Yes, I suppose I agree. The manic aspect of the act of suicide, however, is hardly ever noticed in the literature. I wonder how many of us on this site have tried to approach suicide scientifically. Suicide is a fact. It exists. People do it. Or ‘commit’ it, as one says to underscore revulsion and criminality. But what is suicide? What is it for? Why do people choose kill themselves? Apparently, two things seem to me true about suicide. The first is that no one really knows why the mind resorts to suicide and in so doing wastes so much energy that could be channeled into recovery from whatever drives the misery. The second is that the reason why one kills oneself just to end one’s life is often to do with love and a sense of burden. More precisely, the desire love (including oneself) and to be loved (including by oneself) and the burden the suicidal person s/he is on other people. All the other motives are secondary. The German pilot presumably could not imagine loving himself (or being loved) without continuing to be a pilot. His health problems (depression, detached retina, etc.) would eventually have prevented him from continuing to serve as a pilot. But why did he take 149 people with him? Revenge? Or inevitability? I guess we’ll never know. That’s the mystery about suicide. Not even a note can explain it satisfactorily. It’s a mystery. No one ever came back to explain fully and completely.
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Yes, I suppose I agree. The manic aspect of the act of suicide, however, is hardly ever noticed in the literature. I wonder how many of us on this site have tried to approach suicide scientifically. Suicide is a fact. It exists. People do it. Or ‘commit’ it, as one says to underscore revulsion and criminality. But what is suicide? What is it for? Why do people choose kill themselves? Apparently, two things seem to me true about suicide. The first is that no one really knows why the mind resorts to suicide and in so doing wastes so much energy that could be channeled into recovery from whatever drives the misery. The second is that the reason why one kills oneself just to end one’s life is often to do with love and a sense of burden. More precisely, the desire love (including oneself) and to be loved (including by oneself) and the burden the suicidal person s/he is on other people. All the other motives are secondary. The German pilot presumably could not imagine loving himself (or being loved) without continuing to be a pilot. His health problems (depression, detached retina, etc.) would eventually have prevented him from continuing to serve as a pilot. But why did he take 149 people with him? Revenge? Or inevitability? I guess we’ll never know. That’s the mystery about suicide. Not even a note can explain it satisfactorily. It’s a mystery. No one ever came back to explain fully and completely.