In season 6, episode 19 of Everybody Loves Raymond, the family has a bit of a melt down in trying to answer their daughter's question "Why are we born? Why does God put us here?". Raymond, unable to answers his daughter's questions asks the family.
Surprisingly, for a sitcom, the conversation gets very philosophical and the show does a great job at exploring the meaning of life and throwing out some common answers.
Frank: Look, here's what life is. You're born, you go to school, you go to work, you die. That's it, that's all.
Raymond: Listen, we're not talking about what we do while we're here dad.
Robert: Yeah, yeah. The big question is why we're here in the first place. I've spent many of night laying in bed thinking about this kind of stuff. Life's imponderables. Frank: You need to find yourself a broad and pronto. Robert: Where are we? Where are we in the big scheme of things? Frank: Don't gotta be a pretty one, just grab something. Debra: Ray, listen. Just get up there and tell here that God put us on Earth to help each other. It's simple, it's direct, it's a good way for her to live her life. Raymond: What are you talking about? That doesn't answer anything. What are you telling me that God said 'Earth, let's see, what should I put there. Hmm...'... So what did God say, 'Hey, I'm going to put some humans on Earth so that they can help each other. Or I could just skip humans all together and go hit a bucket of balls.' Marie: Oh I know, it is all in the Bible. (Marie gets up to go get a Bible)
A bit later...
Robert: You ever think about space? What is it? Is it really endless? If you had a spaceship, could you go flying and flying through space forever? Frank: Why don't you give it a shot? Robert: No! I'm not kidding around here. I mean how can space go on forever and if it doesn't what's at the end? Marie: Stop it Robert, you'll give yourself a tummy ache. Robert: What about the beginning of time? What was it before that? Before time? Nothing? I mean, what is nothing? How could there be nothing? This doesn't bother anybody else?
Later again...
Robert: You know the fruit fly only lives one day? One day, what's his meaning of life? Maybe there's no meaning of life for any one of us. I mean really, am I really different than the fruit fly? Frank: The fruit part's the same. Debra: Robert the fruit fly doesn't question why he's here, that's what makes us different. I don't know, maybe that's kind of the meaning of life. Never knowing the answer, but always wondering about it. Raymond: So God made us smart enough to know there's an answer, but not smart enough to figure it out.
So what do you think? Does the life of a fruit fly having meaning? Does our lives have any meaning?