Talk:Death

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Death was a good article nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these are addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Reviewed version: January 23, 2007
To-do list for Death: edit · history · watch · refresh

Expansion

In biology

In medicine

In culture

Other

  • Expand lead section to 3 or 4 good paragraphs
  • Introduce each main subsection with a paragraph or so of prose
  • Reference fully
  • Article is too animal (especially human) centred - greater discussion of other life forms needed
  • Merge as much of 'See also' into the article as possible
  • Improve picture placement, ensure all free images used are moved to or located at commons
  • Discuss whether this article should be split any further, and if so how to split it (e.g. death in nature (non-human death), death in science (biology and medicine or human/non-human death), death in medicine, death and culture (done), human death (medicine and culture, probably not given we now have a culture article)). Current size is around 60 kilobytes. You can comment at Talk:Death#Splitting off articles.
  • Please comment if electrical activity in the cortex/whole brain, once it has stopped, could be restored. If so, there need to be a time frame for electrical inactivity in which consiousness can be recovered.
  • Resubmit for GA when rest is complete

Please add anything you feel is missing
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[edit] Is it really necessary

To pollute this article with the bogus environmentalist claim that humans are precipitating a mass-extinction? This canard has been debunked so many times and it soils this article with political agendas. --82.43.47.6 (talk) 18:32, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Also habitat destruction is not a cause of death. This is more environmental propaganda. Habitat destruction can cause malnutrition or vulnerability to predation, but it does not cause death. 86.132.78.239 (talk) 11:31, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Question about the role of the health care provider

I would very much like to add a section about the role of the health care provider. There are two excellent research articles In Search of a Good Death: Observations of Patients, Families, and Providers. Annals of Internal Medicine 2000 and "On Saying Goodbye: Acknowledging the End of the Patient–Physician Relationship with Patients Who Are Near Death. Annals of Internal Medicine 2005. That are instructive to health care providers about addressing the emotional needs of the patient and family. Questions:

  • Where should this section go? Under 'Customs and superstitions'?
  • What should the section title be, 'Role of the health care provider'?

Considering these articles were only studied in a western health care setting, I would start the section with a note to this effect. Badgettrg 11:22, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


Sounds like a good addition. I would put it under the medicine section as opposed to cultural. I'll add a medicine subsection since there isn't one as yet - if you look to the top of the page you'll see a to do list I have drafted which gives some outline as to how the article might look when complete. There is also a related section on euthanasia under culture, located here because it is also a philosophical and political issue. Richard001 06:50, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
I would like to place the text at User:Badgettrg/death into the Medicine subsection following causes of death / autopsy. Could someone please comment whether they think this is appropriate? Thanks - Badgettrg 23:58, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Citation needed for berlin wall picture

No proof that it is what it claims. The link goes off to some page that deals nothing with the picutre. Remove it or provide proof.

-G

The image of Peter Fechter is used on the pages Berlin Wall and Peter Fechter's own article, as well as many other websites. I'm not familiar with the incident myself having just read about Fechter now, but I can see no reason to doubt the veracity of the image. The placement of the image is rather arbitrary though, once we have a section on warfare it can be moved there.
Also, please sign your posts so we know who you are. We often have trolls making posts similar to yours; signing your name properly is a good way to avoid any such suspicion. Richard001 22:29, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] I died and let me tell you all about it

seriously, I'm a fucking corpse now!

[edit] Is this right?

The second sentence says something along that death comes to all multicellular organisms. Is this suggesting that there are some single cell organisms. Or is it that this doesn't technically count as death?

Microorganisms don't have any aging mechanism that I know of, though they're likely to die for one reason or other sooner or later. Richard001 06:37, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Most micro-organisms reproduce by binary fission - just as human cells do. Therefore, you can argue that unless a significant mutation occurs, the same organisms will live for ever, depending of course upon your definitions of "live", "significant" and "forever" - of of "life" for that matter. Basically, it's such a can of worms that glossing over it in the article is probably the course of wisdom! (Dlh-stablelights 12:27, 12 June 2007 (UTC))

I disagree. Death is the ultimate fate for every life form. From the smallest bacterium to the giant sequoia to us, nothing lives forever, death will come one way or another. Even if you do not consider binary fission death, there is no doubt that external causes can result in "death" for a microbe. (also, we can only survive as long as the conditions for life are met on Earth.) Fusion7 17:05, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The Large Hadron Collider Will Kill all of us

The LHC created by CERN will cause the destruction of our beautiful planet this May of 2008, help stop this project!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.138.145.193 (talk) 03:33, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Great Ive got an exams in May. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.222.200.204 (talk) 13:28, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cessation vs. end

I disagree that "cessation of life in a biological organism" is a good description of death. Cease mean stop, while end means termination. That which ceases can resume, while that which ends is finished. Permanence is a key aspect of the concept of death, and cessation does not adequately capture that. It is too easily confused with simple cessation of vital functions. Additionally, the words "life in a biological organism" imply vitalism. I therefore suggest the wording, "Death is the end of the life of a biological organism," or something similar. Cryobiologist 06:20, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Death VS Moment of Death

Science debates how to identify death, or in other words how to define death for the purpose of our human perception and identification. The definition of death is philosophical, it is simply that which will never be restored to anything we can call life, whereas life has yet to be separately defined. What is unclear is how science can find the Moment of death, and for that a definition is required, that will guarantee that prior to that moment and after that moment, what science has to say will match what the philosophers said.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death#Definition

--Ohadaloni 20:47, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Can death be defined as "permanent end"? Is it permanent?

