How Do You Want To Die?
July 19th, 2009
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Is living longer always better, or would you rather accept a shorter life span in exchange for living and dying how you want to?
I started thinking about this in a discussion in Steve Pavlina’s forum about raw foods. Steve said “If you’re an American, you have an 80-90% chance of dying from heart disease or cancer.” I took it that people who eat only raw foods have a much lower risk of succumbing to those diseases.
But is that necessarily a good thing? Your total probability of dying from all causes combined is 100%. That doesn’t change. So if you reduce the probability of dying from heart disease or cancer, you must increase the probability of dying in some other way, because it all has to add up to 100%.
If you knew that you were going to die from a heart attack at 65, maybe you’d change your diet to prevent that. But maybe then you’d live long enough to be skeletonized by piranhas at 66. Is that so much better? Suddenly the heart attack is looking pretty good.
Once you take heart disease and cancer off the table, so many unlikely causes of death become more realistic. Will you fall into a giant vat of sulfuric acid? Get strung up by an angry mob and burned at the stake? Get chopped up by an axe murderer who takes a little too much pride in his work?
The point of all this is that everyone talks about wanting to live longer, and many people make big sacrifices to do so. But dying from heart disease or cancer at a normal age doesn’t seem so bad. Dying a bit older in a horrible accident is worse. And worst of all is living too far past your prime, watching your body and mind slowly deteriorate as you run out of money, friends, and dignity.
As Benjamin Franklin said, “Wish not so much to live long as to live well.”
July 19th, 2009 at 10:20 pm
Hi Hunter,
I was thinking about this death issue and I’m glad you brought it up. I wish more people talk about it.
It strikes me really strange that most people want to live longer. They seem to think the longer the better. Yet they don’t seem to be glad to be alive.
I may have wrote this somewhere, but I’d be glad to leave now — hopefully in a peaceful way with little pain. I’m not suicidal. I just think I’ve had plenty of good things in this life already.
I actually had a serious talk with my spirit guides a few days ago about this. There is a saying, “Too much of a good thing . . .” and we can choose to stop the good thing at an appropriate point. Even if you love chocolate, and even if you are not on diet, eating chocolate indefinitely doesn’t make you happy. So why can’t we choose to leave this good life as we see fit?
Hmm, I think this comment may be getting too long. I might write the rest on my own blog. I talk about death there anyway.
July 19th, 2009 at 11:41 pm
The raw diet sounds healthy at first glance and may well be. But I do not believe it’s any healthier than a diet in which foods are often cooked.
What it really may come down to is quality of life. Good health practices contribute to a higher quality of life, quite often. While poor health choices can compromise that.
This quote seems quite apt for this post:
“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take but by the moments that take our breath away.”
Anyways… I just try to live a reasonably healthy lifestyle, though I do tend to be on the health conscious side.
No one really know for certainty what we’re here for to begin with. So, in that case, suffering may well serve quite an important role in our existence. I’ll just let the cards fall where they may and do the best I can to be responsible for my own life.
July 19th, 2009 at 11:52 pm
Not to be too shameless about self-promotion, but my website is all about this topic.
As morbid as the subject might be, it can actually be amusing to contemplate the possibilities. Nothing like making a memorable final exit.
I love what you do here, Hunter. And my plan is to live as long as possible, even if it means I eventually end up in a lab somewhere, maybe as a semi-conscious brain in a jar. Just prop me up in the corner and point my eye stalks toward a television monitor tuned to continuous reruns from The Game Show Network.
That’s only slightly less active than I am now anyway.
July 20th, 2009 at 12:47 am
Death. When I was younger (keep in mind, I’m only 30) I used to be scared to death of the thought. I am more at ease with dying for some reason. I guess I have come to terms that you can only do what you can to prevent it. The basics such as wearing a helmet when bike riding, seat belt when riding in a car, avoid the SAD diet but the rest is not really up to you. Being recently diagnosed with MS (something that I didn’t cause or can cure) had forced me to appreciate each day as it comes and how I create/live it.
