Fearing Death

David Sanson

2026-09-21

Preliminaries

Agenda

1. Preliminaries
2. Death
3. FD2: Hedonism
4. FD1: Post-Mortem Consciousness
5. FD4: Irrational Fears
6. Where does this leave us?

Reminders

• For today and next time, we are discussing Chapter 4, “Don’t Fear the Reaper”
• I am working on your exams. I will return them with comments.

Death

Agenda

1. Preliminaries
2. Death
3. FD2: Hedonism
4. FD1: Post-Mortem Consciousness
5. FD4: Irrational Fears
6. Where does this leave us?

Against Fearing Death

Argument

• FD1. You cease to be conscious when you die.
• FD2. If you cease to be conscious when you die, then being dead is not bad for you.
• FD3. So, being dead is not bad for you.
• FD4. If being dead is not bad for you, then you should not fear death.
• FD5. So, you should not fear death.

(We’ve talked about this one before!)

Give them a chance to provide objections. Locate each objection.

FD2: Hedonism

Agenda

1. Preliminaries
2. Death
3. FD2: Hedonism
4. FD1: Post-Mortem Consciousness
5. FD4: Irrational Fears
6. Where does this leave us?

FD2

Argument

• FD1. You cease to be conscious when you die.
• FD2. If you cease to be conscious when you die, then being dead is not bad for you.
• FD3. So, being dead is not bad for you.
• FD4. If being dead is not bad for you, then you should not fear death.
• FD5. So, you should not fear death.

Hedonism

HD

Something is bad for you if and only if it’s painful.

‘Painful’ should be understood in a broad sense, to include psychological and emotional pain, in addition to physical pain and discomfort.

Counterexamples?

• eating a whole large pizza in one sitting is bad for you.
• deep tissue massage is painful, but not bad for you.

Hedonism*

HD*

Something is bad for you if and only if it results in more pain than you would otherwise have had.

Counterexamples?

Argument from Hedonism

Argument

• AH1. If you cease to be conscious when you die, then being dead doesn’t result in more pain than you would otherwise have had.
• HD*. Something is bad for you if and only if it results in more pain than you would otherwise have had.
• FD2. So, if you cease to be conscious when you die, then being dead isn’t bad for you.

Objections?

expect objections to focus on HD*.

Objections to HD* from the Book

Congenital analgesia

A condition which involves the inability to experience physical pain.

Argument

• CA1. Someone who suffers from congenital analgesia cannot feel any pain.
• CA2. So, if HD* is true, nothing can ever be bad for such a person.
• CA3. But things can be bad for such a person.
• CA4. So, HD* is false.

Objections?

reply from the book: ‘pain’ includes psychological and emotional pain, and those suffering from congential analgesia can still suffer these kinds of pain.

Objections to HD* from the Book

STOLEN CRUISE

Brendan is about to go on a week-long cruise. His girlfriend, Piper, serves him undercooked chicken, in hopes that he’ll get food poisoning and will let her go in his place. Piper’s plan succeeds, and she has a great time on the cruise. She comes back refreshed, relaxed, and feeling no remorse whatsoever.

• What Piper did was bad, but it was not bad for Piper.
• HD* is only a thesis about what is bad for you, not about what is bad more generally.

What Piper did is bad, but not bad for Piper. HD is a thesis about what is bad for you, not about what is bad, full stop.

Hedonism**

HD**

Something is bad for you if and only if it results in more pain or less pleasure than you would otherwise have had.

This would undermine the Argument from Hedonism: death can deprive you of future pleasure, even if it cannot cause future pain.

Hedonism**

UNREAD MAIL

Carly meets Evan, and they immediately fall in love. Because things are going so well with Evan, Carly stops checking her online dating app. They have a long and entirely happy life together. It so happens that Jami had sent Carly a message shortly after Carly met Evan. If she hadn’t met Evan, she would have seen Jami’s message, fallen in love with her, and she and Jami would have had a long and happy life together. As a matter of fact, she would have been a little tiny bit happier with Jami than with Evan.

Was it bad for Carly that she met Evan?

