Heidegger and a Hippo Walk Through Those Pearly Gates Read online

  Thanks for coming, everybody. I know you came to see Freddy and not me, but Freddy’s indisposed. I appreciate your giving me a listen. Oh, one more story—last one, I promise.

  So Heidegger and a hippo stroll up to the Pearly Gates and Saint Peter says, “Listen, we’ve only got room for one more today. So whoever of the two of you gives me the best answer to the question ‘What is the meaning of life?’ gets to come in.”

  And Heidegger says, “To think Being itself explicitly requires disregarding Being to the extent that it is only grounded and interpreted in terms of beings and for beings as their ground, as in all metaphysics.”

  But before the hippo can grunt one word, Saint Peter says to him, “Today’s your lucky day, Hippy!”

  Good night, everybody! Safe trip home! You too, Freddy.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  There are a number of people on this side of the Great Divide we wish to thank for their help and support: our beloved agent, Julia Lord; our super-smart editor, Stephen Morrison; his ever-vigilant right-hand assistant, Becca Hunt; and our publicist at Penguin, Yen Cheong. As to those on the other side of the Great Divide, we’ll get to you shortly.

  Back in our student days, two teachers braved the scorn of their analytic colleagues and introduced us to the big, murky questions we really wanted to hear about. Those teachers were the late John Wild and the later Paul Tillich. It was a privilege to study with them.

  Far and away our best source of jokes is Gil Eisner, a human repository of classic gags. Thanks, Gil. Also thanks to Joan Griswold and Paddy Spence for a couple of goodies.

  We also tip our jester cap to some of the most inventive comedic writers we’ve ever read: Groucho Marx, Woody Allen, Emo Phillips, Steven Wright, Merle Haggard, and Martin Heidegger. For pointing us to movies about Heaven we’d never heard of, thanks to Jack Nessel.

  As to our wives, Eloise and Freke, and our daughters, Esther and Samara, what can we say? You are nice. Way nice.

  Many years ago, when Freke ’s father, the late Reverend Jan Vuijst, was on his deathbed, he spent a private moment with me (Danny). Among his last words was a statement I will never forget: “It was a privilege to have lived.”

  NOTES

  INTRODUCTION

  1 Arthur Schopenhauer, “On Death and Its Relationship to the Indestructibility of Our Inner Nature,” in Wolfgang Schirmacher, ed., Philosophical Writings (London: Continuum, 1994), p. 287.

  1. SURELY THERE MUST BE SOME MISTAKE

  1 Jill Bolte Taylor, My Stroke of Insight (New York: Viking, 2008).

  2. LET YOUR ANGST BE YOUR UMBRELLA

  1 Gestalt psychology, an early-twentieth-century holistic approach to human consciousness, maintains that our minds make sense of sensory information by distinguishing the significant data from the background. Like, “Hey, that’s a wig in a bowl of spaghetti! Not a bunch of random squiggles!”

  4. HEIDEGGERTY-DOG, ZIGGITY-BOOM, WHAT YOU DO TO ME

  1 Martin Heidegger, On Time and Being (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002), p. 6.

  2 Ibid.

  3 Quoted in Frank Kermode, An Appetite for Poetry: Essays in Literary Interpretation (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), prologue.

  4 Martin Heidegger, Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning) (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999).

  5 T. Z. Lavine, From Socrates to Sartre: The Philosophic Quest (New York: Bantam, 1985), p. 332.

  6 Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, in Stephen Priest, ed., Basic Writings (London: Routledge, 2001), p. 167.

  6. THE ETERNAL NOW

  1 Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (London: Routledge, 2001), § 6.4311.

  2 According to the fifth-century B.C. Greek philosopher Zeno of Elea, if Achilles gives the tortoise a head start in the race, he will never be able to catch up with the tortoise. The reason for this is that Achilles first has to reach the point at which the tortoise started out, but by that time the tortoise has moved a bit. No matter how many times Achilles gets to the point where the tortoise last was—even if he does so an infinite number of times—he can never quite catch the tortoise.

  7. PLATO, THE GODFATHER OF SOUL

  1 Jerome H. Neyrey, “Soul,” in Harper’s Bible Dictionary (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1985), pp. 982-3.

  2 Matthew 16:26; Mark 8:36.3. Neyrey, Ibid.

  4 Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, 3rd ed. (Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1973), § 622.

  5 Plato, “Meno,” The Dialogues of Plato, vol. 1, Benjamin Jowett, trans. (New York: Random House, 1937), pp. 349ff.

  8. HEAVEN—A LANDSCAPE TO DIE FOR

  1 A similar survey in Western European countries showed 49.4 percent of those surveyed said they believe in “life after death,” while 19.2 percent said they believe in reincarnation. The survey results were reported by Erlendur Haraldsson, University of Iceland, in Network, no. 87, Spring 2005.

  2 Adela Y. Collins, “Heaven,” in Harper’s Bible Dictionary, p. 377.

  3 “Beulah Land” was a popular gospel hymn about Heaven, written by Edgar Page Stites in 1876. He later wrote, “I could write only two verses and the chorus, when I was overcome and fell on my face.” Tori Amos wrote a song called “Beulah Land” for her 1998 album, From the Choirgirl Hotel.

