The lure of death: suicide and human evolution.

At some point in evolutionary history, human beings came to understand, as no non-human animals do, that death brings to an end a person's bodily and mental presence in the world. A potentially devastating consequence was that individuals, seeking to escape physical or mental pain, might choose to kill themselves.This article is part of the theme issue 'Evolutionary thanatology: impacts of the dead on the living in humans and other animals'.