Hedonism**

The Unread Mail Argument

• UM1. Carly would have had more pleasure had she not met Evan.
• UM2. If Carly would have had more pleasure had she not met Evan, then: if HD** is true, then meeting Evan was bad for her.
• UM3. Meeting Evan was not bad for her.
• UM4. So, HD** is false.

Objections?

FD1: Post-Mortem Consciousness

Agenda

1. Preliminaries
2. Death
3. FD2: Hedonism
4. FD1: Post-Mortem Consciousness
5. FD4: Irrational Fears
6. Where does this leave us?

FD1

Argument

• FD1. You cease to be conscious when you die.
• FD2. If you cease to be conscious when you die, then being dead is not bad for you.
• FD3. So, being dead is not bad for you.
• FD4. If being dead is not bad for you, then you should not fear death.
• FD5. So, you should not fear death.

You and Animal

Right where you are, there is a living, breathing, flesh-and-blood human animal. For simplicity, I’ll refer to it as ‘Animal’.

Against Post-Mortem Consciousness

Argument

• PC1. If Animal ceases to be conscious when you die and you are Animal, then you cease to be conscious when you die.
• PC2. Animal ceases to be conscious when you die.
• PC3. You are Animal.
• FD1. So, you cease to be conscious when you die.

Objections?

Note how ‘you are animal’ relates to ‘you are your body’ and ‘you are your mind’ from last chapter.

Too Many Thinkers

Argument

• TT1. Animal is in your chair and is thinking.
• TT2. You are the only thing in your chair that is thinking.
• PC3. So you are Animal.

Objections?

objections to TT1: maybe it is your soul, not animal, that thinks? Appeal to squirrels.

objections to TT2: maybe animal is thinking animal thoughts: food, etc; and you are thinking abstract thoughts. But you share a brain…

FD4: Irrational Fears

Agenda

1. Preliminaries
2. Death
3. FD2: Hedonism
4. FD1: Post-Mortem Consciousness
5. FD4: Irrational Fears
6. Where does this leave us?

FD4

Argument

• FD1. You cease to be conscious when you die.
• FD2. If you cease to be conscious when you die, then being dead is not bad for you.
• FD3. So, being dead is not bad for you.
• FD4. If being dead is not bad for you, then you should not fear death.
• FD5. So, you should not fear death.

Irrational Fears

A tarantula crawls onto your hand. It’s unlikely to bite you, and even if it did, it actually wouldn’t be any more painful or harmful than an ordinary bee sting. But even knowing how harmless they are, you are still utterly terrified of the tarantula crawling onto you.

Irrational Fears

Argument

• RF1. Fear is rational if and only if it is proportionate to the risk.
• RF2. The risk is a function of (a) how likely something is to happen and (b) how bad it would be for you if it did.
• RF3. So, if something is not bad for you at all, then it is always irrational to fear it.
• RF4. So, if being dead is not bad for you, then it is irrational to fear death.
• RF5. You should not fear something if it is irrational to fear it.
• FD4. So, if being dead is not bad for you, then you should not fear death.

Objections?

The book talks briefly about the idea that certain fears are natural.

Where does this leave us?

Agenda

1. Preliminaries
2. Death
3. FD2: Hedonism
4. FD1: Post-Mortem Consciousness
5. FD4: Irrational Fears
6. Where does this leave us?

Against Fearing Death

Argument

• FD1. You cease to be conscious when you die.
• FD2. If you cease to be conscious when you die, then being dead is not bad for you.
• FD3. So, being dead is not bad for you.
• FD4. If being dead is not bad for you, then you should not fear death.
• FD5. So, you should not fear death.

Which premise(s), if any, are you still inclined to reject?

Are you confident that you can reject that premise, in light of the further arguments raised?

Reflection Questions

1. Can you think of counterexamples to the hedonist principle HD*? Do your counterexamples support HD**?
2. Does HD* imply that being born into this world was bad for you? If so, can it be modified to avoid this implication?
3. Are you convinced by the argument that you are Animal? How does such a view fare when it comes to body swap and fission cases?
4. Is it rational to fear something because it’s bad for others? Should we fear death because (and only because) of how our deaths will affect other people?