Life is meaningless: Raison d'être in Ergo Proxy

[@faessle4067]

Life has no meaning. Life isn't perfect, nothing is. But that, in a ironical way is perfect. Life has no meaning and that is a good thing. Life just is. That means we cannot fail at it. You can not fail anything because there is no meaning and nothing is perfect. We can only decide things for ourselves, so if you ever feel down or useless or anything like that, it is only you who can make you think that and it is only you who can decide to let it go. Life will happen anyway just like death, so accept that you just are. Accept that your life can be whatever you want it to be.

[@Ragmon1]

My interpretation is: Don't go crazy just because you learn that life is pointless.

[@omoshiroidesune1010]

💯

[@cellocovers3982]

I do not like the idea that life is somehow about being happy. Life is still worth living even if you aren't happy if you have a higher purpose. People's focus on happiness nowadays just sounds akin to hedonism to me. One point I believe ergo proxy is trying to make is that your purpose should come from within not placed upon you from an external source.

[@twbp8298]

I too agree with your sentiment that it's not just about happiness but more about choosing your own dedication instead of one that is given to you. Like pretty much all the character mentioned in the video for going bad correspond with their fixation to their own purpose. Not necessarily following the purpose but more so choosing to still fixate upon it after the moment of truth. The main cast were able to break away from this notion by gradually moving on in their journey by their given destiny.

[@psychoticbreaks167justletm4]

Going off what you're saying, for me an over emphasis on any one area of the human experience leaves you out of the moment during the rest of th... the *majority* of the time that are multiple positive and negative pills occuring up and down your mind-biscuit. People don't work that way. I think we have this leaning in our thinking to compress things to dichotomies of the one and the other. But life is not like a song. Sure, there are dominant emotions. But really man, ask yourself why you do anything... pick something and dig the rabbit hole. You really only have one consistent feeling about it? I think to truly live, you have to accept the full spectrum of your experiences simultaneously. Never let a sincere thought or action go passed up. Search for the things inside of you that you most want to bring into the world, and create it. Live fully in the good/bad/ugly of it and don't sweat the outcome. Fate comes for us all. Nobody knows when we go. A tsunami neither knows of nor cares for the village it is extinguishing. I think to build something meaningful from the tragic absurdity of our whole sisyphean state of being, you have to kind of accept the destructive elements... those things that are like the fire that burns the forest, but in doing so grants renewal, novel flourishing. There's no escaping the void, right? We humans can't really know much about reality from our narrow subjective containers. So ultimately all of us find some form of faith to have meaning in our days, where there can be much joy, but also assuredly much pain. The pain brings us closer to meaninglessness, imprints doubts that break our faith. And when I say faith, I mean it could be anything, even faith in a goal, a personal ethic, something about you, something about people. The void is inescable. We live, we suffer, and we pass. And there's no one reason for it. No grand cosmic purpose to transcribe from the stars. And yet I don't ponder the cosmic meaninglessness of everything while starting my day. I conduct my day as though it matters. And in doing so, I buy my ticket for the suffering that comes with it. It's a bargain we all take, and then come up with fancy ways to forget. If you met someone who could tell you your whole future, would you hear it? Would you need to know? I think I don't need to know. When you fully interface with what drives you, and understand where the meaning is in it all, for you, you're always where you need to be, and suffering and failure are part of your whole journey through life. With vision and fully realized drives you hit a balance where neither happiness nor suffering are ever at the core of your pursuits. Personally I like a little bit about what the stoics had to say, and the proto-existentialists. It never stops freaking me out how many of the sci-fi creators in anime of this period were so big on western postmodern philosophy. I think Texhnolyze has the most interesting and philosophically involved takes on it. There's a whole chunk that's basically just Schopenhauer vs Nietzsche, the anime. Heidegger and Camus orbit the stage too. The guy who came up with that, and SEL was eating his philosopher's Wheaties. I actually haven't found commentary that fully captures the ideological depth of those shows. But it's all about different takes on meaning: what's it's value? What are the relationships? Where does it come from? Why do we get up and do... anything?

