A Thunk is a beguilingly simple-looking question about everyday things that stops you in your tracks and helps you start to look at the world in a whole new light. © Ian Gilbert.
Thunk 15:
Is life an experiment?
Is life an experiment?
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An experiment, I feel, is your ideas put to trial and error.
An experiment, as described in the dictionary, is the act of conducting a controlled test or investigation or testing an idea... so yes, I believe life IS an experiment.
Life itself is defined by your actions and your routines and what you choose to do as part of your lifestyle. For instance, writing an exam is testing your ideas, conducting interviews or leading events (like being Sports Day captain) is conducting tests and reviewing results.
Basically, almost every aspect of our life can be defined as or related to the aspects of an experiment.
I wouldn't say life as a whole is an experiment because once it's over, it's over. You can't go back and change it.
On the other hand, your experiences in life are an experiment, because you do learn from your mistakes or lack thereof.
So, literally speaking, no. Figuratively speaking, yes.
Yes. And i strongly believe that. Its not very controlled, nor can you get a second chance (Well, according to most people's religions) but trying to create a create a controlled environment and then learning from your mistakes or findings/disconveries.
Once again, its extremely difficult to put my thoughts into clear text...
I think life is an experiment, probably the biggest one ever. You observe, you question, you apply trial and error, you learn from the results. I'd say it's our approach to life that resembles a mixture of a positivist's and a subjectivist's view to researching issues, that makes life an experiment.
I think it's like an experiment the most in our earliest years when we're still learning the norms of our society,we find ourselves in new situations or when we're trying to compose a sense of identity. We observe how one person(element A) interacts with another person(element B) and take note of the outcome of the combination of two or more elements. The fact that there are so many elements that could be combined in different ways, different situations, different times, makes our whole life a big experiment, where we never stop testing what is going to happen if we choose to act or do a particular thing.
We try new things. We slip-up, we make mistakes, we learn from them. We experiment with life.
The literal meaning: A venture at something new or different.
Isn't that what we apply into our daily lives? Everyday is a mystery, everyday results in us trying something new. So we should be able to classifly life (as a whole) an experiment.
But I'm thinking, whose experiment is this? Is it God, trying out 'something new' by creating humans and living things and starting life and forming planets? Or is it ours? Because I don't understand how we conduct it. I mean, sure, every little thing we do can be classified as an experiment, and life in general is also an experiment, but how do we say it is our experiment when we're not the ones who started it?
I don't know, maybe I'm just getting too carried away, it's 02.42am and my brain's in over drive, haha.
Yes, in my opinion. Life is an experiment. Making the decisions in life is like choosing the chemicals or whatever you use or do for experiment and seeing the result and the reaction is like dealing with the outcome of the decisions you've made and if you did something wrong or made a mistake there's no turning back but you do your best to learn from it and not make the same mistake, i guess its pretty much the same with experiments :p
nikol
well , there are many ways to consider this thunk . one of them would be , to say
life isn't an experiment . but a collection of experiments make up our lives
we live , we learn .we try keep trying and learn again thus improving on our mistakes . this can be applied numerous times in our lives , many times we conduct these ''experiments'' without even being aware of the fact that we are carrying them out
or
we can say that life IS one big social experiment , where-in we interact with people .for example , making friends (choosing a friend .according to personality can be a form of an observational experiment)
raising a family (choosing a spouse according to desired characteristics , as usually done with science experiments)
all these things are relateable .and we keep relating them on a daily basis .
whichever way you take it . our thoughts lead to actions , our actions lead to results , these results are collected subconsciously and processed and worked on . you can call us giant lab rats .or maybe Gods just playing this MASSIVE game of Sims :S( i certainly hope not)
Mr Roberts !
seriously , this thunk is rather .. cleche.
anyways ,
life an experiment ? i guess , its more like a number of experiments strung together.
i'd say what we do in life is the experiment part but life itself is not , cause your not testing anything as such , theres life and theres death and for those who believe an afterlife..
but its not like the earth is a trial round of some sort. Life is .. not something that can be defined easily.
I suppose in some aspects you can view the events of life as experiments except that when you experiment its normally to find an answer or an result , there are a lot of people who aren't looking for answers or already have them..
and so life changes from an experiment to an adventure for them.
its really theological. Life can be defined as alot of things , to say its a experiment , sure why not ? its a matter of opinion.
Although everyone experiments in life at some point or the other if not constantly i don't think summarizing life as an experiment does life justice.
Life is much more than experiment , although it may consist of a few..or many.
As far as i'm concerned it is not defining life itself that i think is worth discussing but defining what makes it worth living..
if the fact that life is full of experiments is one of the things that make it worth living for you (i suppose to a minimal effect it is for me ) .. experiments are what we do in life to find out who we are , or to develop who we are , or sometimes to confirm who we are not. I think its a part of life , but its not life itself.
Life is not that shallow ..not just a string of experiments , its filled with more emotion and joy that one can gain from the minimal rush of an experiment. although that rushes gain to ones life is not to be underestimated , i suppose it s addition is vital in its own small simple way.
"You get just one life, and it's not a rehearsal".
Life not being a rehearsal would make it the FINAL show, your last and only chance to ace it because you can't resort to practicing for it - you just have to live it and take it as it goes each day.
The quote would explain that life itself is not an experiment.As myra said, an experiment is when you put something to trial and error. We're not putting LIFE to trial and error.
We have one chance to live, and we can't just blow it, like an experiment - which you can redo. However, our activities and what we make of life, is surely an experiment.If we do something wrong,we try to sort the issue out - but we can't go back to the past and change what happened. However, when you compare it to an experiment, you actually CAN go back and restart/redo the experiment.
We can turn ourselves into new leaves, but we can't start way from the beginning and completely erase the past. Because even if you walk away from it, that one figment of your mind will always be thinking about what did really happen.
So what I mean to say is that life in intself isn't an experiment - it's a gift. How we treat this gift, is the way we experiment it. Hence, our activities and acceptance of life is an experiment - one that can have any kind of end to it; because, "to each his own".
no, i feel life is not an experiment.
in an experiment you can start over if something went wrong. with life, you cannot. you only get one shot.
also, if you did the same experiment over and over again, with the same variables, you'd get the same result. however, everyone's lives are different. even if you did and said the same things as someone else, the consequences would be quite different.
I believe that life itself is not an experiment because in an experiment, you get to try out different things, make drastic errors but then wake up the next day and try a whole new different tactic of progression, prepared and countering the previous mistake.
Whereas, in life, one drastic miscalculation could mean the end of your existence as you know it. As some comments have stated that in an experiment, you may put forth your views and opinions to the test and see where it leads you.
So in conclusion, I would have to say that life itself is not an experiment.
Hmm well I think parts of life is an experiment, eg making new foods, inventing new things.
Yes, more or less, life is an experiment. Since we are samll kids we experiment just out of plain humane curiousity. I think that humans are the most curious creatures that i have ever known of.
When a toddler rolls over onto its tummy for the first time, because its uneasy to be lyeing on its back the whole time.
When a child, takes different scented soaps in the bathroom and makes a concoction and flushes it down the toilet to see the pretty bubbles.
When a teenager goes through different relationships, and eventually finds out which ones are worth remembering.
When a young adult takes international exams and takes a chance to apply to universities like Harvard.
When an adult hopes that their money will double when they put it into the stock market.
All of these are everyday experiments that we do without even realizing that we have this natural instinct to experiment in decisions even knowing that there is a 50% chance something could go wrong. We have this instinct to bring ourselves up to a higher level than on what we our, it influences all our decisions and chances that we take.
Life = Experiment
(:
yes it is!! life is made up of all our experiments strung together!!! each decision we make is an experiment we rarely know what might happen, what might the consequences be and yet we try we test, we learn from or mistakes just like in a lab!!! we try and try again until we get all the ingredients in the right ratio and succeed in our goal!!!!
Yes.
An experiment is to try something new in order to gain experiance. Life is just like that. We go through different kinds of experiments everyday. We gain our experiances through the things we do. Trial and error as Myra said is also what we do. Not just sometimes but all the time.
Life is many experiments put together if you think about it. We had our experiments when we were children and now were having a different level of experimenting and im sure that we will have tons more in the future.
So yes Life is a Big Experiment :)
xx
Everybody’s a mad scientist, and life is their lab. We’re all trying to experiment to find a way to live, to solve problems, to fend off madness and chaos.
—David Cronenberg
that statement, probably justifies the idea that life is an experiment. This is because we are in control of our life. What we do, leads to so many things; they can be good and they can be bad too.
