Epicurus Fear Of Death

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The fear of death is irrational; death should be nothing to us. According to Epicurus, death involves neither pleasure nor pain. If pain is the only thing bad for us, then death is not bad for us. The conclusion of his argument is true if one accepts the premises to be true. The first premise must be true based on Epicurus’ metaphysics of atomism. If trying to attack his argument, it must be on the second premise. When Epicurus says “death,” he did not mean the process of dying which could inflict pain and therefore be bad for us. Epicurus also did not mean the moment of death which could also be good or bad for us. What he meant was being dead. If the metaphysical insinuation that one does not exist after death and there is nothing beyond death is accepted, then his argument is sound. Epicurus claims that one should not fear death because “Death, the most frightening of bad things, is nothing to us; since when we exist death is not yet present, and when death is present, then we do not exist” (Letter to Menoeceus, 125). Death might be alarming to an individual because they do not know what to expect, or fear that they will not meet expectations. Epicurus states that when one dies, they no longer exist. If one no longer exists then being dead is not bad, and if being dead was bad, one would not exist to experience it. Therefore death …show more content…

This same argument becomes very controversial. Epicurus is an empiricist and relies on senses to make judgements and evaluate the world around him. Epicurus believes that the soul provided the body with facial expressions and motion in general. The soul must be material for these actions to occur. Epicurus thought it made little sense to claim that the soul was not material because something that was of the void could neither act or be acted upon and the soul both acts and is acted upon (Letter to Herodotus,

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