Do We Long to Die? The "Call of the Void" and its Philosophical Interpretations

The Urge of Death

Let me tell you an anecdote, and let's see if you can relate. You're driving down a small back road, it's late, and the only other life in sight is another pair of headlights streaming towards you, drawing closer and closer with each passing second. You feel your arms tense on the wheel, and all at once a thought, as if from nowhere, as if from a space beyond reason, comes to you.

"I could turn right into that car, and end it right now"

The moment passes, but you're still shaken. You've never felt suicidal; in fact, you're quite content with your life. So then why such a sudden urge to end it?

It turns out, you're not the only one to feel this way.

L'appel du Vide

This phenomenon, the sudden urge to end one's life, has already been given a term by the French: "L'appel du Vide", which translates roughly as "Call of the Void", a rather fitting name for such an unusual feeling. The name is rather fitting, as it describes the way in which we feel the sudden pull of something beyond life, perhaps even death itself.

On a psychological note, many psychologists believe that the phenomenon is created when our brains identify possible sources of danger and react to them in ways that are much stronger than are justified, such as stepping back from a very high ledge even though there is a sturdy railing to hold you. As a 2012 FSU study appropriately states, the "Call of the Void" may feel like a desire to die, when it is in reality your brain violently affirming its will to live. It's the reason why you fail to jump off the ledge, the reason you grip the steering wheel harder and focus on driving straighter: your brain identifies the possibility of extreme danger, and just as quickly rejects it entirely.

But Does it MEAN Something?

This explanation, however, dissatisfied me when I first heard it, and still does. It seems difficult for me to believe that a psychological anomaly that defies our primal instinct to value our own lives can be reduced to simple psychology. I believe there's something more. Perhaps there's something inside of us that rejects order, and we wish to do things like crash cars and jump off cliffs not merely to end our own existence, but to generate some element of chaos in our illusory world of order. Maybe it's a much more complex sociological instinct: the desire to limit a human population that is rapidly approaching its carrying capacity. Or maybe its the call of the afterlife, drawing us in quietly while we fight with everything we have to push it away.

I could give my opinion, but I feel that it's much more important for you as the reader to freely develop your own ideas. Comment below with what you think, and please upvote and resteem if you liked this post!