Please elaborate. I don't understand. If you believe in the supernatural then how does it relate to suicide being always wrong.For the nonbeliever in a naturalistic terms, what makes suicide "always wrong" (i.e. categorically immoral without exception)? — 180 Proof
I never claimed nor implied that I "believe in the supernatural". Your OP references it ("God"). Reread what I wrote. Tell me why, without reference to "supernatural" anything, "suicide is wrong, no matter the circumstances." — 180 Proof
If I didn't like the "movie" of my future life or didn't find it worthwile, I most probably not choose to live that life. I would examine an alternative "movie" of a future life and maybe I would chose that! :grin:If before being born, your were to learn, by some unknown mean, everything that was going to happen in your life, would you still chooses to be born? — I love Chom-choms
No problem with that. Anyway, this is a hypothesis, something imaginary ...I made God the one telling you because I just thought that people would roll with it — I love Chom-choms
But the title of your topic is Suicide is wrong, no matter the circumstances. Have you changed your mind in the meantime? :smile:I said earlier that a suicide is right only if your situation is objectively wrong. — I love Chom-choms
Yes, this is about what usualy happens. In most cases it is something purely psychological, extreme depression or grief, severe mental disease, madness, etc. But there have been also cases in which people have committed suicide because they have lost their whole fortune (big depression in 1929) or evrything valuable in their life (their partner in life) so their life had no meaning anymore for them. Another case is the Japanase who were committing seppuku (harakiri) --I don't know if they still do-- which was a kind of ritual or tradition and it showed bravery rather than a psychological problem. Kamikazie also were a similar case, an act of bravery. Soldiers, in general, can behave like that in wars. But all these acts of "bravery" are moments of "madness" (not as a disease, but just "going nuts"). They are simply irrational acts.A person commits suicide because he/she believes that his life is so bad — I love Chom-choms
Well, there's some truth in it, but is not a strong argument since we can't know what (kind of) circumstances these are or would be and if they are going to occur.no matter what we decide as right or wrong, it would not be objectively "right" or "wrong" because that "right" or "wrong" will change depending on the circumstances in our lives and how we feel. — I love Chom-choms
That person who tried harder that anyone did so because he believed is the promise of greater pleasure that would come if he won, that it would all be worth it. Just like a suicidal person who believes that if he keeps on living then all his pain would end, then it would all have been worth it. — I love Chom-choms
I'm with you on suffering (in the present) for happiness (in the future). Notice however that the best-case-scenario is happiness (in the present) for (more) happiness (in the future). That says a lot, doesn't it? — TheMadFool
I guess what you described of suffering-happiness is about meaningful suffering - to come out of it knowing it (suffering) was worth it. Again, it doesn't have to be that way, no? Simply put, suffering of any kind, a little or a lot, is meaningless. There's no necessity, as far as I can tell, for suffering to be a part of happiness. — TheMadFool
Given all that, a suicider reasons thus: not only is all forms of suffering empty of meaning, I (the suicider) have to bear more than that which is due to me and can endure. That's just too much, right? — TheMadFool
I never claimed nor implied that I "believe in the supernatural". Your OP references it ("God"). Reread what I wrote. Tell me why, without reference to "supernatural" anything, "suicide is wrong, no matter the circumstances." — 180 Proof
I'm with you on suffering (in the present) for happiness (in the future). Notice however that the best-case-scenario is happiness (in the present) for (more) happiness (in the future). That says a lot, doesn't it?
— TheMadFool
Well, if that was the case, then why would anyone commit suicide in such circumstances? — I love Chom-choms
Given all that, a suicider reasons thus: not only is all forms of suffering empty of meaning, I (the suicider) have to bear more than that which is due to me and can endure. That's just too much, right?
— TheMadFool
Yes, that is too much but by that standards of the suicider and I have reasoned that the suicider is mentally unstable, he is depressed and pessimistic. Just because he thinks that it is Too much doesn't mane it too much.
Empathetically speaking, yes I would want to let him die if I can't help him any other way but I have said this before, morality based on feelings is unreliable as it changes and my morality is based on rationality. — I love Chom-choms
I said earlier that a suicide is right only if your situation is objectively wrong.
— I love Chom-choms
But the title of your topic is Suicide is wrong, no matter the circumstances. Have you changed your mind in the meantime? :smile:
Anyway, you maybe mean what I also thought, that is there are cases where there is no meaning in staying alive, e.g. extreme suffering, being in a coma, incurable disease, etc. But no would call a "suicide" stopping life in those cases. — Alkis Piskas
But there have been also cases in which people have committed suicide because they have lost their whole fortune (big depression in 1929) or evrything valuable in their life (their partner in life) so their life had no meaning anymore for them. — Alkis Piskas
Another case is the Japanase who were committing seppuku (harakiri) --I don't know if they still do-- which was a kind of ritual or tradition and it showed bravery rather than a psychological problem. Kamikazie also were a similar case, an act of bravery. Soldiers, in general, can behave like that in wars. But all these acts of "bravery" are moments of "madness" (not as a disease, but just "going nuts"). They are simply irrational acts. — Alkis Piskas
It is too much! Objectively so. The global distribution of happiness and suffering is unequal and this is true for even within smaller subdivisions of the human family - you can't expect a person to undergo torture and be ok with it when someone in another house, neighborhood, community, state, country pops pills for just a headache.
