Introduction to the Blog

This is a blog authored by students in a course on the philosophy of death at Otterbein University in Westerville, OH. Students will be posting about the issues and readings they are thinking about during their semester. Among the questions they will be addressing are these: Do we have reason to think we survive our deaths? Is immortality something to be wished for or feared? What is the proper attitude to have toward the deaths of others? Is grief a healthy emotion, or something best avoided? How should we think of our own deaths? Should we be afraid? Content? What are the appropriate ways to treat the bodies of people who have died? Other questions may arise along the way, so if you have found your way here from the internet somewhere, stay a while and offer a comment on the posts.

Here are some of the things we will be reading:

Todd May, Death
John Perry, A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality
George Saunders, Lincoln in the Bardo
Caitlin Doughty, From Here to Eternity
Leo Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Ilyitch
Karel Capek, The Makropoulos Secret
Lucretius, On the Nature of Things
Epicurus, "Letter to Menoecceus"
Seneca, "Consolation to Marcia"
Martha Nussbaum, The Therapy of Desire
Michael Cholbi, "Finding the Good in Grief"
Selections from Xunzi, Mozi, and Zhuangzi on mourning

Comments

  1. PhanawnApril 18, 2019 at 11:33 PM

    Lucretius argues man’s bad behavior origin is his fear of death. He insists man overlaps the boundaries of right to attain power urged by fear of poverty and disgrace. People believe poverty and disgrace is essentially close to death. He concludes the fear of poverty and disgrace is connected to the fear of death causes bad behavior. People fear the unknown. Regardless if it’s fear or darkness or the future. As man we are intellectually superior than else sharing earth, accustomed to attaining knowledge. When that intellectual power is taken from you, irrational decisions can lead to bad behavior. We have a shared existence with death for eternity but remains unknown. Second bad behavior is caused by influences. Before any action a decision is made every decision has optional counter choices. Your influences make you think about how you choose that choice. Whether its routine quick response or deep contemplation. People only fear poverty if they thought life’s only value is in power and wealth. Bad behavior is not a affect of fear of death because behavior is a reflection of your influences and people don’t fear death it’s the fear of the unknown, due to societal influences causing thought barriers.

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