How often do you think about death in your daily life? Humans are mortal. We usually live without being conscious of this. We are all destined to die, but when we're healthy and busy with our daily lives, we sometimes fail to acknowledge this fact. It's understandable that we don't want to think about it until we're faced with an imminent situation. However, isn't this an escape from the "truth" of being alive? This is evidenced by the fact that when the thought of death rears its head as something that concerns us personally, we are suddenly overcome with anxiety and impatience.
Many cultures have had systems in place that allow people to live in direct contact with death. To mature means to acquire a "culture of life and death" and deepen one's awareness of it. However, it is also true that modern, utilitarian culture and academia have shunned the "culture of life and death." This is true not only in medical settings such as hospitals, which aim to extend life, but even in settings such as hospices, which care for the dying.
At the University of Tokyo, based on the idea that "bioethics reflect views on life and death," research is being conducted on the differences in attitudes toward brain death, organ transplants, euthanasia, induced abortion, assisted reproductive technology, prenatal testing, and pre-term care testing, along with the religious views that underlie these differences.
One distinctive feature of Japanese religious views is that they are rooted in animism. Animism is the belief that all things, including not only humans but also animals, plants, and inanimate objects, have souls. For example, wouldn't you feel uncomfortable stepping on a book? This sense of resistance is an underlying feeling in the animistic philosophy that sees souls in objects. In polytheistic countries like Japan, animism forms the religious foundation. On the other hand, Christian nations have shaped their religious views while rejecting animism. Christian religious views distinguish humans from other animals and plants, and have asserted "human dignity" based particularly on the existence of reason. In Western societies, people whose brains have stopped functioning, even though their organs are still functioning, are considered "brain dead," and organ transplants are actively encouraged. In Japan, on the other hand, there is a strong resistance to viewing people whose bodies are still functioning as "dead." This is undoubtedly due to the deeply ingrained belief that the body is not a machine driven by reason, but rather has a soul of its own. These differences in Eastern and Western religious views (of life and death) also lead to differences in how bioethical issues are addressed. As a result, the extent to which brain death systems are implemented varies greatly between Japan and Western countries.
In the case of brain death, while Western societies simply consider brain-dead people to be "dead," Japan's animist religious views have reserved judgment. However, this does not mean that Japanese religious views value life in all aspects compared to Western societies. It is also true that abortion and infanticide, such as so-called "infanticide," are more prevalent in Asian cultures based on animism. While infanticide was not entirely absent in Western Europe, even today, there are many countries and regions where abortion itself is prohibited by law, particularly in countries and regions where Catholicism and certain pro-life denominations are deeply rooted. It is not true that infanticide was practiced openly in Japan. It must have been accompanied by hesitation and sadness. Belief in the reincarnation of children is thought to have provided some comfort. Rather than being considered individual individuals, we are considered to be like a large pool, born for a certain time and returning after death. This way of thinking leads to the belief that even if individuals disappear, the group remains.
In this way, in non-Christian cultures, individual lives are often sacrificed based on animistic values. Buddhism does not distinguish between humans and non-human nature, viewing both as part of an unbroken universe. Compared to Christianity, Asian traditions such as Buddhism, Taoism, and Shinto tend not to make a clear ethical distinction between humans and other created beings.
Now that we are in the 21st century, the sciences may be reexamining the nature of human beings as mortals. Becoming familiar with the idea of life and death is surely an essential part of learning.
Reference: University of Tokyo, List of lectures on thanatology
https://ocw.u-tokyo.ac.jp/course_11318/
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