  4 Richard H. Hiers, “Kingdom of God,” in Harper’s Bible Dictionary, p. 528.

  5 Adela Y. Collins, “Hades,” in Harper’s Bible Dictionary, p. 365.

  6 1 Thess. 4:16-17.

  7 Micah 6:8

  8 Luke 10:25.

  9 Koran, 56:15ff.

  10 Sunan al-Tirmidhi Hadith 2562.

  9. TUNNEL VISION

  1 William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience (New York: Modern Library, 1902), p. 378.

  10. THE ORIGINAL KNOCK-KNOCK JOKE

  1 These stories of the séance investigations of James, Sidgwick, and Munsterberg are found in Deborah Blum, Ghost Hunters: William James and the Search for Scientific Proof of Life After Death (New York: Penguin, 2006).

  11. BEATING DEATH TO THE PUNCH LINE

  1 Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus (London: Vintage, 1991), p. 3.

  2 Cicero, De finibus bonorum et malorum, H. Rackham, trans. (New York: Macmillan, 1924).

  3 Seneca, “Epistulae morales,” 70th epistle, in Letters from a Stoic, Robin Campbell, trans. (New York: Penguin Classics, 1969).

  4 SciForums.com.

  5 David Hume, “On Suicide,” in Essays on Suicide and the Immortality of the Soul (Whitefish, MT: Kessinger, 2004), p. 8.

  12. IMMORTALITY THROUGH NOT DYING

  1 Michael Kinsley, “Mine Is Longer than Yours,” New Yorker, April 7, 2008.

  2 Manfred Clynes, “Time Consciousness in a Very Long Life,” in The Scientific Conquest of Death (Buenos Aires: Libros en Red, 2004).

  3 Lewis Thomas, “On Cloning a Human Being,” The Medusa and the Snail: More Notes of a Biology Watcher (New York: Penguin, 1995), p. 52.

  4 Michael Treder, “Upsetting the Natural Order,” in ibid.

  SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING

  Aristotle. De Anima. London: Penguin, 1987.

  Ballou, Robert, ed. The Portable World Bible (excerpts from scriptures of the world ’s religions). London: Penguin, 1977.

  Blum, Deborah. Ghost Hunters: William James and the Search for Scientific Proof of Life After Death. New York: Penguin, 2006.

  Becker, Ernest. The Denial of Death. New York: Free Press, 1973.

  Camus, Albert. The Myth of Sisyphus. London: Penguin, 2000.

  ———. The Stranger. New York: Vintage, 1989.

  Cicero. De finibus bonorum et malorum. New York: Macmillan, 1924.

  Conrad, Mark, and Aeon Skoble, eds. Woody Allen and Philosophy: You Mean My Whole Fallacy Is Wrong? Chicago: Open Court, 2004.

  Descartes, René. Discourse on Method. London: Penguin, 2000.

  Freud, Sigmund. Beyond the Pleasure Principle. London: Penguin, 2003.

  ———. “The F
uture of an Illusion,” in Civilization, Society, and Religions . London: Penguin, 1991.

  Heidegger, Martin. Being and Time. San Francisco: Harper, 1962.

  Husserl, Edmund. The Essential Husserl. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999.

  Immortality Institute. The Scientific Conquest of Death. Buenos Aires: Libros en Red, 2004.

  James, William. “The Varieties of Religious Experience” and “Pragmatism,” in William James: Writings, 1902-1910. New York: Library of America, 1988.

  ———. “The Will to Believe,” in William James: Writings, 1878-1899. New York: Library of America, 1992.

  Jung, C. G. “The Soul and Death,” in Herman Feifel, ed., The Meaning of Death. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1959.

  Kierkegaard, Søren. The Concept of Anxiety. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981.

  ———. The Sickness unto Death. London: Penguin, 1989.

  Moody, Raymond. Life After Life. San Francisco: HarperOne, 2001.

  Nietzsche, Friedrich. The Gay Science. New York: Vintage, 1974.

  Plato. “Meno,” in Protagoras and Meno. London: Penguin, 2006.

  ———. “Phaedo,” in The Last Days of Socrates. London: Penguin, 2006.

  ———. The Republic. London: Penguin, 2007.

  Rank, Otto. Beyond Psychology. Mineola, NY: Dover, 1958.

  Ryle, Gilbert. The Concept of Mind. London: Penguin, 2000.

  Sartre, Jean-Paul. Being and Nothingness. London: Routledge, 2003.

  Schopenhauer, Arthur. The World as Will and Idea. Whitefish, MT: Kessinger, 2007.

  Seneca. Epistulae morales, 70th epistle, in Robin Campbell, trans., Letters from a Stoic. New York: Penguin Classics, 1969.

  Taylor, Jill Bolte. My Stroke of Insight. New York: Viking, 2008.

  Tillich, Paul. “The Eternal Now,” in The Eternal Now. New York: Scribner’s, 1963.

  Wrathall, Mark. How to Read Heidegger. New York: Norton, 2005.

