with the theory skepticism, which seem to show an individual questioning his/her existence and experiences. Nagel explains that we don’t know if there is a world that exists outside of our minds or that our mind is the only thing that is real. Nage also...