Before I share another portion of my book (yesterday), I take time to reflect on the discussion in which I engaged during the meeting of atheists and agnostics which I attend once a month.  After we watched a video talk given by Sean Carroll, a professor at Cal-Tech, a talk in which he argued that there is no purpose in the universe, some of us suggested that this doesn't matter, that we make our own purpose, whatever we decide it should be.  That is, our purpose is not imposed on us; rather, we develop it ourselves.
     Though this sounds good on paper, if we examine it more closely, we face a potential problem.  If the cosmos has no meaning, as the professor insisted, then doesn't that mean that everything in it, including us, has no meaning, either?  When I suggested this, one person responded that there are two levels of purpose and meaning.  There is the universe as it is, the vast and impenetrable universe that is without purpose or meaning.  Then there is us, rational, conscious, intentional human beings who, the professor wants to say, by their very nature, can develop purpose and affirm meaning.  Things, he says, have teleology.
     Fair enough, but do not we human beings live in this universe?  We all know we do.  So how do we justify saying that we have purpose and meaning when we are living in a universe which has none?  We cannot develop purpose in the absence of it.  And we cannot insist, in ourselves, that we have purpose:  what is our basis for doing so?  Subjectivity may work for awhile, but in the end we must realize that we really have no justification for using or asserting it.  Either there is teleology, or there isn't.
     And we go on.