[@miguelitomarques8]

My favorite anime ever, and you were able to understand it with a chef's kiss. Not only that, but I'm currently working on a cyberpunk-esque book series with lots of existential mumbo jumbo to dissect in the most non-direct way just to leave the readers feeling like idiots, and I took some of the questions analyzed in Ergo Proxy and Neon Genesis Evangelion (among others) as inspirations. Finding your channel was a blessing. I hope you choke on a massive flow of subscribers in the nearest future, cause you certainly gained one more with me. Fly high, brother. Keep up with the amazing content.

[@tonyfunk]

I really, really appreciate your support man, this comment means a lot to me! I wish you the best of luck on your book series mate! Fly high too brother!

[@welayinthorns747]

Are you still working on this? I’d love to check it out!

[@miamyra.a]

So I clicked this on accident and now i'm invested in this channel. Amazing content dude.

[@tonyfunk]

Thanks, that means a lottttt!!! 😤

[@DavidRodriguez-gl5pn]

It’s not about just living life, it’s about doing what you think is right. Believing in your happiness

[@bluefire7991]

wow i definitely need to rewatch this series it is probably my favorite anime but i missed a lot of this the first time around :O specifically didn't realize what proxy one's relationship to ergo was; since they looked the same i thought they were the same person with like...two conflicting personalities or something. was very confused lol

[@bighex5340]

Another banger of a video from Mr. Funk. You love to see it 😤

[@tonyfunk]

Always a pleasure Mr. Hex. 🤘

[@Andriej69]

Well, two things: Monad wasn't really a "mother" to Ergo, who's pretty much a clone of Proxy One (also her relationship with him seems to be purely romantic) Raul wasn't hallucinating like you said, Proxy One admitted that he manipulated him, Daedalus and Donov, so in those visions One was impersonating Vincent Other than that, spot on! EP is one of the most uplifting (if not outright therapeutic) character-driven stories I've seen in a fiction show, anime or western. Anyone who calls it "pretentious" is a moron, or a typical reddit atheist (which pretty much also means moron by default)

[@franzhaas5597]

It's funny that this video came into my life. I tried so hard for a long time trying to find some Purpose. Some obsession. But in the end I really didn't find anything. Some of our obsessions or purpose is pleasing other people's ideas. Once I gave up and just followed my heart I was a lot happier. This is a very eye opening video. Thank you.

[@shiddy.]

if the creators who left on the boomerang star were willing to do that to the humans that would live in the domes, imagine how bad life might have gotten on the actual boomerang star

[@davidpineda5285]

As always great video, man. I really enjoyed your analysis.

[@tonyfunk]

Much appreciated!!!! Glad you enjoyed it!🤘

[@johnfrogman3710]

thanks for spread the ergo proxy word.

[@sicarii545]

