Attitudes toward death rest on a more fundamental project of living

Evidence

Heidegger had long since pointed out that no one goes forwards forever. In Being and Time, he depicted Dasein as finding authenticity in ‘Being-towards-death’, that is, in affirming mortality and limitation. He also set out to show that Being itself is not to be found on some eternal, changeless plane: it emerges through Time and through history. Thus, both on the cosmic level and in the lives of each one of us, all things are temporal and finite. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 933 (#expands, via linked claim)

At the very beginning of Being and Time, Heidegger promises that the book will take us to a grand finale in which he will make this ultimate point: that the meaning of Dasein’s Being is Time. He never did this because he never finished the book: what we have is just the first part. But he showed clearly which way he was planning to go. If we are temporal beings by our very nature, then authentic existence means accepting, first, that we are finite and mortal. We will die: this all-important realisation is what Heidegger calls authentic ‘Being-towards-Death’, and it is fundamental to his philosophy. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 292 (#expands, via linked claim)

According to terror management theory, the combination of a basic biological inclination toward self-preservation with sophisticated cognitive capacities renders us humans aware of our perpetual vulnerabilities and inevitable mortality, which gives rise to potentially paralyzing terror. Cultural worldviews and self-esteem help manage this terror by convincing us that we are special beings with souls and identities that will persist, literally and/or symbolically, long past our own physical death. We are thus pervasively preoccupied with maintaining confidence in our cultural scheme of things and satisfying the standards of value associated with it. But preserving faith in our cultural worldviews and self-esteem becomes challenging when we encounter others with different beliefs. Sinister complications almost inevitably ensue. — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core, 476 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Choosing to be indifferent to the dead is still a choice of attitude — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 1263; Cultural worldviews structure conscious experience to mask death’s inevitability — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core: On the Role of…, 184; Death-awareness drives humans to cling to cultural worldviews and self-esteem — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core: On the Role of…, 476 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Being-towards-death frames mortality as the source of authentic existence #expands (0.85) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 933
• Being-towards-death means accepting finitude as the core of authentic existence #expands (0.80) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 292
• Cultural worldviews structure conscious experience to mask death’s inevitability #complicates (0.72) — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core, 184
• Death-awareness drives humans to cling to cultural worldviews and self-esteem #complicates (0.72) — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core, 476