Death Is a Blessing Argument

Philosophy

“Death is a Blessing Argument”

The Argument in Socrates �Death is a blessing’ speech; is that of he does not see death as being a horrible thing that we do. He says that if death is just a state of nothingness where eternity would be just one single night. Now if death is what we humans perceive death to be, and we go into an afterlife then Socrates says this would even be better because so many other great people have died before him and he would be able to discuss theories with them and best of all he would be able to continue on his quest for true knowledge, without the fear of being called into trial or sentenced to death because he would already be dead.

This Argument to me was perfect for Socrates to say to the judges. He was basically saying, �go ahead sentence me to death it doesn’t matter it will be better than living here where I can’t do the things I love to do at least in the afterlife I can live my life freely.’ The judges who want to punish Socrates can’t be happy that he is going to be happier from their punishment than he is now. Socrates just totally turned the worst punishment possible into a huge..for lack of a better word; blessing.

How he did this? As I stated in my opening paragraph he told the judges of how living in the afterlife would allow him to freely ask questions he wasn’t allowed to ask in his life now without being called into trial. The alternative to that according to Socrates is nothingness, unconsciousness which according to Socrates is good because it would be an undistributed even by the simplest things like dreams. In this case eternity would be just one night.