This conversation is profoundly important —and Sheldon Solomon's work is essential. But for all it reveals it obscures a vital input: this is still a story told through the male gaze.
Framework
_____
1. The Unacknowledged Rhythm that Only Women Possess -the Consciousness that Aligns with Reality More
Death and Renewal are not metaphor for women. It's a monthly somatic fact. We experience a forced ongoing self-witnessing, a learning to read internal weather, develop a richer interoceptive vocabulary by necessity.
This difference is never stated plainly enough: our more dimensional consciousness is more aligned with what is Real —more so than any of the human stories we Westerners have constructed to placate ourselves...with most authored by men.
_____
2. Terror Mgmt Theory Doesn't Disaggregate by Sex —a Genuine Theoretical Gap
Solomon states that humanity's primary quest is to create culture organized around death anxiety. True and relevant —but more for men than women.
Cyclical consciousness makes women better equipped to sit with death, not more frightened by it. Women report higher death anxiety. Men hold their silence, but behaviorally exhibit it. The male-built civilization we inhabit right now IS death anxiety —it's simply so overt, ubiquitous and long-standing we're unconscious of it.
_____
3. A Consciousness Monoculture —and the Pathway Out
Points 1 and 2 lead here: the world we experience today is exclusively male-made.
A patriarchy centers men; a matriarchy centers children. We have only ever known patriarchy.
Terror Management Theory is valid to THAT world —masculine energy has fully dominated for centuries.
Rhythmic Feminine Energy and Cyclical Consciousness must not only have a voice, it must be structurally incorporated into the effort: puzzle table, puzzle image, and each puzzle piece. For now, these imperatives don't even have a wanted poster, they’re not yet known to be missing.
Agreed Ann – This is an important point. See the Body and Soul chapter in The Worm at the Core (link below) for our effort to, as Ann put it, “Disaggregate by Sex”.
And when I teach about terror management theory, we also read:
Carson McCullers. (1961). Clock without hands. Houghton Mifflin.
David Graeber, & David Wengrow. (2021). The dawn of everything: A new history of humanity. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Esther Menaker. (1982). Otto Rank: A rediscovered legacy. Columbia University Press.
Karen Horney. (1950). Neurosis and human growth: The struggle toward self-realization. W. W. Norton & Company.
Robin Wall Kimmerer. (2013). Braiding sweetgrass: Indigenous wisdom, scientific knowledge, and the teachings of plants. Milkweed Editions.
Silvia Benso. (2000). The face of things: A different side of ethics. State University of New York Press.
All of these works align with Ann’s point that “Rhythmic Feminine Energy and Cyclical Consciousness must not only have a voice, it must be structurally incorporated into the effort: puzzle table, puzzle image, and each puzzle piece.
For now, these imperatives don't even have a wanted poster, they’re not yet known to be missing.” – and this is also a major point in James Rowe’s (2024) Radical mindfulness: Why transforming fear of death is politically vital – Rowe integrates insights from Black radicals, Indigenous theorists, terror management theory, and Buddhist feminists to advocate mind-body practices as an important element for fostering personal well-being and ecumenical political/economic/religious social structures.
Thanks Sheldon…was finally able to read The Worm at the Core.
Again, I find TMT profoundly precise for a male/masculine worldview default while still standing by the 3 reasons I gave earlier about why it's just not such a Universal Truth for the female/feminine segment. Thereby, the Core Worm you identify is insightful for better understanding men's motivations, mostly. Not that this is not helpful to humanity. I think of transhumanism along the same lines —focused on skirting death, and there's just not that many women involved in its genesis or perpetuation.
The question isn't what percentage of women align with TMT's frame — it's whether the frame was ever derived from studying female psychology in the first place? The book briefly notes women's bodies are specially policed —but never asks whether women manage mortality differently, or whether TMT's 2 pillars (worldview + self-esteem as death buffers) are primarily male psychological defaults?
Curious: regarding the judge experiment, were the judges equally male and female?
Because a significant segment of the population possesses an intuitive, embodied, naturally-embedded relationship with the notion of death that TMT never accounts for —women's psychology is generally more on a continuum of bodily mortality rather than estranged from it: cyclical hormonal time, the biological reality of gestation, microchimerism. These aren't symbolic strategies for transcending, they're visceral to it. So TMT's entire architecture assumes a psychology that finds the body threatening...not only…it suggests women's bodies are doubly threatening to men: they trigger both animal lust and the creaturely reminder of mortality. TMT frames misogyny partially as a death-anxiety externalization.