I'd like to question the latter edit of changing "cessation" into "permanent end". I can agree on "cessation" but are we sure that death is actually permanent? Is death defined as a permanent end of biological life? 84.216.55.146 11:07, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

I suggest people watch this first: http://www.veoh.com/videos/v245370EZTb9tQJ?searchId=42375096801581832&rank=1

-G —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 134.117.157.7 (talk) 13:41, 11 April 2007 (UTC).

Permanence does not imply irreversibility. This is actually a major issue in the ethics of death in medicine. In medicine the permanence of death is often a direct result of a decision to permanently stop treating the patient, as occurs in "no code" status and organ donation after cardiac death (DCD). So permanence can be the result of social factors, not just biology, but it is still permanent. I will expand on this issue, with references, in the Definition of Death part of the article in coming days. Cryobiologist 19:47, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

This is what I wondered about, when are you truly 100% dead? We used to think it's when your heart stops, cardiac arrest, but even someone with no blood pressure's brain still functions until either they are resuscitated or their brain ceases. But is that really the end, either? Is it possible, or will it ever be possible to "jump start" someone's brain like a car and get their blood flowing again? In that case would you have brought the person back to life, or would they not have been considered dead, since they were at a point where they could be resuscitated? The snare 18:55, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Snare, after a few minutes of no oxygen a persons brain cells start to irreversibly go bye bye. I dont think that you would want to be alive after you lose your cognition, you probably would'nt want to do much of anything. I think that a person with no physical signs of life would in fact be considered "clinically dead" and if they were resuscitated they were never truly dead, just clinically dead. True "death" as we all are acutely aware of is in deed physically permanent. Anything more than that is hearsay. As far as how long a brain can go without O2 is an interesting topic and who knows what future possibilities medicine holds in store for us. So to finally answer your question, I guess you are permanently dead when no one can or is willing to resuscitate you. Anthony 00:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
The term information theoretic death is beginning to creep into medicine to describe death that is absolutely irreversible by any technology. The brain does not function when there is no blood pressure, but nor do cells "go bye bye" in a few minutes either. The brain just sits quietly accumulating damage that requires increasingly sophisticated technology to reverse with a good prognosis. From what is now known about cerebral ischemia, information-theoretic death probably doesn't occur until a long time after clinical death. An article in Newsweek recently dealth with this issue. Cryobiologist 16:14, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the link CryoBio, pretty interesting stuff. I always hoped that when I died it would at least be in a warm setting (I hate the cold). But now I hope it occurs outside in the winter. Of course that is as long as I don't die of some kind of head trauma. Anthony 22:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

What do you mean the brain doesn't function with no blood pressure? The first steps of CPR are to check the person's breath and heart beat, then when there is none, perform it. If the brain ceased operation right after the heart stops, then wouldn't you already be irreversibly "dead", and CPR or a defibrillator would be pointless? The snare 09:58, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Snare, he didn't say when your heart stops your brain instantly decomposes. All he said was the brain doesn't "function" without BP. If left alone then ofcourse you die. If you are revived in time then you don't. Bringing ones body temp down apparently keeps the programmed destruction of your brain cells at bay. Thus giving you a bit longer to be revived with minimal brain damage. Anthony 23:38, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

But I've heard that brain cessation constitutes irreversible and permanent death. Once it stops functioning so do you, unless there's some way to get it started again. If it stops right after your blood pressure stops then you'd already be beyond help. I didn't know the brain ceases after cardiac arrest, I thought it's during a code blue that people have their near death experiences. And that the heart couldn't function without the brain, and needs it be get the heart started again. The snare (talk) 03:57, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Necropsy

"A necropsy is the term for a post-mortem examination performed on an animal or inanimate object. "

Maybe I'm a bit of a thickie, but I don't see how one could perform a post-mortem examination of say, a rock. Metalrobot 21:14, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

I think I just pasted that from the autopsy article without reading it over. It should only apply to animals, I've made the correction. Thanks. Richard001 23:32, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Not only animals die

The first sentence reads "Death is the permanent end of the life of a biological organism." The whole of the rest of the article acts as if the only biological organisms are animals. The vast majority of the article deals with human death. I suspect a large proportion of the article should be diverted into a new article called Human death or something similar, and the remained needs attention from somebody more expert that me in non-animal biology. Kevin McE 19:39, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

