I mean if u don’t die from a heart attack or something. If you die from aging how do you die? Do you just stop breathing?
In: Biology
This comes up a lot, and it’s often very wrong answers that get upvoted, or at least very very incomplete.
The Wikipedia page for [Manner of Death](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manner_of_death) states:
>A death by natural causes results from an illness and its complications or an internal malfunction of the body not directly caused by external forces, other than infectious disease. For example, a person dying from complications from pneumonia, diarrheal disease or HIV/AIDS (infections), cancer, stroke or heart disease (internal body malfunctions), or sudden organ failure would most likely be listed as having died from natural causes. “Death by natural causes” is sometimes used as a euphemism for “dying of old age”, which is considered problematic as a cause of death (as opposed to a specific age-related disease); there are also many non-age-related causes of “natural” death, for legal manner-of-death purposes. (See Cause of death § Aging.)
Some people get confused because there is a medical context, a legal context, and casual speech, ala *euphemism for “dying of old age”*…but even that may be too crude a grouping.
Context is key, even similar context may have different sub-context.
>There is particular ambiguity around the classification of cardiac deaths triggered by a traumatic incident, such as in stress cardiomyopathy. Liability for a death classified as by natural causes may still be found if a proximate cause is established,[2][3] as in the 1969 California case People v. Stamp.[4]
A court may consider “natural” to mean “not homicide or negligence”, or, it may find that “natural causes” is not sufficient enough, maybe they were old but *also* given the wrong medication, so the court would have to determine the exact cause to see if it was negligence or even murder.
A medical determination may mean specifically old age, the pathology being somewhat irrelevant because every organ was about to fail….At the same time, a medical determination may need to know specifically, even in the case of old age, to trace pathology for research purposes.
What if it was cancer from extreme radiation or toxin? That’s not necessarily “natural” in terms of finding liability, and not useful medically either…
Every different discussion containing “natural death” or “natural causes” would have to be taken in it’s own individual context, the nature of the question asked, and the desires of the person giving the answer.
Someone talking about a loved one might say “natural causes” regardless of the cause because they simply don’t want to talk about it. A Dr. or Lawyer, similarly may find the cause of death trivial, or extremely important. Research would probably be the least likely to use “natural causes” specifically because the whole point is to study the miniscule cause/effects.
Other than that, there is no unifying rule that explains all possibilities.
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