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"Dead", "Died", "Deceased" and "Dying" redirect here. For the Alice in Chains song, see Died (song). For the coloring process, see Dyeing. For other uses, see Dead (disambiguation) and Death (disambiguation).
A human skull, widely used as a symbol of death and decomposition

Death is the termination of all biological functions that sustain a living organism. Phenomena which commonly bring about death include biological aging (senescence), predation, malnutrition, disease, suicide, homicide, starvation, dehydration, and accidents or trauma resulting in terminal injury.[1] Bodies of living organisms begin to decompose shortly after death. Death has commonly been considered as a sad or unpleasant occasion, due to having a bond or affection to the person who has died, or having fear of death, necrophobia, anxiety, sorrow, grief, emotional pain, depression, sympathy, compassion, solitude, or saudade.



The word death comes from Old English deað, which in turn comes from Proto-Germanic *daulaz (reconstructed by etymological analysis).[3] This comes from the Proto-Indo-European stem *dheu- meaning the "Process, act, condition of dying".

Associated terms[edit]



Almost all animals who survive external hazards to their biological functioning eventually die from biological aging, known in life sciences as “senescence”. Some organisms experience negligible senescence, even exhibiting biological immortality. These include the jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii,[4] the hydra, and the planarian. Unnatural causes of death include suicide and homicide. From all causes, roughly 150,000 people die around the world each day.[5] Of these, two thirds die directly or indirectly due to senescence, but in industrialized countries—such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany—the rate approaches 90%, i.e., nearly nine out of ten of all deaths are related to senescence.[5]


Signs of biological death[edit]

A dead rat
A dead rat


  • Cessation of breathing
  • Cardiac arrest (no pulse)


Problems of definition[edit]

A flower, a skull and an hourglass stand for Life, Death and Time in this 17th-century painting by Philippe de Champaigne
French – 16th/17th century ivory pendant, Monk and Death, recalling mortality and the certainty of death (Walters Art Museum)

The concept of death is a key to human understanding of the phenomenon.[8] There are many scientific approaches to the concept. For example, brain death, as practiced in medical science, defines death as a point in time at which brain activity ceases.[8][9][10][11]



Other definitions for death focus on the character of cessation of something.[13][clarification needed] In this context "death" describes merely the state where something has ceased, for example, life. Thus, the definition of "life" simultaneously defines death.







See also: Legal death
Dead soldier from the American Civil War

In the United States, a person is dead by law if a Statement of Death or Death certificate is approved by a licensed medical practitioner. Various legal consequences follow death, including the removal from the person of what in legal terminology is called personhood.

The possession of brain activities, or capability to resume brain activity, is a necessary condition to legal personhood in the United States. "It appears that once brain death has been determined ... no criminal or civil liability will result from disconnecting the life-support devices." (see People v. Mitchell (1982) 132 Cal.App.3d 389 [183 Cal.Rptr. 166]).


There are many anecdotal references to people being declared dead by physicians and then "coming back to life", sometimes days later in their own coffin, or when embalming procedures are about to begin. From the mid-18th century onwards, there was an upsurge in the public's fear of being mistakenly buried alive,[15] and much debate about the uncertainty of the signs of death. Various suggestions were made to test for signs of life before burial, ranging from pouring vinegar and pepper into the corpse's mouth to applying red hot pokers to the feet or into the rectum.[16] Writing in 1895, the physician J.C. Ouseley claimed that as many as 2,700 people were buried prematurely each year in England and Wales, although others estimated the figure to be closer to 800.[17]


As medical technologies advance, ideas about when death occurs may have to be re-evaluated in light of the ability to restore a person to vitality after longer periods of apparent death (as happened when CPR and defibrillation showed that cessation of heartbeat is inadequate as a decisive indicator of death). The lack of electrical brain activity may not be enough to consider someone scientifically dead. Therefore, the concept of information-theoretic death has been suggested as a better means of defining when true death occurs, though the concept has few practical applications outside of the field of cryonics.

