I can remember how when I was young I believed death to be a phenomenon of the body; now I know it to be merely a function of the mind−and that of the minds of the ones who suffer the bereavement. The nihilists say it is the end; the fundamentalists, the beginning; when in reality it is no more than a single tenant or family moving out of a tenement or a town (42).…
Based on what I have read so far Pohnpeians do have a positive outlook on life as well as death. They seem to view death as a passage to another point in their lives. When a person is about to die in Pohnpei, according to the book, they are surrounded by people who love them. Once the person dies there is a big feast and the funeral lasts four days. Whereas, in most cultures, death is a tough topic to think about. In the United States, death is celebrated with a single day funeral and not mentioned much after that. Losing someone close to you is definitely tough, but the way the people of Pohnpei celebrate life shows how they see death as a way to continue their lives and going to the next step in their existence.…
Death is one of the most discussed topics that has always risen a lot of doubt and concerns . Many philosophers and writers, through the centuries, have tried to find a definition or a reason for this mysterious and inevitable event. Analyzing Plato’s Apology, he seemed to have a positive view about death. He claimed that death is a “state of nothingness and utter unconsciousness”; in fact, he compared death with the act of sleeping. But since death is more deep and irreversible, humans cannot be bothered by dreams or thought because they’re dead, whereas this could happen while they’re sleeping. So death is a state of relaxing for the soul and for this motivation he considered death as a conquer for human’s life. He also pointed out another…
The author shared his take on mortality in his first book, “Right and Wrong as a Clue to the Meaning of the Universe.” Lewis enlightens us with an in-depth discussion on mortality, focusing on the Law of Nature. He explained humans are curious to know what is perceived to be right or wrong according to cultural moral norms or universal ethical standards. These standards among religions are considered similar by society, but different among individuals.…
Experiences and relationships can also shape one’s appreciation of life and understanding of the nature of death. This is shown in part…
Nagel’s paper opens by pointing out that people naturally provide an expression for the sense that life is absurd. He notes that the reasons that are ordinarily given for thinking that life is absurd are inadequate and then cites four examples. The first is that our existence will not matter a long time from now. He argues that if it is true that…
Life can not keep on going without death. I agree that death is the best invention of life, it clears out the old to make room for the new (Steve Jobs 71). We must first live a good life, after living a good life we are able to enjoy death because we have done everything we could to make our lives better. Once again, death is the motivator of life and we should try to make our lives worth living before we are gone and it is too late to do something about…
When reading Chapter Two of “What does it All Mean?” I couldn’t help but notice how Nagel begins this section off by saying “If you think about it, the inside of your mind is the only thing you can be sure of.” Although some may chose to disagree with Thomas Nagel, I personally do agree with his view on life and the fact that it may not be real. In my opinion, when Nagel suggests that the inside of our mind is the only thing we can be sure of, I believe this is as true as it can be, why you may ask? Well simply because our mind is a very powerful tool in our body that makes everything possible. Our minds do everything for us from just everyday regular thinking and movement to giving us the power to imagine things that sometimes aren’t possible.…
Death is inevitable. No matter how much an individual clings to life hoping and wishing to escape death, death always follows. Yet, in the presence of those who cling to life, there are individuals who accept that death is a part of life. Those individuals realize that from the moment of birth death is inevitable. In light of these two polar responses to death I find it important to try to understand the concept of “good death.” For the purpose of this short essay I will not dive into whether death is good. For now I will only explore the fluidity of “good death” by highlighting specific attitudes that have endured over the past 150 years and offer personal suggests for why I think these attitudes have persisted.…
In the science fiction film Avatar directed by James Cameron, Jake Sully, a paraplegic former marine, replaces his brother for the avatar project on Pandora, where humans are mining for a valuable mineral, unobtanium. However, there is a group of inhabitants called Na’vi who are forced to fight against human invaders because they were trying to assimilate them and deprive their harmony life with nature. Initially, Jake and his avatar is ordered to understand and learn from those native Na’vi and provide information to human about Na’vi‘s home tree which located on the richest deposits of unobtanium for hundreds of miles. But after the failure of diplomatic solution for the Na’vi to move, Colonel…
Nagel asserts that death, the most terrifying of things, is nothing to us. Since as long as we exist, death is not with us; but when death comes, then we do not exist. It does not then concern either the living or the dead. He explained that death can be considered a negative evil because when a person dies, their lives end. This means that there is nothing left; no love, work, food, clothing, cars or anything else. When Nagel says death has no value, positive or negative, he means to the person who has died. One's death can clearly have value to others, negative to one's family and friends, positive to one's enemies or those who profit from it.…
Thomas Nagel's Death explores the debate concerning the nature of death itself: is death a bad thing? Nagel explores this question by formulating 2 distinct hypotheses. The first of these is the postion that death deprives us of life, which is the only thing (or state) we have, which would make death a certain evil. The other position holds that death is merely the cessation of all awareness and, consequently, existence. Nagel discusses the conditions of position one, saying that life may not be the accumulation of good or bad experiences, hence life has a value that is not simply measured in existence of the organic body. This means that life itself, or the act of having life is inherently valuable and good, but is not solely based on mere existence. Nagel here uses the example of surviving in a coma and missing what goes on during said coma; this experience would not be desireable in this point. Another point in the first position is that good in life can be increased over time. The second position, being that death is simply the state of non-existence and thusly not evil in itself, has three points. The first is that death's evil is not something that has quantity, and thusly does not increase as one is dead, as good does during life. The second point holds that a temporary absence of awareness in life (such as a coma) would not be a great loss by itself. The third point is especially intriguing; it posits that we do not generally bemoan the period of time before we were born as being a misfortune, as we do the period after we cease living. Holding this belief would be a contradiction, and would not make logical sense.…
In What Does It All Mean? A Very Short Introduction to Philosophy, philosophy professor Thomas Nagel explores the possibility that the world exists in a subjective reality, where everything in the world was created by and exists solely in one’s mind. In support of this possibility, he suggests that the inside of your mind is the only thing you can know exists with certainty (Nagel, 8). Essentially, Nagel is suggesting that there is no way to definitively prove that an objective reality, or an external physical reality, exists outside of our own minds. Because an external reality cannot be definitively proven, it cannot be an absolute reality.…
Dr. David Searls, a professor of genetics and science philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine said "Seeing death as the end of life is like seeing the horizon as the end of the ocean." i This image expresses the belief that there is more to the existence of the human spirit than our physical life on Earth.…
1. When you choose to act one way rather than another, you were free to have acted differently.…