There used to be an article called death in culture, but it was merged into this one, that that's why human death is covered here. When most people come here they would probably expect something that deals with human death, though it is difficult to cover all aspects of human death without the majority of the article being about death in human culture. I've mentioned in the to do list that splitting the article up is a possibility, and human death is an option we could look at. I do feel the culture section especially is disproportionately long, though I think it's better to wait until more medical and biological aspects have been covered before deciding what to do with it.
Your point about plants is a very good one. A lot of the aspects discussed apply to plants equally well, though most of the images and examples refer specifically to animals. While we're here we also shouldn't forget other forms of life such as fungi, protists and of course the bacteria and archaea from which all life evolved. Richard001 22:42, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
That is why in my comments here I deliberately did not refer to plants, but to non-animal biological organisms. I struggle to find more than a couple of sentences that could be applied to non-animal death, and while a visitor to this page should "expect something that deals with human death", the reader with a wider interest should be able to expect something that does not deal almost exclusively with human death. Sections such as "Causes of death" do not even specify the type of organism whose death causes they are describing: they should either do that or treat of the causes of all. One would not want Wikipedia to appear speciesist, or even kingdomist. Kevin McE 06:26, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
I think we'll have to live with a certain level of speciesism, but it can certainly be improved upon. One of the difficult things is trying to break the article into suitable categories, but many aspects of human and non-human death overlap. Perhaps a second 'causes' section under biology and then a 'causes of human death' under medicine would be appropriate. Establishing causes for non-human species in a quantitative way will be rather difficult though, especially as it would differ from species to species as well. I've added the problem to the to do list for now anyway.
It's funny - if you look in the Britannica article on death you'll actually find it doesn't cover non-human death even in passing, it merely looks at human death in terms of culture and medicine.
Note: Reading through the biology section I feel it all applies equally well to all organsims (though some non-animal pictures and examples would help stress that). I think the real problem is that this section is so extremely short. Richard001 03:34, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Human Physiology of Death

I couldn't find anywhere in the article a description of what actually happens during death. Do all the cells in the body die at once? What is the physical process that the body goes through when it dies? That the heart stops beating and the brain cells die off from lack of oxygen is all I could really gather. Is it painful to die? What parts of the body shut down and when? Etcetera. Cheers 58.168.238.79 16:05, 16 April 2007 (UTC)Giuls

There is more information on what happens after the heart stops in the articles on clinical death and cardiac arrest. There are so many different conditions that can cause the heart to stop, it is difficult to generalize about that phase of the process. Cryobiologist 18:33, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Death of Cells?

Can you use the term death for cells, as part of an attemt to define a death of the owner organism? If a cell stops its usual function, is it dead? Isn't it necessary to define what is meant by "death of the brain cells" before this concept is used to attempt to define death? If an organism is dead, then all its cells will cease to function soon enough. Some, inevitably ceased their function prior to the death of the organism. What distribution of dead VS live cells constitutes the death of the organism seems like a complicated way of saying: that was the question, not the answer. Better phrased: What set of live VS dead cells in an organism can make us safely say this organism is truly dead? (meaning at least that all cells will be dead shortly(?) ) --Ohadaloni 10:37, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

It depends what organism and which cells. You can cut some invertebrates to pieces and they'll regenerate. When they have no heart or brain, like a tree, it's also very difficult to define. Richard001 09:05, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Splitting off articles

I'd like to propose we split the death in culture section into a full article so we can use summary style to shrink the section down to a more reasonable size. I think a section comparable in length with medicine and biology would be a good length, though by the looks of things it's going to stay much larger than either section unless it is split into its own article. If it is split the culture article can go into greater depth and cover more topics than it has the potential to here, and it will also free up some space for more on the other aspects.

There was some opposition to having a separate culture article previously, but I think the situation has changed enough now to recreate it. From there we can decide which aspects to cover and which to leave out in this article, for example the section on the number 4 in some Asian countries could probably be considered trivial enough to leave out in the main article.

The article existed for a brief time before being merged here. This last version of it before the redirection can be viewed here Richard001 08:57, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Furthermore I think we should look at splitting the medicine section off to death in medicine as well. The section is fairly large as well, and some of the material covered needn't be covered in as much depth. It will also allow Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine to focus on the article rather than a section here, which they can just update as it progresses. Splitting the death in culture article off is more important for now though, so I'd like to hear some comments. Richard001 08:30, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't recommend it. I think these articles are more appropriate in the death section, they're good the way they are now. Besides, 'rather keep them all together than seperate and create more space, right? ZeroGiga 04:25, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, we're approaching 60kb, and the article is still woefully inadequate in many areas. Do we want something 90k or more that just briefly touches on each item discussed? Richard001 23:15, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Spelling edit war.

