Death as a philosophical problem. Philosophy about the meaning of death The problem of life after death philosophy

3. Life after death

3.1 Immortal soul

The immortal soul leaves the body and rushes to its eternal abode.

The immortality of the soul looks somehow one-sided: it appears after birth (passes from the dying to those born; although, as you know, more people die than are born): it is formed over several years. She is changeable.

A believer in God the Creator prepares for the afterlife "anti-existence" already during his lifetime.

After being on Earth, the human soul says goodbye to the body and goes to the kingdom of the gods, where it is rewarded for what it did during material life. The immortal soul retains some connections with the material world, provided that the memory of it is preserved in the world.

The soul is indivisible, incorporeal, unextended and therefore indestructible. Nothing can be clearer than the fact that the body of nature is subject to movement, change hourly; such a being is indestructible by the power of nature, that is, the human soul is naturally immortal.

The individual soul never disappears. She does not die and is not born. She just changes bodies like a person changes clothes. This is perfect knowledge. As being in one body, the soul passes from childhood to old age, so at the moment of death it passes into another body. The soul is destined to live in this particular body for a certain number of years.

Simply put: if there is no immortality of the soul, then it must be invented to strengthen moral principles and free a beneficent person from the fear of death, and strengthen it in a sinner. In any case, a person needs to live righteously, overcome the fear of death and believe in the immortality of the soul.

Scientists and all people in general should strive to escape from the cycle of repeated births and deaths. We deny the existence of the soul on the grounds that we cannot see or feel it with our gross senses. But in fact, there are many things that we cannot see, such as air, radio waves, or sound. The soul knows neither birth nor death. It has never existed and will never cease to exist. She is unborn, eternal, always existing and primordial. It does not die when the body dies. Death in science is the natural cessation of life in a biological system. In philosophy, the death of a person is considered as a social phenomenon that requires rational perception and comprehension. Even the reconstruction of Neanderthal burials testifies to their ideas about the unfinished nature of human existence with death. This idea of ​​the ancients later led to the concept of an immortal, incorporeal soul.

3.2 Types of immortality

Immortality is a concept denoting the overcoming of mortality and oblivion of a person and human race. In everyday life in religious, philosophical and scientific literature it is used in various senses. The following types of immortality are possible:

1. The actual mental and bodily continuation of the life of an individual after death (personal immortality).

2. Existence after death of some impersonal psychic entity, which is absorbed by an absolutely spiritual substance, God (metaphysical immortality).

3. Reaching on the ground or in human mind eternal quality of life (ideal)

4. Other types of immortality.

A person's faith in immortality and the desire for it plays the role of a psychological guarantor of the integrity of generic human existence. They provide psychological protection of a person from the fear of death and enable him to live a full life, despite the knowledge of the inevitability of his death.

Conclusion

Natural science is an integral and important part of the spiritual culture of mankind, acting simultaneously as an indispensable condition for the development of material culture.

A person lives among people, and many people around him are subject to his spiritual influence, and they, in turn, influence him. Consequently, neuropsychic energy is organized in the form of a generalized social superpersonality. She lives long before birth this person and continues to live after his death. In this world, his social immortality is manifested.

The world around us is huge. It would seem that disorder and chaos reign in it, but everything in it is interconnected and interdependent, grasped by feedbacks and cooperatively coordinated. Between all objects of the Universe, starting from an elementary particle and a living cell and ending with stars and the Galaxy, there is a constant exchange of energy.

The most complex phenomena in the Universe, as it turned out with the help of my control work, are the birth of life, the emergence of living organisms and man, who is a perfect rational being, and his disappearance, departure from life to another world. Questions about the origin and essence of life have long been the subject of human interest in his desire to understand the world around him, understand himself and determine his place.

Thus, it can be concluded that the established educational literature definitions of life, death and immortality are varied. There are many such definitions ad infinitum. Many scientists gave interpretations of the definitions of such concepts as life, death and immortality.

There is no place on earth where there are no living beings. Deep underground we find worms, under water fish and other life forms, in the sky a lot of birds.

In conclusion, I would like to note that all living organisms are born and die, and this cannot be changed in any way. These are the laws of nature.

After all, this is what the concept of “immortality” is for. Let better people think that after their death they will come to life again and will continue to exist; than they will fear death.

I would like to conclude my control work that all the goals and objectives of the work I set were fulfilled and reflected in the main part of the work. I considered the concepts of the origin of life, the foundations of death and immortality, given to them general definitions, as well as the opinions of various scientists about these concepts are described. And in this control work, I gave an idea about the human soul and its properties.

List of sources used

I Scientific and methodological literature

1.R.K. Balandin, A.I. Barashkov, A.A. Gorbovsky and others. "Life, death, immortality?.." Minsk "POLYMYA" 1996. – 254 p.

2.A.Ch. Bhaktivedanta Life comes from life. - M.: 1999. – 259 p.

3. Gorbachev V.V. Concepts of modern natural science: 2nd edition. – M.: “Publishing house “ONIKSXXI century”, 2005. – 325 p.

4. Gorelov A.A. Concepts of modern natural science. - M.: Center, 2000. - 356 p.

5. World Encyclopedia: / Main. scientific ed. and comp. A.A. Gritsanov - M .: AST, Minsk: Harvest, Sovr. writer, 2004. - 834 p.

6.S.G. Mamontov et al. Fundamentals of biology: A course for self-education. - M.: Enlightenment, 1992. - 386 p.

7. Raymond Moody "Life after life", Leningrad, 1991. - 325 p.

8. Timofeeva S.S., Medvedeva S.A., Larionova E.Yu. Fundamentals of modern natural science and ecology / Rostov n / D: Phoenix, 2004. - 326 p.

9. Khoroshavina S.G. Lecture course "Concepts of modern natural science" Rostov-on-Don: "Phoenix", 2000. - 356 p.

10. Concepts of modern natural science Rostov n / D: "Phoenix", 2000. - 358 p.

II. Newspaper article

1. Newspaper "Meridian", May, No. 15, 2006

... ". However, this growth does not have those qualitative and quantitative characteristics that are inherent in the growth of living things. Between the properties that characterize the living, there is a dialectical unity that manifests itself in time and space throughout the entire organic world, at all levels of the organization of the living. Levels of organization of the living In the organization of the living, molecular, cellular, ...

Forests on soil that does not contain mycorrhizal fungi contribute small amounts of forest soil to it, for example, when sowing acorns, soil from an old oak forest (Kontrimavicius, 1982). 5. The biological essence of mycorrhiza Seedlings of many species of forest trees grown in a sterile nutrient solution and then transferred to meadow soil will grow poorly and even die from a lack of ...

Require revision in this direction indicated by me. This has important social implications, but even more religious and moral implications. It would be completely wrong to confuse this type of philosophy with the philosophy of pragmatism or with the philosophy of life. The personalist revolution, which has never really happened in the world, means the overthrow of the power of objectification, the destruction of natural necessity, ...

Here is how the author speaks about this in Literaturnaya Gazeta, noting his personal interest in a positive solution to the problem of euthanasia. In his opinion, in this case we are talking about "one of the important rights - the right of a seriously ill person to an easy (without suffering), dignified and quick death when the person himself considers it timely." Is it possible to raise serious objections to...

* This work is not a scientific work, is not a final qualifying work and is the result of processing, structuring and formatting the collected information, intended to be used as a source of material for self-preparation of educational work.

Introduction

1. The concept of death

2. Life after death (religious point of view)

3. Life after death ( scientific point vision)

4. Numerous stories of those who have been "beyond".

Conclusion

Bibliography

Introduction

Since ancient times, man has asked himself the question of what is the essence of human existence. Many philosophers and thinkers tried to answer why a person lives, why he came into this world, why he dies and what happens to him after death.

For Socrates, the meaning of human life lies in philosophizing, in constant self-knowledge, in the eternal search for oneself through testing. Overcoming ignorance involves the search for what is good and evil, beautiful and ugly, truth and error. According to Plato, happiness (bliss) is possible only in the afterlife, when immortal soul- the ideal essence in man - is freed from the fetters of the mortal body. The nature of man, according to Plato, is determined by his soul, more precisely, by soul and body, but with the primacy of the soul over the body, the divine immortal principle over the mortal, bodily. According to the teachings of Plato, the human soul consists of three parts: the first of them expresses the ideal - reasonable ability, the second - lustful-volitional, the third - instinctive-affective. Depending on which of these parts prevails, the fate of a person, the direction of his activity, the meaning of his life depends.

When asked what a person should dream about, Antisthenes said: "About dying happy." “He who wants to be immortal,” he said, “must lead a pious and righteous life.” "States perish when they cease to distinguish the bad from the good."

Unlike Slavic paganism (whose main ideological dominants were the anthropomorphization of nature and the naturalization of man) and the Hellenic type of culture (where the heroized man was the measure of all things), Christianity adopted by Russia dictated a qualitatively different concept of man. The basis of all foundations and the measure of all things has become the highest spiritual substantial principle.

Through the realization of one's smallness, sinfulness, even insignificance before the absoluteness of the ideal and in striving for it, a person received the prospect of spiritual development, his consciousness becomes dynamically directed towards moral perfection.

