Thanatology - Science topic

Alexander Uspensky worked his way up from a seminarian and a policeman to a deputy commandant of the Moscow Kremlin and a high-ranking NKVD officer. During his career, he managed to work in the Urals, in Siberia, in the Ukrainian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic and received ill fame even in the punitive organs.

In 1938 he received a further promotion - transfer to Moscow. But it is unlikely that Ouspensky was happy about this - such "promotions" almost always meant a quick arrest and execution. So he faked his own suicide by writing a suicide note with the words: "Look for a corpse in the Dnieper." His tunic and cap were found in the river, so at first he was really mistaken for the deceased.

Ouspensky fled to Voronezh, where he lived according to previously prepared forged documents and pretended to be a worker named Ivan Shmashkovsky. But the deception was revealed and the fugitive was detained, after which he was shot.

We are by nature contingent, and merely representative of other parts of our specie, so in order to remain vital as a specie we must die. We have no greater importance than that. The problem lies when we isolate ourselves-mind and body-and thereby insist on preferential treatment demanding heaven, souls, etc, whereby to extend the existence of our egos. If we can again visualise ourselves as tiny genes in a huge pool, contributing slightly if at all, we can free ourselves of hyperbole and expectation.

Marion, I pulled up 5 courses on google wih the terms (in quotation marks) "death, dying, bereavement" and "university, college, course" - give it a try.