Please don't edit war over spelling. As per policy:

"Articles should use the same spelling system and grammatical conventions throughout. Each article should have uniform spelling and not a haphazard mix of different spellings, which can be jarring to the reader. For example, do not use center in one place and centre in another in the same article (except in quotations or for comparison purposes). If an article is predominantly written in one type of English, aim to conform to that type rather than provoke conflict by changing to another."
"Stay with established spelling. If an article has been in a given dialect for a long time, and there is no clear reason to change it, leave it alone."[1]

Regards, Ben Aveling 02:55, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

For that matter, what form of English are we using here? Is it consistent throughout the article? Should we leave a hidden comment at the top to make this more clear? Richard001 00:20, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Images

[edit] Lead image

Tombstones of men who died in the American Civil War.
Tombstones of men who died in the American Civil War.
Dog lies dead on major trucking road, route 101, California.
Dog lies dead on major trucking road, route 101, California.
Death related to the natural aging process in the human being (body of Pope John Paul II during the funeral ceremonies marking the end of the physical existence and subsequent entrance into an afterlife).
Death related to the natural aging process in the human being (body of Pope John Paul II during the funeral ceremonies marking the end of the physical existence and subsequent entrance into an afterlife).
A hawk devours its prey - predation is a natural cause of death.
A hawk devours its prey - predation is a natural cause of death.
Human remains found in scrub, circa 1900–1910.
Human remains found in scrub, circa 1900–1910.

I noticed the main picture has recently been altered from the hawk to a tombstone image. My intention, if I ever get the predation article up to scratch, is to include a small section on predation and move the hawk picture (or something similar) down to there. What to use as the main image though isn't so clear. The problem with tombstones is that it's (a) human (b) American and (c) recent. Should the main image relate to human or non-human death? Should it be a dead organism, their remains, a gravestone? Should it be from recent times or historic/prehistoric? What country should it relate to? Should it be related to warfare or peaceful death? Is it possible to find any compromise between all these? Richard001 00:18, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Two recently added images include a dead dog, which I find random and in somewhat bad taste, and an image of the pope, along with caption making POV assertions about his entrance to the 'afterlife'. Can we please have discussion before changing the image. Richard001 02:44, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
The Dog is clearly the best illustration of death put forth so far imho, the pope one is indeed POV. Why do you think the dog is bad taste? Bleh999 03:38, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
I've added small thumbs of each of the images we have had recently. The last one used to be in the medicine section (I removed it because it has nothing to do with medicine), and is another candidate. I think we have a problem with there being far too many images involving Western culture, we need more from other parts of the world such as Asia and Africa for example. The problem with the Pope image is clearly in the caption, I don't have any specific objection to the image itself. As for the dead dog, it's not particularly appealing to me - the dog takes up little of the shot, and by the looks of it we wouldn't want anything more detailed. If we use an image of an animal I'd prefer something in a more natural setting like the hawk image. It also needs to be reasonably stable - not one that people are going to replace with something else all the time. There are plenty of other images we could use as well, the important thing is to discuss the changes. Richard001 03:56, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Korean war image

I tend to agree that this image is fairly disturbing - the body is partly decapitated and there are flies all over the head and torso. It seems a little over the top - Wikipedia is not censored, but do we need to use such a gruesome image to prove a point? Also think about this from a political view - Chinese people may be highly offended by the image. Would an image of a US marine shot dead in Iraq be considered equally appropriate for the article? The image we had before, and I reverted the addition of this image once already, was Peter Fechter dying on the Berlin Wall, though that's from a period after the war had ended, so I'd rather not use that as the 'final' image for the section. Perhaps something from earlier history - even very ancient history, would be more appropriate, avoiding the problems of politics, over-attention to recent history (there are three images related to recent wars involving America, any more than one is too many) and preferably not so gruesome. Richard001 02:17, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I am for your remarks--Ksyrie 07:27, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
Note the image was only used thumbnail size in the article so if you were so offended why did you click so to see the larger version? PBS is a public broadcasting service in the USA they use the same image on an article about the korean war [2] Bleh999 08:51, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't think it's a valid point that it's small - would it be okay to have a thumbnail of a detailed photograph of two people enthusiastically copulating on the sexual intercourse article if you couldn't see their genitalia in the thumbnail? My remarks weren't an invitation to change it to a US soldier to prove a point either. There's no need to have an image from a controversial ongoing war that is likely to cause edit wars between people who want or don't want the image for one reason or another. I strongly suggest using an image from a war that didn't involve America (the graves from the American civil war is enough) and preferably one from long enough ago that it won't cause any edit disputes - the Mongol invasions for example. Richard001 09:49, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
I dount if any available pic far away too 1000 years ago,a slaughter scene from Sparta War?--Ksyrie 10:35, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
Once again you are wrong, take a look at wikipedia commons there are graphic images of sexual acts available (I can post some examples here if you still don't believe me), I suggest reading I don't like it is a bad reason to remove content Bleh999 21:55, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
Regarding pictures from long past wars, there obviously won't be anything in the form of a photograph, but there plenty of paintings etc. I had a very brief look for something suitable but there was nothing that especially caught my eye.
Now to address your point Bleh - your argument regarding sexual images is moot; there are of course such images at commons if people want to see them, just as there are plenty of gory images of dead people and such, but there is no photograph on sexual intercourse of two individuals at the height of copulation. There is no need to show the most graphic or pornographic image just because one is available, and if an image is controversial for whatever reason there should be at least some rationale for keeping it. There is already a picture from a 20th century war just below in the suicide attack section, as well as the image of American graves in the lead, so I believe it would be more balanced to include something from times long past, like artwork from a chariot battle for example. As for the 'I don't like it' comment, I don't mind these images at all, I'm just looking for the most suitable one, and preferably not one that's going to be removed every few days by someone who objects to it. Richard001 06:47, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