It still doesnt completely make sense because experiments can be altered if they go wrong in most cases; life isnt like that. You make a mistake it affects so many aspects of your life that trying to correct them may seem harder and harder due to how our society etc is shaped and controlled. We cannot start over if an experiment goes wrong, thus from that point of view, life isnt an experiment.
Well, I'd like to put it in a different sense >: Life is a science lab, not just an experiment. It's full of chemicals, some dangerous, some not. You create a concoction, more often than not unaware of what could happen and what happens...happens. Sometimes, it could blow up. Sometimes you could blow up with it.
Yes...Definitely because like Mehvash said we experiment with our lives we try out new things..Each and everything we do like the decisions we make, we don’t know what is going to happen, it might be good or bad or dangerous etc. but yet we try it. Yes life is definitely an experiment.
Largely, life is an experiment. You take risks and chances as you are unsure about the outcome of your decision, but you tend to largely have a hypothesis about it. Though, unlike an experiment, the mistakes can't always be fixed and the experiment can't always be started up again. You take risks to fulfill ur dreams, goals, wants and needs and are not guaranteed success, just like an experiment in which you are not guaranteed to get the right conclusion. So yes, to a large degree, life is an experiment with a series of tests, some F's and some A*s :)
Yes it is. We go through life learning new things every day, from small things like "This time set the microwave for 3 min" or to things like relationships which take some trial and error and a hell lot of lessons.
Life started as a experiment from the first humans to experiment with different ways of surviving which lead to agriculture and eventually the need to spread out.
We experiment in our lives everyday with things.
Or what if maybe God just decided to mix some heavenly potions together thus causing his first chemistry experiment known as the Big Bang, then he got really good at Physics by making light and stars and gravity after I guess he liked Biology for making plants and experimenting what should the dominate speicies should be
(poor dinosaurs, lacked brain cells..)
and now I guess he's just taking notes till he decides to clean up and start again which should be around 2012.....
I do not think that "experiment" is the appropriate word, and I think it should be "test". If it was test, then I would say yes, that life is a test, the biggest exam of all. But, life as an experiment...? Trying new things have consequences, and you cannot try it again, for example, Sky-diving for instance, if you die, you cannot do it again, therefore, how can it be an experiment? As a test, I would agree, but as an experiment? Experiment by whom? For what? Why?
Yes, life is an experiment. We try new things, we experience failure and victory, and sometimes it just all fizzes and goes POOF!
How big an experiment your life is depends entirely on the person living it. Some peoplelove living life on the edge, taking risks and trying new things. And some just don't-they prefer to be in their comfort zone and don't go out of it much.
I believe life is full of experiment opportunities, but is not an experiment as a whole.
Life, as a whole, is not a single experiment. You get one chance to do things,and when you screw up, you cant turn back time and expect to get the same result.
An experiment, as Tannya and Myra said, is something in which you put things to trial and error in a CONTROLLED test. We cant exactly control life and the conditions we are put under.
To view life as a string of experiments is more likely,because we try new things, and we learn from past errors, take note of what we did wrong, and do our best to not repeat it the next time another similar situation presents itself once again, which happens at a time we least expect. Humans are fairly stubborn creatures tho, and need to fall at least 3 times to actually change.
Yes, I definitely think life is in some way an experiment-we try new things and when we fail, we try them until we get it right just like experiments in a lab.
Aisha Bashir
10g2
yes i do agree that life is an experiment simply because we as people always want to know or experience what different things are if it works for us then that's great yet if it doesn't theirs always a way to change or try something different..its pretty hard to define what life is because its filled with a series of surprises just like experiments you never know what the end result is going to be.
i suppose that in away yes, life is an ongoing experiment
For some, it might be. Like for exmaple, those people who spend their lives trying out different jobs of every possible nature, travelling the world around, and always living on the edge. It depends on your upbringing as to what you prefer and as well as the pressures of society. But anyhow, most people willingly prefer settling down after an age. Experimenting is left for the thrill-seekers.
I myself will prefer security and stability. Experimentation has its limits and consequences.
I do think life is like an experiment as your always going through a series of tests through out your life. We go through tests like doing exams and having enormous pressures on your back because you didnt do something right. Like a hypothesis our minds too give a statement of everything we do.
In my opinion, no. Because usually when an experiment goes wrong, we can do it all over again and several times until it's right. Once our life is over we can just look back at it but cannot change what has happenned or been done.
Life is sure an experiment. We keep experimenting with ourselves - doing tings differently and thats what makes us happy. If we stopped experimenting and followed the path everyone has been following , life would just become very boring. Sometimes experimenting with ones life is not safe - the results might turn out different but that's okay because we humans can accept the wrong and work towards the right path.I personally feel if i stopped experimenting with my life i wouldn't have half as much as fun as i am having now. Experiments are always a lot of fun :)
Yes i do think life is an expirement.life is all about making mistakes and learning from them and then trying to figure out how to avoid making the same mistake agian, expirements are also all about learning from mistakes so i think it is quite similar. Nnamdi.
Life's all about exploring, discovering, experimenting, trying, failing, etc. In order to do all of this one must be open to ideas, open to experiences, open to try new things. So yes, in a way, life could be thought of as an experiment, because like most experiments, we do not know what the end result is going to be. Believe it or not, we've been exploring and discovering ever since our first steps into this world, and we're even doing it right now at this very moment, to possibly hope for life to turn out to be satisfying. Even though we're not sure that's going to be the end result, we're still implementing ideas and going through experiences with good hope. So I'd definitely say life is like an experiment, and that we shouldn't stop treating it like one!
Experimenting is something along the lines of testing a hypothesis, and if the hypothesis is wrong, you go back and try again with a new hypothesis.
Yes, this sounds familiar - it sounds like life. But it isn't. I believe that just because parts of life require experimenting, doesn't mean life as a whole is an experiment. First of all, when we are born, and at the very beginning of our 'experiment', we have no hypothesis. A newborn has no idea what their purpose in this experiment is.
As the human grows up and matures, the human realises that he is expected to follow a career path and ultimately settle down with a family, or perhaps do something else.
However, following a career path and settling down requires some choosing. Sometimes, the human may realise that just because he wanted to become a psychologist at age 18, doesn't mean he wants to do it at age 30. Or just because he thought Person X was the person he wanted to spend his entire life with at age 22, doesn't mean Person X is the person he wants to spend the rest of his life with at 45.
And therefore, the human goes out and begins to experiment. He thinks about what he wants out of his life, his career, his partner, etc.
Obviously, this all requires experimenting.
However, life is not all about making decisions, life is not all about proving yourself right or wrong and finding something new - sometimes you may not know your hypothesis or even how to prove it wrong or right.
Just because you're 'experimenting' when you're finding a partner or choosing a career path, doesn't mean finding a partner or choosing a career path is the definition of life.
Plus, it's not like you can keep experimenting forever (at least not yet). One may even discover that by the end of their lifetime, they have not proven their hypothesis right or wrong or that they don't know what their hypothesis is.
In conclusion, I don't think life is an experiment.
A hydrogen test is an experiment. Schrödingers Cat is an experiment. Life is not. The things one does when one is alive might be experiments, such as when one has one’s first wine tasting ceremony or when one sprinkles a bit of sand to figure out the direction of the wind. These are experiments because after they’re completed, more procedures such as analysis and a formal theory are to be established. After the ‘experiment of life’ we can’t really do much. You know, because we’re dead. Besides, before conducting an actual experiment we generally formulate a hypothesis. But exactly what are we hypothesising? Whats the purpose of this experiment, the purpose of life?
An experiment is – as google defines it – is an orderly procedure carried out with the goal of verifying, refuting, or establishing the validity of a hypothesis; in other words, trying out new things to see which one fits or works out for you. Is that not what we have practically done since birth? Humans are the most curious creatures that have roamed this planet till date and that can be seen in the numerous ways we do things. Take, for example, the toddler who tries to take his first steps only to fall down or the mischievous child that takes different scented soaps only to flush it down the toilet and watches to see what happens. Even when we grow into teenagers and adults, we still experiment; with the waywe look - from dying our hair radical colors and practically shaving it off (Behshid I’m looking at you) to what we wear – with the way we jump out of one relationship into another in hopes of finding ‘the one’ , with the way we decide our college majors and our career paths, and with the way we invest into a company only hoping for the money to double on the stock market. Our entire lives we try out various things in hopes of finally getting the results we want and crave.
So in conclusion, yes I think life is an experiment.
