Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On Monday, December 22, 2014, Bruce Kellett <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On Monday, December 22, 2014, Bruce Kellett
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
wrote:
John Clark wrote:
On Sun, Dec 21, 2014 , Bruce Kellett
<[email protected]>
wrote:
>An instinct for self-preservation is unrelated to
whether or not
you have a fear of death, or of oblivion
Unrelated?? Don't be ridiculous! Why the hell do you imagine
Evolution
invented the fear of death in the first place?
Evolution did not "invent a fear of death". That is purely
cultural,
and is not even associated with consciousness -- it comes
only with
self-awareness and an inner narrative. Evolution gave living
things
an instinct for self-preservation. But you can have such an
instinct
operating healthily and still not fear death. Fear of death
probably
comes from a fear of the unknown, and is linked to the fear of
prolonged suffering. But oblivion is oblivion -- it is not
something
to be feared because no-one has ever experienced it, or can ever
experience it.
Following that reasoning, do you believe there is nothing wrong
with murder?
How on earth did you get that from what I said?
If there's nothing wrong with oblivion, and murder leads to oblivion,
then there's nothing wrong with murder.
You slip too easily from "oblivion is not something to be feared" to
"oblivion [death] is a universal good to be sought by and for everyone".
Do you really think that the only reason people don't go out and commit
widespread random murder is that they fear oblivion? The reason most
people don't commit murder is that they think that murder is wrong. That
has got nothing to do with fearing anything. Sure, for some religious
people, the reason they refrain from doing wrong things is fear of
eternal punishment. But that is a perversion of religion even more than
it is a lapse of common sense.
Bruce
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