Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist and a science communicator. He’s a cosmologist with a particular interest in understanding what time is. He is also a vocal atheist who spends a fair bit of his own time arguing with philosophers and theologians. Here’s what he has to say about the meaning of life.
.. the absence of meaning “out there in the universe” does not mean that people can’t live meaningful lives. Far from it. It simply means that whatever meaning our lives might have must be created by us, not given to us by the natural or supernatural world. There is one world that exists, but many ways to talk about; many stories we can imagine telling about that world and our place within it, without succumbing to the temptation to ignore the laws of nature. That’s the hard part of living life in a natural world, and we need to summon the courage to face up to the challenge.
TAM is far better than much of the self-congratulatory back-slapping and air-punching bullshit at TED.