Why do you not?

@salima,

Salima (sorry i didn't get back sooner);

Yes this time of year is very conductive of ones state of being.

You did not necessarily fail, you succeeded in knowing better what it is to be alive and still vital to this world, you learned what it is to be part of something very few will ever creidt to themselves or their creators (parents).

Do you lose yourself, or do you find yourself? not just in the outcome but in the process?

Would you say you are a stronger person for going through with what you went? meant? knowing now that it was not what you meant or went?

But for some (I include especially the Yogis in this) is it not finding total balance? Getting off the wheel to skip forward a turn, just to get back on.
Suicide can ever be reasonable?

I think only the stupid dont deliberate it and take it seriously, only the stupid dont realsie what they are about to do and done and lose.
even if they are very clever in what they will receive.

Why is there stigmatism (shame) for what many may feel is absolute outcome, absolute freedom?

I know it harms those left behind who did not die along with, but for many there is more harm to be dealt and to deal beofre this decision is made, perhaps the harm and harmful can only be avoided with this outcome.
No more harm in death?

You had reasoning, reason, reasonings to live.
Is suicide ever reasonable?

'And will not survive their body'
What if they dont want their soul anymore after either?

'so can anyone give me reasons why an unhappy person would not?'
Thank you for this and i would like it answered also so i ask it also.
My answer would be, There is always hope,
without hope the person is useless
and therefore that person may 'have' to die.

It does matter.
Because although time will always dictate, timing is all supposition which can offten be regarded as truth.

Or a good question,
does to be alive mean one should be happy? (to survive it?)

Misery is redundant, it leads nowhere but down, but this is just somewhere we have to realsie is part of the universe.
However can not misery teach us more how to be happy? how to be alive?

Thanks

@sometime sun,

i guess i am going through an existential crisis. that's what my brother calls it, he says he is also having one. it is very hard to deal with when you already have philosophized everything to the end of the line and think you dont need any answers and all the questions are gone and then you go through it all over again like a song you cant get out of your head that you really dont even like, without any reasons or excuses and no way to even argue with yourself.

at first the reason for why i did not again was like that fellow said (i forgot his name) no reason to, so why bother? then i thought why not live is just as valid a question as why not die...same reason i quit smoking. why smoke?

i think every once in awhile there are outside influences that leech onto us when we are in negative moods and make it a lot harder to get out of them. something must be helping me this time because i havent been able to feel this despondent in years! as they say, and it is a proven fact of existence and so why not also of non-existence, that like attracts like. it is also a proven fact that opposites attract. how to choose what is attracted to you? i cant even choose what i am attracted to, and that would help.

feeling helpless...never thought of it that way. it must be the feeling of helplessness that is the most difficult to bear, and the choice to end it at least gives one a sense of control over the situation, though most likely it is illusory. forget what i said up to now because that was just rambling...but this might be important to the question at hand...

@salima,

salima;110903 wrote:

.....reasons why an unhappy person would 'not'?

:listening:

The quotes below are picked fresh off the net.

" I had the blues because I had no shoes,
Until upon the street, I met a man who had no feet"~Harold Abbott.

This guy said he felt bad he had no money and then he saw a man who had no legs and even he was smiling and said, "Good morning, sir. It is a fine morning, isn't it?" and Abbott felt ashamed of his self pity.

Eddie Rickenbacker said "the biggest lesson I learned from that experience was that if you have all the fresh water you want to drink and all the food you want to eat, you ought never to complain about anything".

BTW, if someone seriously contemplates that his life is useless and is unhappy and un-blessed, then maybe HE should go for it. And save a lot of trouble.

@sometime sun,

sometime sun;108450 wrote:

Why do you not commit suicide?
...

Regardless of what most people say, the real reason that most people do not commit suicide is the same reason most dogs don't commit suicide: instinct. This has nothing whatsoever to do with reason or rationality. If reason were relevant for not committing suicide, infants would never survive.

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;115494 wrote:

Regardless of what most people say, the real reason that most people do not commit suicide is the same reason most dogs don't commit suicide: instinct. This has nothing whatsoever to do with reason or rationality. If reason were relevant for not committing suicide, infants would never survive.

I agree. But I would put it differently. Iinstinct is not a reason, it is a cause. In fact, it is the very opposite of being a reason for doing anything. The term, "real reason" is ordinarily used to designate the reason that is also the cause. So, instinct could not be a real reason, for it is not a reason at all. So, what causes us to refrain from suicide is instinct. The question is whether we have a reason for not committing suicide, even if that reason is not a "real reason", i.e. the cause of our not committing suicide. I suppose my reason for not committing suicide is that I don't want to die. And, why (the reason) I don't want to die is that it would be the ultimate deprivation. The deprivation of everything (or so I believe).

