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If there is really any goal that has stretched throughout history, it is the idea of living forever. From the immortality of Jesus Christ to Chinese alchemists drinking mercury in the hopes of becoming immortal, from Ponce De Leon's Fountain of Youth to Buddhist reincarnation cycles, almost universally throughout humankind have humans sought after eternal life and youth.
These days, though, immortality is seen by many as a thing for lesser, ignorant, peoples.
Some scientists claim that immortality is a pipe dream, and that we can only live slightly longer beyond "our" lifespan of 150 years or so. They thus prefer to do research on other things, like the molecular makeup of C. elegans or a myriad of other projects that although may be fascinating and of use for "future research," isn't future research. One need only look at a whole flurry of research papers: "This has applications in blahblahblah and blahblahblah and can be used for future research in so-and-so." Well, where is this future research?
Then we have the moralists, those who claim that we were never meant to live long, that living long is immortal and that we should be happy with the fact that we can live as long as we can. If we had listened to the moralists 500 years ago, when the average lifespan was 40, we surely wouldn't be where we are today. So why suddenly are we preoccupied with this trend of abandoning this research in favor of helping those slightly disadvantaged to others, because they "are less fortunate?" If we had done that during the Middle Ages, we wouldn't be here either, we'd be in a cycle of mediocrity.
We then have the anti-humanists. Humans are destructive, slaughter numerous living creatures, and seek to be everything, they say. That may be true, and detrimental to the planet's health. However, why should we abandon future pursuits that may let us fix these problems, instead constraining everybody to a sphere of "public responsibility" and "the moral high ground?"
And last but not least, we have the compromisists. They say, we already have a long life, and we can live slightly longer by eating less, or eating healthy, or exercising often, or so-and-so. They also say how we can live on through our kin, and their kin, and so on, and how we never really die as long as our memories live on. Well, speaking as a person who's still alive, that's ridiculous. What if all your kin die? That's the end of whatever "immortality" you had. And besides, no matter how many kids you have and how many history textbooks you're in, you're still dead. You can't do anything new.
This thought process is similar to that involving Faster than Light research. Sure, it may be "impossible" or "unethical" or "destructive to the environment" but why do we not try? Why will nobody seek to end "inevitable cycles?" Nothing is impossible, as humankind has done many times. It just requires finding the right loopholes around "natural law."
(this rant sponsored by the damn fly on my desk association)
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Lol, I think about this stuff too. The only difference is I'm Christian so I believe I live on eternally in heaven.
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On July 19 2008 14:06 freedom yay wrote:
Lol, I think about this stuff too. The only difference is I'm Christian so I believe I live on eternally in heaven.
but wouldn't it be nice to live eternally both irl and in heaven? i mean i don't think there's BW in heaven  probably other things to do there though. Like WoW.
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According to Wiggs Dannyboy, it's all about your state of mind.
If you're interested in immortality. Read Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins.
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If people lived forever.. (or even if the average age jumped to 120 in 50 years.) There would be big problems. Resources are already stretching thin among the current humans (although mostly due to allocation problems and America being wasteful and having a huge biological footprint.)
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On July 19 2008 14:17 Jonoman92 wrote:
If people lived forever.. (or even if the average age jumped to 120 in 50 years.) There would be big problems. Resources are already stretching thin among the current humans (although mostly due to allocation problems and America being wasteful and having a huge biological footprint.)
not quite as bad as you think
if people live longer, they'll be less inclined to have as many kids, so the population growth will slow
in 3rd world countries, immortality will be likely unaffordable for a while, so with or without immortality the situation there will be the same. However, people will have more "time" to help the situation down there, by serving in the peace corps, etc. instead of having to worry about having kids, going to college, getting a job, this and that, etc. and have to "rush" in fear of their time being up.
Besides, longer lives = more time available for experienced researchers to find new ways to develop this-and-that.
And resources aren't being stretched as bad as you think. Most of it has to do with misdevelopment and "environmental" solutions. Like biofuels. Perfect way to shrink food and water supplies while trying to solve a problem by being inefficent and taking tax money and forgetting what the problem is.
edit: also arco what are you doing go back to smi
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On July 19 2008 14:11 Caller wrote:Show nested quote +On July 19 2008 14:06 freedom yay wrote:
Lol, I think about this stuff too. The only difference is I'm Christian so I believe I live on eternally in heaven. but wouldn't it be nice to live eternally both irl and in heaven? i mean i don't think there's BW in heaven probably other things to do there though. Like WoW.