My overall point: TMT/The Worm at the Core serves to reveal the terror mgmt architecture of men, but by stating that same scaffold applies to everyone, it delegitimizes the fundamental feminine perspective. By not even acknowledging that another population possesses a structurally different relationship with death —not a deficient one, a different one, held by a significant portion of the overall population— you institutionalize that delegitimacy.
I like your points Ann. TMT is very possibly a thesis for the old world...but one that probably still needs to be worked with during this liminal time. I suspect something to your Rhythmic Feminine Energy and Cyclical Consciousness is on the horizon...
There is so much in the conversation that deeply resonates with where my mind has been at. I've really found myself in a place of knowing in my bones that the quality and authenticity of our love for this world right now matters somehow for those yet to come. This will likely sound woo-woo, but it's where I'm at, especially after traveling to Iona and wandering around the island. Love is so much more profound than I ever really knew before being confronted with death regularly in my work and in the meta-crisis. I believe in love more as a lived reality than as a concept. And that love as an act of surrender and offering of selfhood towards someone or something is at the very heart of all that is. Alongside my fears for the world there is a tenderness, a release, a becoming, that defies words, and that invites me to breath deeply and rest in the beauty of how it holds me and connects me to everyone and everything. Life becomes truly lived when I can surrender my fears about the future, hold those who are suffering in a inner gesture of love, and consider what devotion and service are in my little world, in granular, openhearted ways. There is an immense power in this, but it's not a power that controls or dominates or positions itself in judgement in any way. It's a power that is exquisitely tender, open, and utterly accepting of itself in its unwillingness to use power for power's sake. The conditions of knowing it require me to be unselfconsciously naked before it, because it too dwells naked in the world, without armor or defense, asking for hospitality. There is an aliveness to this love and power, and I want to live my life in service and devotion to them.
Such a fascinating conversation that makes so much sense of what is going on. Especially the Climate Change narrative started in the 1950’s by The Rockefeller Foundation. This fits the existential threat and all its consequences . This is why it was recognised and promoted as the ideal way to increase our anxiety, fear and vulnerability to be controlled.
Only half way through , but the questions I have is did Sheldon study the exceptions…those of us who live comfortably with awareness of our own mortality ?
Isn’t that the basis of most religions , of heaven , resurrection and reward in the after life ? That death is the ultimate reward and liberation so must be embraced ? Where did the disconnect happen ?
For me this is part of ‘collapse awareness’ , the knowing that death and adversity could happen at any time.
Our work was primarily focused on the unsavory aspects of human attitudes and behavior resulting from death denial. Other subsequent research has shown that people who live comfortably with the awareness of their mortality tend to be humble, grateful, and in a frequent state of awe. Secure attachment and being part of a culture that is not blatantly death-denying is also contributes to death acceptance.
Then re: religion and where (and how) the disconnect happened -- see
Thank you Sheldon for your response to my question and for the document. You have peaked my interest to explore your work further …but first the doc you sent …
Thanks Sarah, this is such a great conversations with so much to cogitate and be curious about. You did ask some stunning questions, you are always so impressive.
Sarah, the one thing that perhaps needs some further consideration is the notion of human exceptionalism and superiority that was discussed at the start of the conversation, and that seems to be a tenet of terror management theory - I worry that the discordance it creates undermines the call for empathy and humility? I see this discordance everywhere, so am a bit sensitised to it, but always wonder what evidence backs up such ideas, and what subconscious harms arise from the mixed messaging.
Is it not simply a convenient assumption that other animals are less intelligent, or less able to ponder death and other matters? Does it not allow for the continuation of their subjugation, and our cruelty, and our blatant trashing of their world, if we “assume” they are less capable of higher order thinking? It is a similar mentality to systemic colonial othering.
We simply don’t know what other animals think (although there are some incredible examples of potential long-term, complex thinking), and we are often not humble enough to learn to listen to them on their terms. I suspect there are many other animals, and species in general, that are more emotionally intelligent than many humans? Not sure. Either way, I agree that there is a better way forward. I just want to do so from a basis of genuine grace and connection, not from a position of self-imposed superiority by which I am measuring the worth of another.
