Sarasota, Fla. – Sir John Templeton was many things to many people.To the general public, he was one of the past century’s greatest investors and philanthropists ? a man who revolutionized both mutual fund investing and the effort to explore the nexus between science and religion.After his passing this week, he will likely be remembered by the rational and affluent West as a poor boy from Tennessee turned Rhodes scholar and Dean of Global Investing.Christians might remember him for his Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion, and as someone who puts first things first: Faith, patience, prudence, and ethics were foremost in his thought.Scientists might remember him most for his Templeton Foundation, which gives millions to study the links between science and religion.
Also, Tom Disch, an prolific writer and commenter on this blog, apparently took his own life last week. His blog is here http://tomsdisch.livejournal.com/
my thoughts go out to those whose lives were enriched by tom and i think that includes the readers of this blog.
I’ve been reading and enjoying Tom Disch’s science fiction for many years. I didn’t know until looking just now on Wikipedia that he was born and grew up in my adopted (for 22 years now) home town of Des Moines. My sympathies to family and friends.
I have not read Tom’s work but I will look for a copy of “The Brave Little Toaster: A Bedtime Story for Small Appliances” this weekend.
From reports I have seen it sounds like Tom was suffering from depression and ended his life with a gun.
So sad … so very very sad.
How could a brilliant man like Tom Disch inflict such pain and despair on his family? I’ve no pity for him. Shame on him! My heart bleeds for his family; they are now his victims.
C4T, I don’t think that you can really judge someone for suicide. He was probably very badly off and couldn’t think clearly, and he didn’t have the help he needed.
Cry4Turtles
As far as I can tell, Tom’s only family died in 2005, and he had been mourning him ever since, from what I’ve been reading. Tom also had a history of mental illness and depression. His LiveJournal indicated he didn’t think he was going to live long. Whether that was due to his physical illnesses or a premeditated suicide isn’t clear. It is very sad that he was in such a state that he wanted to end his life, and his brilliance and artistic talent were no match for the deep depression he was in. I wonder if he’d still have suicided if he hadn’t had access to a gun. There’s that immediacy issue again.
I’m glad for you that you don’t understand how he could do such a thing. That means you’ve never felt that kind of pain and desperation.
Augustine is right on the money.
My opinion is that having a gun wouldn’t change my resolve to commit suicide, it’d just improve the lethality. One doesn’t typically survive a gun-shot to the head and I’d hate to have to attempt suicide more than once: it would just prolong the inevitable.
Thanks for saying that Augustine. Have you ever noticed that, in times of great tragedy, there’s no shortage of people (particularly people with the cowardly anonymity of the internet) who are ready to pass hasty, critical, often cruel judgment on other people when they’re down, dead or in despair?
People cope in their own ways. I make jokes. To wit, if he didn’t own a gun, perhaps we all would have been privvy to an advanced copy of The Brave Little Toaster Goes Swimming.
Life is for the living. However unfounded condemning a person who was clinically depressed for their selfish actions is, the emotion that led to it is just as real.
Many of us will miss Tom. My sympathies to family and friends.
KIP
That’s the point about the immediacy of guns. If you’re clinically depressed, it would be very dangerous to have a gun around. With other means of suicide, the timing factors can often be enough to allow for a change of mind. I understand what you mean about resolve, because there were times when I had 3 or 4 methods I was going to combine all together to make sure the job got done, because I had no gun and I did not want to end up a vegetable or just a failed suicide. Guns just make it so much easier to not have an opportunity to change your mind.
If you’re considering it, please get some counseling.
Cynic-
The Brave Little Toaster Goes Swimming-I think Tom would have laughed hard at that. I got a good chuckle out of it myself.
I have bipolar disorder so I know what it’s like to be depressed enough to attempt suicide. That’s why I refuse to keep a gun in the house.
My heart goes out to Tom, his family and friends, and everyone else out there who knows what its like to want to die.
I’m sorry, but I still can’t condone suicide. But I guess if someone doesn’t have any family to hurt, then it’s a go. Perhaps Tom had no friends either? Maybe in some cases life is way overated, huh?
Maybe if the wingnuts in this country
hadn’t imprisoned the “Doctor of Death”, we would have some kind of Death With Dignity legislation and those wishing to end their chronic pain would have access to humane avenues for end of life issues.