As for morality, feelings, and rationality, remember suffering and happiness are emotions. — TheMadFool
Right, loss normally results in grief, but not necesserily. There are cases of loss in which just realizing that you have lost everything is enough to put an end to your life. In Greece, there have been hundreds of suicides at the peak of our economic crisis in 2010-2014, committed only because persons lost suddenly everything and mainly their houses seized by tht state or banks because of unpaid taxes, loans, etc.) This kind of losses don't involve grief. They lead to "cold" suicides.I think we can say that they are suffering emotional pain, — I love Chom-choms
There might be also such cases. But as I said, it was mainly a ritual. It was enforced by tradition and moral rules and it was performed by people of a certain status who were found guilty of a serious felony. It was considred a privilege!The reasoning behind seppuku is that it is better to die than to live is shame — I love Chom-choms
There is no rule book to life. — Tom Storm
Well, kinda. Both the dim social view and the legal proscription against suicide have their origin in Jewish foundational ethics, wherein the divine command "thou shall not kill" has absolute force. But, within both Judaism and traditional Christianity, the "theology of life" exceeds and in fact predates that deontological ethic. The foundational virtue of the Jewish, and so of the Judeo-Christian, worldview is the unwavering devotion to life itself. Surely we are all familiar with the old Jewish toast: "L' chaim"/"To life". In the northwest Semitic religious traditions, this virtue predates even YHWH, Ba'al, Elohim, and all other early beliefs. As someone raised Roman Catholic, I can personally attest to the centrality of the Church's "theology of life" to the chatechism...this was simply carried over from Judaism into the early church. The strength of the social and legal abhorrence of suicide within our Western cultures is evidence of the depth with which the Judeo-Christian worldview had early on penetrated our 'western' cultural consciousness, and so effected sensibilities both social and legal.The reason why people have a dim view of suicide, I surmise, is because if someone else killed you, that would be murder; that in taking one's own life, you do kill a person, even if that person were yourself, people, I suppose, find it difficult to distinguish suicide from murder. — TheMadFool
Part of the ethics of suicide do involve the question of the right to make such a choice and this is extremely complex. Mental health services often step in to forcibly stop people killing themselves through keeping them in hospital under Section, and by putting them on suicide watch observations, if people are perceived as a risk. Of course, the real issue is of being able to measure risk accurately, because the person who is really planning suicide may keep the ideas as a secret. — Jack Cummins
have their origin in Jewish foundational ethics, wherein the divine command "thou shall not kill" has absolute force. — Michael Zwingli
There were times the Bible specifically commanded the killing of people or permitted the killing of people (war, crimes, self-defense, etc.). — Ennui Elucidator
Deut. 7:1
When the LORD thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and shall cast out many nations before thee, the Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven nations greater and mightier than thou; and when the LORD thy God shall deliver them up before thee, and thou shalt smite them; then thou shalt utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor show mercy unto them.
— “Deuteronomy 7:1”
16 Thou shalt not murder.
— “Deuteronomy 5:16”
Well, kinda. Both the dim social view and the legal proscription against suicide have their origin in Jewish foundational ethics, wherein the divine command "thou shall not kill" has absolute force. But, within both Judaism and traditional Christianity, the "theology of life" exceeds and in fact predates that deontological ethic. The foundational virtue of the Jewish, and so of the Judeo-Christian, worldview is the unwavering devotion to life itself. Surely we are all familiar with the old Jewish toast: "L' chaim"/"To life". In the northwest Semitic religious traditions, this virtue predates even YHWH, Ba'al, Elohim, and all other early beliefs. As someone raised Roman Catholic, I can personally attest to the centrality of the Church's "theology of life" to the chatechism...this was simply carried over from Judaism into the early church. The strength of the social and legal abhorrence of suicide within our Western cultures is evidence of the depth with which the Judeo-Christian worldview had early on penetrated our 'western' cultural consciousness, and so effected sensibilities both social and legal. — Michael Zwingli
the divine command "thou shall not kill" has absolute force. — Michael Zwingli
I’m not sure what you mean by “later”. Less than 50 “lines"? — Ennui Elucidator
Thou shalt not murder. — “Deuteronomy 5:16”
No, that's not what I am claiming at all. Certainly, clearly these "torot" were present in Judaism in the 1st century CE, and had been since the Babylonian period. There remains, however, a clear ethic of life that in my view predates the Yahwist, Deuteronomist, and Priestly writings, and seems to form the basis for Jewish, resultantly, for Christian cosmology. Perhaps I should have followed my gut, and not included the biblical quotation in my post...it seems to have been distracting from my point, which was not the precise meaning of the decalogal injunction. I guess my point is, that an act of suicide violates none of the philosophical bases upon which our legal code rests. The only explanation for such an act's proscription by our law, is by the undue and misplaced influence of our Judeo-Christian religion.It feels unfair to claim that the Jewish ethic did not include things like the death penalty, self-defense, and holy war at the time of early Christianity (or the end of late temple period). — Ennui Elucidator
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