Immortality

I am having this discussion with a lot of people lately, and it is a very intriguing thing. Deep down everyone of us craves to be immortal. But if you think about it for a minute... is it really that awesome?

Imagine this: By some mysterious cause X you gain immortality. Time passes by and you have done all sorts of things on Earth, tried everything - maybe even managed to bed every girl you dreamt of. By this time, humanity probably will have developed proper interstellar propulsion systems and hence you venture out into the unknowing darkness. As millions and millions of years pass by you get to see all the wonders of the universe, you visit the Horsehead nebula, drink Johnny Walker with aliens from Betelgeuse, Jump through a wormhole butt-naked...

And now it's 5 trillions years later. You did everything there is to do, you went everywhere you can go. Met every celebrity there is and celebrities that were thanks to a timemachine/holodeck.

Now what?

Maybe you really have lived a full life, seen and done everything. But when there is nothing else to do, what is the point?

I'll put it in a (modified) quote from exitmundi:



What's your take?

i don't get why people are craving for immortality either. i might sound a little bit old-fashioned, but seeing every friend you have, had and will have die isn't my idea of awesome.

i dont really want to live for ever.But if i got the chance to do everything there is to do ever i would go out with a big bang like taking a whole galaxy with me with a redstar nova nuke or something.

basicly i would commit the most memorable suicide in the history of existance

I dont think immortality should mean never ever dying, it probably should be just your ageing would stop, but you are able to be killed by voilence, others as normal.
Now that wold be a little better, when you've had/seen enough, just jump off a cliffm or something like that.

To me the most interesting part of that is that the severity of murder would increase, I believe. It is a terrible thing to take away someone's life. It can't be undone. But surely it's terrible on a whole new level if that person didn't ever have to die anyway?

Jibb

I did not particularly mean murder, just that if immortality was just based on stopping one's cellular ageing, one could live really long but still had to be as carefull as before.
I think the other way, people would do some strange things (yes you are right, including murdering others) just for the sake of it, because they know they could not die.

Once youve reached the point of having done everything its easy.

GET YOUR MIND WIPED!

By surgery or hypnosis, whatever.

Erase all memories from say 20 years old onwards.

Then you can start all over again and not even know it...

what's the point of erasing your memories? it's the same as dying.

Not all of them...
Leave the first 20 - 50 years or so to keep your personality intact.

Just remove the "interesting" stuff so you can do it all again.

it's still the same as dying. your personality also consists of your memories. the person you were will be gone.

what's the point? it's as pointless as reincarnation if you don't remember your previous life.

immortality is a waste of time....

lol

Exactly, A person is the sum of his memories, when you erase 5-trillion years of memories, there isn't much left of the original person.

And as ventilator said... what would be the point?

After the first 10,000 years or so one would probably go crazy anyway, if not sooner.

if you lived sat a trillion years the restof the human race would be extinct, and so there would be nothing to live with. and another thing: when you are 80 you are very frail and weak. imagine how week you would be if you were a trillion years old. there would be nothing left of you. and as pararealist said above, after a while you would loose it anyway, so there would be no point. and if you are immortal can you commit suicide?

I guess with immortality would logically come the conclusion that you would not age. So being frail and weak wont be a problem. And anyway there are plenty people who are old as dirt and still are fit as a fiddle.



Well, that is subjective too. Depends on the person, but yes, after some time one would go crazy too.

I think a good lifespan where you would have time to do really everything you "wanted" to do (not "can" do) would be something around 1000 years.

but surely you would get annoyed by it.if not in 10000 years then maybe 20000 years?

Definition of immortal human is blurry. Is that also include that you cannot suicide? So, even if you do not age you are actually trapped in time and space.

What would happen if i try yo vertically tear myself while i am immortal?

Respawning sounds more interesting rahter than being immortal. They store your memories in some way(like some implant on your body sends everything you live,see,hear,feel back to a server) and when your body dies, they create you a new body(clone) that looks exactly like your previous body and load your memories to that body? Would this person still be you? This is more like immortality with possibility to die.

Lol, this reminds me in Neon Genesis Evangelion's Rei Ayanami

Rei Ayanami is a clone made of Shinjis Mother and Shinji. She doesn't get older, so if her father wants her older, he must kill her and create a new one.
He never must kill her, once she got killed by a woman, once suicide and killed by angles.
Every new Rei looks exactly the same, but can't really remind on her old knowledge. But she knows that she is a clone. Very interesting story - watch the new movies!

Uh oh... It's "Battlestar Galactica" all over again!

