Understanding Death: Harm to whom and in what way?

Socrates and Epicurus argued that death is not something to be feared, while other philosophers have disagreed, contending that death constitutes deprivations of different natures, making it unfavorable and even fearsome. This essay critically evaluates two major accounts of deprivation harm: the comparative deprivation view, which holds that death is harmful insofar as it deprives individuals of the potential future goods they would have experienced had they lived longer; and the absolute deprivation view, which maintains that death is intrinsically harmful due to the loss of essential human goods or powers. I argue that while the comparative deprivation view is intuitively appealing, it faces challenges due to its reliance on counterfactual reasoning. In contrast, the absolute deprivation view offers a more compelling account by grounding harm in the loss of intrinsic goods. After defending the later position against key criticisms, I conclude that, regardless of other potential harms death may entail, it is at least intrinsically harmful due to its irreversible deprivation of vital human faculties at the moment of death.