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The death of death. Number 15. May 2010.

The root of the evil caused by humans is not the animal nature of man, or territorial aggression or selfishness. The root of evil is our need to acquire self-esteem, to deny our mortality and achieve a heroic self-image. Our desire is the cause of the best of the worst. Sam Keen, philosopher and psychologist (American translation).

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Theme of the month: The unconscious fear of death and unquenchable. The terror management.

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The Humans are probably the only living being who knows he will die and certainly the only one who knows the inevitability of his end. This reality is so unbearable that it requires responses at several levels.

The first answer is to forget: most people are older, more death approaches. And the more our consciousness represses the idea of death. Thus, if during a psychological test, the experimenter projects images evoking death and other images, the older people remember fewer images evoking death than others.

But some psychologists say they have discovered more complex mechanisms and surprising that they called "terror management theory" (theory of terror management). Unconsciously we can not accept our death that we integrated into a broader set: our social group, our children, those who think like us. And, still unconsciously, to fight against the fear of our death, we must strengthen this "membership" collective. These psychologists have engaged in numerous experiments showing that the more we are faced with ideas related to death, the closer we come and we dismiss the group differences. Thus, in a curious and fun test, students had to prepare food for people with opposing political views to themselves. They could wish to spice up food. Students face the idea of death were preparing food much spicier (and unpleasant) to their opponents.

The theory of "terror management", like most psychological theories, is disputed by some. But what is not disputed is that the elderly are generally more attached to their children, their families and their ideas and traditions and avoid thinking about death "which is at the end." And it is also true that to a finite life a positive thing makes the end more tolerable or even desirable.

So Many say that death is part of nature that everything is born and dies, it is desirable. Epicurus said 22 centuries ago: Thus the evil that most frightens, death is nothing to us, since when we exist death is not there and when we exist death is here not.

There are also other possible responses to the fear of death.

First is the Grou pe restricted to those who think and hope that technological progress will one day escape from death in all cases during a period of longer and longer. But it is a hope, medium or long term and is still tenuous.

There is also and above all, billions of people, religious survival after announcing the physical disappearance. However, even among those who assert most believers, anxiety about death diminishes somewhat. The best proof is that when someone dies few survivors even very religious who feel sincere joy. A person who is really convinced that her child, spouse, mother, between heaven after long suffering should be filled with joy.

But whether we like it or not, but economic or political upheaval, technological progress will lead us to think otherwise. Us or the generations that follow us. It goes without saying that the psychological mechanisms that allow us to face death for thousands of years will not change overnight. Those who drive a car on a slippery road hugging the steering wheel harder than if the road is dry, without altering the handling of the car. Our brain keeps us awake late at night because artificial light is especially intensive in the last few generations. We find the food or sweetened high-calorie, delicious and enjoyable, so it is too abundant and damaging to our health. Living in a better world is also living in a changing world where the signals we give the "common sense" are sometimes wrong. It is sometimes difficult to manage, but it's exciting!

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The good news this month: The baby who would not age and the creation of a bacterium "artificial"

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Brooke Greenberg is 17 years old but has the body (and mind) of a baby of 15 months. The affection with which she suffers is unknown but it probably is genetic and related to mechanisms of aging. U.S. researchers examine the possible genetic causes. The objective is to determine which genes are responsible for delaying the aging process. A

success in this area does not mean, of course, a way to stop aging, but could allow to understand the genetic factors for a life (much) longer.

The famous and controversial biologist Craig Venter and his team have managed to replace the DNA of a bacterium with DNA totally artificial origin. The press spoke of "artificial life" when in fact it is only a step in that direction. Indeed, only the artificial DNA is not the rest of the cell and it is primarily a single copy of natural DNA, not a creation of a living being again. Nevertheless, this step is a scientific strides that allow a little more each day to understand and master the "alphabet" of life, DNA.

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• More generally: http://sens.org/ , http://imminst.org/ , http://heales.org/ and http://immortalite.org /
• To learn more about the "terror management": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terror_management_theory
• Learn more About Brooke Greenber: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooke_Greenberg
• To respond or to receive the newsletter: info@heales.org

Image source: http : / / www.flickr.com/photos/peterjr1961/2495638395/