Kurt Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan reveals loving “whoever is around to be loved” is the meaning of life (220). This belief is deeply rooted in humanism; love is a basic human need, love exhibits goodness, and loving encourages appreciation of potential value. His giving this meaning of life as straightforward and blunt gives a postulate to be disproved. The use of love as the meaning of life serves as as the optimistic foil to reality. Throughout, Vonnegut ridicules religion and science simultaneously while reaching his real, ultimate, humanistic “answer” to the mankind’s purpose of life. Vonnegut believes people have become drones to political leaders and religious beliefs. His description of the Martian Army planning a failed attack on Earth illustrates the soldiers on the planet as controlled by being “fresh from amnesia treatments,” having had “antenna installations,” and having eyes “as empty as the windows of abandoned textile mills” (Vonnegut 150). This description parallels Vonnegut’s idea of how people blindly and enthusiastically follow gods and religions.
Vonnegut ridicules modern religion by creating a new one, the Church of God Utterly Indifferent. He demonstrates God does not really care about his creations and imparts an idea it is the duty of the people to “Take care of the people” and in turn, “god almighty will take care of himself,” hopefully, making people no longer blame misfortunes on God, but instead on themselves (Vonnegut 182). Early on, he states “Everyone now knows how to find the meaning of life within himself” (Vonnegut 7). However, when Unk arrives on Titan, it becomes clear the meaning of human life on Earth was to deliver a spare part of the spaceship. Instead of causing frustration, the novel ends with a realization that the worst thing to happen “would be to not be used for anything by anybody” (Vonnegut 317). Vonnegut’s humanistic view of the world is the main tool used to reveal the simple solution of human purpose. It is the same as any purpose: to be used.
