• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!
  • Welcome to our archives. No new posts are allowed here.

Eternal life

Rainman05 said:
There is the possibility that we can reach 100 years of life by 2050 in the developed world, and out of those 100 years, have 70-80 pretty functional. So basically, be at 70 what you are now at 50.

But immortality... no, I wouldn't want it. I think it'd be great if we had the technology to make it work, but as to actually implementing it... it's not really correct. Death has been the companion of humanity for all it's existence. It is the only fair thing in the world and fear of death... or the prospect of death is what drives people forward. Accomplish smth in life now before you die... make meaningful and good decisions before you die.

Death is a blessing. And also because I'm a Christian, Christians shouldn't fear death.
Click to expand...

Just because its been a companion for all of our history is not a reason for keeping it around. Cancer, Malaria, and infectious disease have also been around for the entirety of our history but that has not stopped us from bringing our scientific resources to bear against them. The story of humanity is a story of a species wrestling and conquering nature, this is just another step on that path.
 
Sherman123 said:
Just because its been a companion for all of our history is not a reason for keeping it around. Cancer, Malaria, and infectious disease have also been around for the entirety of our history but that has not stopped us from bringing our scientific resources to bear against them. The story of humanity is a story of a species wrestling and conquering nature, this is just another step on that path.
Click to expand...


I think you don't understand exactly what cancer, malaria and other diseases are in relation to death.
Death is the cure of all illness and all diseases. It is in fact humanity's oldest and more reliable cure to all ailments in both the human body and society itself. You have cancer and are in pain? death is there to end the pain. You broke your leg and have an infection, and may lose that leg, become a cripple should you live? Death is there to not let you suffer that fate.
Death is there to make sure you don't suffer a fate worse than death in life. :)
 
Rainman05 said:
I think you don't understand exactly what cancer, malaria and other diseases are in relation to death.
Death is the cure of all illness and all diseases. It is in fact humanity's oldest and more reliable cure to all ailments in both the human body and society itself. You have cancer and are in pain? death is there to end the pain. You broke your leg and have an infection, and may lose that leg, become a cripple should you live? Death is there to not let you suffer that fate.
Death is there to make sure you don't suffer a fate worse than death in life. :)
Click to expand...

That is horrific. You have cancer and are in pain... so here is some death? Our goal is the remediation, the abolition of cancer. Why? Yes because it causes pain, but more pressingly because it snatches life away.
 
Sherman123 said:
That is horrific. You have cancer and are in pain... so here is some death? Our goal is the remediation, the abolition of cancer. Why? Yes because it causes pain, but more pressingly because it snatches life away.
Click to expand...

Nobody is saying to not find a cure for cancer. By all means, I lost family to cancer. Lets find a cure for it.

But since chimo works only if cancer is caught early... and it's a horrible treatment to go through... and the pain that comes with cancer... and all that ugly stuff, death is a blessing. A release.

It is of course more tragic if the people who have cancer are young. It's heartbreaking when they're kids. but if you're old and the best years are behind you... instead of suffering through all that pain, death is not such a horrible prospect for some I find. And in fact, objectively speaking, it's a blessing. So death is a good friend to humanity and has always been, and will always be. And if you're not afraid of death, if you believe in the afterlife, there is no motive to fear death, but embrace it when it comes. Of course, you shouldn't seek it, you should seek life and enjoy life, but when it comes, it comes.
 
Rainman05 said:
Nobody is saying to not find a cure for cancer. By all means, I lost family to cancer. Lets find a cure for it.

But since chimo works only if cancer is caught early... and it's a horrible treatment to go through... and the pain that comes with cancer... and all that ugly stuff, death is a blessing. A release.

It is of course more tragic if the people who have cancer are young. It's heartbreaking when they're kids. but if you're old and the best years are behind you... instead of suffering through all that pain, death is not such a horrible prospect for some I find. And in fact, objectively speaking, it's a blessing. So death is a good friend to humanity and has always been, and will always be. And if you're not afraid of death, if you believe in the afterlife, there is no motive to fear death, but embrace it when it comes. Of course, you shouldn't seek it, you should seek life and enjoy life, but when it comes, it comes.
Click to expand...

I never advocated for removing choice from someones life. By all means you have sovereignty over your own body and the most essential freedom I can imagine is choosing whether to live or die (though this has its own complexities). That being said the goal is to remove the problem you've outlined. Technologies that will yield an indefinite lifespan will come on the heels of therapies that allow us to defeat cancer, reverse mental degeneration, and replace or revitalize organs. This is the worthiest of goals.

Death is not a friend, it is a tragedy. It is the capricious mechanism of nature that steals precious lives. Rationalizing it can bring comfort but it doesn't remove that essential truth.
 