As far as suicide to deal with crappy happenstance in one’s life, IMHO it’s a cop out. Welcome to the jungle where we all get shit on.
Well, I feel very sad about this. The “Brave Little Toaster” movies were favorites of my son when he was little.
He had a set of toys he gathered together that were his “Brave Little Toaster” gang. I drew a “Toaster” face on a little white cardboard box, he had a play vacuum cleaner that was “Kirby,” a “Barney” lamp was “Lampy,” a toy walkie-talkie was “Radio,” and a small blanket was, of course, “Blankie.”
He put them all in a toy grocery cart and tied Kirby to the front and Kirby pulled them all over the house on their adventures! *sigh* Thanks, Mr. Disch, for giving my son those childhood memories!
Yeah, well I say living is the ‘cop out’. The only reason you haven’t killed yourself is because you still prefer life to death.
A little understanding can go a long way toward making this world a little less painful for all involved.
Who are we to say that a life of emotional pain and dispair is a life worth living?
A young atheist acquaintance of mine killed himself last year.
I respected his decisions on everything that he did. He was educated and knew that depression was a treatable illness.(in most cases)
He wanted no more problems to solve. He did the right thing for himself. It would have been selfish of me not to respect his decision in the end.
We all die. Some of us plan the time.
shorebird,
I wonder if that young athiest’s family feel the same way as you do. I don’t even want to imagine their pain. I’m sure if his mother or father or bro, etc. knew of his plans, they would’ve intervened. Of course there are those who have no family of friends. Like I said before, I guess if your suicide is guaranteed to generate no pain ever, then have at it. If my brother committed suicide because of his impending divorce, the loss of his stepkids, recovering from heart surgery, and constantly seeking work, I’d never forgive him for not reaching out to us for help, and just taking matters into his own suicidal hands, as if he lived in a bubble with no implications of his actions.
This fellow wanted no more problems to solve? Please say that wasn’t his reasoning. It sounds like a toddler’s tantrum to me. You said he was young. How did he even know which direction his life was going to go? He may have met the woman (or man) of his dreams tommorrow. Maybe he landed that new job, or maybe his favorite band was coming to town. Now he’ll never know. Good shit happens to us all, and bad shit happens to us all. Perhaps a less devastating choice would’ve been to take the wait and see how things pan out approach. Most problems have a way of working out in the end. Suicide leaves no room for that, just a room full of mourners, and tears on a golden picture frame for many years to come. Suicide only ended his pain, everybody else’s just began.
Just MHO.
cry4
Clinical depression isn’t about “good shit” and “bad shit” happening to those afflicted by the disease. Dysphoria due to “bad shit” happening in one’s life is called reactive depression. Clinical depression is a whole different beast. Imagine the absence of “bad shit” happening yet nevertheless you do not want to get out of bed, eat, have sex or do any of the things you presently love to do. Now imagine that this doesn’t happen simply overnight but over a period of a few years slowly tearing at the image you once had of yourself. Hard to imagine isn’t it?
I have seen enough of the disease to have some understanding what those afflicted by it go through but I can only imagine what it must be like. Please try imagining.
cry4turtles,
Everyone is in charge of their own life. Opting out of life is everyone’s choice.
Heaping guilt on those that choose when to end their life shows lack of respect for them.
Those that want an intervention give signals. He did not.
Those that would be critical of him are being sujective about their own lives.
Or that they actually care about the suicidee.
Guess we can’t have that though.
Right. We’re the ones who don’t care.
I was saddened to hear of Tom Disch’s death. I enjoyed some of his writing and actually illustrated one or two of his stories when they were adapted for comics. He is hardly the first artist or writer that I have known who chose to end his own life this way. I wish he had written more in his blogs about why he felt he had to do this. But I respect his decision. It’s not for anyone else to say when ones life is no longer worth living. A hundred years ago there were many circumstances where suicide would be considered the only honorable thing to do. Like seat belt laws and anti-smoking legislation it is a sign of the times that supposedly well-meaning meddlers feel the need to protect us from ourselves. More handgun legislation would only force those who choose to go down this path to find less certain or messier means. If you really want to die you will find a way.