Abstract

This paper examines the crisis of human existence. It examines the nature of existence and the central place of humans in existence. It critically discusses the myriad of problems humans encounter in existence that prompted some thinkers to believe that: (1) coming into existence is not worth it: ‘it would have been better not to have been born,’ and that coming into ‘existence is always bad for those who come into existence’; ‘although we may not be able to say of the neverexistent, that never existing is good for them’, ‘we can say of the existent that existence is bad for them’, (2) death, in principle, removes all meaning from life; if we must die, then, life is meaningless. It agrees that the crisis of human existence is brutal and elusive, and rages from natural to artificial. However, it sees the position that says that owing to the fact we shall die, life is meaningless as erroneous, malicious, and capable of devastating human social well-being. Contrarily, it argues that death is a natural regulatory order of the universe. It justifies its position and concludes that ‘life would have been worse if we have not been dying.’