I am rather upset with the current image Image:Civil War graves.JPG This article should be mainly about the science of death, and its ties with human culture secondary. (Or in another article.) However, this image does the opposite. It seems to focus not on death itself, but our traditions that revolve around its occurence. The image should focus on death in general, not a custom. I recomend an image that actually shows the corpse of a human or animal. Fusion7 16:56, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
Can you nominate a replacement image then? As for splitting off, please discuss it in the section above. We need much more input on this, as we currently only have one person for splitting (me) and one against. As for only treating scientific aspects, that's what we used to do, but the culture article was merged here to cover it all in one subject. I don't think we should only treat the scientific aspects as a default, though we need much more material on this subject than we currently have, and as I mentioned I think the length of the culture section gives undue weight at its current size, though it could probably be expanded much further still with ease. Richard001 00:31, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
I agree with your comments, Fusion7 I replaced this image with one from the American civil war, I think some of the other images in this article aren't really relevant --Bleh999 07:45, 15 July 2007 (UTC)
Which images do you think should be removed? Richard001 01:00, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] regarding the evolution of aging

Evolution can not create, enhance, or preserve qualities of an organism that can no longer reproduce. These are the superior organisms, where reporudction is complex and has its own death age. Nature is packed with organisms who never age and only die of other natural causes. Age related deaths are rarely achived in nature anyway due to high martality rates from other causes much earlier in life:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Species#Struggle_for_existence.2C_and_natural_selection

Some fish never age, some snakes and other lizards, and most primitive organisms who's reproductive system remains active throught life. With plants, most never age, and as with some insects, a life cycle is not comparable to aging:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_process

The concept of age in single cell structures which reproduce by splitting is irrelevant. For those organisms death and new life are the same, and so older age means closer to new life rather than to death.

Primitive organisms can have many immortal cells, like the germline cells.


removed my conversation with Richard regarding wiki writing style --Ohadaloni 15:31, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] War, Extinction, Etc...

Hi. Why exactly are there such large subsections for issues such as War and Extinction? Do we need to describe the causes of war and so on just because they, well, can cause death? They all have their own articles in any case, and the subsections don't even deal specifically with the issue of death in their respective subjects. Is the idea to have subsections on anything that causes death? Frankly it seems silly to me. I would help, but the article seems to be protected... Great article otherwise... Tree Kittens 07:34, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

I added those sections myself as I felt they were closely connected with the topic. Something that causes death seems to be relevant enough to me, and extinction is the death of every organism in an entire species, so again I felt it was relevant. The idea isn't just to summarize the related article (though that's all we basically have so far), but to discuss it in relation to the subject at hand. You should be able to edit by now - you can always request an unprotection if you want. The article doesn't get all that much vandalism, though much more than useful edits when unprotected. Richard001 09:14, 3 July 2007 (UTC)
Hi there. Sorry to have criticised your hard work like this. I was reacting purely to the article as it stands. I'll try to explain what I mean:
Extinction - With respect, I really dont see the need for this section. OK, so extinction is sometimes defined as the death of the last member of a particular species. That's just one sentence, and the only one relevant to this article as far as I can see. All members of a species - indeed all organisms - will die. A species only becomes extinct if every member fails to reproduce. In other words - death is not really the issue here, as it will happen to each and every organism regardless of whether or not that species becomes extinct. Most of the other information about the causes of extinction, human involvement and so on is, in my opinion, irrelevant as it does not direcly concern death. We could easily say all that is relevant about extinction in a few sentences in the main text, and add it to See also...
War - Yes war is one (rather vague) cause of death in humans. Every human that has ever lived has, or will, die. A very small, but notable, proportion of those will die in wars. Old age, disease etc. kill far more. In other words, this large section gives Undue weight to that particular cause. Besides, the causes of war (sovereignty issues etc.) are really not relevant to an article about death.
Perhaps a better idea would be to have a section on major causes of death in humans, with some figures. War could certainly be in this section, along with things like flu. I would like to reorganise the article to deal with these issues, but I am a newish user, so I won't go ahead wholesale without some agreement.
What do you think? Best regards, and thanks Tree Kittens 04:22, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
We have a causes section in medicine, but warfare isn't really related to medicine. The way the article is layed out makes it difficult to place a causes section, and there's the complicated fact that many causes on human/non-human death overlaps. If you'd like to rearrange the whole article feel free to outline a plan, but it's certainly not going to be a simple matter. Richard001 07:10, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
I don't think they warrant more than a mention. Esp. extinction, it could say something to the effect of "when the last member of a species dies, it is said to be extinct." Bendž|Ť 09:12, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
How about we rename the section further down then as 'Competition, natural selection and extinction', and merge the extinction content there is a reduced form? Richard001 00:33, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Your Life Flashing Before Your Eyes

