Continuing from last week…

What if all our goals are simulacra? Does this present any problem? Or even hold any relevance at all?

I think it’s important, especially for the agnostic, to be aware that everything around herself is in flux, isn’t constant, is (perhaps) simulacra. Things are slightly different for the theist, as they have god, a constant non-simulacrum (subjectively at least); she has an eternal, unchanging aim in life; not even just on a whole-life timescale, every action of the theist is directed towards god. Even if the manifestations of god can be interpreted as simulacra, there exists an eternal god figure transcendent of his “actions” who is a copy of nothing else (as the theist perceives him).

The agnostic might be able to obtain a similar eternal cosmic non-simulacrum goal as well. For example “The Good” as described by Plato in the metaphor of the sun, which is briefly outlined as follows.

The sun … not only furnishes to visibles the power of visibility but it also provides for their generation and growth and nurture though it is not itself generation. … In like manner, then … the objects of knowledge not only receive from the presence of the good their being known, but their very existence and essence is derived to them from it, though the good itself is not essence but still transcends essence in dignity and surpassing power. (509b)

Learn more about it here.

What he is getting at is that there is an eternal constant (The Good) divorced from sense perception that “shines” on objects of knowledge to give them existence, such that everything around us comes from the Good. So the good would not be a simulacrum, although it’s so abstract it’s pretty much in the “god sphere” of belief anyway.

As for the strict atheist naturalist, perhaps they could argue that everything is simulacra of everything, meaning that together all objects make up a unique whole…

Regardless, does it matter? Should we care if our lives have no eternal goal? No solid foundation? I’m comfortable in constant flux, comfortable with a non-eternal lifetime if that’s the way things turn out to be, I’m comfortable not knowing. I think it is entirely subjective. Some people need a firm goal, some people don’t; some people “naturally” have one (the “natural” theist), some people don’t.