The Relevance of Death

Todd May believes that our death is the single most important fact about us.  He bases this claim on the fact the all of us will die, the fact that we're all aware that we're going to die, and the fact that our death could happen at any given moment.  While all these facts about us and our inevitable deaths are true, I don't believe that they necessarily defend the claim that death is the most important thing about us.  Rather than being the most important thing about us, maybe it would be better to say that death is what defines the way in which we live our lives.

Each individual person's life is defined by the opportunity costs they choose to pay when deciding how they are going to lead their life.  Whether they want to devote their life to cancer research or have a steady job that allows them to raise a family, our life choices are what define us as people, not our death.  Our death wraps up our life and its experiences sure, but it's not the fact that we're leaving life that's so important, it's what we've decided to leave behind that is.

The awareness of death that is unique to humans allows us to gauge what it is in life that we would most like to accomplish before our time is up.  So if anything, it is the fact that we as humans are aware of our future death that is the most important fact about us.  This self awareness allows us to focus our attention on what goals and projects we'd like to accomplish before death inevitably can cut them short. 

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