and all the men and women merely players,
they have their exists and their entrances;
and one man in his time plays many parts,
his act being seven ages…
And thus the bard informs us to our place in this play…
I reside in the sixth age and my mother who I just visited in Chicago,
resides in the 7th age;
…last scene of all,
that ends this strange eventful history,
is second childlessness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
my mother who is 87 and is going blind, sans eyes, is just wasting time until death
"to grunt and sweat under a weary life, but that dread of something after death,
the undiscovered country from whose bourn,
no traveler returns, puzzles the will,
and makes us bear those ills we have,
then fly to others that we know not of?
hanging on to an unbearable life because of fear of that “undiscovered country”
means she is hanging on to a life, that seems to me anyway, to be unbearable…
is life such a “precious” thing, that even a bad life makes life worth it?
I don’t think so…for me, the quality of life counts just as much as the, if not
more so, then the length of life…
I have not nor will I ever live my life in fear…and many, far too many fear death…
that “undiscovered country” that fear of death makes us hold onto a life that
is unbearable… at least to me…but how are we to decide upon, answer that
question of what is bearable and what is unbearable? To some, to some,
that life is some sort of test of endurance that must be conquered…
I don’t see life that way… as something to be endured…
it isn’t because we are reincarnated over and over again,
as the Buddhist believe… to become “better” and be reincarnated into
something better or to be reincarnated as something “bad” lower in form
then a human being…
if you think about it, to animals, there is no such thing as '‘good’
or ‘‘bad’’ or ‘‘evil’’… animals just are… we act, then by some random
standards, decide if it is ‘‘good’’ or ‘‘evil’’…we make moral, ethically
judgements about, well everything…but the question becomes
on what basis do we make these moral, ethical judgements?
how are we to know if our moral, ethical judgements are valid?
How are we to judge that our moral/ ethical judgements even mean
anything?
So I see my mom’s life as being needlessly prolonged, but is that a valid
judgement and that is based on what? and how do we know or determine
that my value judgement is the “correct” one or do we use my mom’s
judgement? or someone else’s judgement?
so, how are we to judge and value something without any meaningful
understanding of the criteria we may or may not use to make such a judgement?
the question for me isn’t about the length of life, but about how are we to judge
such a question?
how are judgements possible if we have no way to make that criteria,
a universal criteria? If every criteria is personal, subjective, then we have no
basis for a universal, one size fits all, criteria that fits all people, at all times…
if for no other reason, we must engage in a examination of values to determine
what our own individual criteria is or will be…
and we return to the Socratic maxims, to know thyself and
the unexamined life isn’t worth living…
existence can be said to be a question of, how are we to judge matters?
what values are we going to use to judge what it means to be human?
or what values are we going to use to decide if a life is worth it or not?
what values do we have and how do we arrive at those values?
Kropotkin