I feel that as humans, we are constantly searching for what it means to be alive. We're always scrambling to understand this state we are in, either over simplifying it or over complicating it, eventually concluding that we in fact, do not know what life really is. What our "purpose" is. I often find myself lost in thought , wondering if i have been blessed or cursed with life. What would it be like to be dead? What is the purpose of our existence? Is life an experiment, or is it a story being directed by the "man above" in which I happen to just be another character. Am I the figment of someone elses imagination? With all these questions in my mind, i turned to the one place i knew i would get all my answers... Google. After reading multiple theories and quotes by some of the greatest minds in human history, I've come to my own little conclusion. Life itself is not an experiment , make a fatal mistake and there is no going back. All you will be left with is regret. However, just because life is not an experiment in itself, does not mean you should not treat it as one. We fret so about making mistakes, and being wrong, and being judged, and being used ,and not being successful, and being alone, and moving too fast and moving to slow, and eventually we miss out on the true meaning of life, which is simply: to be alive. To breath and to feel. Treat life as an experiment. Make mistakes. Change your conditions. Set goals and strive to fulfill them. Then, and only then would you have truly lived.
As an aspiring scientist, much of what I hope to do in the future is experimenting. Experimenting with calculations, experimenting with theories, and experimenting using equipment in a lab.
But that’s not the only thing I want to experiment with; I want to travel the world, meet new people, and learn something new every single day. I want to explore the frontiers of physics and mathematics, be surrounded by people I love, and inspire people. I want to experiment with my life, and I have already begun. I experiment with everything from the choices I make to the company I keep to the books I read.
After completing a science experiment, we analyze our results, our mistakes, and how we could have improved our experiment. We sometimes repeat our experiment to get more accurate results. Life is very similar in nature to this: I try, I fail, I reflect on my mistakes, and I try again. I never give up until I reach my goal.
Unfortunately, in life as a whole, you only get one try. Hopefully, one try is enough to achieve the optimum results of this experiment.
If you look at this question through the eyes of an existentialist, I think the answer would be a resounding yes.
Consider Albert Camus for example, at the time of his death, he was said to be engaged in an important process of self-analysis and retrospection. In fact, in "The First Man" (his final yet unfinished autobiographical novel), he attempts to move away from the literary conventions he is noted for - departing from his usually substantially philosophical style and choosing instead to create a book "heavy with things and flesh". As Simrah put it earlier, he was simply trying out something new to see what worked (although unfortunately he never found the answer).
What works in life often remains fluid, unlike in hard and fast scientific experiments (at least those generally known), which, to me, separates life as an experiment to the more scientific, traditional definition of the word "experiment". But nonetheless, we use multiple scientific methods, like trial and error, to define the right answer for ourselves in our daily lives. I mean, I only knew the difference between baking soda and baking powder after an embarrassing class project and a failing grade in my science class when I was 12. Those hits and misses are where most of our understanding (and funny stories to tell at parties) as humans come from, after all; making mistakes in one of the many merits in life, I think.
As a final thought: perhaps the ability to tap into our intra-personal intelligence, as identified by Harvard's Howard Gardner, makes us better "life-scientists".
There are a few fundamental tenets to experimentation in the scientific sense.
You need a hypothesis. You need testable variables. You need controls. And you need to be able to derive results and conclusions based on observation. Perhaps most importantly, you need to be able to verify it through repetition.
Individual bits of life are indeed experiments. What will happen if I stick my hand in that yellow, smokey thing? OW THAT HURTS. Hmmm... let's not try that again.
We try stuff out, and learn from how it makes us feel - more than anything else, really.
But as a collective, life is not an experiment. Life is a test. And as a whole, we can't afford for it to be an experiment. We must treat it like a test.
Life... you get one shot. You can't repeat or verify. You are the sum of all your thoughts and actions. All individual experiments should only be carried out insofar as they benefit your result on this test. That's not to say only beneficial experiments will be carried out... we're human. In times of weakness, our experimental hypotheses and thus, expected conclusions when making bad decisions, don't stop us from thinking and acting detrimentally. But reason and logic should tell us to try stuff that benefit us holistically.
So while individual decisions in life could be considered experiments, life as a whole, cannot be. Or rather, should not be.
An experiment is defined as a scientific procedure undertaken to make a discovery, test a hypothesis, or demonstrate a known fact. According to this, life in many ways is an experiment, but in many ways life is also like following a manual. For centuries it has been a social norm for children to go to school since the age of 3, for men to work and for women to be housewives. For centuries it had only been socially acceptable for men to marry women and for either person to be of the same race or from the same caste. To this date, a lot of this stays true, which is why life is like following a manual, however, there have been people in the recent past who have “experimented” with new paths in life, for example same-sex relationships, mixed-race marriages, working women etc. In all these examples, the people have ditched the manual and have explored new paths in life. Similarly, life is an experiment because not everybody goes through the same things in their life; yes everyone may perform the essentials for example brushing teeth, eating and drinking etc., but not everybody experiences the same things. A simple example is the comparison of a child’s life and their parents’ life. With a change of times has come a change in the way people live life completely. Unfortunately, we have only one shot at this “experiment” which is why we should make the most of it.
Starting from the day we enter this world of humanity, love, compassion, care and all the other things that make us human, our existence, which we term as ‘life’ has been an experiment. To me, life is an experiment. Each day, is an experiment. Our emotions, our body, our brain, our mere consciousness, are the main apparatus for this experiment, helping us at every step which turns into a milestone, and every step which doesn’t. People around us observe our way of living, they observe how we handle situations of crises, pain, failure, and they observe our weaknesses. They observe our strengths too, however, in their experiment of life our weaknesses stand out and becomes their strength. That’s how it goes, well most of the time it does. We observe our own selves too. We learn from our mistakes, we try not to make them again, we still make them again, well sometimes, and at least I do. But that does not stop me from living my experiment, from continuing the process which will take me to my desired results. And in the end, the aim of this experiment, is, to live. To live content. To live despite all trials and all failures. Life is an experiment.
An experiment is a set scientific procedure used to make a discovery or test a previously known fact. If life were a set of organized steps that we are predetermined to take, and learn the outcome of, honestly that would be great. But thankfully, life is not an experiment. Rarely to we ever know what the next step to take in life is, and rarely do the steps which we thought we would take carry through. Also, an experiment is a set of procedure's which we undergo in order to reach a discovery, and for many of us the purpose of life is not to simply reach a single finding, it is to experiance things which we do not always plan for, and learn and grow along the way.
I am going to answer this question with my understanding of what life is. Therefore, in order to give an answer that truly is the answer I WANT to give, I will bring religion into it. Because I believe this is a personal question, demanding an individuals personal beliefs.
I do not believe life is an experiment. Sure, the events and actions that an individual carries out throughout their life can be considered experiments. however 'experiment' truly is an understatement to describe something so profoundly beautiful- an experiment is something you do in the chemistry laboratory, something you do when you want to see how fast your friend runs in water or when you put a mentol in a pepsi bottle.
Life is more than an experiment, and even if it is considered an experiment, then who is it an experiment for? Who's the experimenter?
I believe life is a test, a test that determines your place in the afterlife.
However, I also believe life is a series of events that take place.
The cuts, the black and blue bruises, the smiling faces and tears; surely they are more than just an 'experiment'.
I'm still searching, for what exactly life is, besides being a test.
I can say for sure, however that it is everything but an experiment.
Is life an experiment? Well, by definition an experiment is when you test a hypothesis but in this case let us assume it is some sort of simulation or game. There's a very interesting theory that suggests that life is a computer simulation pretty much like in the movie the matrix and the scientific community accepts this as plausible simply because it cannot be proven wrong. The big thing in the field of physics is term known as grand unification. It is basically the search for a 'theory of everything', an attempt to find one equation or theory that unites all the forces, electromagnetic, strong, weak and gravity into one. Without getting into the details, the problem occurs when the postulates of Einstein's theory of general relativity don't work when applied to Bohr's quantum theory and has left scientists stumped. Now i digress, into a bit of computer science. When writing a computer program, programmers never make the program 'perfect', but just holistic enough to do the job. There are always 'holes' in any computer program. Now this ridiculous sounding theory suggests that this universe could very well be a computer program, with the gaps between quantum theory and general relativity being the holes in the software. For all you know, one day a big banner may float across the sky saying 'you have finished level 1'. It all sounds quite ludicrous but the fact is it is equally possible than any other theory of the universe. Life may very well be an experiment or a simulation of some sort. The real question is, if so, who's experimenting with us?
