death instinct

noun

1. suicidal tendency or inclination; predisposition to self-destruction.

2. Psychoanalysis.,  an impulse to withdraw or destroy, working in opposition to forces urging survival and creation life instinct.

Word History and Origins

Origin of death instinct¹

First recorded in 1915–20

Example Sentences

Again, Trump is dominated by the death instinct which includes pleasure in being destructive.

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The Greeks, like Sigmund Freud, grasped that war is the purist expression of the death instinct, the desire to exterminate all systems of life, including, ultimately, our own.

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Nations in terminal decline embrace, as Sigmund Freud understood, the death instinct.

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When I was younger, I was really into Freud, and the entry point for me was an interest in what he calls “the death instinct.”

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A cult is really about the death instinct.

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