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;115531 wrote:

I agree. But I would put it differently. Iinstinct is not a reason, it is a cause. In fact, it is the very opposite of being a reason for doing anything. The term, "real reason" is ordinarily used to designate the reason that is also the cause. So, instinct could not be a real reason, for it is not a reason at all. So, what causes us to refrain from suicide is instinct. The question is whether we have a reason for not committing suicide, even if that reason is not a "real reason", i.e. the cause of our not committing suicide. I suppose my reason for not committing suicide is that I don't want to die. And, why (the reason) I don't want to die is that it would be the ultimate deprivation. The deprivation of everything (or so I believe).

Reason is a word that is ambiguous, and I should have selected a different term for greater clarity. I should have said something more like:

Regardless of what most people say, the real cause of most people not committing suicide is the same cause of most dogs not committing suicide: instinct. This has nothing whatsoever to do with reason or rationality. If reason were relevant for not committing suicide, infants would never survive.

I suppose I may excuse myself for the lack of clarity because I was posting later than I should have stayed up.

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;115494 wrote:

Regardless of what most people say, the real reason that most people do not commit suicide is the same reason most dogs don't commit suicide: instinct. This has nothing whatsoever to do with reason or rationality. If reason were relevant for not committing suicide, infants would never survive.

It could be better put, why do you not do 'it' once you come to understand what 'it' is?

@Pyrrho,

Well this is the first post I read form the PF and I am impressed with most everyone's answers. I'd like to apply my simplistic way of thinking through things if I may.

Why not?

Well there is no honor in it whatsoever (<----my opinion inserted here). I don't know if I agree instinct is not a reason. Some people are more in tune with this baser part of themselves while others might be a little more complicated upstairs and therefore lose this animal resolution. This might also be my Id speaking but I always leave myself an "out" in all situations, by this I mean my instinctual side is actively a part of my more rational thinking. Maybe it protects me from these lines of thought. Finally, pride. If my thoughts have ever strayed down this path I believe its pride that steers me back. As long as I'm breathin' I still got a chance right?

P.S. I love Viktor Frankl's book. Its got me through some stiff times.

@sometime sun,

Why not live? Perhaps people don't commit suicide because they cannot decide whether to continue living or commit suicide. Since they are already living; they simply stay in the same state. Darn those cognitive illusions. . .

@sometime sun,

sometime sun;115708 wrote:

It could be better put, why do you not do 'it' once you come to understand what 'it' is?

If I am truly honest, and guessing (because it is difficult, if not impossible, to truly know why one does what one does), I would suppose that I do not kill myself due to instinct. There is a kind of momentum from living; suicide requires an actual decision, which I have not made. At the moment, my life is pretty good, as I am financially comfortable, have a wife who adores me, and have reasonably good health. I have no particular reason to kill myself, though I expect that I would look into the possibility if I had such a reason.

@sometime sun,

i don't really know why, i only know that i haven't done it yet.

i guess my parents caused my life. nothing has come along to cause my death yet, or to cause my own suicide.

if the question is why do i not want to commit suicide, i guess... its against social conventions to do so. my values don't permit it. i see pain as bad, suffering as tolerable and my own life as a whole as being quite worthy of existence.

@andy1984,

andy1984;117125 wrote:

i don't really know why, i only know that i haven't done it yet.

i guess my parents caused my life. nothing has come along to cause my death yet, or to cause my own suicide.

if the question is why do i not want to commit suicide, i guess... its against social conventions to do so. my values don't permit it. i see pain as bad, suffering as tolerable and my own life as a whole as being quite worthy of existence.

Why, I wonder, should a person have to come up with a reason for not committing suicide? Isn't it for the person who is contemplating suicide to give a reason for doing so? It is hard enough, sometimes, to think of a reason for doing something you want to do. Let alone think of a reason for not doing something you don't want to do. As often is the case in philosophy, if the question seems odd, that is because it is odd. Suppose I cannot think of any reason not to commit suicide, what follows? That I should commit suicide?

@prothero,

I've never much liked this whole, "... to live is to suffer"-credo. Sure, suffering is a part of life, but so is... say... bicycling. So why not, "to live is to ride a bike" - it has all the legitimacy of the former statement. That takes care of the value of that statement...

Why not commit suicide? Uh... why would you? Even for the most miserable: Who thinks its a good idea to trash any chance for improvement? Wow, what a notion. Now, for those whose condition is one of pure suffering; it is conceivable to me to comprehend a situation where all I want is for the pain to end. Ok, I can see that, but it still doesn't answer the previous question: Why would anyone want to obliterate any and all chance for 'happiness'?

For those who hold that beyond death lies eternal bliss, never-ending life or some presumption of continuance: Ok, I can see that; again, no reason to clamp on to such a fantasy.