As an individual with an avid interest in both Physics and Chemistry (‘very empirical' sciences, if we’re making sweeping generalisations here) I picture an experiment as a sequence of actions that tries to prove an hypothesis. But I think, colloquially, we can change the meaning of experiment to become more accessible to non-scientists; experiments can just be something you try because you don’t know much about it and you want to explore it. Doing a particular sequence of actions will then (presumably) teach you about the thing you wanted to explore.
So, if we apply that broader definition of the word ‘experiment’, we can say that life is an experiment. Life is what you, as an individual, is a sequence of actions you try to complete to learn more about, essentially your environment - whether that be psychology, astrophysics or football.
Life is like an experiment, but essentially, you can’t repeat it. That brings a solemness to it, a sobriety and philosophical aspect that possibly traditional experiments do not have. Something to ponder about as we continue to explore.
An experiment is conducted to test a hypothesis, with controls and other variables being manipulated by the experimenter, are we really in control of our life? Perhaps. But life could easily be an experiment because we're constantly failing and succeeding, trial and error. With extraneous variables constantly altering the results of our tests..We'll never really know the true results maybe till we're watching our life flash back in front of our eyes.
Experimenting is a crucial part of our lives, it's like we have no way out of it. The results are always going to be based on the way you conduct that experiment.
Life is so many experiments actually, not just one. These experiments could also be used to help other people with their own experiments. With that said I now see life as a science lab..
One must first ask themselves this question when deducing an answer to this thunk: what is an experiment? According to the scientific method, it is using trial and error in order to deduct a final conclusion. Life, indeed, is not scripted, No one knows all the answers, and we are all just fumbling through the darkness, trying to get it "right." There is no set of rules to follow as much as we's all like to believe, we literally make it up as we go and hope for the best. No one comes into this world knowing exactly what they ought to do. Even if someone thinks they're sure, with time even that person will question themselves. Which is why are really basing all of our decisions in life off personal "trial and error," because that is the only way in which one can know what they really want- by knowing of what they don't. So yes, in conclusion, life is an experiment.
I firmly believe that life is an experiment. The basis of an experiment is that you don’t know the outcome. Everything we do is originally a ‘first’, and so I believe that a veil of ignorance surrounds every action we do for the first time.
In life, there are always some unexpected events and outcomes; however people always have a vague idea of the result of their actions; measures against what they think is about to happen. So, possible thoughts of a result against a hypothesis.
It can be said that living in a world with 7 billion others, ours lives have a pattern that we can follow by copying anyone around us, and experiencing guaranteed outcomes. That we can essentially follow a ‘formula’ and life becomes something with fixed rewards. Yet, in my opinion, this cannot stand, cannot be true in our constantly changing world. I believe that as much as one tries to shape their life to follow a particular route, their individual circumstances would always lead to diverging experiences from a person elsewhere, doing the same things.
As there are 7 billion people, there are many whose objectives are often conflicting, and some people may not always get what they want, according to how resources are allocated, or even simple chance. For example, my goal (or in this case, ‘hypothesis’) could be to go to a great college and then go on to earn a 7 figure salary. But I don’t know if this could happen for sure - I could get run over. That somebody who runs me over could just want to get to work on time to avoid getting fired. The unpredictability and randomness of life is what makes it an experiment.
No two people are the same, and for me, there would be no point to life if there was no novelty. This novelty of life is what makes it untested, an experiment with uncertain outcomes.
For something to be dubbed an experiment in the scientific sense, it must follow a few universally accepted doctrines. An experiment must have a thesis, which is tested with independent and dependent variables along with a control to avoid any anomalous or inaccurate results. The purpose of an experiment is to test an idea/independent variable and see its effects on the dependent variable. An experiment also assumes that if its procedures are reproduced, we would arrive at the same if not very a similar result. Can life, in all its convoluted entirety be called an experiment?
Life in the English language is divided into two fundamental meanings. One is the life of an individual person (life 1) and the other is life itself, including every organism, ecosystem and species that has thrived in the universe (life 2). We will begin with life 1.
It would be wrong to say life 1 is an experiments, but more accurate to say it is many experiments in one because it has multiple independent variables with the same dependent variable.The independent variable can be many things: your genes, upbringing, financial state, education and many more. The dependent variable is always your survival and the degree of its impact. The one thing life 1 is short of, that is crucial to every experiment is a control. No two infants will be born with the exact same circumstances and so life 1 fails in this notion.
Life 2 however, observes the impact of life itself on the universe, and can be classified as an experiment. What happens when we put a collection of atoms that can grow and reproduce in the universe? There you have the thesis. Life here is the independent variable itself whilst the dependent is its impact on the universe. The controls may be defined by the laws of physics which govern everything from the movement of an electron around a nucleus to the orbit of a galaxy around a black hole.
To conclude, I would like to bring up two final dilemmas worth pondering upon. How many times has the experiment of life 2 been repeated? and most importantly; who is the experimenter?
Everyone has different views on life.
But whatever their view, everyone agrees that life is a process of trial and improvement.
And that is the basis of every scientific experiment ever conducted.
The fundamentals of a scientific experiment are to:
1. Ask a question
2. Formulate a hypothesis
3. Perform an experiment
4. Collect Data
5. Draw conclusions
And that's what we do everyday.
Human beings are curious things.
Whether its a toddler asking why the sky is blue, or a religious monk asking why god has prohibited certain foods, or a financial advisor analysing why their business's cash flow is negative this month.
We all go through this process to figure out our answers.
Because if humans didn't have questions, and didn't try and answer them, we would have never created the high rate of exponential growth the human race is diligently working towards.
All because we love to experiment in life.
The term experiment is often used in a scientific manner when conducting a series of tasks where the outcome is unknown. I believe there truly is no better term to describe life than this word, experiment.
As kids, our method of questioning and experimenting begin with our first steps and as a teenager I continue to experiment through the several opportunities presented to me.Through school, relationships, friendships etc, we get several opportunities to carry out experiments in hopes that we find one that ultimately creates a spark and makes our next set of experiments that much clearer. We carry out all of these actions in various different experiments with certain set expectations or with a set hypothesis. Now as with any other experiment, in life these hypotheses we set in our lives may be correct, sometimes may vary slightly and other times greatly- and thats the beauty of looking at life as an experiment. When some of these experiments in our lives fail to prove our hypotheses correct, we work on ourselves, we change a few variables add the catalyst and ignite the flame, hoping for the best outcome.
As much as the plethora of YA dystopian future novels and movies (I’m looking at you, Divergent. And you, Maze Runner) would lead me to believe, I do not think life in an experiment.
First I’m making it clear that I’m not talking from the perspective of humans, about how we make errors and do trials. I’m talking from the perspective of a mind-independent reality, where we are (supposedly) the lab rats.
For one, who is experimenting on us? Is it some higher entity or some higher power that is somehow running the complex whirlwind that is life? Or is it just some other humans who are doing the controlling, silently pulling the strings from the shadows and observing our every step – watching, waiting – for that one moment they can pull the rug from under our feet and reveal some 1000-year-old plot to rule the world? (Man, that gave me the chills!)
Besides, an experiment at its most fundamental level happens when someone controls an Independent Variable which causes a corresponding effect on or correlates with (or doesn’t do anything at all to) the Dependent Variable. In LIFE, what is it that is being manipulated? Is it all of the millions of choices we make day-to-day? How many confounding variables can one control?
Now I’m a (wo)man of science and until I get concrete answers to at least a third of the questions asked, I will not believe that life is an experiment. But if the rug-pulling moment ever came, feel free to rub it in my face and tell me that you told me so.
I feel that life is an experiment .It can be taken in two ways .. Firstly the way we play out our lives where there are constants and variables and some things which come out of nowhere and mess things up. It measures how we react to certain circumstances and things and when we enter life we arent exactly told what we have signed up for and hence enter the process known as lottery of birth . The second way life is an experiment can be seen when one ponders on wheather or not the first bacteria in the seas a long time agowas planted by some alien life form trying to play god . Like in the movie Alliegant they may be observing the earth for oer millenia and it may seem like an hour or so to them . They may be clocked in plain sight and may be waiting for us to reach a certain level of intellectualism in order to communicate with us . What ever may be the case life goes in direction we arent completely in control of .
Life is an experiment. A test for our mental, physical and emotional abilities. A test for our ethical and moral limits. That's why we're often faced with obstacles on our way to what we want to get. It's never easy to earn what you wish for because that's how a person's determination and will are proven to be real and exceptional. Many people do pass this test like Martin Luther King, Isaac Newton and Socrates and consequently they have their legacies remembered for a decades and centuries after their death. So yes, life is an experiment.