There have been some scientific attempts to bring dead organisms back to life, but with limited success.[19] In science fiction scenarios where such technology is readily available, real death is distinguished from reversible death.


The leading cause of death in developing countries is infectious disease. The leading causes of death in developed countries are atherosclerosis (heart disease and stroke), cancer, and other diseases related to obesity and aging. By extremely wide margin, the largest unifying cause of death in the developed world is biological aging,[5] leading to various complications known as aging-associated diseases. These conditions cause loss of homeostasis, leading to cardiac arrest, causing loss of oxygen and nutrient supply, causing irreversible deterioration of the brain and other tissues. Of the roughly 150,000 people who die each day across the globe, about two thirds die of age-related causes.[5] In industrialized nations, the proportion is much higher, approaching 90%.[5] With improved medical capability, dying has become a condition to be managed. Home deaths, once commonplace, are now rare in the developed world.

Pope John Paul II lying in a coffin

In developing nations, inferior sanitary conditions and lack of access to modern medical technology makes death from infectious diseases more common than in developed countries. One such disease is tuberculosis, a bacterial disease which killed 1.7M people in 2004.[20] Malaria causes about 400–900M cases of fever and 1–3M deaths annually.[21] AIDS death toll in Africa may reach 90–100M by 2025.[22][23]

According to Jean Ziegler (United Nations Special Reporter on the Right to Food, 2000—Mar 2008), mortality due to malnutrition accounted for 58% of the total mortality rate in 2006. Ziegler says worldwide approximately 62M people died from all causes and of those deaths more than 36M died of hunger or diseases due to deficiencies in micronutrients.[24]



In 2012, suicide overtook car crashes for leading causes of human injury deaths in America, followed by poisoning, falls and murder.[27] Causes of death are different in different parts of the world. In high-income and middle income countries nearly half up to more than two thirds of all people live beyond the age of 70 and predominantly die of chronic diseases. In low-income countries, where less than one in five of all people reach the age of 70, and more than a third of all deaths are among children under 15, people predominantly die of infectious diseases.[28]



An autopsy is portrayed in The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp, by Rembrandt



Life extension[edit]

Main article: Life extension

Life extension refers to an increase in maximum or average lifespan, especially in humans, by slowing down or reversing the processes of aging. Average lifespan is determined by vulnerability to accidents and age or lifestyle-related afflictions such as cancer, or cardiovascular disease. Extension of average lifespan can be achieved by good diet, exercise and avoidance of hazards such as smoking. Maximum lifespan is also determined by the rate of aging for a species inherent in its genes. Currently, the only widely recognized method of extending maximum lifespan is calorie restriction. Theoretically, extension of maximum lifespan can be achieved by reducing the rate of aging damage, by periodic replacement of damaged tissues, or by molecular repair or rejuvenation of deteriorated cells and tissues.

A United States poll found that religious people and irreligious people, as well as men and women and people of different economic classes have similar rates of support for life extension, while Africans and Hispanics have higher rates of support than white people.[29] 38 percent of the polled said they would desire to have their aging process cured.



Before about 1930, most people in Western countries died in their own homes, surrounded by family, and comforted by clergy, neighbors, and doctors making house calls.[30] By the mid-20th century, half of all Americans died in a hospital.[31] By the start of the 21st century, only about 20 to 25% of people in developed countries died outside of a medical institution.[31][32][33] The shift away from dying at home, towards dying in a professionalized medical environment, has been termed the "Invisible Death".[31]

Society and culture[edit]

A duke insulting the corpse of Klaus Fleming
The regent duke Charles (later king Charles IX of Sweden) insulting the corpse of Klaus Fleming. Albert Edelfelt, 1878.
Dead bodies can be mummified either naturally, as this one from Guanajuato, or by intention, as those in ancient Egypt.


Commemoration ceremonies after death may include various mourning, funeral practices and ceremonies of honouring the deceased. The physical remains of a person, commonly known as a corpse or body, are usually interred whole or cremated, though among the world's cultures there are a variety of other methods of mortuary disposal. In the English language, blessings directed towards a dead person include rest in peace, or its initialism RIP.