i love how so many diffrent interpretations can come from this. i think its worth exploring the many philosophies that define this show. in the end its based on how you relate to the ideas in this show. I dont think the show makes a judgment on right and wrong with the domes destruction. it was dying either way. its ways in which to deal with that knowledge and find a new reason to live. theres more than survival. the diffrent reactions, for Roul its a loss of faith in humanity and a prevented sense of justice, for the administrator its the domes survival, for proxy one its revenge. in this situation theres no "right" way to react really, but i think the show makes the point to look inward, to find authentic reasons to live when the societal narrative has collapsed. at the end Raul finds his, to find his fake daughter. he stops blaming humanity and wanting justice. The decision of Re-l to not let her meaning be defined by others is what I think the message is. not justice, revenge or abstract group survival, but human connection and the experience of life. to find her own truth to arrive at. i think for the ones that survive they accept the world as the horrible situation it is and continue on anyway, but not that they have escaped needing a reason to live. its just that this reason can be whatever they need it to be and does not need to makes sense or be fair. "can you overcome the despair" this is expressed by many of the philosophers they reference and may have influenced my own interpretation. the only places I think I disagree with your description of the society: reasons to live are not found but given, every one is a "cog in the machine" the choice is not that binary. also with your interpretation on the wider issue of human nature regarding reproduction. the quote kinda answers its self, its the fact that we make a fuss about it that means theres more to the human condition than survival. so I think you kinda misunderstood what the show was trying to do with reason of existence. it was more about the effects of losing a pre arranged reason of existence. Think thats the reason they all go crazy. if you can make it past the angst and misery of losing the lie of your existence you can find true authentic meaning, its just really hard. TLDR: its not that we must choose between meaninglessness or a lie of meaning but between finding our own meaning or letting others decide it for us. many of the characters who appear to go insane simply attempt to use denial and societal values to find out how to live after the initial logic is revealed to be a lie: giving into fate, "arriving at someone else's truth" either way I enjoyed the interpretation. all the works I read that "reject the dome" advocate for a miserable yet authentic and interesting life that most people would go crazy in, so I get this conclusion. Thinkers I think inspire or relate to this show: relating to this specifically(truth, meaning): Deleuze Kierkegaard Victor Frankyl (logotherapy) (Sartre specifically on authenticity) more broadly: Jung Nietzsche Gnosticism and tons of other existentialist/psychoanalyst and mythological ideas

[@paul68kdmd]

Thanks for the keypoints you made in the first 5 minutes. Somehow i missed all of them when watching it, and it makes a lot of sense now. Thanks!

[@aitormendia1704]

What about if we are the "created" humans or civilization, but with the feature of reproduction. Our creators left and are "outside the dome", watching or waiting for something to happen.

[@officechair22]

Snake... why are we still here? Just to suffer? Every night, I can feel my leg and my arm... even my fingers... the body I've lost... the comrades I've lost... won't stop hurting. It's like they're all still there. You feel it too, don't you? I'm the one who got caught up with Cipher. A group above nations... even the US. And I was the parasite below, feeding off Zero's power. They came after you in Cyprus... then Afghanistan... Cipher... just keeps growing. Swallowing everything in it's path. Getting bigger and bigger... Who knows how big now? Boss. I'm gonna make 'em give back our past... take back everything that we've lost. And I won't rest... until we do.

[@predtr18]

imagine finding youre love in a half human form....

[@purika8324]

I swear to God that every time I watch an Ergo Proxy video essay or read the comments, everyone has a slightly different interpretation about the characters and the lore. Just shows how much of a mind-bending show it was. 4 minutes in, this is the second time I heard someone say that Vincent is the lovechild of Proxy One and Monad Proxy. From my understanding, Vincent is the creation of Proxy One (but more of a clone, rather than a son) as one last F.U. to the creators once they return because the original Proxies can't survive under sunlight. And as for Monad Proxy's role in the creation of Vincent, I'm not 100% sure, all I know is that she absorbed Vincent's memories which caused her to lose her mind or become unstable. So I guess in this way you can consider her as Vincent's mother? Because Monad Proxy and Proxy One were lovers after all. However, I like to think Vincent is more of a clone of Proxy One rather than a son. But then again, these are Proxies, powerful immortal beings. So I guess I can't apply human standards to them. Also, as everyone may have noticed, I never referred to Vincent as Ergo Proxy. There's a reason for that. Given that I believe that Vincent is a clone, not a son, I consider Proxy One and Ergo Proxy as one entity. So because I consider Vincent as a clone, I view him as Proxy One Version 2 or Ergo Proxy Version 2. At least that's how I view the relationship between Ergo Proxy/Proxy One, Monad Proxy and Vincent.

[@Muhammad_Abdullah_Sultan]

More money more happy 😃😃

[@cellocovers3982]

Thanks for the video. I would suggest that you pause a few seconds before jumping from one character analysis to the other to allow what you say to sink in a little and for dramatic effect.

[@AkiraBergman]

We can not really know if existence has a purpose or not since we do not know Physics fully. Probably it is impossible to know physics fully. For example we do not know how the universe started, and we do not know what dark matter and energy are.