What life are we talking about here? That which is understood by the literal definition, (i.e. the characteristic differentiating organic from inorganic matter), or the more liberal, speculative one, (which deals with the perceptions of our existence)? By adopting the former as a basis to answer this question, one would have to indulge in concepts like creationism and question the very source of our existence (for which we do not really have a definitive answer, although the Big Bang theory does come 10-23 seconds close to answering). However, I shall approach this thunk using the latter approach, as the pleasing fields of mental speculation are enterprising.
The experiences and lessons gained in life are themselves experiments, be it a toddler trying to walk for the first time, a young woman choosing to go into an unexplored field of study, a footballer trying a new dribble, or even a couple on a date! It is this experimental aspect in life that excites many, and it is this idea of experimenting that has lent importance to ideals like freedom of choice (to experiment). The human psyche is conditioned to seek something new, to have never-fulfilling desires, and this is why humans in general love to experiment.
Having said that, an important question needs to be raised. Since vital components of our lives are experiments themselves, can we call life itself as an experiment? In my opinion, I would reply with the affirmative. This is because we humans are indulging in a quest to discover the meaning of life, be it by making the life of the person next to you better, or by indulging in materialistic possesions, or other means, as is suited to each individual. All our activities are somehow or the other intertwined towards this purpose of life, and until we discover this ultimate purpose, we take on new things on board, in a hope of finding meaning and purpose to it that would add value to our life. In other words, we experiment.
However, another point that we would have to consider is that of the role of society. Simply by following the routines established by our family and peers, are we indulging in an experiment? Are we engaging in a process to discover something unknown? Or are we taking part in a process that is analogous to medical procedure (which in a context is the antonym of an experiment)?
To sum things up, life can be a experiment, or it can simply be a societal procedure, depending on how we choose to chart our events. It would be the former if we seek to discover the purpose of life (be it by the means of altruism, scientific research, or other means as suitable to us); and it would be the latter if we seek to just follow the guidelines of others without any sense of direction from our own minds.
“As the archaeology of our thought easily shows, man is an invention of recent date. And one perhaps nearing its end.”
What is the meaning of life? What is our purpose? Such questions are perplexing and unfortunately come with no solid answer leaving us humans to hypothesise about the substance of life itself. We have turned to science to provide us with answers but it has only reported back to us with how we have gotten here – even this has doubts, however – there are no empirical ways on answering why we are here therefore this is purely a philosophical question filled with speculation.
According to the major Abrahamic religions, we were put on this earth as a test to our faith and according to recent investigations by scientists we might just be a simulation similar to the matrix. If we were to follow this train of thought then indeed we are simply here as a trial for future generations or things we are still unknown to.
Life is an experiment in the sense that it is a test for us to see if we can achieve whatever it is we set forth as our personal end goal.
If you feel that your life is a collection of numerous instances of trying different approaches, reacting to different scenarios, learning from different moments and adjusting to correct any mistakes made along the way , your life might as well BE an experiment!
And if you are of the belief that God (or some other supernatural being) might be conducting this experiment, more so!
YOUR definition of YOUR life is as accurate as it gets.
So even if you don’t agree. You feel that your life has no control setup, you weren’t born with your hypotheses in mind (or hand) ready to patent/disprove , you have no idea what you’re doing and you can’t go back and fix a single one of your plentiful mess-ups - your life is NOT an experiment!
Life is of individual nature. It could be your experiment but someone else’s journey ; your test, somebody else’s opportunity. Whatever you believe it to be.
By definition an experiment, is a test, a trial, a tentative operation for the purpose of discovery. Testing hypothesis and testing it repeatedly, finding new hypotheses's all in process to discover something more important.
Sounds to me like how life is and how life has been for centuries for everyone.
I'm 16, and I can't base my understanding of the question on the "vast" experience I've had of life but I can try to assimilate a justifiable explanation based on the 16 years I have had & the lives of people I've seen.
According to its definition: an experiment is a series of tests and trials, like life is. A larger scale experiment. What I don't understand is what're we trying to find by experimentation? Benign control and dictatorship? Self actualization through "nirvana"? Happiness? What is it?
It's a given though that an experiment seems weirdly like the entire concept of life on earth. We're put through constant trials that we must overcome to find a solution and an answer. Each trial leads to another which leads to another but what is the final test that we need to supersede?
We observe these tests throughout the course of our lives, as children when we learn to walk or talk.. As we get older and become adults the tests start getting harder when it comes to employment etc..
It doesn't stop- though what we're testing is unclear in conclusion I do firmly believe that life is an experiment.
Yes, life is an experiment.
Life consists of the various different experiments we conduct in either scientific fields, personal life or within ourselves. We are an experimenting race, attempting to correct the flaws we see in ourselves. Our main purpose of experiments is to learn from mistakes and try to better what we're working on at the time. We keep on conducting these experiments time after time, and start changing the variables to see how it impacts the subject we are testing on.
Life doesn't seem like an experiment, but it is. We learn from mistakes we've made and we even learn from mistakes that have been made by other people to bring about a better change in society. We learn from our past to make a change in the present to bring about a better future for ourselves. We tend to experiment with life in countless ways, experimenting with ourselves and with other people. Even though we've experimented with our lives numerous times, it's important to learn from errors that've occurred in our lives, it may be a failed relationship or an unsuccessful start up of a company. It's all about learning and moving on and trying out the different paths that our lives bring forth upon us.
“ Two possibilities exists: Either we are alone in the universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.” - Arthur C. Clarke
With so many planets in the universe, there is an extremely high possibility that we are not the only form of life that exists. Humans judge a situation based on their current level of knowledge and find it almost impossible to imagine an alien force that have more advanced levels. This portrays humans have limited intelligence which makes us believe that we are no more than Laboratory rats.
The extreme dismissal of all alien reports are eliminated as doubtful photos that are faked; however, not all the reports can be explained. The views of religion hinder are view due to the conflict the possibility with God and the possibility of intelligent alien life. Many people argue that the sightings of UFO’s have increased since the media started reporting these event and displaying them in Sci-Fi films. This may be true, but perhaps we are more of their existence now?
These questions lead us to more questions of weather there is the control of some alien species on us? Do they alter the destruction on our planet to view our responses? Are we being watched as additional knowledge for aliens?
My answer would vary depending on how you define 'life'.
Life is mainly divided into two definitions, the first being the life of an individual (or any organism for that matter) and the second, life as a whole. For the word 'experiment' I will generally take it's definition more or less as described by the scientific method with hypotheses and the various variables.
Using the first definition, I do not think life is an experiment simply because there is nothing to test. Some might say that you are tested throughout your lives physically and emotionally through various challenges and obstacles, however, this is not an experiment but a test, in the same sense as an exam. There can be no specific 'aim' that someone could try to investigate throughout their lives.
On the other hand. I do think life as a whole, or more specifically, evolution, is an ongoing experiment. Nature, through natural selection, chooses the best suited organisms for the environment with the ultimate aim being to produce complexity and diversity. In this case, the essential requirements , mainly the aim, procedure, variables and observations are fulfilled to be considered an experiment and the end result is the incredible beauty, diversity and complexity we see today.
An experiment is a procedure to make a discovery, test a hypothesis or demonstrate a known fact. Now, that is the dictionary definition and is more or less what I'm going to relate my views to.
Is Life an experiment?
Now Life itself is a complicated word. Some may say it distinguishes living things from inorganic matter, the period between birth and death of a living thing or even the existence of a living thing. The definition of life is still a challenge to even the planet's brightest minds.
Now looking at the patterns of evolution and humanity's inability to know what lies after death, I believe life may be an experiment. The experiment could be evolution, designed to only allow the survival of the fittest and organisms. Also, since no proof lies to what happens after death, apart from the scientific processes such as decomposition, death may also be looked towards as the final stage of this experiment or the end of the experiment. Although the body disintegrates and becomes part of the ecosystem, what happens to the knowledge acquired by that human or the very soul of the human?
To conclude, I believe life may be an experiment set on a grand scale.
As usual, there is no certain answer to this thunk. You could say life is most certainly not an experiment. You could also say that while it is not a singular experiment, it is a continuous series of trial and error, but then we are not dipping our toes in the pool. We are fully submerged, and trying to see which fork in the river goes where.
And unlike an experiment, in which we are trying to fine one single answer, we try to find different things over different periods of time.
