Although human beings are intelligent species and have achieved a wise civilization that we are proud of, when it comes to the word "essence", we are usually powerless.
In the past few hundred years, human beings have uncovered many mysteries of the universe, but when it comes to the nature of the universe and life, human beings are far from knowing the answer, and scientists can only explore and discover as much as possible.
Death is the opposite of life. Therefore, as long as we unveil the mystery of life, we will naturally have a deeper understanding of death.
As far as human beings' current cognition of life is concerned, life and metabolism can be equated, and any living species is constantly metabolizing, continuously obtaining energy from the external environment in this process, and after death, the energy will be returned to the environment and returned to nature. The universe has been going through this cycle.
Life, which can be understood as a highly ordered object, is so ordered that it can reproduce itself, perpetuate the race, and at the same time have various interactions with the external environment, and when stimulated by the external environment, it will make corresponding changes to continuously adapt to the environment.
Death, on the other hand, can be understood as a highly ordered life moving toward disorder, which may be the truth of death.
This understanding of death is based on the "principle of entropy increase." What is the "entropy increase principle"?
Entropy is a measure of the order of all things, and the greater the entropy means the more disordered it is, and the smaller the order. Since the birth of the universe, everything has begun to move toward disorder and entropy.
To take a popular example, your house will definitely become dirtier and dirtier for a long time, more and more chaotic, and the entropy will become larger and larger. If you clean regularly, the house will become orderly and entropy will become smaller. You may question: Doesn't the house become orderly violate the "principle of entropy increase"?
That's just the surface. During the time you clean the room, you release more energy into your surroundings, creating greater disorder.
In fact, almost all the objects we see in our daily lives are highly orderly, which is a direct embodiment of entropy reduction. For example, houses, cars, computers, mobile phones, etc., and of course, the life forms that we are more familiar with, these are very orderly things!
The universe is relentlessly moving toward disorder, and entropy is increasing. Why are there still the above very orderly things?
The cosmic march toward disorder is not contradictory to a partial temporary order. The trend toward disorder is a general trend, and no matter how hard humans try, it is impossible to change this trend, but human beings can use their wisdom to create their own orderly environment in the local area.
As large as various cosmic celestial bodies, in fact, it is also the embodiment of order, and in the extremely distant future, even black holes will move towards complete disorder.
So, standing at the height of the universe, death is simple, it just embodies a basic law of the universe: everything will inexorably move toward disorder!
Why do humans have a fear of death?
Most people fear death because life is nature's best gift. For decades, scientists have been exploring outer space and have not yet found any extraterrestrial life, which shows how harsh the conditions for the birth of life are.
And everyone's life has long belonged not only to themselves, but also to their relatives and friends. If our own lives have nothing to do with anyone else and have no effect on anyone else, maybe we are not afraid of death at all.
At the same time, standing at a higher height, the fear of death is indeed the fear of the unknown, because death means the end of everything, and all the enmity and hatred during our lives disappear after death and disappear completely.
But it's not just a fear of the unknown, it's a kind of "powerlessness." As I said just now, no matter how hard human beings try, it is impossible to change the outcome of death. This has nothing to do with the height of human civilization, but the basic law of nature!
Perhaps when human science and technology are developed enough, human consciousness and thought can be stored to achieve "immortality" in a certain sense, but this "immortality" still has a time limit. Come to think of it, even the universe itself will eventually come to an end, let alone life.
In fact, we don't have to be so afraid of death, because death makes life more meaningful, and without death there can be no new life, and death is just another form of new life!
If the sun stops dying, it means that it will no longer glow and heat, so that life cannot appear on earth or on any planet.
From the moment we are born, we are destined to continue to walk towards "our own grave", we are destined to go to "our own grave", this day is destined to come, so we will try to make the process of "going to the grave" from birth more exciting!
From this point of view, we should not only not be afraid of death, but also grateful for death!
What do you say?