I've never really liked, nor seen much logic or value in, that portion of existentialistic thought that leads to this 'false conclusion' of nihilism. There's as much a reason for positiveness as there is for negativeness.

... or, that's how I see it anyway - thanks

@Khethil,

Khethil;117256 wrote:

I've never much liked this whole, "... to live is to suffer"-credo. Sure, suffering is a part of life, but so is... say... bicycling. So why not, "to live is to ride a bike" - it has all the legitimacy of the former statement. That takes care of the value of that statement...

Why not commit suicide? Uh... why would you? Even for the most miserable: Who thinks its a good idea to trash any chance for improvement? Wow, what a notion. Now, for those whose condition is one of pure suffering; it is conceivable to me to comprehend a situation where all I want is for the pain to end. Ok, I can see that, but it still doesn't answer the previous question: Why would anyone want to obliterate any and all chance for 'happiness'?

For those who hold that beyond death lies eternal bliss, never-ending life or some presumption of continuance: Ok, I can see that; again, no reason to clamp on to such a fantasy.

I've never really liked, nor seen much logic or value in, that portion of existentialistic thought that leads to this 'false conclusion' of nihilism. There's as much a reason for positiveness as there is for negativeness.

... or, that's how I see it anyway - thanks

Yes. See my previous post. What kind of request is the request just out of the blue to give a reason for not committing suicide? It is like asking someone why he does not take a ship to Mozambique, a propos of nothing. It makes no sense out of context.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;117260 wrote:

Yes. See my previous post. What kind of request is the request just out of the blue to give a reason for not committing suicide? It is like asking someone why he does not take a ship to Mozambique, a propos of nothing. It makes no sense out of context.

But it is the fact that people ask the question, "Why don't you commit suicide?", out of context, that is what is most telling about our society. People ask the question as if it were in context, as if the proposal to commit suicide should be a legitimate concern at all times; we should, every moment, consciously choose to continue living, or, conversely, to die.

It is almost as if people, in my generation, seek to justify their continuation of life. They need reason to even choose to continue living. Entitlement society? Yeah, it even extends to this: We're even entitled to have you tell me why I should continue living! Justify my existence!

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;117274 wrote:

But it is the fact that people ask the question, "Why don't you commit suicide?", out of context, that is what is most telling about our society. People ask the question as if it were in context, as if the proposal to commit suicide should be a legitimate concern at all times; we should, every moment, consciously choose to continue living, or, conversely, to die.

It is almost as if people, in my generation, seek to justify their continuation of life. They need reason to even choose to continue living. Entitlement society? Yeah, it even extends to this: We're even entitled to have you tell me why I should continue living! Justify my existence!

It could be as you say it is, or it could also be that some people like to ask what they consider to be profound questions that don't make much sense. Or, possibly, a little bit of both. Asking why we don't commit suicide supposes that there is a reason for doing so. But, what is the basis of that thinking that there is a reason for committing suicide? Albert Camus's The Myth of Sisiphus was focused on the suicide question, and Camus came up with the answer that there is no good reason to commit suicide since there was no good reason to do anything at all. Which just goes to prove (as someone told me a long time ago) that if you ask a silly question, you cannot expect a sensible answer. And, I happen to admire Camus (although he was something of a self-parody).

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;117260 wrote:

Yes. See my previous post. What kind of request is the request just out of the blue to give a reason for not committing suicide? It is like asking someone why he does not take a ship to Mozambique, a propos of nothing. It makes no sense out of context.

Why don't you take a ship to Mozambique?

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;117319 wrote:

Why don't you take a ship to Mozambique?

That is exactly what my wife asked me yesterday. What's going on?

@sometime sun,

I think we dont commit suicide because everyone is a natural and basic value unit, if everyone dies away, there would be no meaning for our world to continue its existence. Meanwhile, we also have responsibility for our parents or children, Of course, it is still the expansion of my first viewpoint. For ourselves, to live in itself is basic value, for example, sexing, eating, communicating and even thinking are all the symbols of that we are still living . That is all.

---------- Post added 01-06-2010 at 04:08 AM ----------

In my old manuscript, I think everyone is a background for others, so, to commit suicide is to shrink our coordinate system as background, especially for our family or community. Thus, to commit suicide is obviously not good for our wolrd. Of course, if our world is just only a kind of chaos, then to commit suicide or not to commit suicide, I think, makes no difference.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;108764 wrote:

I think once the body becomes a burden, a peaceful death at a time of one's own choosing is justifiable, even noble in its way. To face death, and to choose it in what you regard its proper season.

My body becomes a burden after raking leaves for a couple hours. I am justified in killing myself then?

Samurais are the only ones who can kill themselves.

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