Suffering
Suffering is usually described as a negative basic feeling or emotion that involves a subjective character of unpleasantness, aversion, harm or threat of harm.
- Suffering may be said physical or mental, depending whether it refers to a feeling or emotion that is linked primarily to the body or to the mind. Examples of physical suffering are pain, nausea, breathlessness, itching[1]. Examples of mental suffering are anxiety, grief, hatred, boredom[2].
- There is much ambiguity in the use of the words pain and suffering. Sometimes they are synonyms and interchangeable. Sometimes they are used in contradistinction to one another: e.g. "pain is inevitable, suffering is optional", "pain is physical, suffering is mental". Sometimes yet, like in the previous paragraph, they are defined in another way.
- The intensity of suffering comes in all degrees, from the triflingly mild to the unspeakably insufferable. Other factors often considered along with intensity are duration and frequency of occurrence.
- People's attitudes toward a suffering may vary hugely according to how much they deem it is light or severe, avoidable or unavoidable, useful or useless, of little or of great consequence, deserved or undeserved, chosen or unwanted, acceptable or unacceptable.
All sentient beings admittedly suffer during their lives, in various manners, and much often dramatically. Therefore, suffering is an important topic in many fields of human activity. Those fields are concerned with, for instance, the personal or social or cultural behaviors related to suffering, the nature or causes of suffering, its meaning or significance, its remedies or management or uses.
Philosophical, Ethical Perspectives
Suffering in philosophy and ethics is addressed mainly in the following articles, among others: Epicurus, Stoicism, Arthur Schopenhauer, Jeremy Bentham, Hedonic calculus, Utilitarianism, John Stuart Mill, Friedrich Nietzsche's On the Genealogy of Morals, Humanitarianism, Negative utilitarianism, Peter Singer, Richard Ryder’s Painism, Philosophy of pain.
Religious Perspectives
Suffering plays an important role in most religions, be it with respect to consolation or relief, to moral conduct, or to ultimate destiny (salvation, damnation).
In theology, there is a classical problem called the problem of evil: it deals with the difficulty of reconciling the existence of an omnipotent and benevolent god with the existence of evil, of which extreme suffering is often considered one of the worst kinds, especially in innocent children, or in creatures tormented in an eternal hell.
Part of the most fundamental teachings in Buddhism is constituted by the Four Noble Truths about dukkha, a term that is usually translated as suffering. The Four Noble Truths state what are the nature of suffering, its cause, its cessation, and the way leading to its cessation (this way is called the Noble Eightfold Path). Liberation from suffering is considered essential for leading a holy life and attaining nirvana.
Within the Bible, the Book of Job is widely regarded as a profound poetical reflection on the nature and meaning of suffering.
Catholic Pope John Paul II wrote a text On the Christian Meaning of Human Suffering. The relationship between suffering and sacrifice in Catholicism is explained under the articles Sacrifice and Redemptive suffering.
Biological Aspects
The process of suffering is associated with many brain structures. For instance, neuroimaging reveals that the cingulate cortex fires up when unpleasantness is felt from social distress or from physical pain that are experimentally induced. This finding led recently to the pain overlap theory, which proposes that physical pain and social pain share a common phenomenological and neural basis.
According to David Pearce’s Hedonistic Imperative, suffering is the result of darwinian genetic design, and it can be abolished. BLTC Research and the Abolitionist Society promote the project of replacing the pain/pleasure axis with gradients of bliss through genetic engineering and other technical scientific advances.
Psychological Aspects
Suffering is said to have very negative affects on the human concience.
Health Care Approaches
Social Sciences Approaches
Social suffering, according to Iain Wilkinson in Suffering - A Sociological Introduction, is increasingly a concern in sociological fields such as medical anthropology, ethnography, mass media analysis, and Holocaust studies.
The Encyclopedia of World Problems and Human Potential is a monumental work by the Union of International Associations. It has three core parts: World Problems (30,000 items), Human Potential: Transformation and Values (7,000 items), Strategies - Actions – Solutions (35,000 items). As it is said in their Notes and Commentaries: “the most fundamental entry common to the core parts is that of pain (or suffering)” and “common to the core parts is the learning dimension of new understanding or insight in response to suffering”.
Ralph Siu, an American author, urged in 1988 the "creation of a new and vigorous academic discipline, called panetics, to be devoted to the study of the infliction of suffering."[3] The International Society for Panetics, founded in 1991, is dedicated to the study and development of ways to reduce the infliction of human suffering by individuals acting through professions, corporations, governments, and other social groups.
In economics, the following articles are relevant to the question of suffering: Well-being or Quality of life, Welfare economics, Measuring well-being, Gross National Happiness, Genuine Progress Indicator.
"Pain and suffering" is the term used in the field of law to refer to the mental anguish and/or physical pain endured by the plaintiff as a result of injury for which the plaintiff seeks redress.[4]
Relief and Prevention in Collective Life
Concerns about suffering come to the forefront in many aspects of collective life:
- Security and Safety (military, sanitary, police, fire)
- Human security
- Human rights
- Community development
- Social security
- Social services
- Animal welfare
Uses of Suffering
Suffering is used in:
- Law (penology, punishment), crime
- Interpersonal relationships (abuse in family, in the workplace)
- Sex (sadism and masochism)
- Religion (penance, ascetism, hell)
- Performance in sports (athletes)
- Arts (ballerine, creators)
- Business (workers, managers)
Arts and Literature Perspectives
Artistic and literary works often engage with suffering. A selection of such works can be found on a website called Literature, Arts, and Medicine Database.
Footnotes
- ↑ More examples of physical suffering: pain, nausea, shortness of breath, weakness, dryness, various feelings of sickness, certain kinds of itching, tickling, tingling, numbness[1][2].
- ↑ More examples of mental suffering: grief, depression or sadness, disgust, irritation, anger, rage, hate, contempt, jealousy, envy, craving or yearning, frustration, heartbreak, anguish, anxiety, angst, fear, panic, horror, sense of injustice or righteous indignation, shame, guilt, remorse, regret, resentment, repentance, embarrassment, humiliation, boredom, apathy, confusion, disappointment, despair or hopelessness, doubt, emptiness, homesickness, loneliness, rejection, pity, self-pity...
- ↑ Ralph G.H. Siu, Panetics − The Study of the Infliction of Suffering, Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Vol. 28 No. 3, Summer 1988.
- ↑ http://www5.aaos.org/oko/vb/online_pubs/professional_liability/glossary.cfm
Bibliography
External links
See also
Pain and nociception, Pain (philosophy), Dukkha, Weltschmerz, Agony, Psychological pain, Psychalgia.
Pleasure, Happiness.
Evil, Problem of evil, Good and evil: welfarist theories.
Theory of relative suffering, Amor fati, Dystopia.
Compassion, Pity, Mercy, Sympathy, Empathy.
Cruelty, Schadenfreude, Sadistic personality disorder, Violence, Physical abuse, Psychological abuse, Emotional abuse, Self-harm.
Euthanasia, Animal euthanasia, Suicide.
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