R: Death Gives Life Meaning

Death consistently ranks as one our greatest fears and yet, it is hard to find a topic that is more pervasive in our society.  Some may say that this fear and preoccupation with death has encouraged rationalizations of all kinds in order to cope with our fear of the inevitable.  On the other hand, a society with a preoccupation with death can just as easily become focused purely on the present and that which brings pleasure.  Closely related to this question is the idea of afterlife and how we reconcile the opinions of different religious traditions.  Amidst all of these opinions, we come together for this debate to question the significance of death (if it even has one) and how this significance relates to how we view life.