The desire for a consistently materialistic solution to the problem of man was vividly expressed in the writings of La Mettrie, Didri and Helvetius. The leitmotif of their philosophical anthropology is the position of the material unity of man, the closest dependence of the "capabilities of the soul", all mental processes, from sensation to thinking, from the nervous system and brain, from the state of "bodily substance". In accordance with this point of view, the death of the body was considered as the reason for the cessation of all mental activity of a person, as a natural and logical completion of earthly life, the only possible and real one.

Life is noble only because there is death in it, there is an end, indicating that a person is destined for another, higher life. In infinite time, the meaning is never revealed, the meaning lies in eternity. But between life in time and life in eternity lies an abyss, through which the transition is possible only through death, through the horror of the break. Heidegger said that everyday life paralyzes the anguish associated with death. Ordinary causes only a low fear of death, trembling before it as before a source of nonsense. Death is not only the meaninglessness of life in this world, its perishability, but also a sign coming from the depths, indicating the existence of a higher meaning of life.

1. The concept of death

Death is a completely natural phenomenon, it has played a useful and necessary role in the course of long biological evolution. What is death like? Humanity has been asking this question since its inception.

Indeed, without death, which gave the fullest and most serious significance to the fact of the survival of the fittest, and thus made possible the progress of organic species, man would never have appeared at all.

The social significance of death also has its positive aspects. After all, death makes close to us the common concerns and the common fate of all people everywhere. It unites us with deeply felt emotions of the heart and dramatically emphasizes the equality of our final destinies.

Death has always been of interest. Everyone wanted to know what was out there, beyond. However, despite this interest, there is no doubt that it is very difficult for most of us to talk about death. This is due to at least two reasons. One of them is mainly psychological or cultural in nature. The very topic of death is taboo. We feel, at least subconsciously, that when confronted with death in any form, even indirectly, we inevitably face the prospect of our own death, the picture of our death, as it were, approaches us and becomes more real and conceivable. Thus, talking about death from a psychological point of view can be considered as an indirect approach to death, only on a different level. Undoubtedly, many people perceive any talk about death as something that in their minds causes such real image death, that they begin to feel the nearness of their own demise. To save themselves from such psychological trauma, they decide to simply avoid such conversations as much as possible.

Another reason why it is difficult to talk about death is somewhat more complicated, because it is rooted in the very nature of our language. Basically, the words that make up human language refer to things that we know about through our physical senses, while death is something that lies beyond our conscious experience, because most of us have never experienced it.

Thus, if we are talking about death in general, we must avoid both the social taboo and the linguistic dilemma that has its basis in our subconscious experience. In the end we come to euphemistic analogies. We compare death or dying with things that we are familiar with from our daily experience and that seem very acceptable to us.

One analogy of this type is the comparison of death with sleep. Dying, we tell ourselves, is like falling asleep. Expressions of this kind also occur in our everyday language and thinking, as well as in the literature of many centuries and cultures. Other people prefer a different but similar analogy. Dying, they say, is like forgetting. When a person dies, he forgets all his sorrows, all painful and unpleasant memories disappear.

No matter how old and widespread these analogies, both with "falling asleep" and with "forgetting", they still cannot be considered completely satisfactory. Each of them gives the same statement in its own way. Although they say it in a slightly more pleasant way, nevertheless they both claim that death is in fact simply the disappearance of our consciousness forever. If so, then death does not really have any of the appeal of falling asleep or forgetting. Sleep is pleasant and desirable for us because it is followed by awakening. Night sleep the one that brings us rest makes the waking hours that follow it more pleasant and productive. If there was no awakening, all the benefits of sleep simply would not exist. Similarly, the annihilation of our conscious experience implies the disappearance not only of painful memories, but also of all pleasant ones. Thus, on closer examination, none of the analogies is so adequate as to give us real comfort or hope in the face of death.

There is, however, another point of view that does not accept the assertion that death is the disappearance of consciousness. According to this second, perhaps even older concept, a certain part of the human being continues to live even after physical body ceases to function and is completely destroyed. This constantly existing part has received many names - the psyche, soul, mind, "I", essence, consciousness. But whatever it is called, the idea that a person passes into some other world after physical death is one of the most ancient human beliefs.

2. Life after death (religious point of view)

Another world is the space where a person moves after life in this world. In other words, the afterlife is a continuation of the present, and death is only a transition to another world. There, a person also remains sensual, alive.

Is there another world? This question excites the minds of many people on the planet, regardless of their religious affiliation. So the person on initial stage his research is based on religion. What does religion tell us? According to the Bible, God created man, and then "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul."

In Russian, the concept of "soul" is associated with the word "breathe". When a person is alive, he breathes. The dead do not do this and therefore do not live. From time immemorial, people, observing their living and dead fellow tribesmen, concluded that there is something inside a living person, the main feature of which is associated with breathing, and it became known as the "soul".

Australian Aborigines firmly believe in the existence of the soul. According to them, a woman becomes pregnant due to the fact that she passes next to a tree, a rock, or some animal, from which the soul of the unborn child moves into her. The presence of the soul is recognized by the inhabitants of Asia, Europe, America, Africa, Australia.

But where is this "something" that makes a person alive? Each religion has its own answer to this question. Some peoples assumed that the soul is in the head, others placed it in the diaphragm, stomach, liver, heart. The inhabitants of ancient Babylon thought that the ears were the seat of the soul. But the ancient Jews believed that it is located in the human blood. Indeed, there was a certain logic in such a statement. Homo sapiens loses life along with blood. Hence the conclusion: the soul is in it. The Eskimos, apparently proceeding from the same considerations, consider the cervical vertebra to be the seat of the soul.

However, there is an opinion that this substance is not located in any one organ, but occupies the entire body. So, for example, considers one of the authorities of the Russian Orthodox Church Dmitry Rostovsky.

There are many religions and versions of the afterlife are diverse. Although, whether it will be a Garden of Eden, or copulation with a certain absolute, this is no longer important. The main thing to understand is that there is life after death. According to Buddhist concepts, death does not occur due to cardiac or respiratory arrest, but only at the moment when consciousness leaves the body. Therefore, the Buryats bury the dead three days after death. It must be noted that in Buddhism there is no such thing as "soul", but there is the term "consciousness". So, in a state of coma or clinical death, consciousness remains in the body. And only when the consciousness finally leaves the body, death will come. But death will come only for the old body. And the consciousness will rush to search for a new body in order to be reborn. After all, Buddhists believe that life is beginningless and endless. Therefore, for a Buddhist, death is the most important point in life, how a person will be reborn depends on it. There is no need to be afraid of death, but one must prepare for it every minute and every second. It's very simple. You only need to have good thoughts and do good deeds.

The afterlife is normal for a Christian. This is reality. According to Christian teaching, man was created by God for life not on earth, but blissful, eternal. After the fall, God punished the human race with earthly life. On earth, a person is subject to various sorrows, illnesses and death. This is a God-measured test, a school that needs to be completed ... When a person has found out at least a little about the afterlife, he thinks: "Well, I will go to another world, But how different will it be from the real one, and what will I do there?" Indeed, religion encourages everyone to do good, and dreams of a cloudless life in paradise. The thought of the existence of paradise pulled with it reflections on the construction of hell. Since the souls of the dead go to heaven and hell, if in heaven the souls do not know what they will do, then in hell they will atone for their sins. Interesting - in hell, souls perform some actions, but in heaven, it turns out, no. “Something doesn’t add up here,” the person thinks again, and continues his thoughts. "In hell, they atone for sins, in paradise, it turns out, on the contrary, they sin. Well, no. Degradation, although it occurs in nature, is rare. And who would even think of deliberately doing bad things to themselves? Therefore, it turns out that in paradise souls aspire even higher. I wonder, but where?". It turns out that there is a certain set of layered worlds in which there is a constant transition of souls that have worked off their sin to a higher layer. Each type of soul has its own world and its own degree of permissibility. The question arises, Why then do we need earthly life? Maybe this is some kind of transitional area, between Heaven and Hell? Yes, and many facts say that a person has several earthly lives. It turns out that people, as it were, go on business trips in order to improve their official (life in this case) status. Earth is a transitional point between the physical and spiritual worlds. And also it is like a refresher course.

What is the soul striving for? To infinity? What is infinity? No one will answer... For infinity cannot be touched, moreover, it cannot be felt.

3. Life after death (scientific point of view)

Despite the prevalence of ideas about life after death, official medicine does not always take it on faith. So, for example, the famous resuscitator Nikolai Gubin undertook a whole Scientific research, refuting the work of R. Moody devoted to this problem. In particular, he believes that the loss of those notorious 60-80 grams of weight, “which in scientific articles is called the weight of the soul that left the body after the agony,” occurs during the agony and is caused by the complete burning of ATP and the depletion of cell mitochondria.

But British scientists believe that consciousness does not depend on the work of the brain. Dr. Sam Parnia and his colleagues at Southampton Hospital interviewed 63 survivors of cardiac arrest. Most patients did not remember anything about the period of unconsciousness. However, four people spoke about feelings "after death". They experienced a sense of peace and joy, the acceleration of time, they saw a bright light, they entered another world. Some patients have reported a loss of body sensation. The authors of the study suggest that the brain is necessary for the demonstration of the mind, as a TV is for converting electromagnetic waves into an image.