[@CordeliaWagner1999]

I talked to Philosophy students at my University. Somehow the male ones are attracted to my looks, of course hhey would say it's ONLY about personality but I think that's just for them. I always found it hard to talk to them because all of them seem so detached from the real life that's Happening around them. I first thought it could be challenging, but None of them Was a challenge. But another guy that got angry when I had better Arguments. I think the question about the meaning of life is so useless. Why not do something in Real Life, do some inner healing work, work on personal growth. Who cares what meaning life has. Just live it as good as you can.

[@letsworkoutabit1959]

I watched Ergo Proxy many times years ago because I really loved it. Where in God's name did you get the information that Ergo 2 (Vincent) is Ergo 1 and Monad Proxy's child? Based on what I understood of the story regarding Ergo 2's identity: 1) All Proxies know that humans will come back once Earth starts to recover and there will be no use for the Proxies and the synthetic humans anymore. Ergo 1 even mentions that they were simply created as caretakers and they (Proxies) see the synthetic humans as their children. On top of that, humans also made some fail-safe measures such as... a) Proxies' weakeness against the sun b) Synthetic humans c) the cognitive virus And as to why Ergo 1 created Ergo 2, call it like a last ditch of effort or a fuck you moment to his creators (humans) and wanted Ergo 2 to continue in his stead because he no longer had the will to live. 2) Ergo Proxy has the power to divide himself -- Ergo 1 and Ergo 2. Why do I think so? Aside from immortality (at least shown on the episodes), all Proxies have their own powers. -- So even if we consider Ergo 2 as the child of Ergo 1 and Monad Proxy in a spiritual sense, I don't remember seeing or hearing any hint of that aside from the fact that Ergo (dunno if it's 1 or 2) and Monad used to be lovers. --- What about the memories written on the wall? This is where I'm confused. I don't know if they're Ergo 1 or 2's memory because... a) it was mentioned that Monad took on Ergo's (dunno if it's 1 or 2) memories which supposedly drove her crazy. b) Ergo 1 still seems to know a lot of things that he even pulled some strings in the shadows to trigger a lot of events like the cognito virus. c) There was no mention of how long has it been since humans left Earth. But I'm guessing it's at least a millennium. However, if I were to make an educated guess, I'd say it was Ergo 2's memories.

[@arazkii]

×Do you know why when Re-L is reading the characteristics of vincent laws, it is written that he has blue eyes? ×Is it right that when Vincent wanted to be a romdo's citizen he had eyes closed but has soon has he embraces the fact that it doesn't matter (not sure of the reason) he let them open till the end of the serie ×Does Re-L has kept her promise to Iggy in the end? I didn't understand what it was exactly about bcs it was pretty vague ×Why were there so much version of Re-L? ×Has deadalus revived monad dead corpse? Or did he just creat another clone of Re-L ×How does deadalus and Raul learned so much about the lore/ the truth ×Why has monad's appareance changed? ×Why the proxy called asura and the other called after the moon didn't tried to recreate another womb and dome ×What are the statues that are floating, they seems serving a purpose to portray something abstract like vanity, etc.. ×Why are vincent and Re-l so much attracted to each others but not particulary in love ×Does Re-L sounding as Real has a meaning? ×In the end when ergo proxy says that he is death when real humans are arriving. Does this mean that he will kill all of them?

[@arazkii]

Sorry for my bad english and the exacerbating number of questions I asked. But ergo proxy just left me with so much questions with no answers. U have answered a lot but yet i have still😅

[@myonlineway1873]

​@@arazkiiu should watch " Ergo Proxy is not pretentious " its another review

[@myonlineway1873]

4X. There are many versions of Re-L because she is/ was an experiment, being a partial clone of Monad

[@myonlineway1873]

5x. Daedalus did not revive Monads corpse. Revival is impossible since the cells are dead... Itsca clone... of who we can't say

[@arazkii]

​@@myonlineway1873thanks u a lot for answering bro👍

[@M4ruta]

"...and our biologies don't care about helping sick people or animals, or traveling the world or making art." I strongly disagree here. Humans are deeply social creatures by nature. Our mental (and by extension: our physical) well-being depends at least on some part on how well socially adjusted we are. The same goes for aesthetics: all humans care to some degree for stories, music, and other forms of art. Consider this: if something is universal (that is to say: if we find it consistently across time and space, even between cultures that never came into contact with one another) than it must be in our nature. Our biology compels us to make and enjoy art just as much as it compels us to eat, sleep, and reproduce.