Death is the center of many traditions and organizations; customs relating to death are a feature of every culture around the world. Much of this revolves around the care of the dead, as well as the afterlife and the disposal of bodies upon the onset of death. The disposal of human corpses does, in general, begin with the last offices before significant time has passed, and ritualistic ceremonies often occur, most commonly interment or cremation. This is not a unified practice; in Tibet, for instance, the body is given a sky burial and left on a mountain top. Proper preparation for death and techniques and ceremonies for producing the ability to transfer one's spiritual attainments into another body (reincarnation) are subjects of detailed study in Tibet.[35] Mummification or embalming is also prevalent in some cultures, to retard the rate of decay.


Gravestones in Japan
Gravestones in Kyoto, Japan

Capital punishment is also a culturally divisive aspect of death. In most jurisdictions where capital punishment is carried out today, the death penalty is reserved for premeditated murder, espionage, treason, or as part of military justice. In some countries, sexual crimes, such as adultery and sodomy, carry the death penalty, as do religious crimes such as apostasy, the formal renunciation of one's religion. In many retentionist countries, drug trafficking is also a capital offense. In China, human trafficking and serious cases of corruption are also punished by the death penalty. In militaries around the world courts-martial have imposed death sentences for offenses such as cowardice, desertion, insubordination, and mutiny.[36]

Death in warfare and in suicide attack also have cultural links, and the ideas of dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, mutiny punishable by death, grieving relatives of dead soldiers and death notification are embedded in many cultures. Recently in the western world, with the increase in terrorism following the September 11 attacks, but also further back in time with suicide bombings, kamikaze missions in World War II and suicide missions in a host of other conflicts in history, death for a cause by way of suicide attack, and martyrdom have had significant cultural impacts.

Suicide in general, and particularly euthanasia, are also points of cultural debate. Both acts are understood very differently in different cultures. In Japan, for example, ending a life with honor by seppuku was considered a desirable death, whereas according to traditional Christian and Islamic cultures, suicide is viewed as a sin. Death is personified in many cultures, with such symbolic representations as the Grim Reaper, Azrael, the Hindu God Yama and Father Time.

In Brazil, a human death is counted officially when it is registered by existing family members at a cartório, a government-authorized registry. Before being able to file for an official death, the deceased must have been registered for an official birth at the cartório. Though a Public Registry Law guarantees all Brazilian citizens the right to register deaths, regardless of their financial means, of their family members (often children), the Brazilian government has not taken away the burden, the hidden costs and fees, of filing for a death. For many impoverished families, the indirect costs and burden of filing for a death lead to a more appealing, unofficial, local, cultural burial, which in turn raises the debate about inaccurate mortality rates.[37]

Talking about death and witnessing it is a difficult issue with most cultures. Western societies may like to treat the dead with the utmost material respect, with an official embalmer and associated rites. Eastern societies (like India) may be more open to accepting it as a fait accompli, with a funeral procession of the dead body ending in an open air burning-to-ashes of the same.

Death and consciousness[edit]

Much interest and debate surround the question of what happens to one's consciousness as one's body dies. The belief in the permanent loss of consciousness after death is often called eternal oblivion. Belief that consciousness is preserved after physical death is described by the term afterlife.

In biology[edit]


Microorganisms also play a vital role, raising the temperature of the decomposing matter as they break it down into yet simpler molecules. Not all materials need to be decomposed fully, however. Coal, a fossil fuel formed over vast tracts of time in swamp ecosystems, is one example.

Natural selection[edit]



Main article: Extinction
Painting of a dodo
A dodo, the bird that became a byword in the English language for the extinction of a species[38]

Extinction is the cessation of existence of a species or group of taxa, reducing biodiversity. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of that species (although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point). Because a species' potential range may be very large, determining this moment is difficult, and is usually done retrospectively. This difficulty leads to phenomena such as Lazarus taxa, where species presumed extinct abruptly "reappear" (typically in the fossil record) after a period of apparent absence. New species arise through the process of speciation, an aspect of evolution. New varieties of organisms arise and thrive when they are able to find and exploit an ecological niche – and species become extinct when they are no longer able to survive in changing conditions or against superior competition.

