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Conversation with a Street Artist
As I walked Decatur Street this evening in New Orleans I ran into one of the many artists that sell paintings along the side of the road. Discussing art with her led into several conversations on the nature of existence, life, death, etc. She brought up a few points that I had never deeply considered until tonight:
1. One of the principle ways that higher thinking organisms differ from lower thinking organisms is in their abilities to perceive non-immediate danger. She used the example of a group of pigeons on the street:
“They’re running around pecking at food, oblivious to everything around them, and then somebody steps too close to them and they all flee like, ‘oh fuck, death, death, death.’ Whereas I’m here smoking a cigarette [implying the relatively benign nature of simply smoking a cigarette] but I know it ultimately leads to cancer and death.”
Yes, this is a simple concept, but have you ever really considered it as the primary difference between organisms? I had not. Being able to preemptively predict danger seems to be tied very linearly to how far an organism rises on the scale of worms to raccoons to humans. Can you think of any counter-examples?
2. On the subject of what happens after death: If one believes that he simply ceases to exist then that idea should be every bit as unsettling as any ideas of heaven, hell, reincarnation, etc. simply because– just like all ideas of after-life– he has never experienced it. All life seems to inherently fear the unknown. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that people fear death (or perhaps more accurately, desire not to die) because they have never experienced what happens when they die: the result is unknown. However, you have never experienced “not existing at all” so that should be just as unsettling as any contrary ideas. This doesn’t address either of our opinions on what happens, but we both agreed that given the premise that we fear the unknown, the idea of simply not existing after death should be every bit as disturbing as any alternative.
3. Why do we fear the unknown? I fear engaging a Grizzly bear in hand to hand (hand to paw?) combat. I have enough perspective that I understand the likely consequences and know they are contrary to my inherent desire to survive. I have no perspective on things unknown. I have no idea whether unknown things will result in favorable or unfavorable conditions for my survival. Why then do all things (it seems) fear the unknown? Why do we take the “glass half empty” approach? Has nature conditioned us that this approach generally results in fewer unfavorable conditions? That’s my best guess.
Thoughts?
An interesting post that raises several interesting points worth thinking about.
I don’t think I fear death per se. Rather, my objection is to the loss of the life I know and value. As for the act of dying, if it’s just an end to my existence, why fear that? How is it different than just falling asleep? And if it’s something more than that, it’ll be an adventure.
I’m not religious, and I’m skeptical of the concept of heaven to say the least. Still, there are some people I’d like to meet or see again in the afterlife, so I like to keep a little hope that the traditional model is right.