• Question: why is there suffering and death

    Asked by coolscientist to Ed, Hayley, Jason, Nathan, Sophie on 22 Mar 2013.
    • Photo: Sophie Holles

      Sophie Holles answered on 22 Mar 2013:

      We experience suffering as a mental thing because everything is relative.. you wouldn’t experience anything good if you never experienced (or at least empathised) with bad experiences. Lots of the experiences of suffering are emotions that help us to survive though, like feeling pain when you’re burnt will form a horrible memory and stop you damaging yourself by touching things that are too hot again.

      There is death because it makes more sense to reproduce new individuals with recombined DNA from different parents because that gives the species the change to adapt over time. If the same individuals stayed alive forever they wouldn’t be able to adapt their body plans and we wouldn’t be able to have all the different species we have today! So the old have to die to make way for the new, better adapted individuals.

    • Photo: Hayley Evers-King

      Hayley Evers-King answered on 22 Mar 2013:

      I think suffering and death are essential parts of life. Both because without them we wouldn’t have evolved the way we have (as Sophie says) but also because it gives us perspective on things – it makes us value the things that make us happy more and makes us love the people in our life more, as we know our time together is limited.

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