I would have thought there should be some mention of the idea that your life flashes before your eyes right before you die. Can someone add something on this? Robski 15:49, 23 July 2007 (GMT)

I challenge this. What if you're Blind. Or have no eyes. Well, there goes another popular phrase. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.100.192.93 (talk) 22:44, August 25, 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I think that's just a rumor, if someone dies permanently they can't come back to tell you about it, so we'd never know The snare (talk) 05:23, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps adrenaline has something to do with it? It usually happens just before a violent death; if you're peacefully dying of old age, you have time to reflect on your life over a prolonged period, and the "flashing" phenomenon doesn't occur. I say this because most instances of "life flashing before your eyes" that I've heard of occurred just before someone died suddenly (or was just rescued from a sudden, violent death.) I think it also has to be something that could be noticed shortly before it killed the person, such as a train about to run one over or a landslide about to bury someone. Something that is completely unexpected, such as an assassin quietly creeping up and whacking the person upside the head without them ever seeing him, would not cause the person's life to flash before his eyes. Basically, I think this is caused by the realization that one is going to die in just a few seconds, especially when one isn't expecting to die (i.e. terminal illness or old age.) What do you guys think? --Luigifan (talk) 18:37, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Most common cause of death?

The intro paragraph sayeth: The principal causes of death in modern human societies are diseases related to aging.

I'm not sure this is true? for example, I read a study recently which estimated one third of adult deaths in China, in coming decades, will be due to tobacco use.

Also, what of infant mortality?

It might be that in first world human socities, the primary cause of death is aging, but that's a different statement to modern human socities, even if that is what the author intended to mean.

Toby Douglass 14:46, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually the primary cause of human death is abortion. But proponents of abortion will not allow this fact to be mentioned because they will not concede that the fetus is fully human. rossnixon 02:21, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, and this would be so even if abortion was illegal. Most fetuses are naturally aborted due to inviability (though the cut-off point can be a matter of parent-offspring conflict). Richard001 07:38, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Richard, are you saying that if life truly starts at conception then the most common cause of human death is primarily due to the incompatability of genes? Do you know the ratio of births to natural abortions? Do you know if this extends to all viviparous organisms? Anthony 00:13, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Dawkins mentions it in The Blind Watchmaker, where he discusses speciesism. It's not incompatibility of genes, just inviability of offspring for whatever reason - genetic, environmental or both. It would definitely be the case for similar animals, though I'm not sure of the exact amount - probably several times the amount of intentional abortions though. Many would be very early on in the process, as it's highly costly in terms of time and energy to bear a feutus that dies after say six months. Natural selection would favour eliminating it early or going with it, so a woman's body basically practices eugenics whether she likes it or not. As I said though there is the conflict that the father's genes have no 'interest' in the wellbeing of the mother, which is basically an extension of sexual conflict in the offspring. Richard001 02:02, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Richard. Can it then be said that "life forms" that aren't aborted are the ones that acquire mutations, either pheno- or genotypically and this is sometimes necessary for evolution? I'm sure their is a lot more to it than that. I definitely need to brush up on my evolutionary biology. Anthony 22:57, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, evolution as we know it could never have occurred without mutations, but no, it's much more likely that the aborted offspring will be the ones with mutations. Almost all mutations are bad, and any that are good are only so by luck. Secondly, mutations are all genetic. Some may be silent and make no difference to phenotype, others may have an effect on phenotype (usually a harmful one). Richard001 06:41, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

That makes sense. Thanks. Anthony 23:45, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Inappropriate image

In the Capital Punishment section of the article There is a gruesome image of a vietnamese woman slumped over a pile of her brains. Regardless of my opinion of the tastelessness of this image it is definitely in the wrong place. What does this image have to do with capital punishment? A picture of a lethal injection table or some gallows would be best here. Could someone who watches this page let me know what you think before I remove it? Anthony 21:22, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree that it does not add anything to the article. The picture does not illustrate any specific point to advance the article. I would be OK with the removal. I would like to hear any devil's advocate argument to keep it before removing. SpoticusKC 02:11, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

