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Interdisciplinary Speaker Series

"When Death Comes"

(University of British Columbia)
Tuesday, October 29, 2024
6:00-8:00 PM
Leacock 927

Abstract: Leo Tolstoy鈥檚 The Death of Ivan Ilyich, despite being a work of fiction, remains unsurpassed for its description of dying as the ultimate transformative experience and still holds untapped insights for philosophy. I will use Tolstoy鈥檚 story for the following philosophical ends. My first aim is to investigate dying as a transformative experience. This will involve adjudicating between two rival philosophical interpretations of The Death of Ivan Ilyich, one by Frances Kamm who argues that Ivan does undergo a transformative experience, and the other by Gerald Lang who argues that he does not. My second aim is to describe in phenomenological terms what I will call 鈥渢he ungraspability of death.鈥� This will involve defending Freud鈥檚 claim that 鈥渙ne鈥檚 own death is beyond imagining鈥� against Shelly Kagan鈥檚 criticisms of it. My third aim is to use Tolstoy鈥檚 story to show the failures in Heidegger鈥檚 account of death. My fourth and final aim is to show how Tolstoy鈥檚 story culminates not in a denial of death, as Daniel Rancour-Laferriere has argued, but rather in a kind of mysticism about death, one which also calls into question Heidegger鈥檚 fundamental ontology of our finitude.