The philosopher smiled and said to him: "My friend, can you tell me the purpose of that cherry-blossom tree right there?
The man was a bit shocked because he was expecting something more from the philosopher. He then said: "Well I don't exactly know what's the purpose of that cherry-blossom tree, I suppose. But I do know in spring time, usually they will blossom and become one of the most beautiful things nature can show us."
The philosopher said: "Good. Now what about the purpose of that dog right there?"
The man felt a little disturbed and answered the philosopher: "Well, I also can not exactly give you the answer to why that dog exists in this world. But I can give you the reasons why we humans like to have dogs around us. We can simply have fun with them. Some dogs may even have the ability to protect us from danger. Some, to help sniff out drugs of drug-dealers, etc.
The philosopher smiled: "Perfect. I suppose you have come to being able to answer your original question by now."
The man was confused and asked the philosopher: "So you tried to answer my question by arguing that we are the same with the cherry-blossom tree and that dog right there, Sir?"
The philosopher answered: "No, my friend. I didn't say that we are the same with those 2 other living things. I'm just saying that we are all living things. We just judge the cherry-blossom tree and the dog JUST because we can. It might have been a different case if there's an equally or more advanced living thing than us humans that can actually judge us to what our purpose in this world is. We can't even give a specific answer to what the purposes of the cherry-blossom tree and that dog are. If there is, we can see things in a different way. We have been brought up thinking in this perspective which is human chauvinism, I might point out. Too human-centric.
To ask what our purpose in life, to me personally, is NOT a valid question. Needless to say that we were all evolved from the same ancestor by the definition of The Theory of Evolution, which has the same level of accuracy as the Gravitation Theory and so forth.