Life is an interesting thing, but originally, it had no purpose. It was just a mix of the same six essential elemental ingredients: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulfur that all organisms are built from. Life has no particular purpose. We just… do it. We just live…
But us humans, we are creatures with advanced knowledge and a conscious understanding of our surroundings and ourselves, so our purposes can vary, depending on the person themselves.
A person could call life an experiment if they looked at it in that way. People could also call it the opposite. It is subjective and differs from each perspective.
So, in total, it’s still a question, except it changes to;
Is life an experiment for you?
An experiment traditionally being a course of action tentatively adopted without being sure of the outcome. In the latter-day, it's more referred to as a synonym to the Scientific Method. Well, life having couple of meanings, one, the mortal human and the other, esse. So, life, an experiment? Plausibly. Couple of ways of looking at the question posed. First way; we all could be subjects of a thumping experiment, the experimenter being an ambivalent high power. Secondarily, looking at it with a small-scale acuity, experiments are within the bounds of our lively praxis. We all live our lives contrarily. All of us humans are wont and we do conduct everyday experiments. Be it in a laboratory & matter related or the quotidian ventures we perpetrate. What's the point of experimenting & and using the orthodox Scientific Method? Customarily, To learn, and know whether your question proposed was true or false. It would be paradoxical to be here, where society is today, without regular scrutiny (approaching the question with plurality) and seeing how I generally do my everyday tasks & how i comport myself with my social relations, yes I suppose my life could be comprised of multiple experiments all together.
To get back to my commencing sentence; we don't have one justifying answer to what has brought us here or what makes us do anything at all. Raising the questions from everyone's mind, Why do what we do? Why thrive onto being a member of the society? Life itself is inevitable. Like the movie the truman show, or even the matrix, we might as well be part of an entertainment show for aliens or a virtual (yet very real) game and be an experiment ourselves after all.
In our younger years, we’d experiment with things. “What happens when you try to flush your toothbrush down the toilet?” Let’s find out.
Then we’d start experimenting with people and their emotions. “Will my kindergarten teacher be sad if I tell her that she’s mean?” Let’s find out.
A few years - and possibly a few dozen harrowing incidents later – we’d start experimenting with experiences. “Should I start exercising?” “Should I try sushi even though I hate fish?” “Should I try belly dancing to see whether I like it/ to keep more career options open?”
Through this perpetual process of experimentation, we define our experiences and give meaning to our lives. Indeed, this is something that distinguishes us humans from certain other ‘living’ beings.
Although “life” in itself is a conundrum (which we can go on about for hours trying to define and analyze) “learning to live” according societal expectations and our own values is more or less certainly a process of trial and error. Nobody knows the ‘right’ answers to life’s questions. We must experiment and find out.
In fact, whenever we take action without being perfectly aware of the consequences, we are, essentially, experimenting. Indeed, with that logic, even the very existence of some of us could have been the result of an experiment...
All our lives we strive to make the perfect choice however looking back we notice that we learn most from our mistakes. I in fact still remember a mistake I made in third grade on a french test. So we always get told to treat life as an experiment, and make mistakes so that we may learn from them and grow. However I like to think of experiences and life as two things. To say my life is an experiment would be an understatement because although learning is a big part of it, it's not the whole story, to call it an experiment would be neglecting all the things I do with no intention of being right or wrong, but for the sake of myself and others in my life. However I do thing that treating experiences in life, whether it is a trip, a summer job, even the gems honors program for example, as an experiment always helps me look at it as a learning opportunity instead of stressing on making everything perfect.
so in conclusion experiences in life can be an experiments, however life is more than just an experiment, because most people aspire to love and grow and make a difference in the world, and use their experiences to test their strengths and capabilities to learn and improve.
“All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.”
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
Some believe that life should have an end goal such as happiness or success. To achieve these vague goals, we experiment with words, subjects, people, ideas, and most importantly our own perceived limits. Through experimentation we may or may not reach the end goal but we definitely learn about ourselves and our surroundings.
Thus though life in itself may not be an experiment I believe it is incomplete without it. Experimentation allows us to evolve and transform. The only reason we have progressed over the years is because man has continuously experimented.
Further I think the longevity of life too depends on our willingness to experiment with science, technology and medicine.
While doing the previous Thunks, we discussed on what it means for something to exist and if something exist even though we cannot sense it in any form.
What I realized was that everything exists only as a thought or belief. The philosophical theory, Solipsism, tells us that nothing exists, except our own consciousness. Our minds can manipulate us to perceive things the way it wants us to. For example, people who take LSD say that they can touch the most convincing hallucinations only because that is what their thoughts make them believe. In such a case, perception of what life really is would be very hard. To some, life may have begun and end because of an all-mighty God, while to others, life can be an experiment conducted by aliens. When reality only exists the way our minds show it to us, there is a possibility that life is much different than what we perceive it as.
There are quite a few arguments to support the theory that we are indeed just lab rats in an experiment controlled by external forces. With so many other planets in our universe and the theory of multi universes, it would take a very narrow minded person to believe that we are the only life form that exists. It would also be arrogant to assume that just because humans are the dominant life force on Earth, we would be superior to any "alien" life from another planet. It can be believed that humans are no more than guinea pigs for a number of different alien races and it is our limited intelligence (compared to the aliens) that blind us from these facts. We can only judge a situation based on our current level of knowledge and may thus never find out if our life really is an experiment or not.
I've read about one theory that proposes that our whole solar system is just a huge virtual reality simulation (and the universe beyond it is an illusion).
However, as mentioned before, we tend to perceive something as real only when our thoughts tell us that we can sense it. Thus, all sorts of things are possible, but without any solid evidence, we can't take such wild imaginations too seriously.
Considering that an experiment is a "course of action tentatively adopted without being sure of the outcome" by definition, one can see the similarity between the two. In essence, we experiment with our life by spending time in varying ways hoping it'll all fix together and pay off.
Since everyone leads slightly different lives, it can be said that everyone finds their own path by experimentation rather than following a definite course with no variety. Even as we all monotonously attend school or rush to jobs, each and every one of us spends that time differently. Despite having 'experience' passed down from the previous generation, each one trudges onward by carving their own path.
The experimentation is present in how we choose to spend time, with any second spent differently leading to a different outcome. Some believe hours upon hours of memorisation will enable them succeed in life so they choose to test that path by walking down it, while others decide to experiment differently and take a new approach.
Each and every second is nothing but an ongoing experiment to define out existence based on the choices we made, and how they were superior.
Yes. No. Maybe?
I would love to say it is an experiment and that everybody has a purpose and that they all have something they need to find out. I would love to say that it doesn’t matter what you do because all the other variables are controlled. I would love to say that there is only one outcome will a small degree of inaccuracy and a high precision. I would love to say that you can do repeats to exclude anomalies.
But none of that is true.
An experiment is all of those thins a scientifically controlled investigation within which there is the purpose to extrapolate an accurate outcome. Life is exactly not that. There are no controlled variables. Looking at my life in retrospect nothing made any sense. Why did this happen? Why did that do that? All of those answered questions are unacceptable in experimenting. Also nobody has a specific purpose we all make different decisions are find different ‘callings’. Worst of all there is no chance at a repeat.
However, the fact that everybody is different perhaps means that we can create our own experiments in the most non-scientific manner. We can all create our own investigation within which we are the only controlled variable but everything else changes. There are many outcomes that all depend of the reaction of different events.
If it is looked at this way, it is quite possible to imagine life as an experiment. And sadly that is oddly comforting. To know there may be forgiveness for mistakes.
Is life an experiment? To answer this, we need to know what an experiment is. An experiment is defined as a test, trial, or tentative procedure; an act or operation for the purpose of discovering something unknown or of testing a principle. With this in mind – Yes. I do believe life is an experiment. But rather than us humans being the test subjects, we are the investigators. Throughout life, we are discovering something unknown on a daily basis. Every day we are experimenting, on ourselves, making ourselves more unique and more diverse. To put this into a scientific perspective, we all follow rules and regulations – these are our controlled variables. But we all have something unique about ourselves – our independent variables. Lastly, we all live lives of different lengths, different extents to which we are successful, and in different health – this is our dependant variable.
Overall, everything that we do adds detail to the long and wonderful experiment that it life. Though there are no said results from the experiment, we are gaining experiences from the experiment.