Jeni, I've paused on this consideration in the past ,too. I've heard Sheldon previously get more granular re the studies about this "fact". I think there is considerable evidence that we are MORE conscious of the truth of our death than other species. Even if it were not true, TMT still holds for humans. And that's who we're dealing with here, that's who listens to a podcast. Your point still stands, of course, that human exceptionalism needs to be addressed...I write a lot about the need for humility (and the likelihood we'll be slammed into it in coming years) in my book
Thank you for taking the time to respond, Sarah. From my quick reading, which could be completely wrong, TMT explores the construction of social and cultural parameters, some of which defy biological reality, that help us hide from the terror of our own mortality. What I do not understand is why TMT promotes human superiority as though it is fact, and why it even needs this human exceptionalism argument? It’s like it has fallen victim to it’s own construction bias? The focus on human exceptionalism suggests the prioritising of the human ego. And yet, I wonder if transcending that human ego, rejecting the narcissism, and trying to embrace all of the life we are surrounded by on a more equal plane might not serve us better?
In 2018, a killer whale carried her dead calf for 17 days off the US coast. In 2025, she carried another dead calf for approximately 11 days. Are humans really that unique in their consideration of death?
Avoiding death anxiety by insisting that another being is less worthy than me, which seems to be part of the TMT understanding of self-esteem (very happy to be corrected), feels counter-intuitive.
Yes, we are all humans listening to these podcasts, and learning from your wonderful work. That doesn’t mean we can’t consider how we view and interact with others, be they children, other animals, or environments. Sheldon is fabulous, and can teach us a great deal – it was a fascinating conversation that built on much that you have helped us see over the years. Thank you for all the work that must go into such videos. I look forward to receiving my copies of your book, and seeing you speak in May.
I may have been somewhat misleading in my conversation with Sarah, but/and Ernest Becker and terror management theory do not argue that humans are better than other creatures; rather, the claim is that we are uniquely different in our capacity to transform imagination into reality, and awareness of and apprehension about death in situations where our lives are not threatened.
Different does not mean better, although people often somewhat automatically interpret differences on a hierarchical scale. And I have often argued that human intelligence is vastly overrated unless it is accompanied by a rich assortment of moral sensibilities.
Viewing humans as superior is more a product of the Judeo-Christian worldview -- humans are created in God's image and are given domination of all other forms of life -- than Becker or TMT, which is based on Darwin's contention that all forms of life are functionally equivalent. This is another point that I often make in my presentations of these ideas; specifically, that humans are no more significant or enduring than lizards or potatoes.
Hello Sheldon, and thanks for replying, and for explaining more - very good of you! We could consider the semantics of "exceptional" vs. "unique" (maybe its just a cultural thing - where I come from, we are less inclined to claim a sense of exceptionalism or uniqueness?), but in the end, as you suggest in your last paragraph, we are all just humble lifeforms. Hence why it is good to learn from each other.
Thank you again for the great talk with Sarah - it was really fascinating, and quite inspiring. All the more reason why I wanted to question the one aspect that didn't feel right - the rest was very important! Thanks
I am 12 minutes in and was also thinking about that ‘sense of superiority' also part of our culture, trying to make sense of life. But then Sarah takes the example of a cow, aware of a threat, and my sense of humour kicked in when she said : we, humans, ruminate about death… The irony of it. Sarah you couldn't have chose a better verb to describe it!
Also, I just watched ‘Silent Friend', awesome perspective on life from plants and more precisely from a ginko tree, highly recommend it. Very humbling experience.
I haven't had a chance to listen yet, but I really look forward to reflecting on things when I can. But right out of the gate, it strikes me that those who aren't afraid of dying also seem to have a deep capacity for love now, and can somehow offer the hospitality of their own personhood to the people around them. They inhabit their own selfhood, have somehow made peace with the loneliness of what it is to exist and be their own consciousness observing themselves, and be anchoring for others. Life goals!
"hospitality of their own personhood" - a cracker line, Madeleine.
I have been told the past few weeks by journalists who've interviewed in the past that I seem different, happier...and I truly think it is because I've gone up close to death so many times the past few years.
Having been in the ecological overshoot/collapse rabbit hole (aka the doomosphere) for 12 years now, I have long since come to the realisation that collapse acceptance relies solely on death acceptance. Then recently Sheldon's work appeared via Nate Hagens and now here, and what he talks about makes so much sense, especially when we tie in the anthropological angle.