  Zimmer, Heinrich. Philosophies of India. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1989.

  INDEX

  accountability, for finite life

  After Life (film)

  afterlife, jokes about

  Allen, Woody

  Alpert, Dickie

  American Society for Psychical Research

  angst. See anxiety

  anxiety

  drawing about free-floating

  Kierkegaard ’s views about

  loopholes for handling

  too much possibility of

  See also death-anxiety

  Appetites, as part of soul

  Aquinas, Thomas

  Aristotle

  art/artists

  artificial intelligence

  assisted suicide

  Augustine, Saint

  Barry, Dave

  Becker, Ernest

  Beethoven, Ludwig van

  behavior

  behaviorism

  Being

  belonging

  Berkeley, George

  Bible, references to heaven in

  Big Delusion

  Big Questions

  Biological Immortalists

  biotechnology. See immortality: biological

  Birdseye, Clarence

  Blake, William

  Blavatsky, Madame

  body

  boredom with life

  Bosch, Hieronymus

  Bouhours, Dominique

  brain

  Broad. D.

  Brown, James

  The Bucket List (film)

  Buddhism

  Buffet, Warren

  Burtle, Alan

  Byron, George Gordon, Lord

  Cabin in the Sky (film)

  Camus, Albert

  Capek, Karel

  Carson, Johnny

  Carter, Philip

  cartoons. See jokes/cartoons

  charity, immortality through

  children’s books

  Cicero

  civilization, and immortality

  clinical death

  cloning

  Clynes, Manfred

  Colbert, Stephen

  competitive longevity

  computer technology, and mind-body debate

  Confucius

  consciousness

  and being remembered by survivors

  of death

  and death-anxiety

  and immortality

  and mind-body debate

  and near-death experiences

  post-earthly

  Sartre ’s views about

  self-

  of time

  country singers

  cryogenetics

  culture, and Just Do It

  cyber-immortality

  da Vinci, Leonardo

  Dante

  Dass, Baba Ram. See Alpert, Dickie

  Dean, James

  death

  acceptance of

  as aim and purpose of life

  attitudes about

  consciousness of

  denial of

  fear of

  as lifestyle choice

  and process of dying

  questions about

  raging against

  suddenness of

  as welcome relief from life

  and what you would die for See also specific topic

  Death Drive

  “death instinct,”

  death row, will-to-live on

  death-anxiety

  and brain

  and eternity

  Heidegger’s views about

  as part of human condition

  psychology as ineffective against

  religion as ineffective against

  and soul

  and ways of denying mortality

  defiant self-creation

  delusions

  Demosthenes

  Descartes, René

  despair

  doctors

  dualism

  Durante, Jimmy

  Dyer, Wayne

  eBay

  Einstein, Albert

  El Greco

  Epicurus

  epiphenomenalism

  Eternal Force

  Eternal Fruitcake Conundrum

  Eternal Now

  Eternal Recurrence

  eternity

  cartoons about

  and death-anxiety

  as dimension of time

  in heaven

  how long is

  as now

  ethics

  eulogies

  euphoria

  “everydayness,”

  evolution

  existentialism . See also specific philosopher

  experience, “what-it ’s-like” aspect of

  faith, and cryogenetics

  Faust (film)

  final utterances

  for-itselfness

  Foucault, Michel

  Frayn, Michael

  free will

  Freud, Sigmund

  functionalism

  funerals. See also eulogies

  Gandhi, Mahatma

  Ganzfeld Effect

  Garden of Eden

  Garnett, Kevin

  Gates, Bill

  genetics

  Geron (genetic engineering company)

  God

  gods, illusions about

  Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von

  Greeks, ancient . See also specific person

  Groundhog Day (film)

  guilt

  Haggard, Merle

  Hale, Nathan

  hallucination, reality as

  Hanson, Harriet

  headstones

  heaven

  admission policy for

  artists’ views of

  belief in

  Biblical references to

  in children’s books

  descriptions of

  on earth

  eternity in

  God in

  Hollywood depictions of

  jokes/cartoons abou
t

  as kingdom of God

  questions about

  and religious affiliation

  survey about belief in

  as Valhalla

  and ways of denying mortality

  Heaven (film)

  Hebrews, ancient

  Heidegger, Martin

  Hell

  Here Comes Mr. Jordan (film)

  Heyman, Edward

  Hilton, Conrad

  Hinduism

  history, Zinn’s views about

  Hitchens, Christopher

  Hobbes, Thomas

  Hodgson, Richard

  Hollywood

  Hollywood Forever

  human

  essence/purpose of

  experience of being

  Hume, David

  Husserl, Edmund

  Huxley, Aldous

  Huxley, T. H.

  Ideal Triangle

  identity

  illusions

  immortalists, doctors as

  immortality

  and being remembered

  belief in

  biological

  and boredom with life

  and civilization

  cyber-

  denial of

  and evolution

  and experience of being human

  experiencing

  and filming of life story

  and inheritances

  jokes/cartoons about

  and moral issues

  by not dying

  and population

  and self

  of soul

  and survival of the fittest

  therapies about

  ways of denying