Letters: November 2017
Your thoughts on absurdism, SI measures and Brexit
I object to the ideas in Adam Brownsell’s comment on absurdism (Chemistry World, October 2017, p1). The idea that we all search for meaning but can’t find it makes a huge assumption – that no one has ever found meaning in life. Well, lots of people have through faith. So absurdism is off to a bad start.
Absurdism’s founder Albert Camus’ position (that once aware of absurdity one has three options: suicide, faith or acceptance) again starts with a significant presumption, namely that there is no God. If there is a God, then of course we are all going to have a God-shaped hole in our lives, an insatiable longing for meaning. That is not absurd – it is logical.