Jane Wynne Willson

Vice President, IHEU

A rational view of death

I have chosen this subject because, at the many humanist and rationalist conferences I have attended over the years, I have never heard anyone speak, in a general way, about death. To my own considerable surprise I have over the last ten or so years, because of my practical guide Funerals Without God, become closely associated with non-religious funeral ceremonies in the UK. Ceremony work has involved meeting many bereaved people and thinking round the whole subject more than I might otherwise have done. And, since death is something that every one of us has to face up to, both our own death and that of others, it seemed to me that, as humanists, we should try to be as rational about it as possible. To this end, I have put together a few of my own thoughts which will, I hope, provoke some discussion and might even be a step towards identifying a common rational stance on these issues.

Death is the one certainty in life, and accepting its finality is hard for anyone. Facing one's own death with equanimity is hard for people in many situations. Much harder is the acceptance that those near and dear to one will also die, when feelings of grief and anger, and of loss and often loneliness, are inevitable. Such feelings are worse when a life has ended prematurely.

In view of this, it is scarcely surprising that so many people, whether religious or not, consciously shut the concept of death out of their minds and only face up to it and cope as best they can when they have to. This pattern is particularly common in countries where death is no longer an everyday event and has become virtually a taboo subject. People in many western countries often go through life never having seen a dead body.

George Melly, the British jazz musician and humanist, on hearing a young person throw out the remark "Who wants to live till they're 98, anyway?" jokingly answered: "Why, someone of 97, of course!"

But as people get older one might expect them to become more reconciled to the prospect of death, and even to welcome the prospect. And many do. Bertrand Russell, the great British philosopher and humanist, wrote:

Let's consider some of the attitudes to death that are held by religious people.

I went to the funeral of a close friend, Christopher, two weeks ago. He had died from bronchial pneumonia at the age of 67 after a lifetime of smoking. He was a Church of England minister in a small village, and the little church was packed to overflowing with friends and parishioners. At the get-together or 'wake' after the burial, his widow made a short but moving speech. "When I come to join you up there, Christopher," she ended, casting her eyes upwards towards where she imagined heaven to be, "if l don't find you in the non-smoking section, watch out for trouble!"

What exactly do religious people believe? Certainly in some kind of continued existence for individuals beyond physical death. Far back in pre-history traces remain of such an idea, in the way in which bodies were buried and in which tools and ornaments were laid beside them for use in the life to come.

In historical times right up to the present day, most world religions have shared this belief in immortality, although there has been much variation in their teaching about death and a future existence.

The Jewish, Islamic and Christian religions share a fundamental belief in resurrection. The Hindu, Buddhist, and far-eastern faiths pin their hopes on reincarnation. Either way, living virtuously appears to be an essential key to happiness in a future life, whatever form that may take.

I would imagine that most of us here do not share any of these views. To the rational person death is the end of the conscious personality, and the only immortality lies in the influence individuals have had on the people in their lives, and in their children and grandchildren. We remember people we knew in the past, who have since died, and get pleasure from having known them. Sometimes we even forget that they are dead as they are still in our thoughts. We do not have to persuade ourselves that we will actually meet them again, in the flesh or in some other form. We can derive comfort from thinking that we ourselves may have left some good memories for our friends and family to enjoy when we are dead.

Without death, evolution, by a process of random variation and natural selection, simply would not work. This makes it rather remarkable and indeed irrational that scientists in the USA and elsewhere, researching in the field of regenerative medicine, are working towards an ideal of perpetual youth. Having started with fruit flies and going on to mice, they have had some success in putting cellular ageing on hold. If they were to apply their techniques to humans, delaying the ageing process indefinitely, this could have catastrophic results for humanity. In my view, as humanists and rationalists, we should be wary of encouraging such developments. But they do illustrate the point that, however rational people try to be, the human will to survive is a very powerful force indeed.

Is it rational to be afraid of your own death? The Greek philosopher Epicurus wrote:

'A right understanding that death is nothing to us makes the mortality of life enjoyable, not because it adds to it an infinite span of time, but because it takes away the craving for immortality. For there is nothing terrible in life for the man who has truly comprehended that there is nothing terrible in not living.'

And on ancient tombs throughout countries around the Mediterranean can be found the Epicurean inscription, which translates:

To be afraid of dying is a different matter altogether, and a fear of dying in a painful or degrading way is completely natural and rational. Dying painfully in terrible accidents and natural disasters can never be eliminated. Sudden and premature death in war and in acts of violence such as murder may one day be substantially reduced, though human nature will have to change for the better if this ideal is to be realised.

But instances of dying miserably at home or in hospital could be drastically reduced if voluntary euthanasia and assisted suicide were felt to be acceptable and were legalised in all the countries of the world.

Religious believers assign to some celestial power the right to decide when people should be born and when they should die. For those of us who hold no such beliefs, it seems a basic human right to choose when to give birth and to decide, in certain circumstances, when our own life should come to an end. When someone has expressed a wish to die, to bring an end to unbearable pain or loss of dignity from which there is no prospect of recovery, most humanists would consider that, with adequate built-in safeguards, voluntary euthanasia is the morally right course.

To conclude, we can be free of superstitious fears of death. We can lead our lives without being distracted by thoughts of what may be lying round the corner in some future existence.

As rational people, we know that every human life must end in death. It seems likely that medical research will succeed in improving the quality of life world-wide, by eliminating many of the worst diseases. It should be possible for more people to live a full span of years, though not an infinite span. We can value and enjoy this life as we know it, concentrating our efforts, as good humanists, on trying to make the world a better, fairer and saner place for people alive today, and for generations as yet unborn.