Suicide - The ultimate frontier?

[skakos]

Commiting suicide is a very interesting subject for philosophical discussion.

I do not agree with the "easy" explanation some give: that those who commit suicide are just sick people who need treatment.
Surely there are such cases. But I do not think these are even the majority.
I believe that commiting suicide is the ultimate evidence of human free will.
Some chooses to deliberately end his/ her life.
If this life is all we have, if there is nothing else beyond this world, then it would be impossible for someone sane to make that choice.
I have not (of course) concluded on the matter, but I believe it holds some of the truths we seek when it comes to the philosophy of life and existence.

What do you think?

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Some people just don't enjoy life very much. I don't think suicide is necessarily an indicator of illness at all. I don't see why those who want to, shouldn't end their lives; in fact I think there should be special clinics for it. There are far too many people anyway. There is an old Charlton Heston film called Soylent Green where there were special clinics where you could go when you had had enough of life. You could have your choice of music playing, with a screen showing your favourite scenery. We have the ability to do that now. Why should people have to live with unbearable grief, pain, or other misery? If we have the techology, then that technology belongs to the entire human race. It's a basic human right. Instead, people have to risk brain-damage, or being disfigured and debilitated for the rest of their lives due to botched suicide attempts.

[Skip]

If this life is all we have, if there is nothing else beyond this world, then it would be impossible for someone sane to make that choice.

That just means you haven't seen many of the lives that human societies impose on people.
Would you say the spy in vintage films, when caught by the enemy, is insane to bite down on that cyanide tooth? Was the officer who had him fitted with that hollow tooth before sending him out insane? But the KGB or Gestapo who is planning to torture him for however long he can be made to last, isn't insane?
The 85-year-old woman with pancreatic cancer is insane to want to end it - but the judge who [though he's pronounced a death sentence on a retarded boy, who probably shot somebody] refuses permission is sane?

The Catholic Church, in all its holy wisdom, outlawed suicide very soon after selling the European peasantry on heaven. That was a perfectly sane thing to do, since they intended to make those peasants' lives as miserable as they possibly could, and didn't want them bailing on the drudgery, escaping any masters' whips.

It's insane to suffer if you can do something about it. It's a helluva lot more criminally insane to inflict preventable suffering on other people. I'm not sure just where professional torturers and their bosses score on the sanity curve.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

If this life is all we have, if there is nothing else beyond this world, then it would be impossible for someone sane to make that choice.

That just means you haven't seen many of the lives that human societies impose on people.
Would you say the spy in vintage films, when caught by the enemy, is insane to bite down on that cyanide tooth? Was the officer who had him fitted with that hollow tooth before sending him out insane? But the KGB or Gestapo who is planning to torture him for however long he can be made to last, isn't insane?
The 85-year-old woman with pancreatic cancer is insane to want to end it - but the judge who [though he's pronounced a death sentence on a retarded boy, who probably shot somebody] refuses permission is sane?

The Catholic Church, in all its holy wisdom, outlawed suicide very soon after selling the European peasantry on heaven. That was a perfectly sane thing to do, since they intended to make those peasants' lives as miserable as they possibly could, and didn't want them bailing on the drudgery, escaping any masters' whips.

It's insane to suffer if you can do something about it. It's a helluva lot more criminally insane to inflict preventable suffering on other people. I'm not sure just where professional torturers and their bosses score on the sanity curve.

Well said.

[hammock]

Suicide - The ultimate frontier?

New territory for whom? The Abrahamic-influenced culture of the West? It's long history of autothanatophobia and classic felo-de-se stigmatizations?

"Zzzzzzzz...." sounds wafting from the Nipponese audience watching the "groundbreaking" Euro/Anglophone-world documentary about suicide. Its Shatner-esque version of "Where no man has gone before" swooshing across the movie screen for two tedious hours.

[SpheresOfBalance]

Commiting suicide is a very interesting subject for philosophical discussion.

I do not agree with the "easy" explanation some give: that those who commit suicide are just sick people who need treatment.
Surely there are such cases. But I do not think these are even the majority.
I believe that commiting suicide is the ultimate evidence of human free will.
Some chooses to deliberately end his/ her life.
If this life is all we have, if there is nothing else beyond this world, then it would be impossible for someone sane to make that choice.
In my opinion you were doing so well until this line, as suicide can indeed be contemplated and fulfilled by the sane, an ultimate deed of the only true human sacrifice. It would seem your resolve here comes from selfishness and fear, not philosophical reason. But that's par for the human course, or at least the majority.

I have not (of course) concluded on the matter, but I believe it holds some of the truths we seek when it comes to the philosophy of life and existence.
I see it only as selfishness and fear, that rules your resolve, and not any innate truth, necessarily contained in the philosophy of life and existence.


What do you think?

That no one in emotional distress should read my words or any that shall be posted in this thread, and act upon them as if factual in nature, to be used as any sort of recommendation, as to how they must proceed, especially if one is young, below the age of, well for me it probably would have to be, say 40 or so. Of course the law would say otherwise.

[henry quirk]

More like: Suicide, the Ultimate Surrender.

Which, of course, is *fine...a body doesn't want to live anymore: who am I to say 'no'?

Suicide: not an option I'll exercise, but that's just 'me'.









*this applies to strangers and folks I don't give a flip about ('you wanna off yourself? who are you again?')...now: when it comes to some one I value (love), I'm far more likely to sit on 'em, tie 'em up, lock 'em in a closet, than just sit quietly while they eat Drano