I'm amazed how no one seems to fear death

[Oaky]

Death is inevitable. We will all experience it. It is accepted and so time is just my walk to my death. I need not be afraid of that. I am far more afraid of my status when I die and the process of becoming dead itself.

 

[AOA]

I usually don't fear death, but I am all too aware that when the time impends for me (or anyone) to face the likelihood of death it is literally the most inescapable, most horrifying sensation you'll ever feel. 'Cause when the time comes... *who knows what you'll think.*

 

[miss fortune]

Everyone dies. I try not to be afraid for my entire life because well, that sounds kinda shitty.

I don't do anything to severely hasten it, though. I certainly don't want to die, but as a young healthy person, it's kinda silly to dwell on it, don't you think?

Quality of life is important too, not just quantity.

as happens quite often, you said exactly what I was thinking, only more nicely succinctly

 

[rav3n]

Ever considered that they are lying or deluded? I'd guess most who claim not to fear it are in one of those two categories.

The evidence is that the vast majority of the population fears death very strongly.

More that we fear not having a reasonably long life than fearing inevitable death when we're old. So why court what you don't desire? I avoid dogs who display hostile behaviour towards me when unrestrained but I don't really fear dogs per se. I fear pain.

 

[ReflecTcelfeR]

I think it may be the fact that if you can separate fear from death, fear is now avoidable. We want to avoid fear not death.

 

[Qlip]

I'd love to say how irrational it is to fear death, but the fact is I'm not afraid of death because I don't have a very good imagination. The scenario seems unreal to me. I think when the idea becomes more palpable I'll be able to handle it gracefully, because I'm pretty flexible when having to come to terms with changes and the unknown.

 

[Tamske]

I guess lots of people don't fear death because it seems so far away you can ignore it. Moreover you can't avoid it. It's more useful (genetically speaking) to program a fear of spiders or heights or a crowd surrounding you (barbaric enemies, on the scale of genetic evolution the "memory" of barbaric enemies is a very recent one), because that could make you avoid possibly dangerous things that CAN be avoided. Which is genetically useful because it will improve your chances to reproduce. Remember any gene which improves the chance of itself being copied will be "rewarded" by lots of copies and thus survive.

On a more personal level: I'm quite afraid of death, but I'm able to put that fear away and rationalize it. I can think about death, feel very afraid, and the next moment think about something else and make the fear go away. Which is not the case for some other fears of mine. In such a survey I'd put those before death.
I'm afraid because it means the end. After death I can't finish my novel, so I've got to finish it NOW. Same for any other plans (read: mad ideas). Which are, of course, too numerous to count, let alone realise them! My image of death is a bunch of unfinished projects being thrown away. Or worse: being kept "because they are mum's (...)" but with no intention of ever finishing them or displaying them, and with complaints of them taking up too much place...

 

[Mole]

It's in our genes.

All animals fear death. And as we are meaning creating animals, we fear death along with every other animal.

And being meaning creating animals, we rationalise death. And religion is the prime means we use to rationalise death.

But no matter how much we rationalise, along with all other animals, we have a visceral fear of death.

And if we didn't have a visceral fear of death, we wouldn't be here.

So we can say we have been selected to fear death, just as we have been selected to fear snakes and to fear falling. Such visceral fears have guaranteed our survival and the survival of our genes.

 

[nolla]

All animals fear death.

But they don't fear it before it is a real possibility. They don't have a chronic fear of death. I actually should have made this distinction in my own post. Of course I will be scared shitless when someone points a loaded gun to my head or a lion jumps out of the bushes, but that was not what I considered this topic to be about..

 

[Mole]

The Religious Animal

But they don't fear it before it is a real possibility. They don't have a chronic fear of death. I actually should have made this distinction in my own post. Of course I will be scared shitless when someone points a loaded gun to my head or a lion jumps out of the bushes, but that was not what I considered this topic to be about..

Yes, we are the only animal that consciously fears death. And in fact we are so conscious of death that we have created ten thousand religions to rationalise it.