Other scholars draw an analogy between the moment of death and the experience of the birth of a child. “Perhaps we are first introduced to death at the moment of birth. Few people have the opportunity to once again experience such a dangerous and terrible journey, which he did, leaving the ten-centimeter birth canal. We will probably never know exactly what is going on in the mind of the child at this time, but, probably, his sensations resemble different stages of dying. In this case, researchers face a logical question: are not the deathbed visions a transformed experience of birth trauma, naturally, with the imposition of accumulated worldly and mystical experience?

The experience of scientific generalization of psychological (or, rather, parapsychological) phenomena that occur to a person after the disappearance of all signs of vital activity was first published in the authoritative British journal The Lancet.

The study that served as the basis for writing the above article was conducted in the Netherlands. Its goal was to conduct a thorough interview of all near-death patients, even before they were discharged from the hospital. In total, several hundred people were “surveyed”. Almost one in five of them retained fairly clear memories of the period when the equipment recorded the cessation of his life. At the same time, some memories even succumbed to elementary verification for truth. For example, a 44-year-old man was admitted to the hospital in an unconscious state, without a pulse and with unrecorded electrophysiological brain activity. He immediately began to do artificial respiration, heart massage and defibrillation. At the same time, the sister who assisted during intubation noticed that the patient had false teeth, took them out and put them on the table. The resuscitation process was successful, the man was transferred to the intensive care unit. A week later, this man accidentally saw a nurse, recognized her and remembered how she took out his false teeth. According to him, he watched the efforts of the doctors who fought for his life and his own motionless body from a certain height, while remaining within the premises.

The memories of other patients proved much more difficult to verify, since 8 to 12 percent of the people who participated in the study spoke of going through a tunnel, at the end of which a light was visible, of communicating with deceased relatives and friends. True, in some cases, people first said that they had experienced similar experiences, and then they refused their words. There were also opposite examples when, after discharge, patients told their relatives about such "post-mortem" conversations, and the researchers were told that they did not remember anything.

To claim that this study provides definitive answers to the question of whether our consciousness is really the result of the neurophysiological activity of the brain or whether it is able to exist outside of its physical essence, no one undertakes. “We have a very strong understandable and natural need to believe that we will survive our physical death and be reunited with our loved ones,” Christopher French, director of the Center for Anomalous Psychological Research at the British Goldsmiths College, notes in the preface to the article. Therefore, wishful thinking is possible without malicious intent. Moreover, this study has little to do with confirming or refuting the existence of God and the soul.

However, the fact that certain psychological processes, occurring with some people during clinical death, no one is trying to refute. Those who have experienced "post-mortem" communication note significant changes in their personality. And according to their own assessments and according to others, they become much more tolerant, loving, altruistic. But in those who have undergone clinical death, but have not retained the experience of “otherworldly” communication, such changes are not observed.

5. Numerous stories of those who have been "beyond".

Memoirs of people who have experienced clinical death, about "leaving their body", about "long tunnels, at the end of which one can see the light", appear quite often in popular literature. All these cases practically do not differ from each other, regardless of religion and religious beliefs of a person. Here are some examples described by Raymond Moody:

“About a year ago, due to a bad heart, I was admitted to the hospital. The next morning, lying in bed, I felt severe pain in my chest. I pressed the call button for the sisters, they came and began to provide the necessary assistance. I was uncomfortable lying on my back, and I turned around. As soon as I did, my breathing stopped and my heart stopped beating. I immediately heard the sisters scream something. silt from one side of the bed - you can even say that I went through the railing down to the floor. Then I began to climb slowly up. During the movement, I saw how several more sisters ran into the room - there were probably 12 of them. I saw how my attending physician came to their call, who just at that time was making a round. His appearance interested me. Moving behind the illuminator, I saw him very clearly from the side - hovering under the very ceiling and looking down. It seemed to me that I was a piece of paper, soared to the ceiling from a light breeze.

I saw how the doctors tried to bring me back to life. My body was spread out on the bed and everyone was standing around it. I heard one of the sisters exclaim, "Oh my God, she's gone!" At that time, another leaned over me and gave me artificial respiration from mouth to mouth. At this time, I saw the back of her head. I will never forget how her hair looked, cut short. Immediately after this, I saw how they rolled in the apparatus, with which they tried to influence the electric shock on my chest. I heard my bones crack and creak during this procedure. It was just terrible. They massaged my chest, rubbed my legs and arms; and I thought: "Why are they worried? After all, I feel very good now."

“I had a heart rupture, and I clinically died ... But I remember everything, absolutely everything. Suddenly I felt numbness. The sounds began to sound as if in the distance ... All this time I was perfectly aware of everything that was happening. I heard the heart oscilloscope turn off.

At this time, everything seemed to grow dim, a sound was heard that I cannot describe; it was like the beat of a bass drum; it was a very fast, rushing sound, like the sound of a stream running through a gorge. Suddenly I stood up and stood several feet high, looking down at my own body. People were bustling around my body. But I had no fear. I didn't feel any pain either, only peace. After about a second or two, it seemed to me that I rolled over and got up. It was dark - like a hole or a tunnel - but soon I noticed a bright light. It got brighter and brighter. It felt like I was moving through it.

Suddenly I was somewhere else. I was surrounded by a beautiful, golden light emanating from an unknown source. It occupied all the space around me, coming from everywhere. Then music was heard, and it seemed to me that I was outside the city among streams, grass, trees, mountains. But when I looked around, I didn't see any trees or any other known objects. The strangest thing to me is that there were people there. Not in any form or body. They just were there.

I had a feeling of perfect peace, complete satisfaction and love. It seems that I have become a particle of this love. I don't know how long these sensations lasted - the whole night or just a second.

“I felt some vibration around my body, and in itself. I was sort of divided, and then I saw my body ... For some time I watched the doctor and nurses fiddling with my body, and waited for what would happen next ... I was at the head of the bed, looking at them and at my body. I noticed how one of the sisters went to the wall along the bed to take an oxygen mask, and felt how she went through my neck.

Then I floated upward, moving through a dark tunnel, and came out to a shining light... A little later, I met my grandparents, my father and brothers, who had died... Everywhere I was surrounded by a beautiful sparkling light. In this wonderful place there were colors, bright colors, but not like on earth, but completely indescribable. There were people there, happy people... whole groups of people. Some of them have studied.

In the distance, I saw a city that had buildings. They sparkled brightly. Happy people, sparkling water, fountains... I think it was a city of light with beautiful music. But I think that if I entered this city, I would never return... I was told that if I went there, I could not go back... and that the decision is mine."

The most incredible thing that the dying on the other side encountered was the appearance of a luminous being that radiated love, understanding, support. The light emitted by this creature was of an unearthly brightness, but it did not blind the eyes. People perceived the creature as God, Christ, an angel, or simply a luminous being radiating love.

Upon spawning, the creature makes contact with the deceased, with no audio communication. Light asks a person if he is ready to die, what he did in this life, shows the mistakes made in life and what should be changed.

"The light was bright, it covered everything and, however, did not prevent me from seeing the operating room, doctors, nurses and everything that surrounded me. At first, when the light appeared, I did not quite understand what was happening. But then he kind of turned to me with the question:" Are you ready to die? humor... Definitely it was!"

"When the light came on, he immediately asked me the question:" What have you done in your life? "And suddenly, at the same moment, pictures flashed. "What is this?" - I thought, because everything happened unexpectedly. I found myself in my childhood. Then I went year after year through my whole life from early childhood to the present. I had a strange feeling. I was a little girl playing by a stream. Then other scenes followed: experiences related to my sister, our neighbors and familiar places where I had been "Then I ended up in kindergarten, and I remembered the time when I had the only toy, very beloved, and how I broke it, and then wept bitterly. The pictures changed ... the senior classes, when I had the honor of being elected to the school scientific society. So I "passed" through all the senior classes, then the first years of the institute. And so - until now. The scenes that arose in front of me were so alive! As if you were looking at them from the side, and the view You can see in three-dimensional space and color.In addition, the paintings were moving. For example, at the moment when my toy broke, I saw all the movements. It was very different than what I would have seen when I was little. I had the feeling that some other girl, like in the movies, is playing on the playground. And yet it was me... When I "looked through" the paintings, the light was practically invisible. He disappeared as soon as he asked what I had done in my life. And yet I felt his presence, he led me in this "view", sometimes noting some events. He tried to emphasize something in each of these scenes... Especially the importance of love... At the moments when it was most evident, as, for example, in communication with my sister, he showed me several scenes where I was selfish towards her, and then - several times when I really showed love. He kind of pushed me to the idea that I should be better, although he did not blame me for anything.

He seemed to take an interest in matters related to knowledge. Each time he marked events concerning the teachings, he "said" that I should continue to study and that when he came for me again (by this time I already realized that I would return to life), I should still have a desire for knowledge. He spoke of knowledge as a constant process, and I got the impression that this process will continue after death." Thousands of testimonies, memories of people who survived clinical death have been collected by scientists, and almost every person who has been "there" has changed his attitude to life, has become more understanding and loving other people. After that, many devoted their lives to serving God and people, became more religious.

Conclusion.

Death is a phenomenon of life, it is still on this side of life, it is the reaction of life to the demand of the end in time from life. Death is a phenomenon that extends throughout life. Life is a continuous dying, a living out of the end in everything, a constant judgment of eternity over time. Life is a constant struggle with death and a partial death of the human body and the human soul.