It's at best distantly related, and we already have as many wartime images as are needed. This isn't a slideshow of gruesome war images, so I'm removing it. Richard001 04:04, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Richard, thanks for taking the initiative. Not to beat a dead horse here (excuse the expresion). But upon further inspection of the article I have noticed two other instances where the pictures do not coincide at all with the topic being dicussed to the left. This is true especially in the section Settlement of dead bodies . The pictures here in my opinion depict death in art more than anything. Maybe there should be a section created with this title. The second instance is in the section Martyrdom where there is another war casualty picture. I think if these pics were replaced with more appropriate ones or none at all it would tighten up the article. Just some observations. Anthony 06:54, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

The martyrdom image was added by User:Bleh999, along with the Vietnamese one. Not to denigrate his efforts, but I think we have enough war images, and the one of the woman is a bit much. I'll restore the previous martyrdom image and hide the other image for now - there's no room for it further down, but it's a good image and would be okay at the beginning if there were actually a paragraph or two of introductory text for the culture section. Richard001 07:59, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

  • I must remind you that Wikipedia is not censored Yes we may have things here that you may find objectionable but that is not a reason to not include the content if it is freely licensed and appropriate for the topic (death), death and destruction is not pretty and perhaps those who promote it will reconsider after seeing the end results, it's not a picture of capital punishment, but appropriate for the murder/homicide section if there is one in this article. Still, I am reasonable enough to agree to keep it out if you present some other argument (other than censorship) Bleh999 19:33, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
I understand your desire to express our freedoms, however, why make the article seem unorganized in order to do so? As far as the Vietnamese girl goes, there are other websites that dedicate themselves to that nauseating mess. So I think for the overall betterment of the article we should leave out the gore. Anthony 20:37, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
The argument, as we've made, is that there are already more than enough war pictures - there is more to death than images of people being shot dead in a war. There are already 2 others, and there was a third in the martyrdom section, which was again irrelevant. And as we've said, this isn't capital punishment but a wartime mass execution of the perceived enemy. A picture of an electric chair would be more appropriate, or if we must continue to shock the reader, a person that has been hung with flies hovering over their corpse.
As for the military suicide picture, we already have two black and white WWII images of dead people, so I think something a bit different would be preferable. The remains of a blown-up vehicle, for example. Richard001 01:49, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
I've rearranged and altered the pictures a little. Any suggestions for improvement? Richard001 04:51, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Basically the argument boils down to censorship and this is not allowed by policy, and as someone else noted previously above we should have pictures of dead humans or animals to illustrate the topic of death not 'less offensive' alternatives, some of which are off topic in this article. ' Crucifixion of St. Peter, by Caravaggio' is also POV from a religious viewpoint and we should look for an alternative for this image. Bleh999 12:55, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Bleh, then we don't need a picture in the Martyrdom section. It would be impossible to find a non-POV picture of a martyr since the definition of a martyr is someone who dies for their POV. Anthony 18:09, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
It doesn't boil down to censorship at all, it boils down to not having an article full photographs of dead bodies from the last century's wars. There is a lot more to the subject than that, and images don't have to be of dead bodies themselves. I think people are intelligent enough to make the connection between Atilla the Hun charging into Rome and there being some death here and there - if there wasn't I'm awfully confused as to why they have all those weapons, and why they are in such a hurry. Richard001 22:20, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Richard, this looks good. If you want me to nitpick for a possible improvement I would say scrap the hearse pic and here's why. First we must decide what is the absolute most common form of body settlement used today (I would assume it is burial in a cemetery). Then replace the hearse pic with one more accurately depicting actual settlement of bodies. But the hearse pic works as well since you've gotta get to the hole someway or another. I guess the most important thing to do now is to complete the to do list. I will try to help you as much as I can since I am very interested in this subject and I think we could make this not just a good but a featured article one day. Anthony 06:16, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think its vital or even desirable that we have the most common/modern practice shown in images, but I welcome you to help expand it. I've done a little work on it, mainly earlier in the year, but for such an important article it is improving far too slowly and needs more contributors to get it up to at least a B class. Richard001 08:34, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Possible additions

Should we put something in the biology section about phenoptosis and or programmed cell death? Also does this article only pertain to death of organisms? Could we possibly add a small section about the death of a star during stellar evolution, since without the Sun there would be no life as we know it. We could even extend this to the theories on the death of the universe. If we did this we would only add a couple of sentences on these topics with no pictures but links to their main articles. What do you guys think? Anthony 18:48, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, we need more material on cell death and senescence. I don't think it's relevant enough to give much more than a see also link or a couple of lines somewhere for the death of stars etc though. Richard001 22:15, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I've added heat death of the universe to see also, though I think that should be enough. I would look at other encyclopedic articles on death and see if they give any mention of the subject. It is perhaps a little more relevant that say blue screen of death though, since all life depends on the energy released by stars directly or indirectly. Richard001 22:37, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Request for comments re: Category:Death in the United States

Hello, I'd like to request help resolving a dispute about Category:Death in the United States. Another editor and myself are in disagreement about if Category:Death in the United States belongs in Category:United States, and if it does, at what level of that category's tree is most appropriate for its inclusion. Additional thoughts would be helpful to resolve this. Thanks very much, Kurieeto 02:15, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Assuming it survives the deletion request, I would put it in the main United States category. Which subcategory could it possibly be placed in? If it was just say extinction, you might put it in biota, but there's not much of a common theme there as it is. Richard001 05:25, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] After death redirects here.

