Why Do You Live?

Why Live?

Just to get you thinking.


A radical environmentalist rant is not the reason I'm writing this.  I wanted to get your attention, though.  I want to challenge some of the fundamental assumptions you have about your life.  I *do* want you to think.

What I will say is that the paradigm we're using is all wrong.

Just like the environmental rant above, this isn't the heart of the matter, but it *is* worth reading.

I'm not going to apologize for this.  I'm going to speak to residents of the United States, in general. and those who follow Judeo-Christian faiths, in particular.  That's my society and religious background .  It's all I know.  If you live elsewhere or worship differently, the messages will still apply but the examples may be unfamiliar.

You might not like this book's subject and its point of view.  In fact, I will propose ideas contrary to anything you've ever heard.  I wouldn't be surprised if you slam the book shut and/or throw it away.  I would ask you, however, *not* to toss it out.  Instead, pick it up every once in a while and read just a little bit more.  Eventually you might be able to read more.  Perhaps you will get through the arguments and to the conclusion.  That might be a good thing, but I'll let you decide.

o o o

The problem with looking for a cogent argument to read in favor of suicide is that a prospective author might have chosen to depart this Earth before completing it.  I mean, Why bother?

I have a bit of time to write my thoughts.  I feel constrained by ethical considerations I will explain later to stick around for some number of days.  Perhaps there will be time enough to publish my ideas, receive feedback and see counterarguments.  I cannot imagine being talked out of my position but maybe it will turn my philosophy into something viral that takes over the world.  While unlikely, that would be a good thing for the planet.

The problem with even beginning to discuss the subject of suicide is that there are so many assumptions about human life ingrained in society.

Many people think human life is "sacred."  As well, many think the human soul is immortal.  After the physical body dies, the soul goes to an afterlife elsewhere (heaven, hell, purgatory, perdition, paradise, reincarnation).

I'll talk about religion more, much more, later.

Even if not sacred, many think human life is superior to, and more valuable than, the lives of other living things.

obligation to stay

Why do you live?
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Inertia.
Nature demands it.
My religion demands it.
Society demands it.


Why am I here?
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I don't know, but there are some ideas many people believe with which I don't agree.

"God put you here.  Every human life is sacred."  I'm going to talk about religion at length later.

If society had different norms, if the decision to live or die were freely available all the time without stigma or restriction, people could *choose* to live or die, day-by-day or minute-by-minute.  There would be unique reasons people chose for living, but I made a list of ones I think would be popular.

What other ones do you think belong on the list?

affirmative reasons to live (i.e. not "inertia" or "it's difficult to kill yourself")
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love of a person or other living thing
love of things or activities
career
hobbies/interests
addiction (alcohol, drugs, sex & love)
anticipation of something good
celebration of one's own physicality -- dance or martial arts or some other activity where people may delight in their kinesthetic sense
family (children primarily, but also siblings & parents)
loyalties (friends or love of country or God)
religion says you must
society says you must
Should You Be Alive Now?

"I'm allergic to selfish"

Congratulations on having the curiosity to keep reading instead of moving to your next task in life while simply saying, "Yes, of course!  How can you even ask?"

What are my credentials to talk about Life and Death?  It's not like I've been dead yet, right?

All I can say is that I used to be really smart and I've been giving the matter a lot of thought.  Why "used to be"?  The Jeopardy TV quiz show had an "answer" a while back.  Something like "If you had a score of 140 on THIS test, you'd be scary-smart."  The question was "An IQ test."  At age 14, I had that beat.  To put this into perspective, Mensa (the high IQ society) only accepts people in the top 2% of the intelligence curve, scores 131 and higher.  Once you climb to my score of 141, we're talking about the top 1/3 of 1%.  In a US population of 300 million people, 6 million could join Mensa.  I'm in a group of only 1 million.  If there are one million others as smart or smarter than I am, what's the big deal?  The big deal is that 299 million *aren't* as smart.

That sounds all "elitist," I know.  But it isn't as though being "IQ smart" means I'm "socially smart" or "emotionally smart" or successful, or many other things people talk about.

Rising Plague p.168
As Dr. Arnold Epstein, chairman of the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health, recently said, "The U. S. is the one country in the world where [people] think death is optional."
C. D Baker et al., "Health of the Nation--Coverage for all Americans," NE Jour Med 359(2008) 777-80