The study of death is key to understanding mental processes. Without a close acquaintance with the experience of death and the process of death-rebirth, it is impossible to understand religion, mysticism, shamanism, mythology. According to various mystical schools, people who survive death or mortal danger and return to life are called twice-born. Contact with death changes the attitude towards it, regardless of whether this contact is purely symbolic or takes place in reality, for example, as a result of accidents or in the course of events leading to real clinical death.

Time and space are deadly, they create ruptures that are a partial experience of death. When human feelings die and disappear in time, then this is the experience of death. When in space there is a parting with a person, with a house, with a city, with a garden, with an animal, accompanied by a feeling that, perhaps, you will never see them again, then this is the experience of death. Death comes for us not only when we ourselves die, but also when our loved ones die. We have in life the experience of death, although not the final one.

In my essay, I tried to reflect several points of view on the phenomenon of "Life after death". Also, based on the work of Raymond Moody "Life after life", I gave several stories of people who have been in clinical death. Of course, at the moment it is impossible to definitively say whether or not there is life after death, but I think that in the future humanity will solve this riddle of nature as well. In the meantime, we can only guess what is there "beyond". I think that sooner or later we all know about it. In conclusion, I will quote the words of Raymond Moody, Ph.D.: "I do not seek to 'prove' that there is life after death. And I do not think that such a 'proof' is really possible."

Bibliography.

1. R. Moody “Life after life”

2. E. Kübler-Ross “On Death and Dying”

3. S. Rose “Soul after death”

4. A. Landsberg and C. Faye “Four kinds of encounters with death”

5. collection of K. Selchenok “Psychology of death and dying”

6. N. G. Gubin - “Terminal conditions and clinical death”

7. A. Potapov, “Immortality of the soul”

Many generations of people have tried to answer the question of the existence of life after death, from the most primitive to modern ones. At the same time, all existing opinions are conditionally divided into religious, more ancient, and scientific, which differ in many respects, but there is also something similar. It all started with the fact that life after death was undeniable and accepted as a fact. Religion was the proof of this.

All existing religions recognized life after death, believing that the main thing in a person is an immortal soul. This opinion was primitive and natural. People took religion for granted, not doubting the immortality of their essence.

First of all, considering religious opinion In this regard, the following can be highlighted. Both in Western and Eastern religion had faith in afterlife and the immortality of the human soul. And in Ancient Greece, and in Ancient Egypt, and in ancient india the body was the receptacle of the soul, which after death left it and moved on. She could end up in another world, which was a punishment or a reward for her life, or she could again be in ours, but in a different body.

Christianity also attached great importance to the Holy Spirit. The body was recognized as so worthless and useless that it didn’t even matter how it looked, because it was given by God. To strengthen the spirit, Christian beliefs provided for some hardships, such as fasting. At the same time, many prohibitions were imposed on those things that corrupted the spirit and were done for the pleasure of the mortal body. Perishable means mortal and vulnerable. Therefore, any weakness could harm him, ranging from gluttony to murder. And in a damaged body, the soul was also rotten, therefore, leaving it, the spirit went to eternal atonement for its sins, without which even an absolute righteous man could not live.

So everyone known religions the existence of a soul or spirit was recognized, which determined everything in a person. One way or another, a person continued to live forever in the form of his soul, either moving into a new body, or repenting of his sins in hell. All this knowledge helped believers not to be afraid of death and motivated them to lead a righteous life.

And so people lived for several hundred thousand years until the advent of science, which approved: after death, a person ceases to exist, since there is no soul. And this was recognized as a fact that many believed.

Death has always frightened people with its uncertainty, since no one has yet been able to reliably tell about it. At the same time, the process of death is both very intriguing and attractive, because it is unknown.

So what made people stop being afraid of death and refuse to believe in an afterlife?

In our opinion, the first proof of this is that with the development of science, people have ceased to trust empirical knowledge. Everything that happens in the world was difficult to explain by the presence of spirits or the will of God. This means that many religious dogmas have been questioned. Initially, they tried to prove them with the help of science, but scientists could not do it. So it is with death. All evidence of the soul available to scientists is not reliable, since this does not coincide with the description in religious sources. In the modern world, even the concept of death has changed. Now this is associated not with the absence of breathing or heartbeat, but with the death of the cerebral cortex. Consequently, all personality traits that a person had during life are lost. Since everyone has a unique set of genes and a set of cells, even being reborn into a different body, this will no longer be the same person. The soul, having an immaterial nature, will not be able to exert any influence on the body.

At the same time, there are many scientists who believe that science is limitless and not everything has been studied yet. And in this uncertainty there is a place for life after death.

So, Dr. Joseph Seifert, rector of the International Academy of Philosophy in Liechtenstein, believes that there is life after death. The main proof of immortality he cites is that at death for the soul all the most important actions human personality will remain unfinished. From the point of view of justice, innocent people who died by their own or violent death did not deserve it, and are simply obliged to start life anew after death and fulfill their destiny.

The next argument that is given by people who do not believe in the afterlife is that a person receives all sensations through the senses. After death, they cease to function, therefore, even if the soul were in a new place, we would not be able to get information about it. Therefore, it cannot be argued that we will ever know the secret of life after death, and if so, then it is not worth believing in it.

The argument against this is that when a person sleeps, his eyes (sense organs) are closed, but he sees. So sense organs are not required to experience something.

We believe that the brain is the main generator of sensations, while the sense organs play the role of intermediaries. Therefore, with brain death, information processing is also impossible. Therefore, this argument is quite valid.

Non-believing people who have experienced clinical death claim that they saw something on the other side and perceived it as the beginning of the afterlife. At the same time, they could not explain exactly where they were, and who they were. Even if they imagined an afterlife after death, their expectations were not justified. That's why they refuse to believe in own death, convincing himself that this is a dream. It is quite possible that this is a dream that a weakened organism in a critical state shows us in order to avoid the fear of death. The person thinks that he will wake up and calm down, during which time the doctors resuscitate him and return him to normal life. This argument is made by Charles Leadbeater in LIFE AFTER DEATH.

Rational thinking has long rejected that which has no material embodiment. How can you believe in something that you cannot touch, see or hear. So it was with many things that became everyday things. Therefore, often people who are deeply material in nature deny the existence of the soul as a form of energy that moves our body. And if this is not the case, then with the cessation of life processes, everything ends and the person ceases to exist both materially and spiritually.

On the other hand, there are many scientific theories proving life after death. For example, the theory of the cycle of elements in nature. Everyone knows that a person consists of atoms and molecules, like the smallest particles. Firstly, all these compounds appeared on Earth from space and once upon a time stars and other celestial bodies consisted of them. Secondly, the circulation of matter or energy is now taking place on earth. For example, the dinosaurs that lived on the planet previously consisted of the same molecules as modern people. We can say that in each of us there is at least one molecule of those that have already entered the body of a living being. Thirdly, after our death, we will also disintegrate into atoms and molecules, which plants will use for their life. Therefore, a part of our body will be present in their body, and we can say we will live the next life.

Thus, relying on scientific knowledge about the circulation of substances, it is assumed that each person now exists, lives not the first and not last life in the form of the set of chemical compounds that it possesses. And some of his chemicals will be passed on to his descendants, just as they were passed on to him from our predecessors.

But not all people can boast of knowledge of molecular chemistry, and for them this theory is not proof.

In any case, the answer to the question of the existence of the afterlife has always occupied the minds of people. So why are we so interested in this?

Before the advent of science in modern times, people were afraid of death as unknown, while recognizing its uncertainty. They died early, and it would have been impossible to live in fear all the time, so various religions and beliefs were aimed at reducing human fear. People were convinced that dying is not scary, since only the body dies, and the soul moves to another place, and in fact the person remains to live. And now, with the increase in life expectancy, everything has become easier and the fear of death has receded into the background, since before her was a life that could be devoted to anything. People began to perceive death as a natural physiological process of inevitable aging.

But at the same time, there is a constant search for means aimed at delaying death and slowing down the aging process. And these means are necessary, since people have ceased to believe in the continuation of life after the death of the body. Otherwise, there would be no point in them, since the soul will find a new incarnation and continue to exist.

However, the recipes eternal life people searched even in pre-scientific times. People saw God and his companions as eternally young and immortal, and aspired to become like them. Also, people strive to regain immortality lost as a result of the fall of the first people. Therefore, even some religious people want to find the elixir of eternal life. Consequently, they have less faith that their life will continue after death. Over time, they may forget about it altogether. Otherwise, they would understand that, in accordance with religion, they are already immortal, since they are endowed with a soul.

Summing up, we can say that there are many concepts that reveal why people stopped believing in an afterlife. Many of them are connected with the alienation of a person from religion and the appearance of materialistic views in him. The development of science gives them reason to doubt that after death they continue to exist. However, the world does not stand still, and the religious evidence is no longer indisputable. The evidence of science is also not yet fully disclosed, so there are still many doubts on this issue and one can take both sides.

Bibliography:

1. Antipenko L.G. Philosophy of death.// "Philosophy and Society" No. 1, 2001. 12 p.
2. Voyno-Yasenetsky V. F. Spirit, soul and body.// CJSC "Brovary Printing House", 2002. 43 p.
3. Deeva Ya.N. Philosophy of life after death.// AST Moscow, 2006 13 p.
4. Charles Leadbeater. Life after death. //AST Moscow, 2005.- 35-40 p.
5. Shlemova A.N. Life after death.// “Kraunz. Humanities” №6. 2010. 10 p.