Evolution of aging and mortality[edit]

Main article: Evolution of aging

Inquiry into the evolution of aging aims to explain why so many living things and the vast majority of animals weaken and die with age (notable exceptions being Hydra and the already cited jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii, which research shows to be biologically immortal). The evolutionary origin of senescence remains one of the fundamental puzzles of biology. Gerontology specializes in the science of human aging processes.

Organisms showing only asexual reproduction (e.g. bacteria, some protists, like the euglenoids and many amoebozoans) and unicellular organisms with sexual reproduction (colonial or not, like the volvocine algae Pandorina and Chlamydomonas) are "immortal" at some extent, dying only due to external hazards, like being eaten or meeting with a fatal accident. However, in multicellular organisms (and also in multinucleate ciliates),[39] with a Weismannist development, that is, with a division of labor between mortal somatic (body) cells and "immortal" germ (reproductive) cells, death becomes an essential part of life, at least for the somatic line.[40]

The Volvox algae are among the simplest organisms to exhibit that division of labor between two completely different cell types, and as a consequence include death of somatic line as a regular, genetically regulated part of its life history.[40][41]

See also[edit]


  1. ^ Zimmerman, Leda (19 October 2010). "Must all organisms age and die?". Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Engineering. Archived from the original on 1 November 2010. Retrieved 5 February 2012. 
  2. ^ "The top 10 causes of death". WHO. June 2011. Retrieved 16 October 2012. 
  3. ^ "Online Etymology Dictionary". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved 5 November 2013. 
  4. ^ "Turritopsis nutricula (Immortal jellyfish)". Retrieved 2014-01-18. 
  6. ^ Crippen, David. "Brain Failure and Brain Death". Scientific American Surgery, Critical Care, April 2005. Archived from the original on 24 June 2006. Retrieved 2007-01-09. 
  7. ^ Artishevsky, Alexander (2010). Life Death Whatever. Createspace. ISBN 978-1-4495-9420-6. [page needed]
  9. ^ "Additional Lifespan Development Topics". McGraw-Hill Companies. Retrieved 2014-01-18. 
  10. ^ Human Immortality; Death and Adjustment Hypotheses Elaborated. Book Review by Dr. Peter Fenwick
  11. ^ Facing the finality – Death and Adjustment Hypotheses Dr. Mohammad Samir Hossain, 2009
  12. ^ Metcalf, Peter; Huntington, Richard (1991). Celebrations of Death: The Anthropology of Mortuary Ritual. New York: Cambridge Press. [page needed]
  13. ^ Oxford English Dictionary[clarification needed]
  14. ^ Miller, F.G. (October 2009). "Death and organ donation: back to the future". Journal of Medical Ethics 35 (10): 616–620. doi:10.1136/jme.2009.030627. PMID 19793942. 
  15. ^ Bondeson 2001, p. 77
  16. ^ Bondeson 2001, pp. 56, 71.
  17. ^ Bondeson 2001, p. 239
  18. ^ a b Limmer, Dan; O'Keefe, Michael F.; Bergeron, J. David; Grant, Harvey; Murray, Bob; Dickinson, Ed (December 21, 2006). Brady Emergency Care AHA (10th Updated ed.). Prentice Hall. ISBN 978-0-13-159390-9. 
  19. ^ "Blood Swapping Reanimates Dead Dogs". Fox News. 2005-06-28. Retrieved 2014-01-18. 
  20. ^ "Tuberculosis Fact sheet N°104 – Global and regional incidence". WHO. March 2006. Retrieved 2006-10-06. 
  21. ^ Chris Thomas, Global Health/Health Infectious Diseases and Nutrition (2009-06-02). "USAID's Malaria Programs". Archived from the original on 2009-07-01. Retrieved 2010-05-23. 