You may be immortal but still bound to the laws of the universe. In the scope of the multiverse theory, if our universe collapses (either with another universe or with a big shrink) your existence will end. Does it now get meaning to become immortal? For else you could just as well question life in general. Life seems to be pointless regardless of immortality.

Alternatively you could freeze yourself in when you're done. If you wont wake up anymore after billions of years, problem solved. If you do, you have something new to explore.

I am going to become immortal when I go to heaven. Everyone who goes to heaven is immortal. And it will never become boring. Time will not exist in heaven. And no discussions about "No religion in game design" because I won't hear it.

youre so gonna bite your ass when you realize there is no heaven...

immortality sucks. living longer, now thats something id like to have, but being immortal sucks. is impossible anyway, when all your molecules are destroyed youre dead. if you have no brain, you are dead. that simple. thus, immortal always means not aging or dying of natural causes. getting sucked into a black hole created by chuck norris even kills chuck norris, but only because he wants to prove the point that a black hole created by chuck norris even kills chuck norris.

I feel sorry for you. What a blatant disregard for truth. All of us will become immortal eventually. Whether or not you would enjoy it, is up to you. Choose paradise or pain. There is no third or other choice.

Hm first let me quote Tim Minchin



And back to topic:
If you would live for 1000s of years I bet your brain would run out of capacity some day. So from this point on you could experience forgotten things new, might help a bit against getting bored

For existence potentially being of infinite nature as well, I have no doubt in my mind that you would get bored quickly or even ever. 5 trillion year is a lot for someone that's not immortal, but for someone living basically for eternity it's quite literally nothing.

I think the idea that life is more worth when it's not infinite might very well be untrue as well, for it's actually the more memorable memories that count when it comes to the emotional experience of life itself. Not the fact that you may one day not live anymore. :-p

I do think the idea of immortality sounds great, especially as a severally increased lifespan (ie. literally infinite) really provides one with the ability to do a whole lot of otherwise impossible things.

You're still bound to change and progress or degradation of cultures, planets, life and so forth though, so it's not like you'll end up living an unrestricted life.

What if a culture decides to capture you as their 'God', holding you captive for thousands of years? Immortality obviously isn't the same as having unlimited physical, mental or 'magical' powers.

The immortality factor might not always be positive, but the same holds true for mortal life.

Actually nope, not at all. You'd simply forget about past experiences and memories. The brain can't literally become full, it will just prioritize the memories and literally forget about the rest. On a daily basis this is the case already and it wouldn't have to adapt to eternal life at all.

I'm pretty sure an immortal being would (slowly but steadily) come to perceive events in the world as much less important to remember than someone who would only live for 50 to a 100 years or so.

When it comes to the total gross of knowledge ever gathered or developed, you'd have to rely on some kind of data storing technology if you want to preserve technological advancements made over many thousands or even millions of years, for your own personal benefit.

It's pretty questionable how much of a priority that would get when one is immortal though. For example, a neat old-timer car is nice, but compared to the flying car of the future that holds perhaps anti-gravity drives and so on.. what would it be worth?

I'm sure there's a lot we can simply forget about without ever feeling sorry about it.





The same kind of blatantness you're exposing your opinion by though! It's actually stupid to consider the afterlife theory of your religion as truth in the sense that word was actually meant; truthful, actual, factual, tangible, potentially reproducible and so on.

It's plain arrogant to think there is no third choice or fourth choice, just like it's actually pretty damn arrogant to think of your view as superior somehow... just because you're a convinced religious person.

I respect your view, don't get me wrong, but I do not respect these kinds of attitudes so much. Why impose your belief onto people like that? Especially when your main argument will always be that faith is required to understand (which from a more neutral point of view makes no rational sense whatsoever, but that aside).

It creates the obvious issue of a conditional truth. That in itself can not actually even be a real truth. It would just mean the exclusion or ignorance of the potential REAL truth. It's also really just an over-obvious but admittedly clever mechanism of self-preservation of certain ideas.



Physical immortality really isn't that impossible. It's possible for organisms to not age, but still reach a certain size and maturity. The whole dying thing has been an evolutionary development, quite useful too, but I think technology in the near-future will really increase both our lives and the chance of finding a way to become virtually immortal.

I'd consider potential progress like that somewhat inevitable, even though the future literally is unwritten and anything might happen.

This is not religion, it is truth.

Is it arrogant to believe the truth?

Because God tells us to.

That is completely wrong.

Ultimately, what this boils down to is personal belief. Depending upon what you believe, you may have a completely different world view from someone else, and a completely different perspective on truth. This doesn't mean you are right about your perceptions of the world.