Is life an experiment? I believe it is, however life is also combined with the element of experiences. An experiment is scientific procedure conducted to test a hypothesis, make a discovery or showcase a known fact, this can be applied to the natural sciences, such as biology as well as the social sciences, like psychology. Life can be similar to the fact that humans test out certain skills and discover something new everyday; without 'experimenting', development in civilisation itself would have never been possible, for example the invention of paper, Egyptians used papyrus, cavemen used stones, medieval times had a manual printing press, but now we have factories that print millions of newspapers every single day, and gradually the physical paper would vanish, because of the existence of the internet - this is how much we have improved, and this change has occurred because of the human's natural instinct to find more effective and efficient ways to solve problems.
However, referring to the definition of an experiment, stating 'scientific procedure', I know for a fact that life is not structured life a scientific experiment, for there are countless existing variables that can influence the results of life. Moreover, an experiment always produces an identical result; it be conducted anywhere, and yet the answer will still be the same, contrary to that, a life of one person can never be replicated. Life is more of learning through experiences, still experimenting with choosing the experience. We test our own ability to do things and challenge our mindsets to achieve different goals.
I would say that all of life is an experiment. For every experience and mistakes we make, we learn and try to improve. We learn from the past to be able to have a better future. Therefore we live to become better and to find out who we are and what we are supposed to do.
“All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better. " - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Life is learning from experience from the moment that you are born. As time moves on you learn from each new experience and mistakes you encounter.
When you learn a language or any new skill the more you practice the sooner you gain the skill required to become better. Often we take a day or week off of our learning. That action just sets us back. Just as Emerson said, "The more experiments you make the better”
It does not matter whether each experiment is successful or not. What is important is that you keep experimenting. Edison experimented over 10,000 times before he invented the light bulb. The more experiments he made, the closer he was to a solution.
Therefore, yes life is an experiment and the more experiments we do, the better it is.
I will try to tackle this question with two perspectives. The first one, stating that we are the experimenters who try to live our lives in a much better way than in the past (‘learning’ from our mistakes). The second one, stating that someone is the master experimenter who is running the universe as we know it.
For the first perspective. I would say that it is extremely likely that life is an experiment. The nature of experimenting is testing a hypothesis that may or may not be true. So, in a way, we are constantly learning, about ourselves, about the universe, about how everything works. If I would doubt that life is an experiment – in this perspective – it would be because I believe that experimenting is an active process. Maybe not everyone is experimenting consciously, maybe certain people are living just to ‘get through’. It could be that they are unconsciously experimenting throughout their lives, but that is something I cannot say with absolute certainty
Moving on to the next perspective, is there a master experimenter managing the universe? Are we ‘participants’ of a grand scale scientific study? The problem with this perspective is that there is no definitive answer. It is possible, but it is also not possible. For now, there is no way we can find out an answer directly. We can, however, make indirect references. For example, we could say that “Life is chaotic and imperfect. Therefore it must be an experiment to see which participant has the ‘master gene’”. Coming up with hypotheses to explain life is just one part of the puzzle. The next part, which is providing the actual evidence, is the tricky part.
Having considered these two perspectives, I feel more inclined to believe that life is indeed an experiment. We are the experimenters and - quite possibly - the subjects of the experimenter.
Experimentation is used to discover and invent better methods of doing things. After experimenting over and over again, Thomas Edison (or whoever you believe actually invented the light bulb) eventually managed to invent something much more feasible than candles. Then each generation after him found ways to improve this invention of his.
So if experimentation is the core of the betterment of science, what is the core of the betterment of life in general? Could it also be experimentation? Let's look at murder rates. They are lower than ever. This is probably the result of our ancestors trying over and over again throughout generations to find ways to reduce the amount of murders in their societies. We, as human beings, are born with the perpetual desire for better, Be it better lives, better safety, better leisure, so on and so forth. This desire for better is what drove each generation of our ancestors to learn from the experiences of the ones before them and use this knowledge to improve upon whatever they did wrong. With each generation, people understood what worked and what didn't and over time, we kept finding better and better ways of doing things.
This, to me sounds like experimentation. The lives of our ancestors were (most of the time) spent trying to better their own lives. However, they involuntarily made OUR lives better. From our perspective, our ancestors' lives were merely experiments on how to live your life and how societies and communities should function. And perhaps future generations will view us by this way too.
Therefore, life indeed is an experiment.
Experiments are usually scientific procedures used to determine something. Of course, it is used to discover something new, and justify a hypothesis or a theory. Now, since it’s still only 2017 and humankind still has the right to live on free will and haven’t been enslaved by Aliens or Apes (Sarcasm), we still have the free will to go out and explore the world for ourselves. Every day we learn something new, sometimes not through secondary data but primary research; by going out there and putting ourselves out of our comfort zones, into uncharted territory, doing things we’re not good at. This is what experiments are, in life. For example, we’ve all tried our best to see if we had superpowers as a kid; if we could fly, or teleport, or shoot super strong laser beams from our eyes. Even though it may have seemed ridiculous, and impossible, we still tried to do so. This is what life truly is; no one said it would be perfect, and truth be told its more of a trial and error, and we just got to keep going on, every day, learning more. Sure Life as an experiment isn’t all scientific, but we sure can agree it’s a lot more entertaining and fun to do.
In the status quo, we believe that an experiment is the process in which we test a particular hypothesis with the help of the scientific method. Using that definition, we can probably write off most of the activities people undertake in their life to be experiments, whether it is performing "actual" experiments in some fancy science laboratory or trying out new things to see if that's our calling. However, if we have to consider life as an experiment we need to take a few more factors into account.
In those experiments I mentioned earlier, we were the ones experimenting and controlling some variables, but in life no one controls the variables or at least no one has been able to, so far. Of course, some people might argue that god might be the ultimate experimenter and all of the people in that religion or on earth are just his experiments, yet I find it hard to believe that all actions an individual takes CAN be controlled by god because it pretty much goes against the idea of free will and accountability, but that is a discussion for another time. For now, we must understand that right now life might not seem like an experiment because the society makes it seem like we all have a defined path we have to take and we only have one shot at life and we can't afford to "fool around" or make mistakes, but in the future life would be the very definition of an experiment and we have already started seeing the signs. From designer babies to achieving immortality (or something as close) and other exponential technologies, we will be able to control most of the variables that are out of our hands now and yes, then we all will be able to accept that life is an experiment.
One of the most commonly-asked philosophical questions asked is "what is life?" The answer could not be more complex, really. Several people have several different outlooks on what life really is because everyone has different experiences and circumstances. However, can life really be described as an experiment?
To analyze this, let us first define the word 'experiment': "a scientific procedure undertaken to make a discovery, test a hypothesis, or demonstrate a known fact". Right from the very beginning of mankind, our ancestors have been making new discoveries, inventions, exploring more of the planet we live and the bodies beyond it. Of course, life is a big bundle of other things as well, but I believe that life has a purpose; at the end of the day, we all go to sleep with a goal in mind, be it finishing homework or that project, attaining a Master's degree or even setting foot onto Jupiter. Throughout every process, we learn several new things everyday, acquire new experiences, meet new people and accomplish something. And once a goal is reached, we move onto the next one. Sometimes we fail, sometimes we succeed; a lot of it is trial and error, although our choices and decisions these days are based off critical thinking and careful calculations because there always might be a variable we did not anticipate or account for.
As I'm describing this, it sounds like an experiment to me. The only difference is that with scientific experiments, you can control most of the variables; in real life, there are countless and countless of variables completely out of your control. But the key fact is that you move forward. Despite all the setbacks or the wild curveballs thrown at you, you continue to discover new things, explore the universe more and develop as a person. So yes, life is an experiment, just a highly complex, confusing, and rapidly evolving one.
There have been many theories about how humans came to be on this earth. The most widely-accepted theory is Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. However compelling Darwin’s theory may be, some still choose to believe otherwise. A percentage of our race even believes that we may have been put on the earth as an experiment (by aliens or God or who knows what).
Seeing as humans tend to learn from their mistakes and improve upon them until a certain result is achieved, as done in the method of experimentation, it can seem like life itself is an experiment that has been continously repeated for as long as life on earth has existed, enabling it to grow more complex physically as well as mentally over time. So, in a sense, yes life is an experiment, but a highly unpredictable one.
If life does turn out to be an experiment and at the end of mine, I wake up in some futuristic lab in outer space, I’d hope to be able to say that it was a successful one.
The funny thing about most religions is that they talk about the concept of an afterlife therefore believers are conditioned to think of this life as their one shot, after that they either pay for their sins or get rewarded for their good deeds. Therefore it compels them to try to be their best as humans, I strongly believe it brings about order in the world, being able to tell right from wrong.If we were to consider life as an experiment, it would leave many of us to devalue our morals.
