Science discovers the meaning of life

All life comes down to matter, says Materialism

A Mystery as Old as Humanity: For centuries, we’ve asked the same impossible question: What is life—and what gives it meaning? Now, scientists think they’re closer than ever to answering it. But their explanation isn’t philosophical or spiritual—it’s something far more concrete, hidden deep within the structure of matter itself.

• What if Buddhism's fundamental unit of materiality in this universe, the rupa kalapa, or "form particle," explains the "meaning of life"? What if all we are is just material, arising in the cosmos, turning, and passing away into nothingness, having emerged from there in the first place?
• Preposterous. The Buddha rejected this wrong view (miccha-ditthi) in very strong terms. It leads to a very pernicious view that denies a great deal about our lives. There are two extreme views the Buddha rejected and avoided; they are the annihilationist view on the one hand and the eternalist view on the other. Instead, he taught Dependent Origination as an explanation for all things.
• The idea that we (the self, soul, ego, personality, living being) are only material in nature is flawed and leads to the annihilationist wrong view that says that when we die, everything stops. There is no further becoming. Karma has no force to produce further becoming, rebirth, rearising in another state, manifesting the results of previous deeds.
• There is a similar extreme on the other end, that of the eternalists who proclaim that the self/soul (atta or atman) continues in essence unchanged forever, individuated, fated to receive the result of all previous deeds (karma). This, too, is a wrong view.
• How could they both be wrong? Wouldn't one being wrong necessitate the other being right? No. Both views are at odds with reality, and enlightenment (bodhi) is knowing-and-seeing things as they truly are thereby being liberated from the endless Round of Rebirth (samsara).
• What does the Middle Way say is the case? One must first understand that "middle" does not mean a compromise between both views, a mean or average of the two. Indeed, what we are or at least what we identify with, has a material component, but there is also a psychological component. This is nama-rupa, "name and form." This can be said of all things, not just us.
• More importantly, what is "us"? What are "we"? What is the self or soul or the being? The Buddha said when people speak of self, they are referring to the Five Aggregates clung to as self. These are form; feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness(es).
• What, ultimately speaking, is "form" (rupa)? Science does not know, but well-instructed mystics (noble ones, knowers, seers, those endowed with the divine eye or dibba cakkhu) know. They do not know it by rote. Anyone can come to know that. They know it by direct perception. They are well instructed not to memorize a list but rather to engage in a practice (Satipatthana) to directly see, penetrate, and understand what is there in material form. Unfortunately, what is there is described in ancient and archaic terms. When modern people hear these words, they -- thinking they know what they mean -- dismiss them out of hand.
• Those who listen, who give ear and attention to comprehend what the Buddha meant by these ancient terms is then instruction on the PRACTICE to be able to see them directly. See what? The Four Elements. We "know" there aren't four elements. There are many more. This is not what "elements" (dhatu) means in Buddhism. The elements are not, roughly speaking, material. They are qualities, characteristics, descriptions of matter. Those many descriptions are put into four categories, and these categories are the "elements."
• The PRACTICE of Four Elements Meditation is the way to know-and-see them. This is not science to SHOW others. This is Buddhist psychology (Abhidhamma) to see for oneself. For it is only by knowing-and-seeing for ourselves that we can become free. No one has ever gained freedom, enlightenment, spiritual liberation simply by reading -- just as no one has ever learned physics by flipping to the back pages of a text for the answers to equations. The answers are back there so that, after doing the PRACTICE of calculating, we can see if our results comport and accord with what others have confirmed are the answers. It is essential to come see for oneself. That is the Path of Freedom (Vimuttimagga), the Path of Purification (Vissudhimagga).

Source: Scientists think they’ve finally found the meaning of life (MSN)