The philosophers and spiritualists have been saying it for eons...and I have to confess that through the writing of my book , facing the death of the system and possibly a lot more, I really came to understand this truth, at a visceral level. It's changed me profoundly
Sarah, I like your conclusion that we need to normalise the things Sheldon talks about that will save our species from self-annihilation. But I don’t think this will come from leaders. It will be a grassroots movement - and it’s happening already. The more the islands of sanity can be visible, the more influential they will become. At least, that thought provides me with, dare I say, some hope.
Another wonderful interview and had no idea these types of studies existed. From my own perspective I was faced with my own mortality in my late 40s when diagnosed with a degenerative autoimmune disease (no cure). It came with relief and a whole body sigh, knowing the best years were behind me and I had to act accordingly. Death became a topic of discussion in our house and we ‘normalised’ my decline. Then promptly got on with our lives, but this strange parallel happened where we can talk about death in our household but not outside of it… because of everyone else’s negative reaction and knee jerk reassurance- everything is going to be ok… wonderful topic and thanks
If you're still not conviced after all this evidence – which, if we'd had acknowledged it already at the time of Ernest Becker, would have saved Earth a looot of trouble since decades now... –, read ➡️ "Radical Mindfulness Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital" by James K. Rowe (2024)
@Sarah, "surprisingly" no books regarding TMT (neither Beckers' ones for that matters...) has ever been translated in any other european language. I myself tried and tried to find an editor, but without success. I guess the Denial Machine is deeply grounded in the elite's subconcious (or maybe its cynical conciousness...).
Since you seem to have some sort of influence on your audience, perhaps working towards an acknowledgement of TMT by a large audience would make a great "immortality poject".
P.S.: and no amount of statistical "pickiness" (cf. Chen & al., 2025) will remove the phenomenological fact that death anxiety projection "ping-pong" games is as the core of our miserable state of living from a psychoilogical point of view (vs materialistic pov), leading to increasing suicide rates in "developped" societies.
The other ‘problem’ of course, with not fearing death, is being careless with life and I am very guilty of taking totally uneccesary risks with my life because I place alot of trust in ‘when it’s my time’.
Many of these have been out hiking or on my bike. I’ve had many ‘words of warning’ delivered to me from the powers that be, the guardian angels etc. Brakes have failed, a frog on the road when I was going downhill at crazy speed, my rear end smashed into by a car nearly flinging me into a roundabout of speeding cars… a slip off of a rock and by bag getting caught, cramp on a knife edge that prevented me from attempting a dangerous climb… loads and loads of examples, when I’ve sat and talked these through with a religious friend he was amazed, he was like… you definitely should be dead by now… someone/thing (God he said) really wanted me alive for some purpose. I’ve never really believed that though. I just think they are tests of resilience and survival. Part of reaching limits and learning those boundaries.
Not had a chance to listen to the full episode yet so just some quick thoughts:
I don’t feel like I’ve ever feared dying, leading to some unsavoury events in my teen years. I’ve never understood the fear of dying by others.
But… though I don’t fear it. My fascination with the human power to survive at all costs, the resiliance we have and the systems in place to try so desperately to keep us alive… sort of contradicts the first thing. The philophical mind says… if we have evolved with such powerful systems to try so hard to keep us alive… maybe there is some truth in the idea that we should not die until the body decices this, not our consciousness. Which often overlaps with the spiritual idea around ‘when it’s your time’ etc.
I would add one thing that I dislike about no fear of death… it means I don’t mind when others die, but in society that often results in people thinking I don’t care or that I am cold hearted etc. which isn’t how I feel.
This conversation is profoundly important —and Sheldon Solomon's work is essential. But for all it reveals it obscures a vital input: this is still a story told through the male gaze.
Framework
_____
1. The Unacknowledged Rhythm that Only Women Possess -the Consciousness that Aligns with Reality More
Death and Renewal are not metaphor for women. It's a monthly somatic fact. We experience a forced ongoing self-witnessing, a learning to read internal weather, develop a richer interoceptive vocabulary by necessity.
This difference is never stated plainly enough: our more dimensional consciousness is more aligned with what is Real —more so than any of the human stories we Westerners have constructed to placate ourselves...with most authored by men.
