Considering the magnificence of life, that allotment may seem all too short. Yet, at the same time, nothing is more natural than death. Our need is not to reject nature but to live in harmony with it. This does not mean rejecting our technology, but it does mean controlling our numbers, quieting our egos, and simplifying lifestyles. In the world of nature, death provides a service because it makes room in an ecological niche for a young one.
People are part of nature, too, and when people die, they make room for more people.
In a time of population explosion, it would be useful to be able to die without making too much of a fuss about it. But we humans, particularly in the affluent cultures of the first world, face the final journey of life with a load of weighty baggage. We avoid talk of death, and we dread the realities of the aging process. We as individuals don't necessarily create and lug around this excess baggage on our own. Something pervasive in our society molds our collective choices.