Ministry of Education and Science R.F.

Federal Budget GOU VPO

Volgograd State Technical University

Department of Philosophy

Essay on philosophy.

Topic: "Life and death as problems of philosophy"

Completed:

Checked:

Volgograd, 2012

Introduction

1. The concept of the meaning of life.

2. death as philosophical problem.

3. Immortality

Conclusion

Bibliography

Introduction

Everything that is born is doomed to die. In the material world, we do not know anything contrary to this law. Animals and plants, stars and planets, Even the Universe, according to modern concepts, once had a beginning, which means they also have an end.

Man is the only being who is aware of his mortality. And this awareness of the inevitability of death poses a number of important philosophical questions for each person.

Both mythology and various religious teachings, and art, and numerous philosophies. But unlike mythology and religion, which, as a rule, seek to impose, dictate certain decisions to a person, philosophy appeals primarily to the human mind and proceeds from the fact that a person must seek the answer on his own, making his own spiritual efforts for this. Philosophy helps him by accumulating and critically analyzing the previous experience of mankind in this kind of search.

1. The concept of the meaning of life.

Beginning the consideration of the problem of the meaning of human existence, recall the definition of a person given
The specificity of human existence is most clearly revealed when considering the meaning of his life. If a person's life does not consist in simple physical survival, not in the preservation of the body, but has other goals that are given to a person from outside or chosen by him, this means that it makes sense.

The meaning of life is the goals, ideals and values, the implementation of which acts as the leitmotif of human existence. At the level of everyday explanation, the meaning of life is what a person lives for. Socrates, in response to accusations of him spreading philosophical knowledge, corrupting morals, said that he was engaged in philosophy because it helps him understand life. It is not worth living without understanding what life is. Socrates discovered that many of his contemporaries spend their lives pursuing various goals - wealth, fame, pleasure - and do not even think about whether it matters. But if a person does not ask himself the question of the meaning of life and reflect well on it, he cannot be sure whether he lives correctly. And his whole life may turn out to be a waste of time. Albert Camus - French philosopher, who lived two and a half millennia later than Socrates - wrote: "To decide whether or not life is worth living is to answer the fundamental question of philosophy. Everything else - whether the world has three dimensions, whether the mind is guided by nine or twelve categories - is secondary." F.M. Dostoevsky called the question "what for to live?" secret of human existence.
Thinking about the meaning of life, a person, in fact, is engaged in self-justification of his life, trying to convince himself that he lives not because he was "born" into this world, without asking his consent, but because he performs a certain "mission" and without his participation the world will never replenish itself to integrity. To have meaning means to have an objective rational purpose, to be involved in being outside oneself.
The search for meaningful life guidelines is not an easy task. They are trying to solve it simple people, laymen, and professional philosophers. All developed in the course of the development of philosophy, the concept of lifestyle can be divided into two types: subjectivist and objectivist. The first include ideas about the meaning of life, formed individuals based on their subjective ideas about a decent life. Proponents of this approach to determining the meaning of life insist that each person has his own individual vocation in life, his own meaning of life, different from the meaning put into life by other people. Objectivist (metaphysical) concepts proceed from the fact that a person's life has meaning only insofar as it is oriented toward the realization of goals that go beyond the limits of only his individual being. Life and activity can be meaningful if they are guided not by random inclinations, not by a capricious play of passions and arbitrariness, but by a single, rational, higher principle, penetrating all aspects of life to the end. This beginning, comprehending life and activity, can only be a goal that has an unconditional value, an unconditional objective value. If a person sets himself individual, subjective goals that do not correlate with objective goals and values, then sooner or later the question of the meaning and significance of these individual goals will arise. This discrepancy between the conditional goal and the desire for the unconditional A.P. Chekhov very clearly depicted this discrepancy in the story "Gooseberry". The dream of the life of the hero of the story was to acquire a small house with a plot on which gooseberries must grow. In the end, he managed to realize this dream, but can the achievement of such a goal be considered the realization of a meaningful life purpose? The author of the story writes that when he saw this man who had reached the limit of his dreams, he smelled of terrible longing, emptiness and nonsense of such "happiness".
An analysis of theoretically formed ideas about the meaning of life shows that they all agree that life has meaning only when a person is guided by goals, ideals and values ​​that are not related to simple physical survival. A person lives "for something" and the clarification of this "something" is a very important task, anticipating a conscious, meaningful life.

2. Death as a philosophical problem.

Since ancient times, man has asked himself the question of what is the essence of human existence. Many philosophers and thinkers tried to answer why a person lives, why he came into this world, why he dies and what happens to him after death.
Death is a powerful factor that makes any of us think about whether we are living the right way. Therefore, despite its external unattractiveness, the theme of death occupies one of the central places in philosophy.
From the point of view of science, death is the inevitable end of the functioning of any living system, and is a natural result of the exhaustion of its vital resources, aging and death of cells. Death is the cessation of life.

However, death cannot be seen as the opposite of life. Death is not the absence of life, but its end, completion. Therefore, death is opposed not by life, but by birth. This is a completely natural process of transition from a living state to an inanimate one. Living and non-living, survival and non-survival are two sides of a single nature surrounding us.The causes of death in biology and medicine are well studied. Death can be postponed for some time, it can be fought against, prolonging life, but it is impossible to win completely.

Death can serve as a deliverance from all kinds of passions and suffering.
The theology of most religions proceeds from the dogma of the immortality of the soul and frailty, the insignificance of the body: the body dies, but the soul, which is the essence of man, is eternal and immortal. The death of a person is regarded in Christianity as deliverance from earthly suffering.
Philosophy is not interested in death as a physical phenomenon, but in the meaning of death, that is, its significance in the system of human existence. If a person differs from other living beings not in external signs, but in principle, in essence, then the death of a person differs from the death of, say, a monkey or a dog. The death of a person does not mean a simple cessation of life, just as the life of a person does not come down to eating food, reproduction and protection from various dangers. Death has a meaning, and to find out what exactly it consists of is the task of a philosophical study of the problem of death.
The most important meaning of death is that the consciousness of the fact of its inevitability makes a person relate to life more meaningfully. The consciousness of death is the consciousness of one's finiteness in this world. If life is limited in time, then you should not waste it on secondary, vain deeds. The inevitability of death prompts a person to treat the world more meaningfully, to make a "revision" of values, to separate the essential from the non-essential.
The problem of death is present in most historical types philosophy. Within the framework of Brahmanism, the doctrine of karma, adopted by other philosophical and religious teachings of India, took shape. The idea of ​​karma played the role of a moral imperative in the life of Indian society, made death and rebirth dependent on the content and quality of life. Similar meaning has the idea of ​​hell and heaven in Christianity and Islam. The theme of death was especially popular in existentialism.
The philosopher had his own view of deathArthur Schopenhauerwho created the theory palingenesis , which is a philosophical alternative to religious reincarnation. The essence of his theory is that the human will never dies, but manifests itself again in new individuals.However, Schopenhauer rejects the main provisions reincarnation about the transmigration of a particular soul. The theory of palingenesis was outlined in A. Schopenhauer's work "The World as Will and Representation" in particular, in the chapter "Death and its relation to the indestructibility of our being". Unlikeopen individualism, palingenesis considers the spatial boundaries between people as metaphysically significant, i.e. one person cannot exist simultaneously in two or more places in space. In his essay, Schopenhauer states: Infinite time passed before I was born, what was I all this time? The metaphysical answer to this, perhaps, would be: "I have always been me: namely, all those who during this time called themselves I, that was me."Schopenhauer denied the possibility of preserving, after the destruction of the body, the individual "I" with all its memories. The destruction of the brain means the complete annihilation of the personality. On the other hand, the unique will of each person is not subject to destruction. The will of a person is preserved after the disintegration of the body, and over time this will turns out to be in a new intellectual shell. The new personality appears completely different from the old one.Schopenhauer refuses to talk about metempsychosis, that is, "the transition of the whole so-called soul into another body", preferring to call his theory "palingenesis", by which he understood "the decomposition and new formation of the individual, and only his will remains, which, taking the form of a new being, receives a new intellect." In fact, in Schopenhauer's idea of ​​"the indestructibility of our being" one can find continuity with the ideas ancient Greek philosopher Parmenides on the absence of non-existence.

One of the thinkers who declared the connection of his views with the thoughts of Schopenhauer is the Austrian theoretical physicist, Nobel Prize winner in physics (1933) Erwin Schrödinger. At the same time, Schrödinger adheres to more radical views, which the philosopher Daniel Kolak called open individualism.

Philosopher Merab Mamardashvili expounds Schrödinger's views as follows: “And Schrödinger asked this question: you were 16 years old, and you were torn apart by passions. And what is left of that “I” that was the bearer of these passions? As a kind of embodiment of “I”, because it was you along with your body, with your experiences, etc., but you don’t remember him. And you are. So you are the other self! At any given moment, your past selves seemed to you to be the most important, the latest, and they changed without even giving rise to the concept of death. They all died, and the term "death" did not even arise. And maybe your "I" now is also an imaginary character, embodied for several hours, for several days or months, which will also be replaced by another, like all previous characters. Why, says Schrödinger, be afraid of death?

Death is the deepest and most significant fact of life, elevating the very last

of mortals over the routine and vulgarity of life.