_____
2. Terror Mgmt Theory Doesn't Disaggregate by Sex —a Genuine Theoretical Gap
Solomon states that humanity's primary quest is to create culture organized around death anxiety. True and relevant —but more for men than women.
Cyclical consciousness makes women better equipped to sit with death, not more frightened by it. Women report higher death anxiety. Men hold their silence, but behaviorally exhibit it. The male-built civilization we inhabit right now IS death anxiety —it's simply so overt, ubiquitous and long-standing we're unconscious of it.
_____
3. A Consciousness Monoculture —and the Pathway Out
Points 1 and 2 lead here: the world we experience today is exclusively male-made.
A patriarchy centers men; a matriarchy centers children. We have only ever known patriarchy.
Terror Management Theory is valid to THAT world —masculine energy has fully dominated for centuries.
Rhythmic Feminine Energy and Cyclical Consciousness must not only have a voice, it must be structurally incorporated into the effort: puzzle table, puzzle image, and each puzzle piece. For now, these imperatives don't even have a wanted poster, they’re not yet known to be missing.
Find my expanded comments on my page.
A note from Sheldon
Agreed Ann – This is an important point. See the Body and Soul chapter in The Worm at the Core (link below) for our effort to, as Ann put it, “Disaggregate by Sex”.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qsCi-0mv9HiZXHv0jN2PI0Bb3t15WCy5/view?usp=sharing
And when I teach about terror management theory, we also read:
Carson McCullers. (1961). Clock without hands. Houghton Mifflin.
David Graeber, & David Wengrow. (2021). The dawn of everything: A new history of humanity. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Esther Menaker. (1982). Otto Rank: A rediscovered legacy. Columbia University Press.
Karen Horney. (1950). Neurosis and human growth: The struggle toward self-realization. W. W. Norton & Company.
Robin Wall Kimmerer. (2013). Braiding sweetgrass: Indigenous wisdom, scientific knowledge, and the teachings of plants. Milkweed Editions.
Silvia Benso. (2000). The face of things: A different side of ethics. State University of New York Press.
All of these works align with Ann’s point that “Rhythmic Feminine Energy and Cyclical Consciousness must not only have a voice, it must be structurally incorporated into the effort: puzzle table, puzzle image, and each puzzle piece.
For now, these imperatives don't even have a wanted poster, they’re not yet known to be missing.” – and this is also a major point in James Rowe’s (2024) Radical mindfulness: Why transforming fear of death is politically vital – Rowe integrates insights from Black radicals, Indigenous theorists, terror management theory, and Buddhist feminists to advocate mind-body practices as an important element for fostering personal well-being and ecumenical political/economic/religious social structures.
Thanks Sheldon…was finally able to read The Worm at the Core.
Again, I find TMT profoundly precise for a male/masculine worldview default while still standing by the 3 reasons I gave earlier about why it's just not such a Universal Truth for the female/feminine segment. Thereby, the Core Worm you identify is insightful for better understanding men's motivations, mostly. Not that this is not helpful to humanity. I think of transhumanism along the same lines —focused on skirting death, and there's just not that many women involved in its genesis or perpetuation.
The question isn't what percentage of women align with TMT's frame — it's whether the frame was ever derived from studying female psychology in the first place? The book briefly notes women's bodies are specially policed —but never asks whether women manage mortality differently, or whether TMT's 2 pillars (worldview + self-esteem as death buffers) are primarily male psychological defaults?
Curious: regarding the judge experiment, were the judges equally male and female?
Because a significant segment of the population possesses an intuitive, embodied, naturally-embedded relationship with the notion of death that TMT never accounts for —women's psychology is generally more on a continuum of bodily mortality rather than estranged from it: cyclical hormonal time, the biological reality of gestation, microchimerism. These aren't symbolic strategies for transcending, they're visceral to it. So TMT's entire architecture assumes a psychology that finds the body threatening...not only…it suggests women's bodies are doubly threatening to men: they trigger both animal lust and the creaturely reminder of mortality. TMT frames misogyny partially as a death-anxiety externalization.
My overall point: TMT/The Worm at the Core serves to reveal the terror mgmt architecture of men, but by stating that same scaffold applies to everyone, it delegitimizes the fundamental feminine perspective. By not even acknowledging that another population possesses a structurally different relationship with death —not a deficient one, a different one, held by a significant portion of the overall population— you institutionalize that delegitimacy.