Lol no bw but theres wow? Yeah, im also christian btw, if jesus came down and we were immortal, that would be a strange sight. and we would look nasty, our skins all loose
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if people live longer, they'll be less inclined to have as many kids, so the population growth will slow
This reminds me of how elves are described in fantasy games; they dont have as many children and so the population grows really slowly.
One of the downsides to long life would definitely be that because people live for so long, it would take a long time to change orthodoxy as generations would last for so much longer. Imagine if something that granted long life was discovered in the middle ages, things like slavery and extreme gender inequality that existed back then would probably still exist today. Our leaders good or bad would stay in power longer and so the same ideas would be around for a much longer period of time. Change would be slow.
But while I don't think highly of immortality I do support the pursuit of immortality though. The quest for immortality has, after all yielded so many amazing results through the various failures throughout the ages. Where do you think modern chemistry originated from? Think of all of the kinds of discoveries the human race could make in further research.
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I'd rather die young then live forever
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no.... people living forever would cause a huge strain on resources and there would have to be strict population control.
even in another 50 years we will start to see the effects of over population.
"pro life" will probably be a laughable position 50-100 years from now;o
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As a guy who has some knowledge in biology and physiology all I can say is that think immortality is unachievable.
That is the nature of the living things. They just wear out, their metabolism is going slower and slower, there are more mistakes in the organism, immunity (and I mean all kinds of defense of the plants and animals, not just the human immune system) is lowering.
All of this leads to death.
Sure, this can be slowed down. By a lot. So that people can live like 120 years or a bit more.
And some trees for thousands of years.
But it can't be stopped. The way I see it, to stop aging would be like stopping the Earth from spinning around.
Those are all physical laws. Every living system's goal is to have equal temperature with the environment. This means death.
We prevent it by supplying energy to the body so it doesn't reach the environmental temperature but we can't do it forever cause the systems wear out. That's all there is. IMO.
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yeah i remember hearing even if people were immortal their bodies would still get old and some people think more people in the world = more people that can work and study research etc but the worlds economy would fail before anything achievable would happen. you just hafta realize you are going to die sooner or later, and believing in heaven after death or not is something you should start considering before immortality imo.
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Immortality is for if you don't know what to do with your live. And you need more than one lifetime to figure it out. And then you become bored for eternity.
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On July 19 2008 14:17 Jonoman92 wrote:
if people live longer, they'll be less inclined to have as many kids, so the population growth will slow
Having kids is mostly in the western countries a matter of having nothing better to do. Couples are afraid they will get into a grind if nothing changes so they will have kids to keep things interesting.
In the most cultures children are needed to run their farms and businesses and provide for the parents when they are to old to work. And having many children is part of tradition and social prestige.
I think children as replacements for yourself is the least prominent reason.
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On July 19 2008 16:21 hymn wrote:
As a guy who has some knowledge in biology and physiology all I can say is that think immortality is unachievable.
That is the nature of the living things. They just wear out, their metabolism is going slower and slower, there are more mistakes in the organism, immunity (and I mean all kinds of defense of the plants and animals, not just the human immune system) is lowering.
All of this leads to death.
Sure, this can be slowed down. By a lot. So that people can live like 120 years or a bit more.
And some trees for thousands of years.
But it can't be stopped. The way I see it, to stop aging would be like stopping the Earth from spinning around.
Those are all physical laws. Every living system's goal is to have equal temperature with the environment. This means death.
We prevent it by supplying energy to the body so it doesn't reach the environmental temperature but we can't do it forever cause the systems wear out. That's all there is. IMO.
are you familiar with cancer cells? When cancer cells are created they can keep multiplying indefinitely. If supplied with proper nutrients, they can live forever, and yet they were derived from human cells. Suppose we could isolate what makes these cells immortals and ours mortal (telomerase, Hayflick limit). Sure, we probably will die eventually according to the laws of entropy. But we also shouldn’t resign ourselves to a 70 or 80 year lifespan.
see HeLa cells: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helacyton_gartleri#Telomerase
And as for the concerns that our society “can’t” keep up: like I said, an awful lot of our screw-ups come about because of false initiatives that we seek to “help” people but in reality just make things worse. Biofuels, for instance, led to depletion of food supplies and water. We can choose to develop the technology to increase area for food growth (floating horticulture facilities, tower farms, etc.) and not to mention population growth in 1st World countries is basically zero (where this immortalization therapy would likely take place as it is almost certainly going to be expensive) so it wouldn’t significantly affect population either way.
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even if u can fix the physiological issues u cant fix the neurological ones the way our brains work. the older people get the less flexible the brain gets. imagine how stupid a person with a 500year imprint must be...the "neural network" or whatever would be solid as rock...(like a roboter whose programming you cant change)
not even speaking of the psychological aspect.. why get anything done if you got all eternity.
