Is Death Bad for You?
(Not a Dumb Question)
Here's a question that might seem obvious: Is death bad for you?
Epicurus, argued that death isn't bad for us at all. His reasoning? You can't experience being dead, so how could it possibly harm you?
This view is challenged by Travis Timmerman who argues for a Deprivationist view. Put simply, death is bad for you because it denies you of the pleasure that you might have experienced if you hadn’t died. An Epicurean might counter that you will have no awareness of the life you’re missing out on after you’re dead. So, actually, it isn’t a problem.
But Timmerman uses two thought experiments to demonstrate his point that Epicureans can’t be totally indifferent to death. The first is “Carl’s Dilemma.”
“Two Choices:
Convenience store clerk Carl crosses paths with psychopathic killer Anton Chigurh, who happens to be in a good mood. Chigurh offers Carl the following deal. If Carl walks out the front door, he will receive a satchel filled with two million dollars cash. If Carl doesn’t do this, then Chigurh will painlessly and instantaneously murder Carl.”
Carl would have to be awfully slow to deliberate about this decision for very long. But that’s precisely Timmerman’s point. The answer is obvious. So obvious that the correct answer is just common sense. So too with his second thought experiment:
“Torturing the Spy:
Sage the spy has been captured and is about to undergo years of constant torture followed only by death. If Sage continues living, her well-being at every subsequent moment would be negative according to any account of well-being. Sage can avoid such a fate iff [sic] she immediately takes the cyanide capsule she has hidden on her.”
Obviously, Sage should reach for that cyanide pill and take it. Her preference for death over torture is logical because she would be depriving herself of nothing by ending her life before spending years of suffering which will result in death anyway.
Because there are scenarios in which living or dying is clearly preferable, then it follows that the Deprivationist position is sound. Timmerman puts it to Epicureans; either accommodate this view into Epicurean views of death, abandoning indifference to it, or quibble over semantics.
To answer for this, Timmerman introduces a number of Epicurean defenders to argue against the view that death is bad. Their positions are summarized here:
David Hershenov argues that death is not bad for anyone because, once a person dies, they cease to have a well-being level. He distinguishes between “good for” and “bad for” in a way that only applies to events that do not result in immediate nonexistence.
Aaron Smuts also argues that death isn’t bad in itself, but he grounds this in experience rather than well-being levels. However, Smuts acknowledges that death does prevent future pleasures, which means it makes a person’s life less good overall. In this sense, people have self-regarding reasons to avoid death when it would cause them to miss out on future well-being.
James Stacey Taylor argues that death is never a harm to a person—because once they’re dead, they cannot experience suffering—but it can be a harm for them if it prevents a future they would have wanted.
Stephen Rosenbaum takes a different approach by arguing that being dead is never bad for anyone, but dying can be. He distinguishes between the moment of death and the state of being dead. Rosenbaum claims that death can be bad for a person if it lowers their total lifetime well-being, but once they are dead, nothing can be bad for them anymore.
O.H. Green argues that if death, by definition, entails a total lack of experience, then it follows that it can never be bad in a subjective sense. However, Green acknowledges that death can be objectively bad if it prevents a person from fulfilling their potential or achieving valuable goals.
Timmerman dismisses these related and similar arguments by insisting that there really is no disagreement with the Deprivationist position. All of these Epicureans believe in shades of what he does and their attempts to prove otherwise are nothing but verbal evasions. They rely on legalistic redefinitions of common terms and concepts to avoid conceding the obvious that death is something to us after all.
But what Zimmerman misses is that the crux of his argument depends entirely on just such a narrow, legalistic definition. His entire case revolves around a single word in a single phrase spoken (ostensibly) by Epicurus, “nothing.”
If we substitute the word “insensate” or even “void” for “nothing” then the Gordian knot falls apart. Translation of archaic Greek is tricky, and either of these might have been closer to what Epicurus might have meant.
But let’s say that this isn’t the case and the word Epicurus used really does best approximate “nothing.” Must we as Epicureans insist that death is a matter to which we should be totally indifferent, even to the point of denying the value of continuing to exist?