I like your points Ann. TMT is very possibly a thesis for the old world...but one that probably still needs to be worked with during this liminal time. I suspect something to your Rhythmic Feminine Energy and Cyclical Consciousness is on the horizon...
There is so much in the conversation that deeply resonates with where my mind has been at. I've really found myself in a place of knowing in my bones that the quality and authenticity of our love for this world right now matters somehow for those yet to come. This will likely sound woo-woo, but it's where I'm at, especially after traveling to Iona and wandering around the island. Love is so much more profound than I ever really knew before being confronted with death regularly in my work and in the meta-crisis. I believe in love more as a lived reality than as a concept. And that love as an act of surrender and offering of selfhood towards someone or something is at the very heart of all that is. Alongside my fears for the world there is a tenderness, a release, a becoming, that defies words, and that invites me to breath deeply and rest in the beauty of how it holds me and connects me to everyone and everything. Life becomes truly lived when I can surrender my fears about the future, hold those who are suffering in a inner gesture of love, and consider what devotion and service are in my little world, in granular, openhearted ways. There is an immense power in this, but it's not a power that controls or dominates or positions itself in judgement in any way. It's a power that is exquisitely tender, open, and utterly accepting of itself in its unwillingness to use power for power's sake. The conditions of knowing it require me to be unselfconsciously naked before it, because it too dwells naked in the world, without armor or defense, asking for hospitality. There is an aliveness to this love and power, and I want to live my life in service and devotion to them.
A note from Sheldon
Agreed! See link below for overlapping ideas --
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VmsWcBoWYTvXXDf0LRHcjhsW_jx7KWPT/view?usp=sharing
Such a fascinating conversation that makes so much sense of what is going on. Especially the Climate Change narrative started in the 1950’s by The Rockefeller Foundation. This fits the existential threat and all its consequences . This is why it was recognised and promoted as the ideal way to increase our anxiety, fear and vulnerability to be controlled.
Only half way through , but the questions I have is did Sheldon study the exceptions…those of us who live comfortably with awareness of our own mortality ?
Isn’t that the basis of most religions , of heaven , resurrection and reward in the after life ? That death is the ultimate reward and liberation so must be embraced ? Where did the disconnect happen ?
For me this is part of ‘collapse awareness’ , the knowing that death and adversity could happen at any time.
A note from Sheldon
Our work was primarily focused on the unsavory aspects of human attitudes and behavior resulting from death denial. Other subsequent research has shown that people who live comfortably with the awareness of their mortality tend to be humble, grateful, and in a frequent state of awe. Secure attachment and being part of a culture that is not blatantly death-denying is also contributes to death acceptance.
Then re: religion and where (and how) the disconnect happened -- see
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VEJFsxAP5nq3VVuHzlhJWERTnlpF2iGX/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=100206989476582969070&rtpof=true&sd=true
for our take on these matters
Thank you Sheldon for your response to my question and for the document. You have peaked my interest to explore your work further …but first the doc you sent …
I've asked Sheldon to come on and answer questions...I've just prodded him again Susan.
Thanks Sarah, this is such a great conversations with so much to cogitate and be curious about. You did ask some stunning questions, you are always so impressive.
Sarah, the one thing that perhaps needs some further consideration is the notion of human exceptionalism and superiority that was discussed at the start of the conversation, and that seems to be a tenet of terror management theory - I worry that the discordance it creates undermines the call for empathy and humility? I see this discordance everywhere, so am a bit sensitised to it, but always wonder what evidence backs up such ideas, and what subconscious harms arise from the mixed messaging.
Is it not simply a convenient assumption that other animals are less intelligent, or less able to ponder death and other matters? Does it not allow for the continuation of their subjugation, and our cruelty, and our blatant trashing of their world, if we “assume” they are less capable of higher order thinking? It is a similar mentality to systemic colonial othering.
We simply don’t know what other animals think (although there are some incredible examples of potential long-term, complex thinking), and we are often not humble enough to learn to listen to them on their terms. I suspect there are many other animals, and species in general, that are more emotionally intelligent than many humans? Not sure. Either way, I agree that there is a better way forward. I just want to do so from a basis of genuine grace and connection, not from a position of self-imposed superiority by which I am measuring the worth of another.
