Several years ago, New York Jets safety Jamal Adams told a group of Jets fans, “If I had a perfect place to die, I would die on the field.” In response, Green Bay Packers tight end Martellus Bennett tweeted, “Look football is great but I ain’t dying for this shit. Lol.”
This begs the question of why so many people will gladly die for country, family, religion, politics, humanitarian ideals, high-risk adrenaline rushes, deranged cults, physical and mental relief—the list is endless. Some don’t even bother to question death preferences since they have to do with individual choice. Nothing could be more personal. Moreover, humans have a limited understanding of life and death. Secular logic can’t explain existential purpose and uncertainty with serious authority. Faith-based thinking proves even more analytically unstable. Ultimately, motivation just is.
Maybe the issue has more to do with agency and less to do with motivation. Agency happens when people act independently and make their own choices. A decision made in the heat of the moment due to youthful naivete or when thought is marred by years of damaging outside influences probably isn’t agency. What if Romeo and Juliet had encountered slightly different circumstances that allowed them to forge a new life away from Verona? Then, after a year of marriage, they realized they couldn’t stand each other. In this context, any death might look ridiculous.
Similarly, people in the military and cults are often taught to be auto-toxic, or dangerous to themselves. In meme theory, which focuses on ideas replicating from host to host (e.g., from mind to mind), auto-toxic thoughts are what promote the destruction of the host, not autonomous reflection and will. Those who do the brainwashing understand that autonomous thinking is the enemy.
Most people cling to life greedily because they’re afraid of the alternative or they mostly like being here. We’ll soon master genetic applications that will result in extraordinarily long life spans. What would Odysseus have thought of this? He chose a life of pain and inevitable death over immortality, even after he had seen the terrifying shades of Hades. He, too, loved high-risk adrenaline rushes. Still, he was the ultimate survivor. Were he alive today, maybe he would welcome life extension as a way of satiating his ever-burning curiosity. Anything to stave off boredom, regardless of agency.