But wouldn't afterlife make more sense? TheBlazikenMaster 12:55, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

As far as I know the word has no specific meaning of its own, so it could only refer to what happens after death. Redirecting to afterlife would make no more sense than redirecting to decomposition really, so short of deleting it, it seems the best place to redirect. Richard001 21:58, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

On a related note, why does Dieing redirect to Death? The two have nothing in common. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.193.72.197 (talk) 17:26, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

  • Afterlife would make more sense. You are absolutely right--Angel David (talk) 23:17, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Everyone Dies

Maybe I missed it, but I never see the article saying that death is inevitable for everyone, which seems to be an important point about it. It might seem obvious, but then again the basic concept of death is obvious to most people, so if there is an article on it at all, it should mention that everyone dies at some point.

It isn't inevitable for everyone. Bacteria and Hydra(yes there is such a thing, and it is not a mythical beast) are basically "immortal" they never age and deteroriate and die. They just keep reproducing. The snare (talk) 03:46, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

The individual bacteria ceases to live when it then becomes split into two, in the same idea that some animals die after giving birth. —Ƿōdenhelm (talk) 08:46, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, but it still seems that the following 2 things should be mentioned at the top of the page: 1, that Death is (almost always) inevitable, and 2, that Death is (almost always) irreversible. The fact that there is a single 1 mm-long animal that doesn't die should not prevent the article from stating this, as the inevitability of death (especially for us non-hydras) is an important concept to understand in order to understand death as a whole. Same with the irreversibility; the fact that occasionaly people are brought back after death shouldn't detract from the main point, that the experience of the vast majority of people is dying and not coming back, ever. This too is an important concept to get in order to understand death. These two, put together, explain how death is fundamentally different from, say, winning the lottery, or graduating from High School. These two can be put in the lead with caveats, but I think it is important that they are not completely neglected.

Not including these two facts (that, granted, have rare exceptions) would be like not including in the article for the World Series that it is held each year, because it was not held in 1994. It should at least be mentioned, along with the exceedingly rare exceptions, in the lead. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 165.123.143.37 (talk) 22:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Death by extreme emotion

We know it's possible for someone to be literally scared to death, but it isn't the emotion itself in the person's brain that causes the death, it's the heart attack or whatever other physiological effect it causes to the person's body. I've also heard stories that people have died of sadness/depression (again probably something physical the emotion causes) not by taking thier own life, but from the emotion itself like Padme did in Episode III. And I've heard that some Hindu practitioners can get so relaxed in their meditations, that they really can just let go. Is any of this true? The snare (talk) 03:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Law section - Terrible footnotes

None of the footnotes give any relavent sources.

  • Most legal documents void the terms if someone should die, although it can later be contested that the person is in fact alive.

If this is important, by general principles it should be in the main body, not in the footnote where you expect to find testimony to what has been said.

  • See taxes and insurance.

Having a 'dictionary' refering to itself is silly, also since wikipedia is under constant developement, your source may no longer contain the relevant information.

  • Any process requiring verification of ID would meet with resistance, since now that the person shows up as dead, the identification is viewed as false. That is, the birth certificate is nullified by a death certificate.

Again main body or not at all. This is somewhat of an explaination of - as contradicted to what it's not; a verification of - presented facts.

  • As shown by many movies like Black Sheep, in addition to actual legal records.

A movie? :) And 'legal records'? Please present the relevant legal records.

  • A vagrant is someone who is homeless, if and only if they have no visible means of income, which is the case if businesses will not hire.

Their is a section for vagrancy in wikipedia, why not redicrect 'vagrant' for the reader unfamiliar with the term instead of explaining it - in unclear terms - in the footnotes?—Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.242.98.144 (talk • contribs)

I agree. Frankly I think this is a ludicrous section. "Dead people cannot vote"?--Mantanmoreland (talk) 01:10, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] What you feel when you die?

What you feel when you die? You feel the same thing when you get frozen? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.28.221.131 (talk) 20:50, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Merge with premature death

The premature death article does not offer enough information to stand on its own. It should be merged into this article.

Neelix (talk) 23:38, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Agreed.--Astavats (talk) 10:11, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I've been WP:BOLD and have redirected. There is little useful content in this article which is unsourced and lacks WP:RS. Nk.sheridan   Talk 22:56, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Legal rights for the dead

I agree, that list was getting pretty silly, but you gotta admit, "Legally dead people may not participate in employer-sponsored athletic tournament gambling pools" was pretty darn funny. EOBeav (talk) 15:47, 29 May 2008 (UTC)