Life’s True Purpose

Tree of Life (AI-generated by deeznutz1, Pixabay)

The digital magazine of ideas, philosophy, and culture, Aeon, published an essay by Michael Ruse. 

Does life have a purpose?

Nobody expects atoms and molecules to have purposes, so why do we still think of living things in this way? 

There’s no sense for most scientists that a star is for anything, or that a molecule serves an end. But when we come to talk about living things, it seems very hard to shake off the idea that they have purposes and goals, which are served by the ways they have evolved.

As I have written about before in Aeon, the chemist James Lovelock got into very hot water with his fellow scientists when he wanted to talk about the Earth being an organism (the Gaia hypothesis) and its parts having purposes: that sea lagoons were for evaporating unneeded salt out of the ocean, for instance. And as Steven Poole wrote in his essay ‘Your point is?’ in Aeon earlier this year, the contemporary philosopher Thomas Nagel is also in hot water since he suggested in his book Mind and Cosmos (2012) that we need to use teleological understanding to explain the nature of life and its evolution.

Some have thought that this lingering teleological language is a sign that biology is not a real science at all, but just a collection of observations and facts. Others argue that the apparent purposefulness of nature leaves room for God. Immanuel Kant declared that you cannot do biology without thinking in terms of function, of final causes: ‘There will never be a Newton for a blade of grass,’ he claimed in Critique of Judgment (1790), meaning that living things are simply not determined by the laws of nature in the way that non-living things are, and we need the language of purpose in order to explain the organic world. 

Why do we still talk about organisms and their features in this way? Is biology basically different from the other sciences because living things do have purposes and ends? Or has biology simply failed to get rid of some old-fashioned, unscientific thinking — thinking that even leaves the door ajar for those who want to sneak God back into science? 

(https://aeon.co/essays/what-s-a-stegosaur-for-why-life-is-design-like ── accessed 9 August 2025). 

Indeed! Life does have a purpose! A grand and most wonderful purpose!

Those who teach that life evolved are not actually being logical. 

Let us consider this from Dr. George Wald, an American scientist who won the 1967 Nobel Prize in Psychology or Medicine ──  

“One has only to contemplate the magnitude of this task to concede that the spontaneous generation of a living organism is impossible. Yet here we are - as a result, I believe, of spontaneous generation.” 1 

Incredible. He concedes that it is impossible for a living organism to spontaneously generate, yet continues to believe in spontaneous generation.

Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary defines “impossible” as ── 

im▪pos▪si▪ble \ (,)im-‘pä-sə-bəl \ adj [ME, fr. MF & L; MF, fr. L impossibilis, fr. in- + possibilis possible] (14c) 1 a: incapable of being or of occurring b: felt to be incapable of being done, attained, or fulfilled: insuperably difficult 2 a: extremely undesirable: UNACCEPTABLE b: extremely awkward or difficult to deal with ─ impossibleness n  2 

Surely it’s illogical to believe that something impossible can happen spontaneously. 

Notice God’s living word ──   

“Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates of the city. 15) But outside [will be] dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.” – Revelation 22:14-15.

Wouldn’t teaching something that you certainly know is impossible be loving and practicing a lie? 

Also, the fact that evolution and this world’s faith are actually not at odds. Notice this from the Pew Research Center ──

Are faith and belief in evolution necessarily at odds? According to Pope Francis, the answer is no. Indeed, the pope recently reaffirmed the Roman Catholic Church’s view that “evolution in nature is not inconsistent” with church teaching on creation, pushing the debate on human origins … 

1) The Roman Catholic Church has long accepted – or at least not objected to – evolutionary theory. …

2) A minority of Americans fully accept the scientific explanation for the origins of human life. According to a 2013 Pew Research Center survey, 60% of Americans say humans have evolved over time, …

3) … roughly one-in-ten white evangelicals (8%) say that humans evolved through natural processes. …

5) A series of court decisions prohibit the teaching of creationism or intelligent design in public schools. 3 

Nearly everyone who holds to their belief in evolution does not look into any proof that it is not truth. They do not look into why they are here on this beautiful jewel of a planet, nor what their life is supposed to be about. 

Our beloved Apostle Paul warned Timothy, as well as all of us ──

“O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called: 21) Which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. Amen .” – 1 Timothy 6:20-21, KJV.

While in Athens, the Apostle Paul came across, at least for one day, Epicurean and Stoic philosophers. The Stoics believed that the universe operated according to reason, i.e., by a God that is immersed in nature itself. According to the Stoics, the universe is a material reasoning substance, which was divided into two classes: the active and the passive. The passive substance is matter itself, while the active substance is an intelligent aether or primordial fire. 4 Do you recall the blockbuster movie, The Fifth Element, with Bruce Willis? That’s what the fifth element is: their view of a so-called “intelligent aether.” 

Now… there are scientific aspects to God’s living word, i.e., Isaiah 40:22, Job 26:7; 28:5, Ecclesiastes 1:7, Amos 9:6, etc. And let us always remember our LORD God’s word in regards to man and his often fickle word ──

“Commit your way to the LORD, Trust also in Him, And He shall bring it to pass.” – Psalm 37:5.

“Trust in the LORD with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; 6) In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths.” – Proverbs 3:5-6. 

“ … Indeed, let God be true but every man a liar. As it is written: ‘That You may be justified in Your words, And may overcome when You are judged.’” – Romans 3:4.

Also, the Apostle Paul had written Timothy ── inspired by the very mind of the LORD God ── that there would come to be people “in the last days” who are “always learning and NEVER able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” And continuing ──  

“Now as Jannes and Jambres [two magicians in the Book of Exodus; the “wise men and the sorcerers”] resisted Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, disapproved concerning the faith; 9) but they will progress no further [in their thinking], for their folly will be manifest to all, as theirs also was.” – 2 Timothy 3:7 9.

Let us not be foolish. Let us believe the living word of God. Be sure to read our free online booklet, “Does God Exist?”   

Yes! The LORD God (the Elohim, the family of God ── which at this time consists of God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ) DOES EXIST! And the LORD God has a purpose for everyone that has ever been born (even including unborn babies)!

Yet, this glorious and wonderful Master Plan… From the Beginning is a mystery that is wrapped in an enigma to nearly everyone. 

The LORD God's purpose for humanity is to “plant the heavens” (Isaiah 51:16). Sadly, even the overall majority of so-called Christians are not aware of this grand purpose. As I wrote in “God… THE FATHER” ── THAT WE HAVE THE POTENTIAL TO BE GOD AS GOD IS GOD! 

Yes, life has a purpose! □

1 George Wald, Scientific American, 191, 1954, pg. 45. 

2 Webster M. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, Incorporated, impossible, 1996, pp 584. 

3 Masci, D., 5 facts about evolution and religion, Pew Research Center, 30 Oct. 2014.

4 Wikipedia contributors. "Stoicism." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 9 Aug. 2025. Web. 9 Aug. 2025.