Here's something interesting we should think about. One can only understand something in comparison to something else. If there is nothing to base understanding on, there is no understanding at all. For example, a blind man is always "seeing" the color black. However, he does not know it, and he doesn't know what "black" is, because he can't compare it to any other color. If he could see two colors, black and blue, then he could understand them both, but ONLY in relation to each other.

Our human perceptions of truth work the same way. We can only understand truth through our world view. We obtain a world view through faith. Everyone has faith, or belief, in something. For example, most people believe that the universe really exists. We are not able to prove this "fact", but we believe it nonetheless. Through this fact, we are able to derive other information: the sciences and laws of our universe. We are able to understand this universe and the world we live in, but only through faith.

Of course, the human mind wanders. We wonder that, if we do exist, where did we come from? Some people believe that the universe is an eternal entity, and ultimately we were never created. They believe we have always existed. Others believe that the universe is a finite entity. At some time, it didn't exist, and then it did. Eventually, they believe, we will go away. This opens up another question, where are we headed, but we will get to that later.

So, back to the original question: where did we come from? Well, that is a question that can only be answered through more conjecture. Some believe that we came from nothing. They believe that there was a massive explosion many billions of years ago that spawned the universe as we know it. Others believe that the universe was created through divine being(s).

Now, if we believe that the universe was created through a divine being, then we can learn this fact:

-We are totally accountable to our creator(s) for our actions.

Well, what does this tell us? It tells us that truth is whatever this being tells us it is. If we don't do it, then we must face judgment.

Notice that EVERYTHING we have learned has been totally grounded on unprovable facts. These unprovable facts have a name: they are known as postulates. And they are completely necessary to understanding the universe.

Now, my opinion:

I believe that between 6,000-10,000 years ago, God created the heavens and the earth. I believe that man sinned against this God when he disobeyed him. I believe that we deserved eternal punishment, but through His amazing grace, we were saved from His eternal wrath.

I believe that truth can only be found in the complete word of the living God, the Bible.

You don't have to believe this, but I do.

"I do not hide your righteousness in my heart; I speak of your faithfulness and salvation. I do not conceal your love and your truth from the great assembly." Psalm 40:10

PLEASE don't turn this into a religion topic. I really enjoy discussing immortality. The means by which it was achieved is pretty unimportant. Whether by science, genetic mutation or godly blessing. It doesn't matter. In this topic I want to know your take on Immortality, not whether God will have mercy upon our sorry asses if/when/after/before/while we die.



THANK YOU! Finally someone who takes the opposing side!

However, my question would still stand. Maybe not after 5 trillion years, not 100 trillion, or maybe not even after 10 googol years. But at some point, you would have done everything there is to do... with a lot of complaining in between because to do everything can be quite boring at times. Like I quoted in the beginning, "To an immortal, searching every corner of the Universe will make as much sense as examining every blade of grass on Earth makes to us.".

Maybe I should change my question to "What would you do if you were immortal?" hoping for an answer for an activity one could do for eternity.

Maybe play God for a few millenia... who knows.

Immortality is a weird thing, but you are right, it is all subjective. Five trillion years might seem like a lot to us, but to someone who literally has all the time in the universe it might just be as little as a heartbeat for us.

Interesting would be to just "hang in there" until the lifespan of electrons ends and then watch the night sky as the lights go out one by one. That surely would be something worth seeing.

And here's another question: Would a (immortal) partner make eternity more fun or less?

Redeemer, I agree with your beliefs.

Michael, this whole board is for "discussing infinity". Theism means the belief that there is one God. Theism is correct, atheism is not. So really, we have the right to talk about whatever we wish here.

Joquan, many a thread in Hilbert's Hotel has been destroyed by discussions of theism. It may be a theme of this board, but not of this thread.

Jibb

Look at the name of this specific topic. Does it say "Topic about theism, but not about atheism"? Does it say "please interrupt the current discussion with remarks about your religion"? No?

Well then, problem solved!

No need to be a smart-alec.

I have beliefs, but I won't force them upon others. This topic is simply about the topic of immortality, and it's gone off track. Back to what we were originally talking about...



Depending upon the person, he/she/it might just get on your nerves.

How about an immortal adversary

Jibb

At least he/she/it might be the only one who understands certain feelings.

Imagine you have to be married until infinity

I think an immortal advesary would BE my eternal partner.

I find it hard to imagine being able to agree with everything someone is about for that long,
but I find it easily forsee-able to have an eternal argument/dis-agreement with someone...

But that may be just me...

Except remembering is very much a choice if you want it to be.

It's a bit different from dying.

I'd say I definitely would prefer immortality over just dying or reincarnation.