Only the fact of death raises in depth the question of the meaning of life. Life in this world makes sense precisely because there is death. Meaning is connected with the end. And if there were no end, if there was an infinity of life, then there would be no meaning in life. Death - the ultimate horror and ultimate evil turns out to be the only way out of time into eternity, and immortal and eternal life turns out to be achievable only through death.

Life is noble only because there is death in it, there is an end,

testifying that a person is destined for another, higher life. In infinite time, the meaning is never revealed, the meaning lies in eternity. But between life in time and life in eternity lies an abyss through which

the transition is possible only through death, through the horror of rupture. Death is not only the meaninglessness of life in this world, its perishability, but also a sign coming from the depths, indicating the existence of a higher meaning of life.

The living, not the dead, suffer when death has done its work. The dead can no longer suffer; and we can even praise death when it puts an end to extreme physical pain or sad mental decline. However, it is wrong to speak of death as a "reward" because true reward, like true punishment, requires the conscious experience of the fact. In the life of every person there may come a moment when death will be more effective

for his main purposes than life.

The social significance of death also has its positive aspects. The universality of death reminds us of the equality of all people.

The paradox of death is that death is the most terrible evil, which frightens man most of all, and through this evil the way out to eternal life, or one of the ways out, is revealed. Our life is filled with such paradoxes. The infinity of life would make man a finite being.

The paradox of death has in the world not only an ethical, but also an aesthetic one.

expression. Death is ugly, and it is the ultimate ugliness, corruption,

loss of any appearance and face, the triumph of lower elements

material world. And death is beautiful, it ennobles the last of

mortals and puts him on the same level with the very first, she defeats the ugliness of vulgarity and everyday life. Death is the ultimate evil, nobler than life in this world. The beauty, the charm of the past is connected with the ennobling fact of death.

It is death that purifies the past and places the seal of eternity on it. In death there is not only decay, but also purification. Nothing corrupted, decomposed and corruptible can stand the test of death. This test can only endure forever. Let us express the moral paradox of life and death in the ethical imperative:

treat the living as if they were dying, treat the dead as if they were alive, i.e.

always remember death as the secret of life, affirm both in life and in death

always eternal life.

Tragic is the death of personality in man, because personality is an eternal idea.

A person is not born from a father and mother, a person is created by the Higher power.

Materialism, positivism, etc. the teachings come to terms with death, legitimize death, and at the same time try to forget about it, arranging life on the graves of the dead. The Stoic or Buddhist attitude towards death is powerless before it and means the victory of death, but it is nobler than generic theories that completely forget about death. mental, not spiritual attitude to death is always sad and melancholic, there is always the sadness of a memory that does not have the power to resurrect. Only a spiritual attitude towards death is victorious. Only Christianity knows victory over death. Christianity teaches not so much about natural immortality, which does not involve any struggle, but about the resurrection, which involves the struggle of spiritual, grace-filled forces with deadly forces. The doctrine of resurrection comes from the tragic fact of death and

means victory over him, which is not in any teachings about immortality, nor in

Orphism, neither in Plato, nor in Theosophy. Only Christianity looks directly into

eyes of death, recognizes both the tragedy of death and the meaning of death, and at the same time does not

reconciles with death and conquers it. Man is both mortal and immortal, he

belongs to both deadly time and eternity, he and spiritual being, and a natural being. Death is a terrible tragedy, and death through death is conquered by resurrection. But death is conquered not by natural, but

supernatural powers.

The horror of death is not only the horror of the death of the individual, but also the horror of the death of the world. There is a personal Apocalypse and a global Apocalypse. Apocalypse is a revelation about the death of the world, although death is not the last word in it. Not only man is mortal, not only peoples and cultures, but all mankind as a whole, and the whole world.

Death and potential immortality are the strongest bait for the philosophizing mind, for all our life's affairs must somehow be measured with the eternal. Man is doomed to think about death, and this is his difference from the animal, which is mortal, but does not know about it.

In fact, we are talking about a triad: life death immortality, since all the spiritual systems of mankind proceeded from the idea of ​​the contradictory unity of these phenomena. Most Attention here it was devoted to death and gaining immortality in another life, and itself human life was interpreted as a moment allotted to a person so that he could adequately prepare for death and immortality.

With a few exceptions, in all times and peoples, statements about life were negative character. Life suffering (Buddha, Schopenhauer, etc.); life dream (Vedas, Plato, La Bruyère, Pascal); life the abyss of evil (ancient Egyptian text "The conversation of a man with his spirit"). “And I hated life, because the deeds that are done under the sun became disgusting to me, for everything is vanity and vexation of the spirit” (Ecclesiastes); "Human life is miserable" (Seneca); "Life struggle and wandering in a foreign land" (Marcus Aurelius); “everything is ashes, ghost, shadow and smoke” (John of Damascus); “Life is monotonous, the spectacle is dull” (Petrarch); "Life is a fool's story told by an idiot, full of noise and rage, but devoid of meaning ”(Shakespeare); “Human life is nothing but a constant illusion” (Pascal); “All life is only the price of deceptive hopes” (Didero); "My life eternal night.. what is life but madness?" (Kierkegaard); “All human life is deeply immersed in untruth” (Nietzsche). About the same saying proverbs and sayings different peoples“Life is a penny”. Ortega y Gasset defined man not as a body and as a spirit, but as a specific human drama. Indeed, in this sense, the life of every person is dramatic and tragic: no matter how successful life is, no matter how long it is, its end is inevitable. “Whoever is among the living, there is still hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion” (Ecclesiastes). A century later, after Ecclesiastes, the Greek sage Epicurus tried to solve this question of questions in the following way: “Accustom yourself to the idea that death has nothing to do with us. When we exist, death is not yet present, and when death is present, then we do not exist.”

It has been noticed that the wisdom of a person is often expressed in a calm attitude towards life and death. As Mahatma Gandhi said: “We do not know what is better to live or die. Therefore, we should neither overly admire life nor tremble at the thought of death. We must treat both of them equally. It's the perfect option." And long before that, the Bhagavad Gita says: “Indeed, death is meant for the born, and birth is inevitable for the dead. About the inevitable do not grieve!

At the same time, many great people realized this problem in tragic tones. The outstanding Russian biologist I.I. Mechnikov, reflecting on the possibility of “cultivating the instinct of natural death,” wrote about L.N. Tolstoy: family love calm his soul, he immediately saw that it was a vain hope. Why, he asked himself, raise children who would soon find themselves in the same critical condition as their father? Why live? Why should I love them, raise and watch over them. For the same despair that is in me, or for stupidity. Loving them, I cannot hide the truth from them - every step they take leads to the knowledge of this truth. And truth is death.”

For more than thirty centuries, sages, prophets and philosophers different countries and peoples are trying to find a dividing line between life, death and immortality. Most often it is believed that the whole point is the realization of the fact of impending death: we know that we will die and are feverishly looking for a path to immortality. Everything else living quietly and peacefully completes its journey, having managed to reproduce new life or serve as fertilizer for another life. A person is doomed to lifelong painful thoughts about the meaning of life or its meaninglessness, tormenting himself, and often others, and is forced to drown these damned questions in wine and drugs. This is partly true, but the question arises: what to do with the fact of the death of a newborn child who has not yet had time to understand anything, or a mentally retarded person who is not able to understand anything? Should we consider the moment of conception (which cannot be accurately determined in most cases) or the moment of birth as the beginning of life? The unknown and touching death of a small creature, except for his mother, from starvation somewhere in Africa and the magnificent funeral of world famous leaders in the face of eternity make no difference. In this sense, the English poet D. Donn is deeply right when he said that "the death of each person detracts from all mankind, and therefore never ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for you."

Death has a positive meaning. But death is at the same time the most terrible and the only evil. Every evil can be reduced to death. There is no other evil but death and murder.

At all times, people have sought salvation from the inevitable mistress of death. And this

consists not only in the search for the immortality of the body or soul, but also in a certain

"indifference" to death. This is the basis of the principle of the "beautiful life" of Epicurus.

Epicurus formulates this principle as follows: “accustom yourself to the idea that death has nothing to do with us. Everything good and bad consists in sensation, and death is the deprivation of sensation. Therefore, the correct knowledge that death has nothing to do with us makes the mortality of life delightful, not because it adds an unlimited amount of time to it, but because it takes away the thirst for immortality.

Conclusion: “Stupid is the one who says that he is afraid of death, not because she

hurts when she comes, but because she hurts

what will come: for if something does not disturb the presence, then in vain

grieve when it is still expected. Thus, the most terrible of evils, death has nothing to do with us, since when we exist, death is not yet present; and when death is present, then we do not exist. Thus, death has nothing to do with either the living or the dead, since for some it does not exist.

He contrasts his attitude towards death with the attitude towards it of the “people of the crowd”, who either seek to avoid death as the greatest evil, or, on the contrary, crave it, seeing in it a means of “rest from the evils of life”. Epicurus says: "The sage does not deviate from life, but he is not afraid of unlife, because life does not interfere with him, and unlife does not seem to be some kind of evil."

3. Immortality

The problem of immortality is one of the main problems of human life.

Man is a being placed before death in

throughout his life, and not just in the last hour of life. Man leads

twofold struggle: for life and for immortality.

