What Is Nagel's View On Death

DEATH by Thomas Nagel

Thomas Nagel presents an intriguing discussion about death. Nagel presupposes that life is, in general, a good thing to have and death is bad as our state of non-existence lacks any unpleasant positive features. Thus, death deprives us of all what we have, namely life.

Nagel makes an interesting remark about whether we can consider an event or aspect of life that is generally normal to all humans as a misfortune. Since we take it be more tragic when a young person dies than when an old one does (because the are more opportunities lost in such cases), we shouldn’t view it as tragic when someone dies at the end of what would consider a ‘normal’ human life span. He uses the example of moles, which are blind animals, to suggest that it’s not tragic for a mole to be blind since they’re all blind, and would never know sight and come to appreciate it. Nagel also presents a hypothetical scenario where everyone undergoes six months of pain and agony before dying. Everyone knows that this is ultimately going to happen, but Nagel asks if that does make

For example, from my own personal experience, I don’t think that the death of my 85 years old grandfather was a tragedy. Death at the age of 85 would be a tragedy if we lived to a 1000 years without aging, but if we aged at the same rate we currently do, living to a 1000, and having the last 900 years spent like my grandfather’s last 5 years as a bedridden progressive dementia patient, too old to move, see, or meet any of life’s daily self care activities, then I strongly believe that living the full 1000 years is the real tragedy here. As we age, begin to have Alzheimer’s, have our first stroke etc., then the range of open possibilities available to us declines dramatically, and once this occurs, it may be that death is actually no longer a misfortune, though perhaps aging