Jeni, I've paused on this consideration in the past ,too. I've heard Sheldon previously get more granular re the studies about this "fact". I think there is considerable evidence that we are MORE conscious of the truth of our death than other species. Even if it were not true, TMT still holds for humans. And that's who we're dealing with here, that's who listens to a podcast. Your point still stands, of course, that human exceptionalism needs to be addressed...I write a lot about the need for humility (and the likelihood we'll be slammed into it in coming years) in my book
Thank you for taking the time to respond, Sarah. From my quick reading, which could be completely wrong, TMT explores the construction of social and cultural parameters, some of which defy biological reality, that help us hide from the terror of our own mortality. What I do not understand is why TMT promotes human superiority as though it is fact, and why it even needs this human exceptionalism argument? It’s like it has fallen victim to it’s own construction bias? The focus on human exceptionalism suggests the prioritising of the human ego. And yet, I wonder if transcending that human ego, rejecting the narcissism, and trying to embrace all of the life we are surrounded by on a more equal plane might not serve us better?
In 2018, a killer whale carried her dead calf for 17 days off the US coast. In 2025, she carried another dead calf for approximately 11 days. Are humans really that unique in their consideration of death?
Avoiding death anxiety by insisting that another being is less worthy than me, which seems to be part of the TMT understanding of self-esteem (very happy to be corrected), feels counter-intuitive.
Yes, we are all humans listening to these podcasts, and learning from your wonderful work. That doesn’t mean we can’t consider how we view and interact with others, be they children, other animals, or environments. Sheldon is fabulous, and can teach us a great deal – it was a fascinating conversation that built on much that you have helped us see over the years. Thank you for all the work that must go into such videos. I look forward to receiving my copies of your book, and seeing you speak in May.
A note from Sheldon
I may have been somewhat misleading in my conversation with Sarah, but/and Ernest Becker and terror management theory do not argue that humans are better than other creatures; rather, the claim is that we are uniquely different in our capacity to transform imagination into reality, and awareness of and apprehension about death in situations where our lives are not threatened.
Different does not mean better, although people often somewhat automatically interpret differences on a hierarchical scale. And I have often argued that human intelligence is vastly overrated unless it is accompanied by a rich assortment of moral sensibilities.
Viewing humans as superior is more a product of the Judeo-Christian worldview -- humans are created in God's image and are given domination of all other forms of life -- than Becker or TMT, which is based on Darwin's contention that all forms of life are functionally equivalent. This is another point that I often make in my presentations of these ideas; specifically, that humans are no more significant or enduring than lizards or potatoes.
Hello Sheldon, and thanks for replying, and for explaining more - very good of you! We could consider the semantics of "exceptional" vs. "unique" (maybe its just a cultural thing - where I come from, we are less inclined to claim a sense of exceptionalism or uniqueness?), but in the end, as you suggest in your last paragraph, we are all just humble lifeforms. Hence why it is good to learn from each other.
Thank you again for the great talk with Sarah - it was really fascinating, and quite inspiring. All the more reason why I wanted to question the one aspect that didn't feel right - the rest was very important! Thanks
I am 12 minutes in and was also thinking about that ‘sense of superiority' also part of our culture, trying to make sense of life. But then Sarah takes the example of a cow, aware of a threat, and my sense of humour kicked in when she said : we, humans, ruminate about death… The irony of it. Sarah you couldn't have chose a better verb to describe it!
Also, I just watched ‘Silent Friend', awesome perspective on life from plants and more precisely from a ginko tree, highly recommend it. Very humbling experience.
Agreed. Thank you for articulating this.
I haven't had a chance to listen yet, but I really look forward to reflecting on things when I can. But right out of the gate, it strikes me that those who aren't afraid of dying also seem to have a deep capacity for love now, and can somehow offer the hospitality of their own personhood to the people around them. They inhabit their own selfhood, have somehow made peace with the loneliness of what it is to exist and be their own consciousness observing themselves, and be anchoring for others. Life goals!
"hospitality of their own personhood" - a cracker line, Madeleine.
I have been told the past few weeks by journalists who've interviewed in the past that I seem different, happier...and I truly think it is because I've gone up close to death so many times the past few years.
Excellent conversation!