Strong suffering always raises the question of death and immortality. But also anything

the deepening of life raises the same question. Many types were built

religious and philosophical teachings about the victory over the horror of death and the achievement of real or illusory immortality: the spiritualistic doctrine of the immortality of the soul; the doctrine of the reincarnation of souls; the mystical-pantheistic doctrine of merging with the Divine; idealistic doctrine of the immortality of ideas and values; the Christian doctrine of the resurrection of the whole person; blunting the problem of death

through merging with collective life on earth and through the possibility of earthly

happiness.

The spiritualistic doctrine of the immortality of the soul promises immortality only to a part of a person, and not to a whole person. The doctrine of reincarnation still less gives immortality to a whole person, it presupposes his decomposition into separate elements and the plunge of a person into a cosmic cycle, leaves him at the mercy of time. Man can pass into a non-human kind of existence.

The doctrine of merging with the deity does not mean the immortality of the individual, but only

the immortality of impersonal ideas and values. The idealistic doctrine is also not

means the immortality of the individual, but only the immortality of impersonal ideas and values.

Turning away from the theme of immortality through an appeal to the future happiness of mankind speaks of the insolubility of this topic and of hostility towards its formulation.

Only the Christian doctrine of the resurrection of the whole person answers

question, but there are many difficulties associated with it.

Practical immortality is in no way consistent with the change of generations in biological and social evolution. Roughly speaking, there will be no immortality

let us develop. But there is also the possibility that the Personal

practical immortality, which implies the cessation of generational change as a factor of development in its current sense, should not only become an obstacle to spiritual progress, but, on the contrary, be a powerful impetus for the movement of mankind forward, allowing maximum use of the creative potential of people, the inexhaustible uniqueness of each of them without colossal and irrational costs for the reproduction of new generations, master space

open spaces.

The emergence of death as a phenomenon of the end of life led to a greater differentiation (greater opposition) between the finite and the infinite. The mortality of an individual biological individual and the immortality of the genus are, in a certain sense, glaring opposites. On the other hand, the great differentiation of finiteness and infinity of existence was accompanied by a deepening of their mutual mediation, mediating links between them. Sexual reproduction just plays the role of such a mediator. On the one hand, it opposes the organism and the genus (finite and infinite), and, on the other hand, it is a link between them.

The opposing role of sexual reproduction lies in the fact that, firstly, it makes the individual “immortality” of the organism unnecessary and, secondly, during sexual reproduction, the organism does not completely repeat itself in its offspring, does not replicate one to one and, therefore, does not preserve itself in its particularity. The finiteness, peculiarity, individuality of an individual organism appears in this case brighter, sharper, more naked.

Conclusion:

What is death? This is a rhetorical question. There is no answer to it. In many nations, when they talk about a dead person, they say that he is "in a better world." But why are we so afraid of death? Why does the death of those dear and close to people plunge us into deep grief and shock? Probably, we are afraid of the unknown, it is the knowledge of inaccessibility for humanity. Humanity seems to be groping, into the blind, into the unknown. An attempt to understand what death is, baffles many concepts and laws. After all, if life is torment, etc., and death is deliverance from torment, a transition to a better world, then what justifies the joy of giving birth to a child, if, following logic, a mother dooms him to torment?! And what is the essence of life according to the fact of death? So, life is given for something, probably life is one of the links in the chain and the next link is death, but the link is not the last one?

Death remains unsolved and the most indisputable fact. The unknown inspires fear and makes you frantically search for the path to immortality. In the face of death, people, in the full sense of the word, are equal to each other, as well as to any living being, which erases the inequality on which earthly life is based. Therefore, a calm perception of the thought of the absence of eternal life of my “I” and understanding of the inevitability of merging with “indifferent” nature is one of the ways of a non-religious approach to the problem of immortality. True, in this case the problem arises of the Absolute, on which one can base one's moral decisions. A.P. Chekhov wrote: “You need to believe in God, And if there is no faith, then do not take its place with hype, but search, search alone, one on one with your conscience.”

Bibliography:

1. Introduction to philosophy: a textbook for universities, M., 1989. Part 2. Ch.18.
2. Human and society. Modern world. M., 1994.

3. Schopenhauer A. Selected works. M., 1992

4. Alekseev P.V., Panin A.V. Philosophy: Textbook for Universities M., 1998

5. Gubin V.D., Sidorina T.Yu. Philosophy: Textbook Mythology: Russian word, 1997

6. Kanke V.A. Philosophy: a historical and systematic course Mythology: Logos, 2001

7. Kokhanovsky V.P. Philosophy: tutorial for students Rostov-on-Don: Phoenix, 1998

Since ancient times, man has asked himself the question of what is the essence of human existence. Many philosophers and thinkers tried to answer why a person lives, why he came into this world, why he dies and what happens to him after death.

Death is a powerful factor that makes any of us think about whether we are living the right way. Therefore, despite its external unattractiveness, the theme of death occupies one of the central places in philosophy.

From the point of view of science, death is the inevitable end of the functioning of any living system, and is a natural result of the exhaustion of its vital resources, aging and death of cells. Death is the cessation of life.

However, death cannot be seen as the opposite of life. Death is not the absence of life, but its end, completion. Therefore, death is opposed not by life, but by birth. This is a completely natural process of transition from a living state to an inanimate one. Living and non-living, survival and non-survival are two sides of a single nature surrounding us. The causes of death in biology and medicine are well studied. Death can be postponed for some time, it can be fought against, prolonging life, but it is impossible to win completely.

Death can serve as a deliverance from all kinds of passions and suffering.

The theology of most religions proceeds from the dogma of the immortality of the soul and frailty, the insignificance of the body: the body dies, but the soul, which is the essence of man, is eternal and immortal. The death of a person is regarded in Christianity as deliverance from earthly suffering.

Philosophy is not interested in death as a physical phenomenon, but in the meaning of death, that is, its significance in the system of human existence. If a person differs from other living beings not in external signs, but in principle, in essence, then the death of a person differs from the death of, say, a monkey or a dog. The death of a person does not mean a simple cessation of life, just as the life of a person does not come down to eating food, reproduction and protection from various dangers. Death has a meaning, and to find out what exactly it consists of is the task of a philosophical study of the problem of death.

The most important meaning of death is that the consciousness of the fact of its inevitability makes a person relate to life more meaningfully. The consciousness of death is the consciousness of one's finiteness in this world. If life is limited in time, then you should not waste it on secondary, vain deeds. The inevitability of death prompts a person to treat the world more meaningfully, to make a "revision" of values, to separate the essential from the non-essential.

The problem of death is present in most historical types of philosophy. Within the framework of Brahmanism, the doctrine of karma, adopted by other philosophical and religious teachings of India, took shape. The idea of ​​karma played the role of a moral imperative in the life of Indian society, made death and rebirth dependent on the content and quality of life. Similar meaning has the idea of ​​hell and heaven in Christianity and Islam. The theme of death was especially popular in existentialism.

The philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer had his own view of death, who created the theory of palingenesis, which is a philosophical alternative to religious reincarnation. The essence of his theory is that the human will never dies, but manifests itself again in new individuals. At the same time, Schopenhauer rejects the main provisions of reincarnation about the transmigration of a particular soul. The theory of palingenesis was set forth in A. Schopenhauer's work "The World as Will and Representation" - in particular, in the chapter "Death and its relation to the indestructibility of our being." In contrast to open individualism, palingenesis considers the spatial boundaries between people as metaphysically significant, i.e. one person cannot exist simultaneously in two or more places in space. In his essay, Schopenhauer states: Infinite time elapsed before I was born - what was I all this time? The metaphysical answer to this, perhaps, would be: "I have always been me: namely, all those who during this time called themselves I, that was me." Schopenhauer denied the possibility of preserving, after the destruction of the body, the individual "I" with all its memories. The destruction of the brain means the complete annihilation of the personality. On the other hand, the unique will of each person is not subject to destruction. The will of a person is preserved after the disintegration of the body, and over time this will turns out to be in a new intellectual shell. The new personality appears completely different from the old one. Schopenhauer refuses to talk about metempsychosis, that is, "the transition of the whole so-called soul into another body", preferring to call his theory "palingenesis", by which he understood "the decomposition and new formation of the individual, and only his will remains, which, taking the form of a new being, receives a new intellect." In fact, in Schopenhauer's idea of ​​"the indestructibility of our being" one can find continuity with the ideas of the ancient Greek philosopher Parmenides about the absence of non-existence.

One of the thinkers who declared the connection of his views with the thoughts of Schopenhauer is the Austrian theoretical physicist, Nobel Prize winner in physics (1933) Erwin Schrödinger. At the same time, Schrödinger adheres to more radical views, which the philosopher Daniel Kolak called open individualism.

Philosopher Merab Mamardashvili expounds Schrödinger's views as follows: “And Schrödinger asked this question: you were 16 years old, and you were torn apart by passions. And what is left of that “I” that was the bearer of these passions? As a kind of embodiment of "I", because it was you - along with your body, with your experiences, etc., but you don't remember him. And you are. So you are the other "I"! At any given moment, your past selves seemed to you to be the most important, the latest, and they changed without even giving rise to the concept of death. They all died, and the term "death" did not even arise, And maybe your "I" - now - is also an imaginary character, embodied for several hours, for several days or months, which will also be replaced by another, like all previous characters. Why, says Schrödinger, be afraid of death?