To your suggestion that people dont try to research stuff like that or faster than light travel: first of all i find the comparison terrible, physicists are mathematicly exploring every possibiltiy they can find which is allowed by the current laws. the reproach that they are not openminded is laughable. the laws we have are deducted form observation and experiment and the often recited claim that old laws become outdated and are replaced by new ones so our current laws could also be wrong is plain bs. laws dont get outdated they get extented or explained as a special case of a more genereal law.forged by experiment they still stay true in their domain. the better the experiments get the more refined the theories get and new facettes are reavealed. like when quantummechanics were revealed. it doesnt contradict the classic view, how could it. if i throw an apple if flies as it does. it just explains how things work on a scale which could not be observed before and the laws of the old realm is neatly deductable.
Speculations based on the current laws can be wrong of course, the farther they get away from its foundation in experiment. But things that are forbidden in accessable realms stay forbidden no matter, how refined the theories get.
perhabs there could be some loopholes nobody tried to think of, there could also be a way to make horses with a fingersnap but they are just not accessable and to say people dont try to think of them is a very naive statement and a insult to every physicist.
to immortality research. you can imagine the fame and the money it would get you and im sure EVERY scientist in a related field does think about it if he happens to come across an approach and even if he just does so in his bed every evening or so.
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Witty reference to Fight Club: "On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero."
Response to your OP: You generalize every viewpoint and seem to have very little understanding of their reasoning.
Consider this: Are there not many people you'd rather not have live forever? If one person discovers the secret to immortality, do you think they'd share? Or would they be greedy?
The only way you're going to live forever is if the brain can be magically maintained indefinitely, and every other part of our body is either mechanical or replaceable from harvested organs (both of which are technologies well researched and implemented/will inevitably be implemented in real life). You can't replace a brain though, and as far as I know brains degrade over time no matter what you do.
Also, you'd have to be somehow self-sufficient, and have no requirement for resources, except if your resources are infinitely renewable.
All in all, you might as well believe in vampires. Immortality is unrealistic in the world we live in, even if it is possible, and is really the last thing anyone needs to be researching. If I were a self-sufficient immortal, I'd probably just sleep 90% of the time, while chatting and playing games the rest of the time, without any motivation to actually do anything productive (as in a life where time is meaningless, except perhaps in the sense that living things you're friends with that aren't immortal, there's really no need to get around to doing anything ever; you're basically a Greek god).
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@aqui:
"the older people get the less flexible the brain gets."
imo, neurologically speaking, that's not so much true, older people don't get so much less flexible becouse of the old age, but more becouse our society and involvement guides us so, most of the old people don't have any mental challenges, so they don't train or keep their brain at the same level.
anyway, maybe true immortallity isn't achievable, but a higher life expectancy is.
though, if there was a sudden increas of life expectancy (some new tech), there would be a new demographic transition, a population boom. we'd get a lot of newborn children, while the old people woulndn't die yet. after a while, the new people would start dieing and the mortality and birth rate would "even" out (well, they would be close to the normal). so we'd end with a somewhat larger population.
imo, our best chance at immortality atm is nanobots (nanites) + genetics and similar. they'd just rebuild and regenerate your body plus cure any illness you might have or get. but it's hard to make such technology and such precision and wide range of so delicate processes.
the funny part is that our body is actually built somewhat as a machine with "nanobots". xD
the other thing that I've been thinking about (it's connected a bit to the topic) is that the trees aren't actually living longer. they have a lot more slower reaction times than we do, indicating a slower internal clock than we do, so they precieve proportionally less than we do. imo if you'd match the speed of our and their internal clocks, it would kinda even out. (it's a kinda silly theory, but somewhat true)
@PsycHOTemplar:
the world won't be ready for immortality anytime soon, the question is, will it ever be?
if I found out the secret to immortality, I probably wouldn't share it with anyone (well maybe with some people very close to me). the reason is, the world would be in chaos + my life would be pretty much over then. would you guys share it?
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On July 20 2008 09:01 PsycHOTemplar wrote:
Witty reference to Fight Club: "On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero."
Response to your OP: You generalize every viewpoint and seem to have very little understanding of their reasoning.
Consider this: Are there not many people you'd rather not have live forever? If one person discovers the secret to immortality, do you think they'd share? Or would they be greedy?
The only way you're going to live forever is if the brain can be magically maintained indefinitely, and every other part of our body is either mechanical or replaceable from harvested organs (both of which are technologies well researched and implemented/will inevitably be implemented in real life). You can't replace a brain though, and as far as I know brains degrade over time no matter what you do.