Out of the Quagmire
Answering a different but related question, Professor Emily A. Austin provides a way out of this quagmire. She denies that Epicurus insisted that the fear of death is always irrational, pointing out that Epicurus recommended that people seek friends and participate in the community to guard against the threat of violence at the hands of some enemy. This isn’t treating life as something to be indifferent to. Providing for a continued and happy life through rational planning wouldn’t make sense if you walked around believing that death isn’t even preferable to life.
Seen this way, death is nothing to fear even if it isn’t, in the strictest sense, “nothing to us.” It’s true that this means conceding to Timmerman, but it helps make a larger point. Why should we deny the Deprivationist position if it’s internally sound and not at odds with Epicurean philosophy as a means of living one’s life?
So Where Does This Leave Us?
Perhaps the real wisdom in Epicurus's teaching isn't that death doesn't matter, but that obsessing over it gets in the way of living well. We can acknowledge that death might be bad for us while still refusing to let that knowledge paralyze us with fear.
After all, the goal isn't to pretend death doesn't matter – it's to find a way to live well despite knowing that our time is limited. And that's definitely not a dumb thing to think about.
Ειρήνη και Ασφάλεια
Peace and Safety
Austin, Emily A. “Epicurus and the Politics of Fearing Death.” Apeiron, vol. 45, no. 2, Jan. 2012, https://doi.org/10.1515/apeiron-2011-0003. Accessed 15 Dec. 2019.
Timmerman, Travis. “A Dilemma for Epicureanism.” Philosophical Studies, vol. 176, no. 1, Dec. 2017, pp. 241–57, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-017-1014-2. Accessed 8 Apr. 2022.
I think you may be thinking of Lucretius. He was the Roman Epicurean who popularized Epicurus's teachings in an epic poem. Because his work survives, he's considered one of the most eminent Epicureans and so they're often conflated. You make a good point about death being the cessation of any pain. And it's true that suicide is probably best avoided in most situations since it often inflicts pain on the loved ones we leave behind. As for avoiding pain, the case of Sage the Spy illustrates that it's for just this reason that someone might choose suicide. Of course, in reality we don't have assurances that the life ahead will be only pleasurable (like Carl living with $2 million) or only painful (like Sage if she doesn't take the cyanide pill). Only thought experiments can offer this level of certainty about intangibles.
I think what Epicurus meant by "nothing" becomes clearer when you consider the related treatment of death in the Epicurean Tetrapharmakos:
Ἄφοβον ὁ θεός,
ἀνύποπτον ὁ θάνατος
καὶ τἀγαθὸν μὲν εὔκτητον,
τὸ δὲ δεινὸν εὐεκκαρτέρητον
the word used to describe death (θάνατος) is ἀνύποπτον (anypopton). Now I am a Modern Greek speaker, unfortunately I didn't pay too much attention during Ancient Greek classes, so this is only my own very unqualified interpretation. I don't know why the adjective is in the neuter gender when the noun θάνατος is masculine. Perhaps the event of death is meant here, which would be neuter. In both modern and ancient use, anypoptos (masculine) means mainly "unsuspecting", "unwitting" or "unknowing", but also "unsuspected" (see https://lsj.gr/wiki/ἀνύποπτος and https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%B1%CE%BD%CF%8D%CF%80%CE%BF%CF%80%CF%84%CE%BF%CF%82). The verb ὑποπτεύω (hypopteuō) itself, while in most cases translated as "suspect", can also evidently be used to mean "observe" or "notice" (https://lsj.gr/wiki/%E1%BD%91%CF%80%CE%BF%CF%80%CF%84%CE%B5%CF%8D%CF%89).
With that in mind, I think the case can be made that death in the Tetrapharmakos is actually characterized as unobservable or unnoticeable. That is, it is nothing for our sense perception - since it ceases to exist with death. This point is probably more relevant as a counter to theories of an afterlife and the fear or false hopes generated by such superstitions. From the moment of death onward, nothing is perceived. When it comes to our pleasure calculus, death obviously matters, as pleasures are perceived through the senses and death would deprive us of senses. To assume this simple fact would escape Epicurus and all his students is somewhat flippant on behalf of Timmerman. I thus wholeheartedly agree with your conclusion. It would be best if we could live a life of pleasure for eternity; death gets in the way of that. The next best option is living pleasantly now and as long as death can be avoided, and living in fear of an inevitability is antithetical to pleasure.