I'm having trouble understanding. Identity is an illusion created by transience? The end of identity is the end of history?
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Self-consciousness, the awareness of a distinct, separate self in time/space is predicated on the knowledge that time/space are finite.
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E.g. the knowledge that "you" will die. Make time/space infinite by removing death and there can be no possibility of a differentiated self.
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The knowledge of death is the birth of "self"-consciousness. It is also attachment to life, which gives it any meaning we experience.
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We are humans because, fundamentally, we are afraid of death. It runs in every blood cell. The awareness of our finitude is not just mental.
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The flip side of this is that we get to experience meaning, precisely because we are deeply aware that everything is transient.
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The flip is also that we experience fear, pain, anguish etc. Attachment to life brings in both polarities, can't have one without the other.
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So you see, fear of death is our biggest bug, and our biggest feature. We cannot escape it, but we can learn from it.
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