Is Life Worth Living? Final

Is Life Worth Living?

    The question of whether life is worth living has plagued humanity since its earliest history. Sources vary on when the first recorded suicide took place, with some placing it as early as 1300 B.C. From fictional stories such as Romeo and Juliet to real life tragedies like the forced suicide of Socrates, the concept of suicide has consistently found itself in the center of humanity’s story. Despite the invention of modern technology and medicine, suicidal ideation continues to be a significant problem, with many victims citing insufferable conditions in their own lives for the reason they wish to end it all. The world is filled with countless intolerable evils– war, poverty, racism, disease, sexual assault, murder, and mass shootings… just to name a few. At times, it can seem like there is more bad in the world than good. This begs the question: what makes life worth living?



William James

    William James was well acquainted with this question. In the midst of what would be a lifelong battle with depression, James wrote “I am a low-lived wretch. I’ve been prey to such disgust for life during the past three months as to make letter writing almost an impossibility.” James’ depression was partially caused by a series of health issues. However, the larger reason for his melancholy was an overwhelming feeling of existential powerlessness.

    William James came from a wealthy family. James’ father prioritized educating his children in whatever they desired. So, James grew up with the liberty and resources to pursue anything he wanted. James’ father, Henry Sr, wrote of the him “I surround him as far as possible with an atmosphere of freedom” (SSHM 15). “Freedom” seemed to be the word which governed James’ upbringing. However, this freedom did not last. As health issues began to increasingly interrupt his plans, James began to feel powerless. It was this feeling of constriction which eventually caused his existential spiral. In the late 1860s, James took a red pen to a piece of paper to convey his depression:

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William James, 1860

    William James famously claimed there was no educated man who had never considered suicide. James was not simply familiar with depression– he lived it. He sat with sorrow and began to understand its depths. As a pragmatist, James sought to address practical issues in people’s lives. Thus, seeing as suicide was such a prevalent issue in his own life, he would go on to publish a novel exploring the subject. The book, titled “Is Life Worth Living” aimed to answer the very question the title proposed. His answer? Maybe. It depends on the liver.



James’ Response To Suicide

    William James’ book “Is Life Worth Living” was published in 1895. In it, James imagines reasoning with someone whose only comfort from the horrors of life is that they have the ability to kill themself. James takes a balanced approach to this conversation.

    For one thing, he acknowledges that simply “looking on the bright side” is often ineffective. James describes excessive optimism as something which makes the believer think that it is impossible for anything truly evil to exist. “If moods like this could be made permanent and constitutions like these universal,” James writes,“ there would never be any occasion for such discourses… No philosopher would seek to prove articulately that life is worth living, for the fact that it absolutely is so would vouch for itself.” James was not so naive as to believe there was no senseless evil in this world.

    On the other hand, William James would go on to label pessimism as a “religious demand to which there comes no normal religious reply.” In other words, pessimism creates a need which cannot be fulfilled. The pessimist is unable to reconcile the natural world with their desire for a spirit behind nature. This disfunction ultimately leads to further depression.

    James proposes two solutions to the problem of suicide which he calls “stages of recovery”. To the person who believed in God and saw deity in nature, James asks how a benevolent, all-powerful God can allow horrible things to happen. He implores this person to abandon the idea that God exists in nature. By removing a deity behind the evils in your life, you reclaim the ability to fight back against them.
    
    James’ second proposed solution addresses the atheist. James advises this person to supplement the natural world with something unseen. Although the world appears to be bad, there may be some unknown aspect of reality that will make life more bearable. Each person has a right to trust and believe in a guiding spiritual order beyond the visible world. James argues that if accepting such a concept restores a person’s desire to continue living, then it is a worthy idea to believe in. William James would not be the last philosopher to contemplate these ideas.



Albert Camus and Sisyphus

    Albert Camus, born just three years after William James’ death, also addressed the idea of whether or not life is worth living. In his 1942 essay The Myth of Sisyphus, Camus grapples with the absurdity of the human condition. “There is but one true serious philosophical problem”, Camus declares, “and that is suicide”. In Camus’ mind, this question is the fundamental inquiry of all of philosophy– everything else is merely a game.

    Camus goes on to explain the story of Sisyphus, a man punished to roll a boulder to the top of a mountain, only to have it roll back down each time and start the process over again. According to legend, the reason for this horrific sentence is because he was granted permission to leave the underworld but refused to return. To Camus, this makes Sisyphus the quintessential absurd hero. Camus sees absurdity in the human condition. Humans cannot cope with the harsh realities of the world– we cannot rationalize an irrational, chaotic universe. Sisyphus, like many humans, refused death even though he knew it was inevitable.

    Furthermore, Camus draws similarity between Sisyphus’ situation and the human condition. Both struggle through what will ultimately be a meaningless endeavor. Just as the stone always rolls down, so too will death, disease, and oblivion overtake us all.

Titian’s Sisyphus, 1849

    Interestingly, Camus takes a more positive outlook on Sisyphus’ fate. “If the descent is sometimes performed in sorrow” Camus reasons, “it can also take place in joy.” Camus found that Sisyphus could still choose happiness in the midst of his absurd life, the same way humans can find joy despite all our worldly sufferings.

    Sisyphus is still the master of his destiny. It is through his own choices that Sisyphus finds himself on the mountain and it is his own power which pushes the rock day after day. Perhaps Sisyphus finds meaning not in the completion of the task, but in the task itself. “The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart”, Camus concludes. “One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” A lack of ultimate meaning does not prevent a person from find their own smaller meaning within the struggles of living.

    Are we, like Sisyphus, doomed to an eternal fate of senseless suffering? If so, can we, as Camus suggests, still find happiness withing the absurdity of the human condition?



Final Thoughts

    Is life worth living? There seems to be no clear answer to this debate. Some thinkers claim suicide as a human right, while some maintain that suicide should never b`e an option. Others, like William James, said maybe– it depends on the liver. Ultimately, it is up to the individual, not the words of a learned philosopher, to decide.

    What makes my own life worth living? If it is relationships, does my life lose value when those connections weaken or end? If it is my health or my youth, what happens when I become old and my body deteriorates? If it is my mind, will life no longer be worth living when I suffer from dementia or mental health issues?

    It seems to me that all these things which we say make life worth living can easily be taken away. Maybe what really makes life worth living is not found in the presence of those fleeting moments of good amidst all the bad. Maybe what makes life worth living is the knowledge that we are not Sisyphus. We do not know what the next day will bring; we do not know that our stones will forever roll back down. We can continue living today in the hope that tomorrow will be the day our own burdens finally reach the other side of the mountain.