>>41401158
Its not anything grandiose, but I don't believe in either theory. Life is a cutthroat competition, but its still a competition. Competitions have rules, but the rules can be adjusted, bent, or, in some cases, disregarded entirely depending on circumstances.
>So, what are we competing for?
Victory over Death. Think about how you were conceived, how many hundreds of thousands of your brothers or sisters died around you in moments as you launched yourself against your mother's egg cell. But you survived. You are alive. You are a part of life. Chosen only by your own will to live, fight, and eventually, die.

>Who are we competing against?
Death. Not some personification of death, but Death Itself.

>Why are we competing in the first place?
Because: the one who can find and exploit the flaw of Death, become the Winner-over-Death. Once natural death cannot touch someone (either through bodily failure, violence, or disease), they win. And what is their prize? Eternal life.
>So what happens to the losers?
They die. If they cannot beat Death, they will not live forever.

The goal of Life is to defeat Death. We will keep fighting this primordial battle until someone wins or we die. If you value winning, you might be able to procreate to roll the dice and see what you child can live on after you "just enough" to discover the flaw of Death, so that you can live forever vicariously through them, but for all intents and purposes they lost the competition and threw you into the arena thinking you might have a slightly better chance.
If you do win, I suggest you keep quiet about it. Do you know how many people would kill you to know the flaw of Death? The earth itself (to say nothing about the universe or beyond) is a pile of corpse in constant decay, with the children crawling on top of their ancestors' bones and dust, all for the chance to defeat Death once and for all.

From one contestant to another, best of luck!