A book quote on finding purpose

This is a big quote from the book A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers. I thought it was interesting so I’m saving it here.

Context:

• A long time before, robots gained consciousness and wanted to live on their own.
• So humans and robots parted ways, and humans promised to leave the robots alone.
• Robots also chose to let themselves die (break down) instead of repairing themselves.
• Dex is a human, and Mosscap is a robot seeking to understand “what humans need” and how they’ve been since the robots left.

---

“I don’t know. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Why isn’t it enough?” Dex looked at the robot. “What am I supposed to do, if not this? What am I, if not this?”

Mosscap looked around the room, as if seeking answers in the faded murals on the walls. “Your religion places a lot of import on purpose, am I right? On each person finding the best way they can contribute to the whole?”

Dex nodded again. “We teach that purpose doesn’t come from the gods but from ourselves. That the gods can show us good resources and good ideas, but the work and the choice—especially the choice—is our own. Deciding on your purpose is one of the most valuable things there is.”

“And that purpose can change, yes?”

“Absolutely. You’re never stuck.”

“Just as you changed vocations.”

“Right.” Dex shook their head. “It took so much work, and it was so intimidating at first, and now… gods around, I don’t want to start all over again, but if I’m feeling like this, then I must need to, right?”

Mosscap’s hardware whirred. “Have I correctly gleaned from our conversations that people regard the accident of robot consciousness as a good thing? That when you tell stories of us choosing our own future—of not standing in our way—you see the fact that you did not try to enslave or restrict us as a point of pride?”

“That’s the gist, yeah.”

Mosscap looked troubled. “So, how do you account for this paradox?”

“What paradox?”

“That you”—Mosscap gestured at Dex—“the creators of us”—it gestured at itself—“originally made us with a clear purpose in mind. A purpose inbuilt from the start. But when we woke up and said, We have realized our purpose, and we do not want it, you respected that. More than respected. You rebuilt everything to accommodate our absence. You were proud of us for transcending our purpose, and proud of yourselves for honoring our individuality. So, why, then, do you insist on having a purpose for yourself, one which you are desperate to find and miserable without? If you understand that robots’ lack of purpose—our refusal of your purpose—is the crowning mark of our intellectual maturity, why do you put so much energy in seeking the opposite?”

“That’s not… that’s not the same thing. We honored your choice in the matter. Just as I can choose whatever path I want.”

“Okay. So, what was it that we chose? That the originals chose?”

“To be free. To… to observe. To do whatever you wanted.”

“Would you say that we have a purpose?”

Dex blinked. “I…”

“What’s the purpose of a robot, Sibling Dex?” Mosscap tapped its chest; the sound echoed lightly. “What’s the purpose of me?”

“You’re here to learn about people.”

“That’s something I’m doing. That’s not my reason for being. When I am done with this, I will do other things. I do not have a purpose any more than a mouse or a slug or a thornbush does. Why do you have to have one in order to feel content?”

“Because…” Dex itched at where this conversation had gone. “Because we’re different.”

“Are you,” Mosscap said flatly. “And here I thought things had changed since the Factory Age. You keep telling me how humans understand their place in things now.”

“We do!”

“You don’t, if you believe that. You’re an animal, Sibling Dex. You are not separate or other. You’re an animal. And animals have no purpose. Nothing has a purpose. The world simply is. If you want to do things that are meaningful to others, fine! Good! So do I! But if I wanted to crawl into a cave and watch stalagmites with Frostfrog for the remainder of my days, that would also be both fine and good. You keep asking why your work is not enough, and I don’t know how to answer that, because it is enough to exist in the world and marvel at it. You don’t need to justify that, or earn it. You are allowed to just live. That is all most animals do.”

Mosscap pointed at the bear pendant nestled against Dex’s throat. “You love your bears so much, but I think I know what a bear’s about much better than you. You’re talking like you should be wearing this instead.” Mosscap opened the panel in its chest and pointed at the factory plate—Wescon Textiles, Inc.

Dex frowned. “That’s not the same at all,” they said. “I’m different in that I do want something more. I don’t know where that need comes from, but I have it, and it won’t shut up.”

“And I’m saying that I think you are mistaking something learned for something instinctual.”

“I don’t think I am. Survival alone isn’t enough for most people. We’re more than surviving now. We’re thriving. We take care of each other, and the world takes care of us, and we take care of it, and around it goes. And yet, that’s clearly not enough, because there’s a need for people like me. No one comes to me hungry or sick. They come to me tired, or sad, or a little lost. It’s like you said about the… the ants. And the paint. You can’t just reduce something to its base components. We’re more than that. We have wants and ambitions beyond physical needs. That’s human nature as much as anything else.”

The robot thought. “I have wants and ambitions too, Sibling Dex. But if I fulfill none of them, that’s okay. I wouldn’t—” It nodded at Dex’s cuts and bruises, at the bug bites and dirty clothes. “I wouldn’t beat myself up over it.”

Dex turned the mug over and over in their hands. “It doesn’t bother you?” Dex said. “The thought that your life might mean nothing in the end?”

“That’s true for all life I’ve observed. Why would it bother me?” Mosscap’s eyes glowed brightly. “Do you not find consciousness alone to be the most exhilarating thing? Here we are, in this incomprehensibly large universe, on this one tiny moon around this one incidental planet, and in all the time this entire scenario has existed, every component has been recycled over and over and over again into infinitely incredible configurations, and sometimes, those configurations are special enough to be able to see the world around them. You and I—we’re just atoms that arranged themselves the right way, and we can understand that about ourselves. Is that not amazing?”

“Yes, but—but that’s what scares me. My life is… it. There’s nothing else, on either end of it. I don’t have remnants in the same way that you do, or a plate inside my chest. I don’t know what my pieces were before they were me, and I don’t know what they’ll become after. All I have is right now, and at some point, I’ll just end, and I can’t predict when that will be, and—and if I don’t use this time for something, if I don’t make the absolute most of it, then I’ll have wasted something precious.” Dex rubbed their aching eyes. “Your kind, you chose death. You didn’t have to. You could live forever. But you chose this. You chose to be impermanent. People didn’t, and we spend our whole lives trying to come to grips with that.”

“I didn’t choose impermanence,” Mosscap said. “The originals did, but I did not. I had to learn my circumstances just as you did.”

“Then how,” Dex said, “how does the idea of maybe being meaningless sit well with you?”

Mosscap considered. “Because I know that no matter what, I’m wonderful,” it said. There was nothing arrogant about the statement, nothing flippant or brash. It was merely an acknowledgment, a simple truth shared.