Page Reader AI | Physicalism Faces Death. Physicalism says death is the end… | by Gerald R. Baron | Top-Down or Bottom-Up?

Physicalism Faces Death. Physicalism says death is the end… | by Gerald R. Baron | Top-Down or Bottom-Up? | Medium

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Physicalism and the Concept of Death

The article questions physicalism's assertion that death is the ultimate end, highlighting the discrepancy between this viewpoint and the prevalent belief in an afterlife across various cultures and time periods. It cites the statistic that over 90% of Americans believe in some form of life after death.

A Philosopher's Changing Perspective

The central focus is on the documentary "Being 97," which chronicles the final days of an existentialist and physicalist philosopher. Initially, he viewed death as a natural and unfearful event. However, his views evolved over 20 years as he confronted his own mortality and the death of his wife.

The Emotional Reality of Death

The article emphasizes the inherent emotional unease associated with death. It argues that while death might seem acceptable in theory, the reality of its imminence or the death of a loved one creates profound discomfort and a feeling that death is fundamentally 'wrong'.

Conclusion

The article ultimately presents the documentary and the philosopher's evolving perspective as a challenge to the physicalist understanding of death, suggesting that the deeply ingrained human belief in an afterlife and the emotional response to death deserve further philosophical consideration.

Physicalism says death is the end. Period. Virtually all of humankind, from the very earliest to those living today, disagree. Belief in the afterlife began prior to the emergence of homo sapiens, and despite two or more centuries of physicalist belief, over 90% of Americans continue to believe in life after death or some form of immortality. Is this, most basic intuition of humans wrong? Or, might physicalism be wrong? The 24th post in The Case Against Physicalism.

“Being 97” is a powerful short documentary by Andrew Hasse. The filmmaker documented the last days of his grandfather, an existentialist philosopher who at the age of 77 wrote a book about death. As an existentialist and physicalist, he argued that death is natural and should not be feared. Our ideas of death were what needed to change. But, twenty years later, the reality of his wife’s death and his own impending death caused serious rethinking of his earlier convictions.

Death is a scandal. It is wrong, just plain wrong. It offends our sense of justice, our sense of how things were meant to be. We rebel against it with an almost righteous fervor. We tell ourselves over and over that death is natural, nothing really to be feared. We simply go the way of all life. Dust to dust. Like the falling petals or the leaves of grass, we live, then die, and our substance carries on in the continuing life of the universe, in the substance of new living things.

But, then someone close to us dies. Maybe we find that our spouse or partner has been given the final prognosis. Or, we face our own mortality with clear eyes. Death is acceptable in the abstract and quite easily pushed into the background. We busy ourselves, sometimes intentionally, to avoid confronting the dread. But, when the reality of our death or that of those closest to us breaks in on us, we cannot avoid the obvious: it is wrong. It should never have been and should never be. It is just unacceptable.

Most of us pretend to accept death until we don’t. That’s the simple story told in the short documentary “Being 97.” Dr. Herbert Fingarette was a philosopher at the University of California, Santa Barbara. An existentialist and an advocate of the physicalist belief system, he wrote a book called Death: Philosophical Soundings. He was 77 at the time. The documentary, produced by his maternal grandson Andrew Hasse, reveals how the philosopher’s views about death changed in those 20 years.

Through the lens of his existentialist philosophy he viewed death as completely natural. He wrote that it was simply the end and as such there was nothing to fear. He sought to help readers escape from definitions and understandings that attempted to provide consolation but didn’t. The Amazon introduction to this book says: