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What Are Socrates Ideas About Death

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This quotation is significant because it represents Socrates’ ideas about death. He believes that fearing the unknown is unreasonable because we don’t know what happens after death. Socrates also believes that “being dead is one of two things” (Socrates 58); either you feel nothing at all or it is a “journey from here to another place” (Socrates 59). Fearing something we don’t now is not going to get us anywhere except limit our potential. Although, death is a frightful concept, it might also be a good thing. He also believes that it is not difficult to refrain from death, but it is difficult to stay away from evil since it surrounds us all. Doing something evil and sinful will torment one’s soul forever, even after death. Socrates believes …show more content…

After Enkidu’s death, Gilgamesh goes wandering in his quest for immortality. Upon meeting Utapinishti, Gilgamesh observes that Utapinishti seems no different from himself, and asks him how he obtained his immortality. Utapinishti, a mortal man who is now a god, explained to Gilgamesh that death is our certain destiny, even if we don’t know when it will happen. Utnapishtim goes on to say that Gilgamesh inherited his father’s mortality and, like everything else in the mortal world, he is subject to death. (Gilgamesh 93). Utapinishiti’s and Socrates’ assessment of death is greatly similar. Gilgamesh’s quest for immortality fails short when he realized that death is something that can not be ignored. He cannot escape it therefore he has to embrace and appreciate moments in his life. As a reader, I can identify the change Gilgamesh made after the great revelation. The tone Gilgamesh used to describe his village at the ending is filled with pride and appreciation than in beginning. Gilgamesh’s self awareness that he eventually acquires greatly mirrors Socratics’ belief about death; that death is out of our hands, so we might as live well and examine our lives until we are

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I interpret this as Socrates’ stating that he, himself, is choosing to not fear death because there is no way of anyone, alive, knowing what death is like because no living soul has experienced death first hand. Therefore no one should fear death because you will never be able to control or even know the outcome. Another philosopher named Epicurus has a couple of beliefs as to how we should view death.

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Man cannot live for ever this is an indisputable fact; however, long after our mortal bodies decay, we can live on through our children and our children's children. David Ferry’s version of the poem “Gilgamesh” support this idea and synthesises it with other points to support the following theme: no matter how great a man is in living his glory is only valuable if he lives on in his offspring. I believe Gilgamesh’s journey and failure to find immortality supports this, revealing values that early Mesopotamian culture held. After pursuing and failing to find immortality for himself, Gilgamesh pleads to the gods to raise his friend to speak with him about death and its state. The spirit of Enkidu raises and reveals to his friend the following

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Gilgamesh is somewhat bitter with the fact that only gods are able to live forever. When he thinks about death he is very uncomfortable because he feels that he is a mighty warrior of a man and the only thing that will ultimately end him is death. We also see how the death of his beloved friend Enkidu drives him to the edge of the earth in attempt to prolong or completely liberate himself from the same fate. This is a valuable lesson for mankind throughout history. No matter what you may feel or become in the

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The idea of death was interesting in this read because there were two separate ways to view death and neither of which was bad. Socrates seemed to believe that death was nothing to be feared. Whether there was an evil to death or not once you were dead you couldn’t experience that evil and fearing the possibility of evil would lead to more stress than it would be worth. This reminds me of the philosophical argument of Pascal’s Wager on the existence of God. Where pretty much it is said that it is better to believe in god than not to believe in god because it brings less worry and ultimately more happiness.

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‘Sophocles, because he was a great artist, had something more important to do even than to make beautiful plays, namely to express as directly as his medium allowed certain tragic ideas which sprung out of a certain apprehension about human life.’ (H.D.F. Kitto) Consider the merits of this statement with reference to Sophocles’ play Antigone. Putting the words tragic ideas and apprehension about human life in the one sentence is not something we do every day, but if we look at history throughout time, dealing with inevitability of death is something we do every day of our lives and always have. Death is inevitable for every human being, some people choose to use religion as a means to deal with it, others choose living life to the full with extreme sports, and others choose a life full of doom and gloom, drugs, crime or alcohol. Regardless of how we choose to live our lives it can be said that Sophocles was just merely getting the people in Athens to think about their actions while they were on this earth, and realise, that regardless of whether you believe in the archaic gods, or a god, or the king of the city as the supreme chief, and whether you will go to heaven or hell or be reunited with your loved ones after you die, your actions will always have consequences.

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“…if I disobeyed the oracle because I was afraid of death: then I should be fancying that I was wise when I was not wise. For this fear of death is indeed the pretence of wisdom, and not real wisdom, being the appearance of the unknown: since no one knows whether death, which they in their fear apprehend to be the greatest evil, may not be the greatest good” (Apology, 29a-29b). This potent statement not only highlights Socrates’ wisdom, it effectively makes use of his belief that he is wise because he knows nothing. By saying that he knows nothing of the afterlife, it gives him the reason to illustrate to his audience that he cannot fear what he does not know.

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In Plato’s Crito, Socrates has a conversation with Crito, who’d come to visit Socrates in his jail cell. As Socrates had been anticipating his death, one personality trait he exhibits is a very pragmatic sense of thinking. In their conversation, Socrates spoke on his awaited execution saying, “It's because it would be out of tune, Crito, to be angry at my age if I must finally  die.” This quote shows a tremendous amount of wisdom and it illustrates the peace of mind that he’d consistently carried with him. Death is a concept that can be mentally straining to gloss over for even the smallest of times; that being said, the fact Socrates is able to look at such a daunting theory and still have the ability to remain as level-headed as he did

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You have toiled without cease, and what have you got! Through toil you wear yourself out, you fill your body with grief, your long lifetime you are bringing near(to a premature end)!... No one can see death, no one can see the face of death, no one can hear the voice of death, yet there is a savage death that snaps off mankind.” (Tab.X, PG. 25) Utnapishtim attempts to speak knowledge into Gilgamesh about rebirth and how he cannot escape death.

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In the textbook, …, Socrates states, "No evil can come to a good man either in life or in death, and the gods do not fail to pay attention to what he does." (Page 127) These two different sources allow me to understand that Socrates was not scared of death and was humble at the end of his

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The hero Gilgamesh, passed through various tests and turns out better for it. For at the beginning the epic the king appears in the form of an unbridled, corrupted and cruel young man, then after the death of Enkidu, he is finally capable of a heartfelt deep sorrow. For the first time he becomes aware of the futility of existence, feeling the fear of the death, the hero of the poem turns to the gods to find out the secrets of life and death. From now on, Gilgamesh cannot simply rule his people, he wants to know the secret of death. His soul comes to complete despair: how could the immortal power and energy in the body of Enkidu die?

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Death, and how to confront it, has been the subject of debate throughout history. Some, like poet T’ao Ch’ien, have encouraged mankind to approach death with “as little fuss as you can (276 Ch’ien),” a perspective shared by the works The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Odyssey. In The Epic of Gilgamesh, one of man’s most ancient literary works, demigod Gilgamesh attempts to thwart his oncoming death by pursuing everlasting life. In The Odyssey, written by Homer, Odysseus, hero of the Trojan war, embarks on a voyage in which he gains insight on death. Gilgamesh and Odysseus develop fluctuating notions on their unavoidable end of life, evident in their approach to the temptation of immortality, their pursuit of a legacy, and their acceptance of the

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Even though Socrates provides two options for what death is, no one knows what death truly is. Socrates simply assumes that we cannot fear what we do not know for certain; when in reality it is perfectly rational to fear death, even if it is a good thing. I found that he assumes that death, even including the complete end of existence, is not a bad thing because we do not know what it is – it is ignorant to fear the

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711 Words | 3 Pages

As Campbell said, “When we quit thinking primarily about ourselves and our own self-preservation, we undergo a truly heroic transformation of consciousness.” It is revealed to me that the whole quest of Gilgamesh for immortality is not pointless because he became successful in obtaining everlasting life in a sense that his legacy continues to live on. The kingship that the gods bestowed upon him is fulfilled as the people today still remembers and looks up to his unexampled

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The Epic of Gilgamesh: Relevant Truth for Today’s Society The Epic of Gilgamesh is set in Uruk, an ancient city of the ancient Mesopotamian civilization of Sumer, now modern-day Iraq. The epic was said to be written by Sin-liqe-unninni, but it is based on five earlier Sumerian poems with no known author. The piece was difficult to translate, and there are two main version for the Epic of Gilgamesh. This is the result of the environment during the time the piece was being written.

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Socrates constantly asks questions to which there was no answer. But, following his famous aphorism, "The unexamined life is not worth living," he continued to formulate new and new topics for reflection and discussion. Socrates spent most of his time on the streets of Athens and the market, talking with everyone he met about whether this person knows something. Socrates said, that if there is an afterlife, then the same question he will address to the disembodied spirits of Hell. Sneering at himself, Socrates claimed that he knew nothing.

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