The Meaning of Things

What is the meaning of it all? By this, I mean the acquisition of knowledge and the carrying on of life. On one hand, nature is built around the idea of survival of the fittest. On a very basic level, if you're not in it for yourself, you are not going to survive as an individual or a species. No one would question a lion killing a gazelle in the savannah in Africa. To add to that, species DO cooperate, but as studies have shown, generally, species only help others (not related to themselves) if there is the possibility of reciprocity later on, or if the other has helped them in the past. Now, is the human world any different? Do people really do anything without the hopes of reciprocity-even in the most vague of forms-karma or a place in the afterlife, perhaps? What is wrong with this? Is it morally wrong? How can we expect people to do something without any hope of a short term, or even long term but still visible benefit?

The example I am thinking of here is the environment. We all know (well most of us anyways..) that the environment is not a contained resource. By this, I mean, that if I pollute in Canada, the pollution is not contained just to Canada. The pollution will be global, clearly. However, how can we ask people (in developed or rapidly developing countries) to take actions that will limit these bad effects, and start towards a more sustainable lifestyle? Is it rational to ask people not to drive? Or foolish to hope that in the end our senses will prevail, making people suddenly care about saving the environment? Will people really make these decisions for themselves without visibly getting any selfish results? How often does someone go to a mall and think "Nah, I won't buy that pair of shoes. After all, do I really need a pair of shoes? Think of all the resources that were wasted in making them. Think of all the pollutants that were released during their production." We have removed ourselves so much from the sources of production, the sources of labour even, that no connection is being made between the finished product and the process. Items just show up in stores and we happily buy them.

Will we ever be able to cooperate and fix the problems we have created? I am not preaching the doom of the universe here, but I am concerned that as we develop, we are becoming more and more selfish.

So back to my original question, what is the meaning of this acquisition of knowledge? Is it to make us aware of knowledge that we should know anyways? Is it to provide us with hope, or conversely fear of the future? Is it just for the satisfaction of curiosity in itself?

I don't know...