[Human beings in pain : A philosophical approach]

The philosophical discussion of the phenomenon of pain can help to increase the understanding of human beings in pain and to accompany them in such an experience. Pain affects a human being who has a body. The "I" of this human being cannot escape into painlessness. The pain imposes itself upon the human being who will try to withdraw from the pain but to withdraw from pain remains impossible because the human being cannot split himself up and therefore cannot establish a part of himself where his identity is not affected by pain.The pain shows how the experience of being in a body is connected to the experience of having an identity. Pain reduces the ability to act and narrows the possibility to interact with others; it affects the manner how the human is still or no longer able to address himself to others. In the reduction of his existence a human being experiences a basic condition of his existence: He is vulnerable.