Having been in the ecological overshoot/collapse rabbit hole (aka the doomosphere) for 12 years now, I have long since come to the realisation that collapse acceptance relies solely on death acceptance. Then recently Sheldon's work appeared via Nate Hagens and now here, and what he talks about makes so much sense, especially when we tie in the anthropological angle.
Braiding Sweetgrass - 'nuff said!
The philosophers and spiritualists have been saying it for eons...and I have to confess that through the writing of my book , facing the death of the system and possibly a lot more, I really came to understand this truth, at a visceral level. It's changed me profoundly
This was so special - thank you, Sarah and Sheldon. Profound and inspiring
Pleasure!
Sarah, I like your conclusion that we need to normalise the things Sheldon talks about that will save our species from self-annihilation. But I don’t think this will come from leaders. It will be a grassroots movement - and it’s happening already. The more the islands of sanity can be visible, the more influential they will become. At least, that thought provides me with, dare I say, some hope.
Another wonderful interview and had no idea these types of studies existed. From my own perspective I was faced with my own mortality in my late 40s when diagnosed with a degenerative autoimmune disease (no cure). It came with relief and a whole body sigh, knowing the best years were behind me and I had to act accordingly. Death became a topic of discussion in our house and we ‘normalised’ my decline. Then promptly got on with our lives, but this strange parallel happened where we can talk about death in our household but not outside of it… because of everyone else’s negative reaction and knee jerk reassurance- everything is going to be ok… wonderful topic and thanks
This watch bolstered my desire even further to simplify and choose how I want to be in this regardless of whether it means im risking my genetic line.
Death denialism is a symptom of disconnection from nature.
If you're still not conviced after all this evidence – which, if we'd had acknowledged it already at the time of Ernest Becker, would have saved Earth a looot of trouble since decades now... –, read ➡️ "Radical Mindfulness Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital" by James K. Rowe (2024)
https://www.routledge.com/Radical-Mindfulness-Why-Transforming-Fear-of-Death-is-Politically-Vital/Rowe/p/book/9781032523361
@Sarah, "surprisingly" no books regarding TMT (neither Beckers' ones for that matters...) has ever been translated in any other european language. I myself tried and tried to find an editor, but without success. I guess the Denial Machine is deeply grounded in the elite's subconcious (or maybe its cynical conciousness...).
Since you seem to have some sort of influence on your audience, perhaps working towards an acknowledgement of TMT by a large audience would make a great "immortality poject".
A note from Sheldon
Agreed Sébastien – a really important book in my estimation.
P.S.: and no amount of statistical "pickiness" (cf. Chen & al., 2025) will remove the phenomenological fact that death anxiety projection "ping-pong" games is as the core of our miserable state of living from a psychoilogical point of view (vs materialistic pov), leading to increasing suicide rates in "developped" societies.
The other ‘problem’ of course, with not fearing death, is being careless with life and I am very guilty of taking totally uneccesary risks with my life because I place alot of trust in ‘when it’s my time’.
Many of these have been out hiking or on my bike. I’ve had many ‘words of warning’ delivered to me from the powers that be, the guardian angels etc. Brakes have failed, a frog on the road when I was going downhill at crazy speed, my rear end smashed into by a car nearly flinging me into a roundabout of speeding cars… a slip off of a rock and by bag getting caught, cramp on a knife edge that prevented me from attempting a dangerous climb… loads and loads of examples, when I’ve sat and talked these through with a religious friend he was amazed, he was like… you definitely should be dead by now… someone/thing (God he said) really wanted me alive for some purpose. I’ve never really believed that though. I just think they are tests of resilience and survival. Part of reaching limits and learning those boundaries.
Not had a chance to listen to the full episode yet so just some quick thoughts:
I don’t feel like I’ve ever feared dying, leading to some unsavoury events in my teen years. I’ve never understood the fear of dying by others.
But… though I don’t fear it. My fascination with the human power to survive at all costs, the resiliance we have and the systems in place to try so desperately to keep us alive… sort of contradicts the first thing. The philophical mind says… if we have evolved with such powerful systems to try so hard to keep us alive… maybe there is some truth in the idea that we should not die until the body decices this, not our consciousness. Which often overlaps with the spiritual idea around ‘when it’s your time’ etc.
I would add one thing that I dislike about no fear of death… it means I don’t mind when others die, but in society that often results in people thinking I don’t care or that I am cold hearted etc. which isn’t how I feel.