The Philosophy of Suicide: Albert Camus vs. Arthur Schopenhauer

Based on the play of Hamlet by William Shakespeare, suicide is the most prevalent and important themes in Hamlet. Hamlet always asks himself for the reason to stay alive. Even though he always thinks that there is no reason for him to stay alive, however he always chooses to stay. The first reason Hamlet seems to contemplate suicide is because his life is contaminated by sins and revenge. The other reason he is thinking about suicide is because he is young and immature. Young adults usually look for escapes when they become angry with things. There are many instances where Hamlet contemplating suicide and he treats the idea of suicide morally, religiously, and aesthetically, with particular attention to Hamlet’s two important statements about suicide: the “O, that this too too solid flesh would melt” soliloquy (I.ii.129–158) and the “To be, or not to be” soliloquy (III.i.56–88).

"Suicide, what a terrible concept. There are two types of suicide: physical, and theoretical. Physical suicide is the more commonly heard type of suicide. It entails the person actually, physically killing himself or herself. On the other hand, theoretical suicide is when the person does something that will, in turn, get him or her killed. For example, in “All About Suicide” by Luisa Valenzuela, Ismael, a man that works at a minister’s office, murders the minister, a high-ranking public official. Ismael has been forced to be quiet by the government; therefore he lashes out by killing the minister so that he can reveal the truth about the government. In doing this, Ismael technically “kills himself” because he knows the government

Throughout this essay, we will be looking a Durkheim’s analysis of suicide and whether his ideas on suicide were right in his time, and whether they are still relevant in today’s society. Emile Durkheim described ‘suicide’ as a term “applied to any death which is the direct or indirect result of a positive or negative act accomplished by the victim himself, which he knows will produce this result” (Durkheim, Suicide: a Study in Sociology, originally published 1897, 1970). Positive acts were acts that were undertaking with the intention to produce death. Negative acts were actually the distinct lack of survival acts undertaken, with the knowledge that without these acts, death would be the result. As far as Durkheim was concerned, although suicide itself is a very individual act, the reasoning behind suicide was due to predominantly social factors (Durkheim 1970, p44). Suicide was sociological, not psychological. His research was based not on the personality traits of those who had committed suicide, but instead at the suicide rates of different countries compared to the social factors that link the countries together (Durkheim 1970, p40).

The poem “Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note” by Amiri Baraka uses vivid images of sights, sounds, and daily activities to symbolize a heartfelt story. In the poem, Amiri, is one of the African American slaves who is frustrated about the discriminatory treatment by whites. So frustrated he wants to commit suicide. The writer used transition words starting with “lately”, “now”, and “then” for each stanza. He was imagining how he acted before his death and how his daughter reacted to his death.

Hamlet's to be or not to be soliloquy, illuminates something that crosses every human's mind, even if only for a split second; to live or die, fight or cry. Sometimes the world can get to a person, and when allowed to manifest, it can be hurtful. Suicide is a choice when things get tough, but a cowardly act. Life is precious and the only way to succeed must be to be in it; therefore, living. Suicide doesn't terminate a problem, but hides it. People will be judged sooner or later by the powers that be.

However, as Durkheim attempted to restrict this definition to suicide being actions intended to result in loss of life, many disagreed with him (3). He then decided to search for a new definition of suicide. Digging deeper, he filed through cases deemed suicide that included actions of heroism such as a father jumping in the path of a bullet for his son. Such cases reveal a situation in which death is not desired by the individual but is nonetheless an inevitable consequence of the actions taken. This sort of suicide, according to Durkheim, should be known by any other name under the same broad term. Suicide can be divided into smaller categories. The first subcategory defined by Durkheim is Egoistic Suicide. An individual who commits a suicide of this distinction is considered to feel detached from society and thus separated from life’s meaning. He further explains by saying, a society with a focus on human interaction and involvement produces a value on the individual’s existence and contribution. If the society lacks human interaction and involvement, a low value is placed on an individual’s existence and contribution. Thus, Egoistic Suicide occurs when an individual has placed a low value on

Suicide is the demonstration of deliberately consummation one's own particular life. The way societies view suicide differs generally as indicated by culture and religion. For instance, numerous Western societies, and in addition standard Judaism, Islam, and Christianity tend to view killing oneself as entirely negative (Edwards-Dryden, 2016). One myth about suicide that might be the consequence of this perspective is thinking about suicide (self-destructive ideation) to dependably be the aftereffect of a dysfunctional behavior. A few societies additionally regard a suicide endeavor as though it were a crime. Be that as it may, suicides are once in a while seen as justifiable or even good in specific circumstances, such as, in protest in persecution (for example, a hunger strike), as part of battle or resistance (for

By applying the functionalist perspective to the issue of suicide, we will highlight the importance of shared social morals and bonds. “When rapid social change or other disruptive conditions occur, moral values may erode, and people may become more uncertain about how to act and about whether or not their life has meaning” (Kendall , 2014) . Suicide falls under

Therefore, the Myth of Sisyphus of Camus states that the only serious problem of philosophy is suicide, meaning that, he believed that suicide admits the fact that life is not worth living, in other words meaningless. And so, he posed a question by asking, why, do people not commit suicide? Thereby, making his, description of absurdity to come into play or existence. Camus posed that people are not logical in the act of killing themselves, instead, they do believe in the absurdity of their own lives as an individual.