And in my opinion, we are the only animal that is conscious. Of course some other animals look conscious, particularly pets, because they have emotions. But I don't believe they are conscious of their emotions as we are conscious of ours.

So not only do we have a visceral fear of death like all other animals but we are conscious of our visceral fear of death.

This is a very painful situation to be in. And it is a situation no other animal finds itself in. So we are the only animal that has created religion.

 

[Risen]

"Death comes to us all." ^ avatar

" Do not fear Death. Death is always at our side. When we show fear, it jumps at us faster than light. But, if we do not show fear, it casts its eye upon us gently and then guides us into infinity... "

"Men only think of their past right before their death, as if they were searching frantically for proof that they were alive. "

 

[Risen]

"Death comes to us all." ^ avatar

" Do not fear Death. Death is always at our side. When we show fear, it jumps at us faster than light. But, if we do not show fear, it casts its eye upon us gently and then guides us into infinity... "

"Men only think of their past right before their death, as if they were searching frantically for proof that they were alive. "

 

[nolla]

This is a very painful situation to be in. And it is a situation no other animal finds itself in. So we are the only animal that has created religion.

I agree. But the problem was that we attacked conscious fear by conscious methods. Instead of a rational religion we should have chosen the irrational.

 

[A window to the soul]

So not only do we have a visceral fear of death like all other animals but we are conscious of our visceral fear of death.

This is a very painful situation to be in. And it is a situation no other animal finds itself in. So we are the only animal that has created religion.

I'm not afraid to die because I have no doubt there's a God up in heaven and heaven is... well, heavenly.

 

[Kasper]

Death is inevitable. Why fear this?

My response too.

Spiders, public speaking and zoo bears are fine too.

Sting rays tho *shudder* they're so slinky and unnaturally flat!

 

[Zoom]

When I worked with the elderly as a caregiver there was a scent to death, despair, and the dying - it permeates retirement homes, and is a smell I hate. There was much death there, and it knocked some interesting lessons into me early on. The process of dying - and dying alone - were much worse for many of them than the actual thought of death.

I am not at the point where my end is a nearing point and a concern hovering in the peripherals of my psyche, but that doesn't mean I am unaware of it or blithely ignoring it. In fact, the exposure I had to it is part of what made me develop the drive to not take an ounce of this existence for granted and has given a certain perspective to any and all shite thrown oneself in life.

I'm glad of it.

 

[ZPowers]

I agree with the "inevitable" bit. I'm scared of dying, that is to say, I'm scared for those moments when I am actually dying, but I'm not scared of being dead (I'm not a believer in an afterlife, but to be scared of non-existence is to be scared of, well, nothing). That probably doesn't make sense, but there it is.

 

[skylights]

i fear death a bit, but there's not really much i can do about it, so...

i just figure there are a lot of other things more worth my worry.

(/spiritual agnostic)

 

[Arthur Schopenhauer]

I am certainly afraid of death, although not constantly or overwhelmingly.

Oddly enough, you could say that my fear of death has contributed to a wonderfully strange fear of life. I really don't know if all my fears are very reasonable though.

I am both comforted and discomforted by nonexistence... But I've found the entire affair surrounding that point to be completely uncomfortable all-around...

 

[erm]

I guess lots of people don't fear death because it seems so far away you can ignore it.

Yes, but people who fear spiders aren't scared of spiders miles away.

Being scared of something is obviously only relevant when you are actually confronted with that thing.

But they don't fear it before it is a real possibility. They don't have a chronic fear of death. I actually should have made this distinction in my own post.

Sounds like an important distinction. I didn't sense anything chronic about what was described in the OP. Chronic implies that you keep vividly confronting it in your own imagination.

I'm not afraid to die because I have no doubt there's a God up in heaven and heaven is... well, heavenly.

But what if the threat of death is right in front of you? All the consequences (leaving family behind etc) plus the raw reactionary fear seem unlikely to vanish.

At least, when someone shoots up a place, the Christians run like everyone else. Some people genuinely don't run, but those are usually the ones who have had training or previous experience (from marines to monks). Even then, most of those people I've heard mention it say they still fear it.