Concept
Death
Overview
Death is the end of life. It is the irreversible cessation of biological functions that sustain a living organism; however, the identification of the moment of death presents certain difficulties. Some organisms, such as the immortal jellyfish, are biologically immortal; nonetheless, they can still die from causes other than the effects of aging.
Many cultures and religions have a concept of an afterlife. The study of death is known as thanatology.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Death is discussed.
As far as the death of another person is concerned every man of culture will studiously avoid mentioning this possibility in the presence of the person in question. Only children ignore this restraint; they boldly threaten each other with the possibility of death, and are quite capable of giving expression to the thought of death in relation to the persons they love, as, for…
Sigmund Freud, Reflections on War and Death
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; the book is about it; opens on it
Anaxagoras thinks, that sleep makes the operations of the body to cease; it is a corporeal passion and affects not the soul. Death is the separation of the soul from the body. Leucippus, that sleep is only of the body; but when the smaller particles cause excessive evaporation from the soul's heat, this makes death; but these affections of death and sleep are of the body, not of the soul.
Plutarch, Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; author linked in the graph
But I see I must speak a little more carefully of the nature of death. For although the human soul is truly affirmed to be immortal, yet it also has a certain death of its own. For it is therefore called immortal, because, in a sense, it does not cease to live and to feel; while the body is called mortal, because it can be forsaken of all life, and cannot by itself live at all. The death, then, of the soul takes…
of Hippo Augustine, The City of God, Volume I
names the idea; states what it is; opens on it
With the appearance of this differentiation among multicellular organisms death became possible and expedient. Since then the soma of the higher organisms dies after a certain time from internal causes; the protozoa, however, remain immortal. Propagation, on the other hand, was not first introduced with death; it is on the contrary a primordial property of living matter like growth, in which it originated, and life…
Sigmund Freud, Beyond the pleasure principle
names the idea; commentary markers; states what it is; opens on it
Survival of bodily death is, however, a different matter from immortality: it may only mean a postponement of psychical death. It is immortality that men desire to believe in.
Bertrand Russell, What I believe
states what it is; names the idea; opens on it
Philosophers who discussed Death
- Walter Kaufmann (philosopher)
- Shelly Kagan
- Claude Lévi-Strauss
- Plutarch
- Philipp Mainländer
- Anders Sandberg
- Michel Henry
- The unexamined life is not worth living
- Julio Cabrera (philosopher)
Related ideas
- Cognition
- Afterlife
- Greek language
- Hindus
- Philosophy
- Abrahamic religions
- Homeostasis
- Kama
- Stress (biology)
- Jewish eschatology
- Spirit (animating force)
- Suicide
- Karma
- Saṃsāra
- Cremation
- Moksha
- Latin
- Life
- The Guardian
- Organism
- Metabolism
- Natural selection
- Western world
- Qualia
Opposing perspectives
Place in the tradition
Part of Absurdism.