Q&A: I find that people always want more. Even when it comes to death, they want more. It’ s like money – people always want more. They think there should be more. But why? Why after you die people expect there will be more to come after death?

An interesting thought. And thinking about it I can see how some people’s yearning for the afterlife is a variant of materialism.

But I generally tend to associate thoughts (or expectations) about the things after this life with the human passion not for “more things” but for “more knowledge” or “more understanding.” In other words it wells up from the human trait of enquiry – to find pattern in chaos, meaning in mystery, to understand where things are not understood.

We have looked to the miniscule and the astronomic, the visible and the invisible – why would we stop that enquiry when it comes to the shape, purpose and finitude of human life?

In that sense I do not think it is wrong to want “more.” While there is value in a sense of being content with “what is” – without the passion to look further, look beyond, a key driver of human activism for good grinds to a halt.

Originally: http://www.formspring.me/briggswill/q/1105301142