Rethinking Death

“Why should I be frightened of dying? There’s no reason for it—you’ve got to go sometime.” — Pink Floyd, The Great Gig in the Sky

 Morbid Metaphors

Life is often compared to a burning candle whose luminosity is bookended, past and future, by eternal darkness. At first blush, this metaphor seems apt: consciousness comes into existence, illuminates a lifetime of experience, then dissolves, replaced by the abyss whence it came. But such a comparison is wrongheaded, emblematic of prevailing attitudes towards death which are unimaginative and unduly negative.

By equating death with darkness, abysses, and yawning chasms, we ascribe to it feelings of dread, which cannot possibly exist within the non-existence brought on by death. A more appropriate metaphor, which imputes to death neither good nor bad qualities, is that of the sight that lies outside your field of vision. Non-existence is what it looks like behind your eyeballs, or what touch feels like when you’re not touching anything, but it is certainly not some kind of expansive blankness or unending darkness.[1]

It matters how we think about death, which is one of the most reliable, recurring, and affecting of life’s constants. From the time we first learn of our guaranteed future non-existence, death throws a backwards shadow over our lives. We live with the knowledge that no matter how long or fruitful our lifetimes, our bodies will eventually lose their animation and eternal nothingness will take our place. Although it is impossible to adequately imagine this eternal nothingness, the manner in which we attempt to do so impacts our quality of life.

Different cultures cope with death in different ways, most of which involve the telling of comforting myths. In some ascetic traditions, such as Jainism, strict adherents voluntarily renounce both the comforts and necessities of life, seeking to die without the barest desire to continue living.[2] In our culture, where a rapturous afterlife seems increasingly implausible—and few people want Jain-type Enlightenment—death will always be a poignant source of angst. But, though death may inevitably be painful, we can make it less so.

Thinking About Death

When the Grim Reaper hasn’t knocked recently, we try to keep him out of mind. While most of us can’t help but steal a glance at an open obituary or accident scene, we (unlike some of our elderly relatives) know that it’s best not to dwell on death. However, if we hope to lessen our discomfort with death, we should actually think about it more.

If we fear public speaking, we cannot get comfortable by avoiding it. Rather, we must gradually expose ourselves to speaking events to change how we feel about the dreaded stimulus. Likewise, by exposing ourselves more frequently to death, we can reduce our anguish when death inexorably re-enters our lives.

But we cannot just reiterate current neuroses; instead, we must think about death differently. We can do this in many ways, and in the rest of this essay I go over a few methods for reorienting our relation to death. These range from noticing parallels between death and ordinary life, to simple but unusual thought experiments, to inducing altered states of mind.

i. Nightly Death

We ‘experience’ something akin to death every night when we slip into dreamless sleep. The gaps in experience peppered throughout sleep can be thought of as analogues of death, and when consciousness re-engages upon waking (or during dreams), we’re essentially returning from a first-person-death.

Nobody fears the interruptions in consciousness brought on by sleep – in fact, most people look forward to the break. Life is hard, and in sleep we can achieve undiluted rest. Our happy acceptance of dreamless sleep does not jibe with how we think of death, even though death provides for greater repose.

People may argue that sleep-death is not worth fearing because we always wake from it, whereas actual death is permanent. But the moment of waking, when we’re forced to re-engage with conscious existence, is routinely the most dread-filled part of our day. After waking, we often crave a return to sleep—in other words, we often crave the state of death. How can we fear a state that we regularly desire?

ii. Subtle Reminders

Repetition is a powerful teacher. Followers of some Eastern religions spend time in charnel grounds, observing decomposing bodies as a reminder that such a fate is natural and awaits us all. Many morticians develop Zen-like attitudes towards death, so familiar are they with the phenomenon. Though most of us lack (and would never want) open access to the dead and dying, we can develop some equanimity towards death through the use of occasional light reminders.

If, when life is stable, we remind ourselves that everything changes and that every living thing will die, we can be better prepared when favourable tides inescapably evanesce. Such reminders need not ruin good moments, and can actually encourage us to live more intently. For instance, when I’m with my beloved dog Tess, I sometimes remind myself that she will not always exist. It’s a sad fact, but makes my cherished time with her even dearer, and will hopefully reduce future grief at her passing.

Dropping thoughts of death into everyday life can prime our emotions to shatter less brutally when death strikes. And a greater appreciation of the transience of existence can inspire a more sincere connection to life, thus reducing the risk that death will trigger grievous regrets over moments missed or relationships not embraced.

iii. Thought Experiments

Simple thought experiments can cause us to question assumptions about life and death. One such example was given above, whereby we compared the ostensibly unfamiliar state of death to that of dreamless sleep. Some more imaginative examples are listed below.

What Continuity?:

We feel like the same person moment-to-moment and mostly like the same person day-to-day, but less so month-to-month, year-to-year, and decade-to-decade. When we look sufficiently far back, we feel little shared identity with our past selves. If our past selves no longer exist, are they essentially dead?

What is the difference between the death of a past self, and the changing of a self in the present? Can we think of death in the past and change in the present as different ways of describing the same thing?