Sherman123 said:
I never advocated for removing choice from someones life. By all means you have sovereignty over your own body and the most essential freedom I can imagine is choosing whether to live or die (though this has its own complexities). That being said the goal is to remove the problem you've outlined. Technologies that will yield an indefinite lifespan will come on the heels of therapies that allow us to defeat cancer, reverse mental degeneration, and replace or revitalize organs. This is the worthiest of goals.

Death is not a friend, it is a tragedy. It is the capricious mechanism of nature that steals precious lives. Rationalizing it can bring comfort but it doesn't remove that essential truth.
Click to expand...

All I'm saying, is that i doubt technology will ever 'find a cure' for natural death since death is not a disease. And even if there is a way to have indefinite lifespan, I don't think it would be wise or moral of us to adopt such a lifestyle. as for curing diseases, yes, by all means, I am ok with that. I have never stated that we shouldn't try and find cures for all diseases that humanity is facing. I am just saying, that death, is not a disease.

It is not a friend in the sense that we go out to have a beer and that humanity has a special relationship with death. It's a friend in comparison to many things that affect us in life, like diseases. Objectively speaking, of course death isn't a friend and of course it can be tragedy... but it can also be a blessing. And I would argue that most of the times, it is a blessing in the greater scheme of things.
 
Sherman123 said:
That is horrific. You have cancer and are in pain... so here is some death? Our goal is the remediation, the abolition of cancer. Why? Yes because it causes pain, but more pressingly because it snatches life away.
Click to expand...

For some of us Death if preferable to the remedies or treatments for some of these illnesses.
 
Rainman05 said:
All I'm saying, is that i doubt technology will ever 'find a cure' for natural death since death is not a disease. And even if there is a way to have indefinite lifespan, I don't think it would be wise or moral of us to adopt such a lifestyle. as for curing diseases, yes, by all means, I am ok with that. I have never stated that we shouldn't try and find cures for all diseases that humanity is facing. I am just saying, that death, is not a disease.

It is not a friend in the sense that we go out to have a beer and that humanity has a special relationship with death. It's a friend in comparison to many things that affect us in life, like diseases. Objectively speaking, of course death isn't a friend and of course it can be tragedy... but it can also be a blessing. And I would argue that most of the times, it is a blessing in the greater scheme of things.
Click to expand...

Death is not a disease it is an accumulation of many different problems. At the end of the day we are biological mechanisms and ever more advanced and sophisticated technologies and therapies will only increase our control over these mechanisms. We've already made enormous progress in discovering 'why' you die whether you look at telomere research or the degeneration of neural cells. The ability to grow organs or create superior artificial substitutes, the ability to eradicate cancer, the ability to rejuvenate the brain and repair damage on a nanoscale, and much more are all likely routes for the future (whether you believe that timeframe long or short) and these alone would do an enormous amount for dramatically extending human lifespan.

Biological immortality is about putting choice into the hands of humanity for the first time in our history. When that threshold is finally crossed whether it is in 50 or 500 years it will remove the capricious role of nature from the decision of life and death.

Why cure aging? Why stop death? Because it kills people.
 
Tigger said:
For some of us Death if preferable to the remedies or treatments for some of these illnesses.
Click to expand...

I'll refer to you my post below but this is all about choice. The salient point being that eventually life and death should be solely within our hands. Though I'd mention that as time goes on it seems unlikely that treatments would remain as discomforting and painful.
 
Sherman123 said:
I'll refer to you my post below but this is all about choice. The salient point being that eventually life and death should be solely within our hands. Though I'd mention that as time goes on it seems unlikely that treatments would remain as discomforting and painful.
Click to expand...

Why? Why should it be in our hands and not in nature's hands. There has to be a point at which we remember that we are part of nature, not superior to it.

In my mind it's about Principles, not just about the discomfort and pain.


Sherman123 said:
Death is not a disease it is an accumulation of many different problems. At the end of the day we are biological mechanisms and ever more advanced and sophisticated technologies and therapies will only increase our control over these mechanisms. We've already made enormous progress in discovering 'why' you die whether you look at telomere research or the degeneration of neural cells. The ability to grow organs or create superior artificial substitutes, the ability to eradicate cancer, the ability to rejuvenate the brain and repair damage on a nanoscale, and much more are all likely routes for the future (whether you believe that timeframe long or short) and these alone would do an enormous amount for dramatically extending human lifespan.

Biological immortality is about putting choice into the hands of humanity for the first time in our history. When that threshold is finally crossed whether it is in 50 or 500 years it will remove the capricious role of nature from the decision of life and death.

Why cure aging? Why stop death? Because it kills people.
Click to expand...

Sorry, but I'm not a God, nor do I wish to be one. Nature has its own delicate balance and the more we mess with it, the more likely Mother Nature is to find ways to mess with us. I'll take my nice 65-75 year life and move on, thank you very much.
 