By mentioning cases of suicide among wealthy women who were reprimanded or feared reprimands caused by some kind of sexual freedom privation, Marx leads us to conclude that social class is not necessarily the foundation for the reasons to commit suicide. Rather than that, gender forms a really diverse group of patriarchy victims. Not only psychological motivations are called into question, but the issue is understood from a social perspective, since "the classification of the different causes of suicide would be the classification of the failures of society itself".

In “On The Sufferings of the World,” Arthur Schopenhauer has a pessimistic outlook on life. He believes that suffering is a part of life and that without suffering, the world would be an even more miserable place. As many people may assume, life gets better as you grow older. Schopenhauer however disagrees with this statement and claims that life continually deteriorates. Before reading this piece I strongly believed that I was an optimist. I always like to see the bright side of situations but, Schopenhauer really gave me a different outlook on life, a pessimistic view, and I surprisingly agreed with many of his ideas. Although this is true, at the end of the reading, I disagreed with more ideas than not. Therefore, I do not think that Schopenhauer’s account on life is a good proposal to live by because not everyone is continuously miserable in their life and it is perfectly reasonable to have a positive outlook on life.

This is my favorite reading we have done so far. Camus’s claims about the absurd life have really provoked my thinking. Many people can use the expression that “life is absurd”, but Camus tackles it very differently. He says that there is a disconnect in what we want from the world (meaning, stability, reasons, etc.), and what we are going to find in life (no purpose, chaos). He claims that there are three ways to live life. The first involves taking a leap of faith and finding meaning and purpose in God or something else beyond this world. The second is accepting that life is meaningless. But if life has no meaning, then is it even worth living? This is Camus’s opening discussion of suicide. The third way is the idea that we can accept and live in a world that has no meaning or purpose whatsoever, and find happiness.

Albert Camus is a famous writer who discusses a wide variety of topics in his works. His account of the myth of Sisyphus touches on a topic that most writers are either afraid of or unwilling to talk about. This is the issue of suicide and how to deal with it as an individual and as a community. The principal point in the story by Camus is the presence of absurdity in our very existence. The presence of life and all living things that we are aware of is an absurdity according to Camus, who questions the plausibility of some people considering suicide to be the best solution to this absurdity. Having an understanding of the elements of nature that make up our world does not mean that it will ever be possible to understand—and fully appreciate—the reasons why our world is as it is. Whether one believes in God and the creation account, in the evolution process or in the Big Bang Theory among others is irrelevant because of the underlying absurdity to all of these scenarios (Camus 3). He writes that it was his intention to find the relationship between suicide and the absurd. This essay by Camus leads the reader to make an assessment of life and arrive at a suitable decision. This paper will provide a further understanding of these thoughts. This paper will show that life is simply meaningless but must be appreciated nonetheless.

Traditionally, suicide was thought to be a purely individual decision but French sociologist Emile Durkheim recognized that the phenomenon had a social dimension. He believed in the influence of society on the individual and that if anything can explain that relation, it is suicide. His use of the data of suicide, not specific cases and reports, to study the societal trends reveals his true subject of study: society as a whole and its role in the individual experience. Durkheim uses the study of suicide via the quantitative methodological approach as a tool to study society as a broader whole.

Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. "(The Myth of Sisyphus). This is a philosophical statement to some others as with Camus see this a true and evident problem. So many will turn this into a argument for which no side could win. The argument cannot be won by many because they simply will not take their own selves out of the equation. One of the top reasons a person is said to want to die is that the individual has a philosophical desire to die. This desire can be broke down into different patterns or traits the person holds deep inside themselves, also there could be outside factors influencing this. Doctor Alex Lickerman of the University of Chicago states, "These people aren’t depressed, psychotic, maudlin, or crying out for help. They’re trying to take control of their destiny and alleviate their own suffering, which usually can only be done in death."( reasons why people comment suicide). These people are not clinically depressed, they are making the choice to take control of their own destiny. Taking control of one's own destiny or life is not something that is looked down upon in the normal everyday society. In today's world it is extremely important that people be themselves and with so many sub-cultures for the people of this world to fall into people do not want to conform to everyday society. Suicide is considered wrong to some