  22. ^ "Aids could kill 90 million Africans, says UN". The Guardian (London). 2005-03-04. Retrieved 2010-05-23. 
  23. ^ Terry Leonard (June 4, 2006). "AIDS Toll May Reach 100 Million in Africa". Washington Post. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  24. ^ Jean Ziegler, L'Empire de la honte, Fayard, 2007 ISBN 978-2-253-12115-2 p.130.[clarification needed]
  25. ^ "WHO Report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic, 2008" (PDF). WHO. 2008. Retrieved 2013-12-26. Lay summary (2008-02-08). 
  26. ^ Olshansky, S. Jay; Perry, Daniel; Miller, Richard A.; Butler, Robert N. (2006). "Longevity dividend: What should we be doing to prepare for the unprecedented aging of humanity?". The Scientist 20: 28–36. Retrieved 2007-03-31. 
  27. ^ Steven Reinberg (September 20, 2012). "Suicide now kills more Americans than car crashes: study". Medical Express. Retrieved 2012-10-15. 
  28. ^ "The top 10 causes of death". WHO. 2012. Retrieved 2012-12-12. 
  29. ^ "Living to 120 and Beyond: Americans' Views on Aging, Medical Advances and Radical Life Extension". Pew Research Center. Pew Research Center's Religion & Public Life Project. August 6, 2013. 
  30. ^ Ariès, Philippe (1974). Western attitudes toward death: from the Middle Ages to the present. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 87–89. ISBN 0-8018-1762-5. 
  31. ^ a b c Nuland, Sherwin B. (1994). How we die: Reflections on life's final chapter. New York: A.A. Knopf. pp. 254–255. ISBN 0-679-41461-4. 
  32. ^ Ahmad, S.; O'Mahony, M.S. (December 2005). "Where older people die: a retrospective population-based study". QJM 98 (12): 865–70. doi:10.1093/qjmed/hci138. PMID 16299059. 
  33. ^ Cassel CK, Demel B (September 2001). "Remembering death: public policy in the USA". J R Soc Med 94 (9): 433–6. PMC 1282180. PMID 11535743. 
  34. ^ Heath, Pamela Rae; Klimo, Jon (2010). Handbook to the Afterlife. North Atlantic Books. p. 18. ISBN 978-1-55643-869-1. Retrieved 12 April 2012. 
  35. ^ Mullin 1999[page needed]
  36. ^ "Shot at Dawn, campaign for pardons for British and Commonwealth soldiers executed in World War I". Shot at Dawn Pardons Campaign. Archived from the original on 2006-10-04. Retrieved 2006-07-20. 
  37. ^ Nations, Marilyn K.; Amaral, Mara Lucia (September 1999). "Flesh, Blood, Souls, and Households: Cultural Validity in Mortality Inquiry". Medical Anthropology Quarterly 5 (3): 204–220. doi:10.1525/maq.1991.5.3.02a00020. 
  38. ^ Diamond, Jared M. (1999). "Up to the Starting Line". Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies (illustrated, reprint ed.). W. W. Norton. pp. 43–44. ISBN 0-393-31755-2. 
  39. ^ Beukeboom, L. & Perrin, N. (2014). The Evolution of Sex Determination. Online Chapter 2: The diversity of sexual cycles, p. 12. Oxford University Press.
  40. ^ a b Gilbert, S.F. (2003). Developmental biology (7th ed.). Sunderland, Mass: Sinauer Associates. pp. 34–35. ISBN 0-87893-258-5. 
  41. ^ Hallmann, A. (June 2011). "Evolution of reproductive development in the volvocine algae". Sexual Plant Reproduction 24 (2): 97–112. doi:10.1007/s00497-010-0158-4. PMC 3098969. PMID 21174128. 

Further reading[edit]

  • Sachs, Jessica Snyder (2001). Corpse: Nature, Forensics, and the Struggle to Pinpoint Time of Death (270 pages). Perseus Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7382-0336-2. 

External links[edit]

Preceded by
Old age
Stages of human development
Succeeded by