Thank you, Barbara Getliff, for this fabulous and quite practical question!
There are two concepts at play in the question: boredom and death. After considering each separately, we can then evaluate if and how they work or fit together.
Boredom can be described as an existential state of mind, that is, one relating to the experience of being an individual human in the world; it is dependent on one’s fulfillment in life and one’s ability to be fulfilled in life. But it is also a psychological benchmark and springboard for a person, so that when one becomes bored, one also becomes aware of being bored and can therefore do something about it. It is not a fool-proof system, though; there are some situations where serious emotional consequences crop up. In his work, ‘On Tranquility’, the Stoic philosopher Seneca discusses boredom in terms of tedium, or monotony. He explains it as a condition of the mind being outside its natural state of distraction, excitement, wandering, and curiosity, dulled by a constant disenchantment and fatigue. His remedy was to keep engaged in public life, which in his lifetime was ever-changing and ever-exciting. Modern philosophers have differentiated between existential boredom and everyday boredom, and they have described existential boredom as more of a mental health condition, although it doesn’t always amount to that.
This may come as a surprise but there are actually three types of death: physical, intellectual, and spiritual; and boredom can be linked to all of them. A person dies physically, as most of us know, when their body ceases to function, when all their physical systems shut down and cannot be turned back on. A person dies intellectually when their mind is no longer being fed or challenged with information, when they cease to use their mind to contribute to their community. And a person dies spiritually when they stop trying to understand their purpose or place in the world, when they stop growing emotionally. Spiritual death can stem from lots of things; it is also the type of death that is most likely to lead to mental health concerns.
So, boredom can lead to ill health in several ways; and then, from those health conditions, you can indeed die. You would not actually die of the boredom itself, though, as it is not a health condition. If you do not use your mind or challenge yourself by continuing to learn new things, then you may become bored and thus die an intellectual death. If the boredom is due to a lack of spiritual fulfillment because you have stopped growing emotionally, then you may die a spiritual death. In philosophy, all of these are problematic. Arguments have been made throughout time that whenever someone talks about death, they could mean any of these three types, as they all really amount to one and the same thing: the death of an integral part of a human being.
What do you think? Can we actually die of boredom? Let us know in the comments.
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Image: The two cherubs from Raphael’s Sistine Madonna (1512)
I am a post-graduate researcher and teaching assistant in the Philosophy Department at Mary Immaculate College in Ireland. I obtained my undergraduate and master’s degrees, both interdisciplinary in philosophy and religious studies, from Arizona State University in the United States. My doctoral dissertation (and passion) establishes a theodicy embracing Stoic philosophy as an enhancement to one’s understanding of the problem of gratuitous suffering in the world, and centers on philosopher John Hick’s use of St. Irenaeus’ early Christian theodicy. My expertise include hermeneutics and ethics, and my interests extend to ancient religious cults and early monotheism.
The best antidote to boredom, of whatever sort, is music. Listen to it or, better still, make it.