“A Permanent Solution to a Temporary Problem” – The Great Analysis

Suicide is often referred to as a permanent solution to a temporary problem.   I figured the reverse could also be said though.  Whether or not someone chooses to end their life does not change the fact that their life will end one day.  In otherwords, choosing to live is a temporary solution to a permanent problem.  We’re still going to die.

Often I’ll ponder ways that make committing suicide more rational than not committing suicide.  I have not been able to rationalize suicide though.  At best I can say that with a certain value system (a valueless value system) choosing to live is just as rational as choosing to die. Here’s how I do that.

First I’ll make a list of reasons for living:

1) my friends and family will be happier if I lived

2) I get to continue having conscious experiences and learn new things

3) I may find more happiness in life later and change the value I hold to my own life.

4) fear of dying.  We are biologically driven to want to live.  Even when given a painless way to die, I am still driven by fear and a desire to live.  I have no doubt this has been programmed into me from millions of years of evolution.

Then I’ll make a list of reasons for dying:

1) I get to see if there’s an afterlife right now instead of waiting.  I’m an agnostic-atheist and am almost 100% there’s nothing after dead but I can admit that there’s a small chance there is something else.  It’s hard for me to imagine not existing anymore so I’m intellectually curious what happens after death.

2) I won’t have to worry about the bad things in life anymore and I shouldn’t have any regrets about missing the good things either if I will no longer exist.

3) conquers the fear of death

4) won’t have to worry about a surprise death.

5) we will no longer feel anything or conscious.  Therefore we will not be conscious of any consequences and this is a decision without consequences subjectively.

Now that I have all the reasons laid out, I can see that my reasons for living are emotionally based (emotions of others, my fear, my happiness, hope for future happiness, desires).  I would say most of the reasons for living can be eliminated from the acknowledgment that once we die we will no longer experience emotion and everything we’ve learned and experienced will be gone along with us.

The way we feel about others or what what we want for the future won’t matter to us once we’re dead.  If we change the question slightly and ask whether or not we should be rid of our emotions, why should we let our emotions have a say in the matter?  Making the wrong emotional decision will not result in sadness since we will no longer feel sad after we die.

As said earlier if we see value as something emotionally based and conclude that value has no objective value then at best we can come to the conclusion that living and not living have equal value: zero.  And after all that, we’re still lift with our natural biological urges to continue to live.