Death

Why fear death? It is the most beautiful adventure in life. CHARLES FROHMAN, final words before going down with the Lusitania, 7 May, 1915.

Death ends it all. There cannot be anything beyond it. We die because our bodies have been programmed to collapse at a certain time. This time has not been destined but left to statistically gyrations. In the US., 45,000 people will die every year in auto accidents. Your chance of becoming the statistics are about 2 in 10,000, much better than your chances of winning a lottery. Yet, we bet on the lottery and never think of losing life on the highway. Death comes mostly when are old but it also comes because the natural law of selection and evolution requires that the species turn over to allow for regression of defective genes and amplification of genes needed to cope better with the challenges of life.

Our emotional attachment with death is based on our communal nature. We get used to some people being around through their chemical stimulation. When they are not around us we undergo a process of withdrawal, akin to withdrawal of a cocaine junkie. In many cultures, where interpersonal relationships are not as strong, death is rarely a sad event. In some, it is even a matter of joy. Some cultures make death a celebration time, others simply stifle any posthumous discussion of the deceased.

Plato raised a query whether man should fear death? Fear being a survival response prepares us to avert the forces which can harm us. But no fear can prepare us to avert death; thus, fear of death is not a rational response. Being anxious about death has more to do with loss of love and loss of material objects and also to our security or suffering of those dependent on us. Fear of death can only be removed if the human mind is made to accept fallibility, the need to moderate emotional attachment with other humans and total elimination of attachment to things material. Belief in life after death and the Day and Judgment reinforces the frame of mind which inculcates fear of death. The freedom of choice is ours to make, if we do want to live a life free of fear of death?