July 20th, 2009 at 1:17 am
I guess I want to go out fighting. I don’t like the idea of living past my prime, but growth and decline can be tough to gauge. Especially when there are anomalies like Grandma Moses who started painting in her late 70′s, and painted for ~3 decades.
Have you seen the latest Rocky (6, I guess)? … it was actually insightful. It’s a story of growth, decline, acceptance, and fighting onward … Sort of Peaceful Warrior style, but Rocky’fied.
July 20th, 2009 at 9:32 am
This topic has been on my mind a lot lately. I’ve been watching my grandfather, now 87, go through what seems to be typical aging issues – dementia, broken hip, vision and hearing loss. He is depressed, and who can blame him! Living as long as possible is not on my to-do list; but neither is dying any time soon.
The key has to be quality of life rather than the circumstances of death. If I were given the choice of death during sleep tonight or death by piranha next year, I’d go for the fish.
July 20th, 2009 at 2:11 pm
As you mentioned, the odd of dying is 100% but the composition of that 100% need not be the same. Instead of choosing to concentrate on the infinite number of horrible ways to die, I like to believe that by actively doing something everyday to lower my risk of dying of cardiac arrest or cancer I am increasing my chance of dying of old age. I do want to live a long life but only if I am healthy enough to enjoy it!
July 20th, 2009 at 10:14 pm
I want to live a long life, but I definitely don’t want to be too old to get out of bed. There is a fine line that we can’t ever decide.
It’s best to do all we can for our heart health and hope for the best in the future. I don’t eat raw foods, but I mostly eat vegetarian and seafood. I feel better in the present moment when I eat healthy and that’s what is most important to me.
July 20th, 2009 at 10:26 pm
@ Akemi, yeah, I saw you write about this before. Like your former 4 year old self. I don’t know where the longer = better idea comes from, but it seems to be pretty pervasive.
@ Bamboo Forest, I guess “reasonably healthy” means “health nut” by American standards! For those who like living that way, they get a longer life and better quality of life.
@ Jerry, wow, interesting site.
Hope you find a nice jar to live in when it’s time.
@ Carla, very sorry to hear about your MS. I guess that can definitely shift your perspective.
@ J.D., “past your prime” can definitely vary from person to person, especially when you consider different aspects of your life that can be improving or declining. Yes, I saw Rocky 6. I loved Rocky’s speech to his son, and Duke’s speech to Rocky. I’ve got posts about both around here somewhere.
@ Annie, gee, I’d take death during sleep over piranha, regardless of the timing! But I guess since it doesn’t take long to die, the way it happens might not be so important to some people.
@ Ceres, by doing the things that let you live longer, you also increase the odds of staying healthy during the end years. I hope you get all the good years you want.
@ Karl, if you can feel better in the present moment while also being healthy for the long run, that’s the way to do it!
July 21st, 2009 at 2:04 am
Honestly I don’t care how long I live because when I die it won’t matter any more – to others yes, but to me no. I’ll be dead and totally unaware of it or I’ll have moved onto whatever comes next.
Because of that I live my life for today – yes I have goals in the future, but I don’t live in the future any more. I don’t sit around waiting. I live for now so that at the moment of death I can say “I enjoyed myself.”
July 21st, 2009 at 10:23 pm
@ Alex, it sounds like your former affliction with Someday Syndrome has been completely cured.
July 22nd, 2009 at 6:27 am
[...] are so many people I want to thank that I’ve resorted to linking to their latest blog posts in this sentence; in fact, I even extended it to fit a few more [...]
July 22nd, 2009 at 7:31 pm
I want to die remembered and thought of as someone who did his best to help others. J.D. Meier’s comment is similar to another I would like to go down. I want to die in pursuit of happiness. In pursuit of excellence.
