This is in response to something from
The Ain't Christ where he meant to make a comment but wasn't able to for some reason.
Anyways, the comment was, by what I can see, a commentary (maybe a criticism) on how human beings translate their fear of death into a need to pass on one's seed or influence. Ultimately, I have to agree with this idea completely. I don't think it's a bad thing (not speaking for Moth saying it's a bad thing. Just know some people think that). I just think it is an important thing to recognize. See, this little human condition of ours is precisely the reason we do anything that we do.
I suppose someone would misconstrue this as sex being our sole meaning for existence. Hell, I know that idea exists widely for a fact. Thing is I think that's wrong. I think that that is only one part of the puzzle. We seek to create life because we know, deep inside, that our genes are a part of our existence. But this is only one part, the physical side, if you will.
The other part that I think is a major part in the mechanism of our society is the societal side of things. See, one can always say that evolution works in everything and essentially it does but the fact is that evolution is not just simply the progression and selection of certain genes. Evolutionary traits can also be passed on by one group or person (person being any being) seeing a better way to do things.
For example, an ape in his family notices that if he drops a heavy rock on these other small rocks, these rocks break open and he finds there is food inside (the smaller rocks are nuts). This ape has now found a whole new food source, one that may be plentiful around him. This ape now uses this technique to get his food while he raises his new generation of apes and these other apes see this and use this technique as if it was just a natural way of things and it was something they were built to do. Was a new gene introduced in this process? No, there wasn't. A simple idea was passed on from one generation to the next and is just as concrete as a physical gene.
Now, what does this whole process of thinking add up to? Well, I think these small ideas that we introduce into the gamete of our society successfully gain us immortality. Tell me, what is your being? What really makes you different from the generation before you? The only thing that makes you different and makes you an individual is the small addition you make, per the spreading of your genes and the spreading of your thoughts. So, essentially, by spreading your seed and/or spreading your influence, the only you that essentially matters in the universe has achieved immortality.
Does your conscience stay in existence? I don't know. Nothing says it necessarily does but a couple of billion years ago, nothing said that ideas went anywhere. I think this is the most legitimate persistent fear and the basis for most if not all religion. Everything else we know of passes on except our consciousness, right? Think about it for a second. Our physical being passes on, our philosophical being passes on, our emotional being passes on (not something I expounded on and not something that has a very large effect but think about the fact that if you are sad or pessimistic, how this influences the attitude around you, and then think about the compounding effect this can have), and our practical being passes on. Noticing the trend, one would have to logically guess (not conclude, for conclusion, we have to have a concrete method of this transaction) that the transfer of our conscious being passes on. Fact is we don't know if this last part of us does pass on, or if it passes in full in some way (one could argue that it has also been a universal law so far that things only achieve transaction partially).
Anyways, that's enough rambling. Ultimately, I think religion, among other things, is a quest to find this transaction that lets us achieve immortality. Whether or not it exists? Don't know. Either way, it doesn't effect my plan of action. I'm going to do everything I can to pass on who I am and what my existence is. What that existence consists of doesn't really matter until my area of opportunity (my lifespan) ends and by then, I just want to be as well-equipped for whatever may come my way because if there is anything I can do about it, you can be sure as Hell that I am going down fighting.
