Thinking Clearly about Death

by Jay F. Rosenberg

Jay Rosenberg's penetrating and persuasively argued analysis of the central metaphysical and moral questions pertaining to death has been updated and revised to expand and deepen several of its key arguments and to address conceptual developments of the past fifteen years. Among the topics discussed are: Life After Death; The Limits of Theorizing; The Limits of Imagination; Death and Personhood; Values and Rights; Mercy Killing; Prolonging Life; Rational Suicide; and One's Own Death. Rosenberg's prose is lucid, lively, thoroughly absorbing, and accessible to introductory-level readers. Essential reading for anyone interested in reflecting on this engaging topic.

Genres: Philosophy, Death, Nonfiction

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

Jay F. Rosenberg was the author of many philosophy books, articles, and textbooks, and was a professor of philosophy at University of North Carolina: Chapel Hill. As an undergraduate, he wrote a students' cookbook which is still in print at the Reed College bookstore (his alma mater).

Reviews

[Hafez · Rating 5 out of 5]

I came about this book when I watched some lectures from Yale University's course on the philosophy of death on Youtube. The whole course is public commons and free to watch for all. This book was one of the books which the students had to read, it was in the curriculum. They only had to read one chapter but after I started reading it, I decided that I had to finish it.

This book was one of the few books I read where I was forced to think. Reading this book took me a very long time for this reason. Being forced to think and philosiphise with the author in each sentence made this book a frustrating read for me, mainly because of how long it took me to finish this book, but nonetheless I loved it.

I read about the author, he's dead himself. LOL

[Alberteinsteinmaloney · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant, brilliant. A must read.

[M]

an exacting and exhaustive yet thoroughly unpretentious look at all things 'death' from an analytic perspective. a decent amount of humour, and self-consciousness of the limitations of its method are very welcome. might serve a good intro to analytic philosophy.

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thinking Professor Rosenberg's way (and/or using his words when talking) about death. Not bad, but it felt more like wordsmithing and nitpicking than compelling reasons to think a particular way about an admittedly difficult topic.