The Meaning of Death

[Philosophy Now]

Laszlo Makay, George Marosan Jr. and David Vatai consider whether death destroys meaning or creates it.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/139/The_Meaning_of_Death

[Gary Childress]

Laszlo Makay, George Marosan Jr. and David Vatai consider whether death destroys meaning or creates it.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/139/Th ... g_of_Death

Good topic. I'll need to renew my subscription so I can read the article.

[Gary Childress]

Nice article. I enjoyed reading it. I like articles that reflect on existential themes. They're usually articles that almost anyone can understand as a human being. No Ph.D. is necessary in many cases. They're concerns of just about everyone.

As someone with bipolar disorder, I think about death quite a bit. I've been terrified by it most of my life and even had paranoid episodes where I thought I was about to die. One time my mother gave me my medicine after I had skipped it for several days and I thought she was trying to poison me, so out of touch I was. But for some reason, after some consideration, I willingly took the pill, thinking it was going to kill me. It didn't. I was better the next day after some sleep.

It's arguably true that what happens after I die will not affect me after that in any way. However, if I have lived my life well, maybe even heroically, then it is somehow kind of soothing to think that after I die, perhaps good things will be said about me (or at the very least nothing bad will be said). Perhaps my legacy will live on in ether space in the form of all the posts I have made in all the different forums I have visited. Wouldn't it be neat if someone a hundred years from now combs some sort of Internet archive and stumbles across a post I wrote? Of course, I've written some lousy posts too, so it could go either way, I guess. Or it may all just go down in the annals of anonymous never reviewed history.

Yes. I think life can have some "meaning" in spite of being finite, even if there is no soul and even if the Universe will come to an end someday. I still live and go through the daily routine as though it matters. But it is indeed, remarkably disconcerting to think of an absolute end. I wonder why that is?

[PeteJ]

Laszlo Makay, George Marosan Jr. and David Vatai consider whether death destroys meaning or creates it.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/139/Th ... g_of_Death

Wow, The authors clearly have not a clue about what they are discussing. Why do people write articles on subjects they do not understand? It seems be a common practice in philosophy.

Those who wish to investigate the meaning of death have no choice but to study those who investigate these things. Not one of them is mentioned in the article. Not even the Buddha. Madness. This reminds me why I don't subscribe.

[seeds]

Laszlo Makay, George Marosan Jr. and David Vatai consider whether death destroys meaning or creates it.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/139/Th ... g_of_Death

If we approach the subject of death from a more spiritual perspective (as opposed to the purely materialistic perspective of the article’s authors)...

...then I suggest that the best (or at least the most hopeful and “natural”) meaning we can have for the inevitability of death, is to look upon it as being a “final contraction and push” that will deliver our soul out of the cosmic womb of God’s spirit body (the universe), and into the light of true reality.
_______

[Impenitent]

Las't... that could have been the final contraction...

-Imp

[RCSaunders]

Laszlo Makay, George Marosan Jr. and David Vatai consider whether death destroys meaning or creates it.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/139/Th ... g_of_Death

The wonderful thing about the meaning of death is the dead don't care.

[These are questions so-called philosophers ask? They haven't figured out what life is and their worried about death? Good grief!]

[commonsense]

Death is what gives meaning to life. If it weren’t finite, all the accomplishments of a life are diminished since any accomplishment has the potential to be eclipsed later on.

[Dubious]

Nothing which means anything to the dead.