Also, you'd have to be somehow self-sufficient, and have no requirement for resources, except if your resources are infinitely renewable.
All in all, you might as well believe in vampires. Immortality is unrealistic in the world we live in, even if it is possible, and is really the last thing anyone needs to be researching. If I were a self-sufficient immortal, I'd probably just sleep 90% of the time, while chatting and playing games the rest of the time, without any motivation to actually do anything productive (as in a life where time is meaningless, except perhaps in the sense that living things you're friends with that aren't immortal, there's really no need to get around to doing anything ever; you're basically a Greek god).
Brain neurons can be regenerated over time, as studies for certain medical conditions like early Alzhemier's have noted that if you take certain "outer" brain cells and transplant them into the devastated regions, they will actually regrow neurons and regenerate them: unfortunately the mechanism at this time is rather unknown, but one thought process is that they have to be stem cells (adult or embryonic) and so if we could say turn every cell into a stem cell by duplicating the infinite replication mechanism the brain wouldn't really ever die. That's not to say we're immortal, really, though. We can still die in wars, or traffic accidents, or any number of things.
But look at the hydra. If a hydra lives in an environment where it continually will have resources, it can technically live for a far longer time than animals roughly its size(daphnia have a lifespan of about 3 weeks, hydra have lived for 5 years + and still aren't dead yet) because the cells are essentially all hydra stem cells, in that they can replicate and split off and duplicate and reform, etc. etc. etc.
You're right though, immortality is that sort of thing that may turn some people off from doing things. But don't people often complain about "not having enough time to do so and so" and how we have mid-life crisises, we have a large population upset with how their lives ended up but they have to maintain their disliked jobs due to health care/salary. If everybody lived, say, 1000 years, wouldn't that be better for them? Imagine if Einstein was still alive and able to continue his studies on relativity for the past 40 years. Who knows where we could be now?
And to address your point about people that I wouldn't want to be immortal: I don't have the right to tell people they should live forever or not. If people want to do it, they should have the right to. Likewise, people can choose not to, or they can kill themselves if they did become "immortal," or any number of things. If everybody wants to become immortal, go ahead. But there won't be a huge population "boom" b/c of your argument that we will be too lazy. People won't have the urge to have kids before their time runs out if they have a longer fertility time, or more time to explore their dreams, etc.
And another true fact: in 1960 or so, computers were thought to be some silly dream and science fiction story, and its the 'last thing we need to worry about." Same with flight, and space travel, and many, many, other things. Yet why do we have them now?
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On July 20 2008 08:24 aqui wrote:
even if u can fix the physiological issues u cant fix the neurological ones the way our brains work. the older people get the less flexible the brain gets. imagine how stupid a person with a 500year imprint must be...the "neural network" or whatever would be solid as rock...(like a roboter whose programming you cant change)
not even speaking of the psychological aspect.. why get anything done if you got all eternity.
to make a name for yourself, instead of being anonymous. Hell, I can say that I have 80 years, I have time to get an education and I can relax and play SC and watch tv all day. People can still drop dead even with "immortality." All the genetic tweaking won't help you if you get hit by a car.
To your suggestion that people dont try to research stuff like that or faster than light travel: first of all i find the comparison terrible, physicists are mathematicly exploring every possibiltiy they can find which is allowed by the current laws. the reproach that they are not openminded is laughable. the laws we have are deducted form observation and experiment and the often recited claim that old laws become outdated and are replaced by new ones so our current laws could also be wrong is plain bs. laws dont get outdated they get extented or explained as a special case of a more genereal law.forged by experiment they still stay true in their domain. the better the experiments get the more refined the theories get and new facettes are reavealed. like when quantummechanics were revealed. it doesnt contradict the classic view, how could it. if i throw an apple if flies as it does. it just explains how things work on a scale which could not be observed before and the laws of the old realm is neatly deductable.
String theory? The very concept of a theory itself?
Speculations based on the current laws can be wrong of course, the farther they get away from its foundation in experiment. But things that are forbidden in accessable realms stay forbidden no matter, how refined the theories get.
perhabs there could be some loopholes nobody tried to think of, there could also be a way to make horses with a fingersnap but they are just not accessable and to say people dont try to think of them is a very naive statement and a insult to every physicist.
to immortality research. you can imagine the fame and the money it would get you and im sure EVERY scientist in a related field does think about it if he happens to come across an approach and even if he just does so in his bed every evening or so.
I never said people don't think about them, I said that people tend to dismiss things too easily as pipe dreams. Ask most physicists if you can travel faster than light. Most of them will say no. Now lets say there is a way to travel faster than light. Is this dismissive mindset conducive?
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EPT
