Philosophy is an insight to humanity or a humanistic study. It is humanistic because it deals with the beliefs of rational (human) beings. Philosophy differs from other disciplines because it is one that is in search of a subject matter, whereas other disciplines have an assigned subject matter. Philosophy is a way of examining ideas. In order to think philosophically about something it has to meet certain requirements. It is not very wise to try and think about something such as your dresser draw in a philosophical manner, this will not yield very fruitful results. The subject has to be rich, cohesive, complex, and significant in order to be thought about in this manner. The meaning of life meets these requirements.

Most people question the meaning of life at some point in their life. There are three different questions that a rational being may ask that would motivate him or her to search for the meaning of life. The first type of question is a cosmological question, such as, why does the universe exist, why is there something rather than nothing, and is there some plan for the universe? Concerns relevant to these questions are religion and God. Answers to cosmological

Tolstoy finds relief when he looks to love for the working class; he finds faith. He is faced with the problem of cause vs. reason. He renounces science which is a physical explanation dealing with cause, and resorts to reason where he then relies on faith to answer his question. He then becomes happy again. Tolstoy says, "I also understood that, no matter how irrational and monstrous the answers might be that faith gave, they had this advantage that they introduced into each answer the relation of the finite to the infinite, without which there could be no answer"(17). Tolstoy was bothered by the fact that he couldn't assign intrinsic value to any particular aspect of his life. He dealt with his concerns by confronting his faith in God. Tolstoy's conclusion is that knowledge is incapable of helping him in his search, so he must rely on faith.

Tolstoy demonstrates how the three questions discussed can motivate an individual to search for the meaning of life on the corresponding different levels. Questions that philosophers think about are often very complex questions that can be approached from many different angles. In order for a person to approach these sorts of situations they need to evaluate the types of evidence that they have regarding the particular subject matter. Evidence resources include ones particular belief's about the subject matter, the experience provided by ones sen

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