Death is the deepest and most significant fact of life, elevating the very last of mortals above the ordinary and vulgarity of life.

Only the fact of death raises in depth the question of the meaning of life. Life in this world makes sense precisely because there is death. Meaning is connected with the end. And if there were no end, if there was an infinity of life, then there would be no meaning in life. Death - the ultimate horror and ultimate evil - turns out to be the only way out of time into eternity, and immortal and eternal life turns out to be achievable only through death.

Life is noble only because there is death in it, there is an end, indicating that a person is destined for another, higher life. In infinite time, the meaning is never revealed, the meaning lies in eternity. But between life in time and life in eternity lies an abyss, through which the transition is possible only through death, through the horror of the break. Death is not only the meaninglessness of life in this world, its perishability, but also a sign coming from the depths, indicating the existence of a higher meaning of life.

The living, not the dead, suffer when death has done its work. The dead can no longer suffer; and we can even praise death when it puts an end to extreme physical pain or sad mental decline. However, it is wrong to speak of death as a "reward" because true reward, like true punishment, requires the conscious experience of the fact. In the life of every man there may come a moment when death will be more effective for his main purposes than life.

The social significance of death also has its positive aspects. The universality of death reminds us of the equality of all people.

The paradox of death is that death is the most terrible evil that frightens man most of all, and through this evil the way out to eternal life, or one of the ways out, is revealed. Our life is filled with such paradoxes. The infinity of life would make man a finite being.

The paradox of death has not only an ethical, but also an aesthetic expression in the world. Death is ugly, and it is the ultimate ugliness, decay, the loss of any form and face, the triumph of the lower elements of the material world. And death is beautiful, it ennobles the last of mortals and puts it on the same level with the very first, it defeats the ugliness of vulgarity and everyday life. Death is the ultimate evil, nobler than life in this world. The beauty, the charm of the past is connected with the ennobling fact of death.

It is death that purifies the past and places the seal of eternity on it. In death there is not only decay, but also purification. Nothing corrupted, decomposed and corruptible can stand the test of death. This test can only endure forever. The moral paradox of life and death can be expressed in the ethical imperative: treat the living as if they were dying, treat the dead as if they were alive, i.e. always remember death as the mystery of life, and in life and in death always affirm eternal life.

Tragic is the death of personality in man, because personality is an eternal idea.

A person is not born from a father and mother, a person is created by the Higher power.

Materialism, positivism, etc. the teachings come to terms with death, legitimize death, and at the same time try to forget about it, arranging life on the graves of the dead. The Stoic or Buddhist attitude towards death is powerless before it and means the victory of death, but it is nobler than generic theories that completely forget about death. A mental, and not a spiritual, attitude to death is always sad and melancholic, it always contains the sadness of a memory that has no power to resurrect. Only a spiritual attitude towards death is victorious. Only Christianity knows victory over death. Christianity teaches not so much about natural immortality, which does not involve any struggle, but about the resurrection, which involves the struggle of spiritual, grace-filled forces with deadly forces. The doctrine of resurrection proceeds from the tragic fact of death and signifies victory over it, which is not found in any doctrine of immortality, nor in Orphism, nor in Plato, nor in Theosophy. Only Christianity looks directly into the eyes of death, recognizes both the tragedy of death and the meaning of death, and at the same time does not reconcile with death and conquers it. Man is both mortal and immortal, he belongs to the deadly time and eternity, he is both a spiritual being and a natural being. Death is a terrible tragedy, and death through death is conquered by resurrection. But death is conquered not by natural, but by supernatural forces.

The horror of death is not only the horror of the death of the individual, but also the horror of the death of the world. There is a personal Apocalypse and a global Apocalypse. Apocalypse is a revelation about the death of the world, although death is not the last word in it. Not only man is mortal, not only peoples and cultures, but all mankind as a whole, and the whole world.

Death and potential immortality are the strongest bait for the philosophizing mind, for all our life's affairs must somehow be measured with the eternal. Man is doomed to think about death, and this is his difference from the animal, which is mortal, but does not know about it.

In fact, we are talking about a triad: life - death - immortality, since all the spiritual systems of mankind proceeded from the idea of ​​the contradictory unity of these phenomena. The greatest attention was paid here to death and the acquisition of immortality in another life, and human life itself was interpreted as a moment allotted to a person so that he could adequately prepare for death and immortality.

With a few exceptions, in all times and peoples, statements about life were negative. Life is suffering (Buddha, Schopenhauer, etc.); life is a dream (Vedas, Plato, La Bruyère, Pascal); life is the abyss of evil (ancient Egyptian text “The conversation of a man with his spirit). “And I hated life, because the deeds that are done under the sun became disgusting to me, for everything is vanity and vexation of the spirit” (Ecclesiastes); "Human life is miserable" (Seneca); “Life is a struggle and wandering in a foreign land” (Marcus Aurelius); “everything is ashes, ghost, shadow and smoke” (John of Damascus); “Life is monotonous, the spectacle is dull” (Petrarch); "Life is a fool's story told by an idiot, full of noise and fury, but devoid of meaning" (Shakespeare); “Human life is nothing but a constant illusion” (Pascal); “All life is only the price of deceptive hopes” (Didero); "My life is eternal night.. what is life but madness?" (Kierkegaard); “All human life is deeply immersed in untruth” (Nietzsche). Proverbs and sayings of different nations are talking about the same - "Life is a penny." Ortega y Gasset defined man not as a body and as a spirit, but as a specific human drama. Indeed, in this sense, the life of every person is dramatic and tragic: no matter how successful life is, no matter how long it is, its end is inevitable. “Whoever is among the living, there is still hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion” (Ecclesiastes). A century later, after Ecclesiastes, the Greek sage Epicurus tried to solve this question of questions in the following way: “Accustom yourself to the idea that death has nothing to do with us. When we exist, death is not yet present, and when death is present, then we do not exist.”

It has been noticed that the wisdom of a person is often expressed in a calm attitude towards life and death. As Mahatma Gandhi said: “We do not know what is better - to live or die. Therefore, we should neither overly admire life nor tremble at the thought of death. We must treat both of them equally. It's the perfect option." And long before that, the Bhagavad Gita says: “Indeed, death is meant for the born, and birth is inevitable for the dead. About the inevitable - do not grieve!

At the same time, many great people realized this problem in tragic tones. The outstanding Russian biologist I.I. Mechnikov, reflecting on the possibility of “cultivating the instinct of natural death,” wrote about L.N. Tolstoy: “When Tolstoy, tormented by the impossibility of solving this problem and pursued by the fear of death, asked himself if family love could not calm his soul, he immediately saw that this was a vain hope. Why, he asked himself, raise children who would soon find themselves in the same critical condition as their father? Why live? Why should I love them, raise and watch over them. For the same despair that is in me, or for stupidity. Loving them, I cannot hide the truth from them - every step they take leads to the knowledge of this truth. And the truth is death.

For more than thirty centuries, sages, prophets and philosophers from different countries and peoples have been trying to find a dividing line between life, death and immortality. Most often it is believed that the whole point is the realization of the fact of impending death: we know that we will die and are feverishly looking for a path to immortality. All other living things quietly and peacefully complete their journey, having managed to reproduce a new life or serve as fertilizer for the soil for another life. A person is doomed to lifelong painful thoughts about the meaning of life or its meaninglessness, tormenting himself, and often others, and is forced to drown these damned questions in wine and drugs. This is partly true, but the question arises: what to do with the fact of the death of a newborn child who has not yet had time to understand anything, or a mentally retarded person who is not able to understand anything? Should we consider the moment of conception (which cannot be accurately determined in most cases) or the moment of birth as the beginning of life? The unknown and untouched death of a small creature, except for his mother, from starvation somewhere in Africa and the magnificent funeral of world famous leaders - in the face of eternity, they have no difference. In this sense, the English poet D. Donn is deeply right when he said that "the death of each person detracts from all mankind, and therefore never ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for you."

Death has a positive meaning. But death is at the same time the most terrible and the only evil. Every evil can be reduced to death. There is no other evil but death and murder.

At all times, people have sought salvation from the inevitable mistress of death. And this consists not only in the search for the immortality of the body or soul, but also in a certain "indifference" to death. This is the basis of the principle of the "beautiful life" of Epicurus.

Epicurus formulates this principle as follows: “accustom yourself to the idea that death has nothing to do with us. Everything good and bad consists in sensation, and death is the deprivation of sensation. Therefore, the correct knowledge that death has nothing to do with us makes the mortality of life delightful, not because it adds an unlimited amount of time to it, but because it takes away the thirst for immortality.

Conclusion: “A fool is the one who says that he is afraid of death, not because it causes suffering when it comes, but because it causes suffering to those that come: after all, if something does not disturb the presence, then it is in vain to grieve when it is only still expected.

Thus, the most terrible of evils, death has nothing to do with us, since when we exist, death is not yet present; and when death is present, then we do not exist. Thus, death has nothing to do with either the living or the dead, since for some it does not exist.

He contrasts his attitude towards death with the attitude towards it of the “people of the crowd”, who either seek to avoid death as the greatest evil, or, on the contrary, crave it, seeing in it a means of “rest from the evils of life”. Epicurus says: "The sage does not deviate from life, but he is not afraid of unlife, because life does not interfere with him, and unlife does not seem to be some kind of evil."