I won’t accept death knowing that I have accomplished nothing.
July 22nd, 2009 at 9:57 pm
@ John, enjoy the pursuit!
July 25th, 2009 at 7:09 am
hey hunter
dude. you really need to read about mutually exclusive events because your probability example “adding up to 100%” really doesn’t make sense. each event has its own probability but reducing the risk of one event doesn’t increase the risk of another. it’s comparing apples and pears
…and don’t think you can differentiate dying from cancer at one age or an accident at another. one isn’t “worse”. they just are as they are. it’s your thinking that makes them bad or not.
we die. it’s how it is. you don’t have to call it good or bad
keep well mate
alex – unleash reality
July 25th, 2009 at 2:15 pm
@ Alex, I know what you’re saying, but that’s why I talked about probabilities instead of risk.
Let’s say there are only two ways to die: cancer and car accidents, both of which cause deaths in equal numbers. Your probability of dying from cancer is 50%, and your probability of dying in a car crash is 50%.
If you become immune to cancer, that doesn’t make you a less safe driver. Driving is no riskier than it was before, in that each trip you take is just as safe as the same trip taken by someone who is not immune to cancer.
However, with a 0% chance of dying from cancer, you’ll do a lot more driving. In fact, you’ll live long enough to keep driving until it kills you. Your probability of dying in a car accident is 100%.
July 25th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Yes, we all die. And it could be from an accident long before cancer or heart disease gets us. So let’s concentrate on quality and not worry about quantity. Which means eating healthy and exercising and taking nutritional supplements so we can improve the quality of our life. No matter how long it lasts.
July 25th, 2009 at 9:06 pm
Carol, but if you focus on quality over quantity, wouldn’t that mean eating whatever tastes good instead of what’s good for you, and doing whatever is fun instead of exercising? Some people are lucky enough that eating right and exercising are fun, but unfortunately, not everyone.
July 25th, 2009 at 9:24 pm
My first impulse was to reply “yeah, if you’re five.” But the second was that it takes a balance. Struggling with non life threatening health issues, like migraines and low energy, has taught me that eating what tastes good now, like ice cream, leads to a significantly diminished life tomorrow. Plus, for the first time in my life, I’m getting fat. Having been skinny my whole life, without effort, yes, I was one of those, it is very difficult for me to make the right choices to control my weight now. Should I eat whatever I want and balloon up to 250, 300, 350 etc. by the time I die? Isn’t that a slow form of suicide if I know that eating like that and not exercising will eventually shorten my life. And affect the quality now. Why don’t we all just turn into crack heads and alcoholics? If we are going to just do what feels good in the moment. Sorry this got so long. It’s something I’m still trying to work out in my own mind. Balance is the answer, I think.
July 30th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
…with a lot of love.
July 30th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
@ Nicole, good answer!
July 31st, 2009 at 2:29 pm
… with the feeling of a completed life.
If you complete the given stages of your life usually you don’t thrive for going back. If you lived fully while in elementary school, then you’re happy to go to high school. If you lived you 20s well, you’re ready to become a 30s man. And so on. If you lived your life fully, you might befriend death in the end.
I’m not talking about not fighting death. I’m talking about doing our best until it comes.
At the moment, I’m doing my best to be able to do my best. Hmm.. that gives that I’m doing my best.
I don’t fear death.
August 2nd, 2009 at 12:26 pm
@ Cserei, I agree, moving on to the next stage should always feel right if you did a good job. Pac-man doesn’t want to eat all the dots and then just hang out at that same level forever!
July 8th, 2010 at 3:11 am
As you mentioned, the odd of dying is 100% but the composition of that 100% need not be the same. Instead of choosing to concentrate on the infinite number of horrible ways to die, I like to believe that by actively doing something everyday to lower my risk of dying of cardiac arrest or cancer I am increasing my chance of dying of old age. I do want to live a long life but only if I am healthy enough to enjoy it!