Why is death so bad?
Why is death so bad?
For the purpose of this narrative, I will define Death as the absolute cessation of a being with no existence after the exact moment of death.
The first premise is that a terrible event is something where we feel sorry for the subject on whom the ill has befallen. For example, if one were to become crippled for the rest of their life, we would feel sorry for them because they are the subject on whom the terrible ill has befallen.
The second premise is that we don’t feel sorry for someone that does not exist. For example, we do not feel sorry for the children Beethoven did not have.
Death is considered a terrible event. However, since after death, the subject this “terrible event” has befallen upon, ceases to exist, who do we feel sorry for?
To conclude, the person who experiences death, ceases to exist and for a terrible event, there must be a subject who we can feel sorry for. Therefore, death is not a terrible event.
Think about this for a second. When a person dies, we cannot feel sorry for him/her because they do not exist. So why do we consider death to be so bad?
Disclaimer: No I am not thinking about suicide. This topic is solely inspired by my PHIL140 class over the Winter Break.
April 18th, 2006 at 9:40 pm
fuked-in-the-head
April 18th, 2006 at 9:41 pm
fuked-in-the-head
May 9th, 2006 at 10:00 am
Hey, just read this now, but not sure if you’ll get the comment. Humans don’t always feel sorry for external entities, in fact, many times sorrow, pain, anguish, are all products of feeling sorry for oneself. Ask anybody why he/she is grieving over the loss of someone in their life, the most common answer will be “I miss him/her.” So therefore, the sorrow is over your own loss as a result of what happened to the person you lost, not about the effects on the person.
May 11th, 2006 at 7:03 am
That is an interesting point you made Samit. This leads me back to a discussion we had at Karthik’s house a few months ago. The point I was trying to make then and the point I am going to reiterate is this: We are inherently selfish beings. Even seemingly selfless acts are selfish, merely because they give you pleasure.
To weave that into this conversation, think about suicide for a moment. We as a society outlaw suicide not because of the person who might die, but because of our own selfish interests.
May 11th, 2006 at 9:47 am
Wow, I had forgotten about that conversation. You are right. Ultimately we do what gives us pleasure at some level, so there is no real “sacrifice” that people can ever make. Therefore, there is no such thing as “selflessness.” We all aim to make ourselves happy in the end. So the question that can be raised then is : Why is selfishness so bad?