Beam Me Up:

Imagine using the transporter from Star Trek. You disappear from Point A and are reconstituted at Point B. Have you been killed at Point A, replaced by a perfect doppelganger at Point B? To make it clearer, let’s say that you’ve been destroyed at Point A and your matter re-established at Point B—does it make sense to say that you’ve died, even if your pattern of experience still exists, just in a new place?

If you consider transporter use to involve death, then what about normal life, which involves a continuous ceasing of experience at one point (Point A), followed by experience at a new point (Point B)? As we move through life, our experience and the matter within our bodies change, so what essence lives on?

Silicon Substrates:

The computer scientist Jaron Lanier has come up with a hypothetical in which all of the neurons in a human brain are replaced by functioning silicon neurons. However, rather than replace the whole brain at once, only one neuron is replaced at a time.

Obviously, if your brain were 99.9% biology and 0.1% silicon, it would still be you. But what about a 10% silicon, then 50% silicon, and eventually 100% silicon brain, all installed without interrupting conscious experience. Was there a gradual death (and artificial birth) during the installation process, or was there no consequential change?

For now, this idea remains the stuff of science fiction. But with technological and scientific gains, such philosophizing may one day have real world applications.

iv. Spiritual Experience

We see death as a tragedy because it destroys all possibilities for pleasure, the crux of life’s craving. But for the loss of potential pleasure to be tragic, we must first crave pleasure, and of course, death extinguishes all craving. Where we don’t care to re-gain what’s been lost, such loss matters none. For example, the loss of an expensive watch is only problematic if its owner wishes to still have the watch—absent such a wish, there’s no problem. Although death is tragic for the living (who desire the company of the dearly departed) it is no tragedy for the dead (who are incapable of caring about what’s been lost).

This reasoning may make logical sense but do little for us emotionally. We’re so deeply programmed to crave life’s pleasures that we can’t help but dread the prospect of losing them. Conveniently, states of mind exist in which we’re temporarily freed from craving. By sampling such mind-states we can experience the desire-free aspect of death to better appreciate how the prospective end of pleasure is no problem if unaccompanied by desire.

These states of mind—which can be encouraged through meditation practice or by ingesting certain compounds—are typically called spiritual experiences. In addition to a loss of desire, spiritual experiences often involve an expansion of personal identity, where our sense of self encompasses everything of which we’re aware.[3] After identifying with the world outside of our skin, the death of the world inside our skin seems less grave; personal existence may end, but we know that suprapersonal existence, with which we’ve now been intimate, endures.[4]

v. Moral Philosophy

The field of moral philosophy bends intuition by contrasting what feels right against what reason suggests is right, forcing us to question moral matters that previously seemed self-evident. Exposure to moral philosophy can change how we think about right and wrong, and life and death. A philosophical position known as anti-natalism can compel us to make the most of life while lessening our fear of death, even though its tenets initially appear nihilistically depressing.

Put briefly, anti-natalism states that non-existence is preferable to existence, and advocates against conceiving new children (but does not advocate suicide). Because life is constantly unsatisfying, if not outright miserable, we should not create new loci of experience: where experience does not exist there can be no suffering. Of course, without experience there can be no happiness, but anti-natalists claim that the loss of potential happiness is more than compensated for by the reduction in suffering.[5]

Contemplation of the anti-natalist position, whether or not it affects procreation rates, can make non-existence less of a fright. Few of us have ever seriously canvassed the case for non-existence, and familiarity with arguments in favour are bound to result in a re-assessment. And, paradoxically, anti-natalism can actually breed compassion for ourselves and others, none of whom consented to lead these oft-challenging lives. Though most people scorn anti-natalism, one of its take-homes is universally embraced: “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”[6]

Conclusion

A fear of death is a natural and abiding part of human nature. Where this fear helps us continue living, it is useful. But we cannot keep death out of life, and in circumstances where it is unavoidable, our feelings towards death often do more harm than good.

As we look to a future that promises to radically extend the human lifespan, our collective unease with death will only worsen. If people no longer need accept that old age leads to death, every death will seem an avoidable tragedy, an unnecessary end at the perpetual prime of one’s life. To save ourselves some despair, we can work towards viewing death differently.

So long as we hope to enjoy life, death will always cause us pain. But by re-assessing our thoughts and feelings towards death, such pain need not be so crippling. And we may even find that thinking about death, when done skilfully, helps us lead fuller lives.

[1]Obviously, I’m presuming knowledge that can’t be had, but non-existence seems the most likely candidate for the state of death.

[2]A link for the morbidly curious.

[3]Which is truer representation of how things really are. Every object of awareness can only be known through changes in our brains, so when you look at the outside world, you’re really looking at the world inside of awareness.

[4]For unconvinced readers: some research has been done treating terminally ill patients with psychedelics, and they often report lowered death-anxiety.

[5]My goal here is not to make converts (anti-natalism is rather poorly suited for widespread acceptance), so I’ll leave it to readers to investigate further.

[6]Though commonly misattributed to Plato, this line originated with the Scotsman Ian Maclaren in the late 1800’s.