If life were an experiment it would lead us to believe that we can keep engaging in any kind of activities and regard the consequences as simply results of an experiment. We would continue to relentlessly do as we please and not feel guilt as we would think that we would be given a second chance.
The definition of an experiment is to test a hypothesis through scientific procedure, so if we were to consider life an experiment, what hypothesis would we be testing? What would our research question be?
This is dependent on each person as an individual, we each have some sort of goal that we strive for. What is the meaning of life? What comes after life? Questions like these motivate us and drive us, we all have an existential driver within us that pushes us forward and guides us down whatever path we choose to head down, even if we choose not to acknowledge it.
There is another way to look at the question, which is to look at the simulation hypothesis, which states that our universe is nothing more than a computer simulation. If this is indeed the case, then perhaps all of our universe is just an experiment, maybe a thesis statement by some future PHd student trying to prove that life is capable of screwing itself over and over again without going anywhere. That would be fun.
In order to answer this question, we need to define and what is an experiment. As a noun, the word experiment means a scientific procedure undertaken to make a discovery, test a hypothesis, or demonstrate a known fact, however as a verb it is defined as the act of performing a scientific procedure, to determine something. But I think that this question asks us to compare the idea of life with the idea of an experiment - the idea of discovery and the ability to change variables and that everything has an underlying basis of absolute rationality.
My impression of life, is that is arbitrary and unplanned rollercoaster. The idea of it having an absolute degree of structure and logic, to me seems frightening. If this were the case, however, I struggle with my sense of identity and purpose, if my life path can be replicated through a series of controlled variables then am I really unique? And what would make me, me?
To me an experiment is an action that requires a lot of trial and error to figure out something new. In an experiment some variables will be fixed but others that aren't will lead to different results, and you might learn something new out of this. I believe that life is like an experiment as we try different things everyday and we learn out of our failures and mistakes. We make ourselves stronger by testing new things and going out of our comfort zone. If we do not apply the trial and error method to our own lives we will never progress in life, and we won't learn anything because we do not learn from our successes. This can be condensed in this quote from Vincent Van Gogh "What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?"
As always, we must begin by defining what an experiment is. I assume that the prompt means 'experiment' in more of a colloquial term. To see if something works or not. Therefore, one could potentially say that life is an experiment where we try out different things and see how our life goes. But if that is the case, I do not understand the need for rules, regulations, and social structures in our lives. The question prompts us to think that if life is an experiment, there should be nothing stopping us from doing whatever we please. Going down that path brings to light darker thoughts, things we consider wrong. Perhaps even though life is an experiment, laws and such protect us from ourselves and allow us to have a fulfilling experiment of 'life'. We are young as a species, and the objective answer to the question is that we just don't know. We do not know if life is an experiment, and we do not know if it is not an experiment. We can philosophize, question, find out, but for now we do not know if life is an experiment. Many treat it liek an experiment, many choose to regard it as something sacred, and few even do both.
Yes, I believe that Life is an Experiment.
Do we know the Outcomes of a first-time Experiment? No.
Do we try things out in life knowing their outcomes? No, because if we did know the outcomes of our life choices, then no one would make a mistake. Yet, this world is full of mistakes. Mistakes that are outcomes of Experiments gone wrong.
In experiments, we ‘test a hypothesis’, which aren’t usually accurate, hence we process the details of the experiment and do not repeat. Just like we do not repeat the mistakes we make in life, we analyse what went wrong and find a better hypothesis.
How do we know that something is poisonous? How do we know that a certain action would kill us? These discoveries are results of an experiment.
Discoveries are made through experiments. Mistakes are made through experiments. Knowledge is gained through experiments. In life we discover, make mistakes, gain knowledge, hence Life is an experiment.
‘All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make, the better.’ - Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Merely four words, this question is deceitful in its apparent simplicity, since it’s quite well-established in the history of philosophy (and even science, considering that the lines between the organic and the inorganic become increasingly blurred as the kind of life becomes smaller) that no question to do with life can be so easily answered in a hundred and fifty words. Let’s try it anyway.
The word experiment, in common use, refers to the act of trying something out to see if it works. In the scientific sense, it more or less means the same, albeit with a higher level of scientific integrity and a defined set of direct expectations or goals (like the (dis)proving of a particular hypothesis, for discovery, or demonstration). Before we attempt to fit experimentation of either kind to life, we should ask ourselves, who exactly is doing the experimentation? The question reveals two general domains of answers: the first being us, and the second being any other entity or non-entity.
To address the question in the context of the latter, first, requires us to use the definition of life that refers to the distinction made between what is alive and what isn’t – that is, the difference between yourself and a rock. The possibilities for ‘who’, here, are endless: the living/non-living universe, God, a galactic alien empire who’ve sown the seeds for our existence and, upon humanity’s maturity, will return to harvest us as a slave species (and by the way, if either of the latter are listening to this (and if the stories are to be believed, I’m fairly sure one of you are supposed to be) please contact me, because I have a list of design flaws that need addressing). In any of the above cases – and any others, if your imagination were so inclined – it’s undeniable that life in all its forms has been a constant trial and error that, for this planet, has spanned almost 4 billion years. To take this line of thought to its logical conclusion, it can now be said that, as far as we can see, at least, none of the aforementioned parties are in control of the experiment anymore; in a Jurassic Park-esque turn of events we – the 200,000 year-old naked apes – have so unceremoniously seized control and now wreak havoc on the planet, all the while trying to escape. The conclusion to be made from this experiment is very clear: don’t teach the monkeys how to make an ark.
There’s also something to be said on the topic of humans being in control of the experiment (unless we’re in a very graphically intense, sudden death game of Sims) and in the context of life as the continual experience of living. The common fallacy made when addressing the question under these circumstances is that experimenting has exclusively to do with doing something new – that is, to try a new food, a new hobby, a new career – but it must be remembered that experimentation can be done to confirm or reconfirm a prior hypothesis or result. Consider that no person has definite knowledge of what is to happen in the future, regardless of how closely they adhere to societal norms, traditions and expectations and other guidelines on how to live life; they’re experimenting to discover if these past guidelines, these hypotheses and past observations, still recur given different circumstances. Consider, too, the great deal of unhappiness and dissatisfaction caused by the misconception that it is somehow possible to reliably predict the course of one’s life through the decisions they make and the incompatibility between their individuality and that same lifestyle, it is to be concluded that life is not only an experiment, it must needs be considered an experiment to optimize happiness.
In many ways, life is indeed an experiment.
It’s full of trials and errors (more so the latter), learning and discovering, and reaping the results of what we do.
The truth is, no one knows how to live the perfect life—but everyone wants to live it. There’s no magic formula to follow, no map to guide you to it. You must just embark on the quest and forge your own trail.
We started out not knowing much, experimenting on different things until we’ve learned something—and then we repeat the process until we’ve learned a whole bunch of stuff.
But it doesn’t end there, in fact, I dare say it doesn’t end.
Life is one continuous experiment. The variables are always changing and this unpredictability—this uncertainty and lack of stability—forces us to always stay on our toes. To always try something new. To experiment.
In a figurative sense, life is one big experiment. No one really knows what they’re doing; they’re just trying to find their place—like you and me.
Life is an experiment, the biggest experiment of all. A famous quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson states, "All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make, the better." Working with the scientific meaning of "experiment", we all have a personal hypothesis set and a particular method that we follow - each experiment is different and unique as well as this experiment they each person lives cannot be easily replicated and will never be the same as another individual. The independent and dependent variables of the person will also be different, this can be posed when a person tries to copy another role model - how much ever they try, the experiment will never be exactly the same just like in reality. All of us individuals have different results, (raw and processed data), and drawing different conclusions. The evaluation of the experiment is similar to how an individual reflects upon themselves. So yes, life is an experiment - the biggest one of all - non-replicable, unique and of extremely high ecological validity.
Every experiment follows a hypothesis and follow-out method. The goal of any experiment is to test out a given statement through scientific procedure, however, with the question in mind, what kind of hypothesis are we intending to research? What are we all trying to prove, all 8 billion of us? These kinds of questions yield subjective answers, therefore remain unique. The independent and dependent variables of the person will also be different. Even if each factor was inputted the same way to the same degree, we would yield different results each time due to the conscious minds that all operate as per their own motives. “The true method of knowledge is experiment” – William Blake
I believe life is an experiment, a bumpy, uncertain, unique trial that determines who we really are.
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