It may be said, in broad-brush terms, that the primary....

“ It may be said, in broad-brush terms, that the primary purpose of life is the continuation of life. A deep program for survival and reproduction underwrites the complex cycles of life, in which death is the grand equalizer. There is, however, a peculiar novelty: human awareness of the cycle of life and a capacity to anticipate our own, individual death. ”

Richard J. Borden

From : Ecology and Experience: Reflections from a Human Ecological Perspective