[@SNESfan8]

So was Ergo Proxy a clone ? Or was Ergo Proxy Proxy ones son ? Based off of what I was reading it seemed like he was a clone and basically Proxy one and Ergo Proxy were both 2 halves of one mind/being

[@iblobliboo8501]

Yes Ergo was One's clone. Idk where the idea of him being One's and Monad's son comes from. Proxies can't reproduce and he is in love with Re-l, Monad's imperfect clone. The only way I can think of her has his mother is in a metaphorical way, because by her erasing Ergo's memories Vincent was ''born''.

[@Doenu]

What's his name?

[@flynninfinite9116]

Would you kindly care to explain what happened in episode 20? It looks kinda filler like episodes 11,14,15,16,19. Thanks

[@tonyfunk]

Great question! So, the thing about Ergo Proxy is that its story and its concepts could have been explored in 13 episodes succinctly. The reason the creators made it longer, was to breadcrumb plot elements and concepts to avoid having characters just tell you what's going on. The truth is, the breadcrumbing made the series drag a little bit and made many episodes feel like filler when in reality every episode revealed more information about the lore. Episode 20's purpose was to showcase how just like JJ Proxy (the mind prison librarian one) Proxy One could also infiltrate Vincent's mind. In this episode, Proxy One attempts to convince Vincent to leave Re-L behind so that he could fulfill his duties as Ergo Proxy and kill the creators. Since Vincent was too attached to Re-L, Proxy One viewed her as a threat to his plan and needed to destroy Vincent's positive perception of Re-L. We know this because Swan looks exactly like the female version of Proxy One (Vincent too). Just look at her, she's clearly Vincent with women's hair. So that was the whole point of that episode and the timing corresponds with them nearly reaching Romdeau which would've allowed Proxy One to be close enough to him to manipulate his mind. This is also similar to how Pino's proximity to Smileland allowed Will B. Good to hijack her mind. I hope this helps!

[@flynninfinite9116]

​@@tonyfunk Thank you for the response! After looking at the wiki, I now realize that Swan is another version of Monad or Proxy One. I previously believed that she was another Proxy, which didn't make sense to me. While some episodes like the Ophelia one may seem like filler upon first viewing, I might need to rewatch them to fully gather my thoughts. Episodes 19-20 are particularly challenging for me to explain. Additionally, I had always assumed that Proxy One created or utilized the Cogito Virus to his advantage.

[@tonyfunk]

@@flynninfinite9116 Yess I recommend rewatching 19 with the idea that Ergo Proxy is feared due to him having killed a few Proxies. Will B. Good, anticipating the arrival of the creators at this point of the story, wants to avoid confrontation with Ergo Proxy to prolong his already fleeting life on Earth. So he targets Pino due to her innocence as a way to convince Vincent to skip their stop at Smileland. Will B. Good basically sees the writing on the wall and wants to extend SmileLand's existence before they're replaced by the creators.

[@flynninfinite9116]

@@tonyfunk And what about the Cogito Virus? Was Proxy One triggering it too?

[@tonyfunk]

@@flynninfinite9116 I personally interpreted it as being a contingency plan by the creators in case they perished in space. But I'd like to see why you think Proxy One is behind it. You may be on to something by saying that.

[@shelbyduncan9940]

I love the video , u should just watch an episode in dub so u know how to pronounce Daedalus name and raison d'être n such . trying to b helpful not mean :) .

[@yahu5988]

purpose doesnt exist