Tigger said:
Why? Why should it be in our hands and not in nature's hands. There has to be a point at which we remember that we are part of nature, not superior to it.

In my mind it's about Principles, not just about the discomfort and pain.




Sorry, but I'm not a God, nor do I wish to be one. Nature has its own delicate balance and the more we mess with it, the more likely Mother Nature is to find ways to mess with us. I'll take my nice 65-75 year life and move on, thank you very much.
Click to expand...

There is nothing special about nature, it just is. Something being natural is not the equivalent of it being 'good' or any other classification that requires a subjective human appellation. Why should we exceed the environment and boundaries initially given to us by our natural evolution? Because it makes life better. We choose to live in buildings instead of the bush, we choose to grow food instead of living off the hunt, we choose to use medicines instead of leaving it to natural chance, etc, etc. We are an amazing species and we should take full advantage of our genius and the artifices we create. Alleviating pain and placing the choice of life and death into the hands of the individual would be our most extraordinary achievement as a race.
 
Sherman123 said:
There is nothing special about nature, it just is. Something being natural is not the equivalent of it being 'good' or any other classification that requires a subjective human appellation. Why should we exceed the environment and boundaries initially given to us by our natural evolution? Because it makes life better. We choose to live in buildings instead of the bush, we choose to grow food instead of living off the hunt, we choose to use medicines instead of leaving it to natural chance, etc, etc. We are an amazing species and we should take full advantage of our genius and the artifices we create. Alleviating pain and placing the choice of life and death into the hands of the individual would be our most extraordinary achievement as a race.
Click to expand...

I personally see a difference between creating tools to improve our life and creating a situation where we leave the natural order entirely. Obviously we have different viewpoints on how nature should be dealt with. Nothing wrong with that, we just aren't going to agree on things.
 
Sherman123 said:
What's a few more millenia in the grand scheme of things? What an awful view of the world if you'll excuse my saying so! Do we tell someone who is 40 and on their deathbed that "Well... everyone dies sooner or later. Would you really want a few more decades?" Of course not! Because life is precious. Your consciousness is all that you have in the vastness of this Universe. Existing offers limitless possibility, ceasing to exist ends that. Imagine what you could do, who you could love, what you could learn in all those extra millenias.
Click to expand...

You seem to have missed the point.

I was saying that there is ultimately no such thing as "immortality." The best you could really hope for was to live, by geological and intergalactic time scales, anyway, slightly longer than usual.

Don't get me wrong. I'd love to live longer, and experience everything the future had to offer. However, we shouldn't delude ourselves into entertaining any notion of absolute "immortality."

Everything material eventually dies.
 
Surtr said:
We would have to enforce a strict policy of sterilization.


No. I want to live out my natural life cycle and die like I'm supposed to. Immortality is for cowards who can't face reality.
Click to expand...

For cowards? That's a narrow minded way to look at it. It's also for people who enjoy life enough to want to enjoy it forever.
 
Tigger said:
I wasn't intending to argue the merits of my comment, just to point out that when you ask for details on things you never quite know what you're going to get.
Click to expand...

Well thank you for sharing.
 
Immortality hopefully will never come but science is making astronomical leaps in to extending life as we know it and frankly, some of the stuff they claim they will be able to do is scary. Read "The Future of Physics" by Michou Kaku, it will make you scare the liquid out of you.
 
rhinefire said:
Immortality hopefully will never come but science is making astronomical leaps in to extending life as we know it and frankly, some of the stuff they claim they will be able to do is scary. Read "The Future of Physics" by Michou Kaku, it will make you scare the liquid out of you.
Click to expand...

Why should it scare us?
 
Sherman123 said:
Why should it scare us?
Click to expand...

"technology"-one example would be something that is creeping up on us right now-artificial intelligence Why? Well first, what if AI decides it does not like mankind? What then? Man yields to technology in an increasingly subservient role each day. Example; think how many things in your present life are in someway related to computers? So, what if a huge solar flare from our Sun was powerful enough to knock out all satellite transmissions? You could not communicate with anyone, you could not buy food, you would have no heat, no water, your life support systems would fail, you could not even get money. All this is about the present, if you read the book it will take you in to the future of what IS going to be, not what MIGHT be and like I said it will scare the fluids out of you.
 
rhinefire said:
"technology"-one example would be something that is creeping up on us right now-artificial intelligence Why? Well first, what if AI decides it does not like mankind? What then? Man yields to technology in an increasingly subservient role each day. Example; think how many things in your present life are in someway related to computers? So, what if a huge solar flare from our Sun was powerful enough to knock out all satellite transmissions? You could not communicate with anyone, you could not buy food, you would have no heat, no water, your life support systems would fail, you could not even get money. All this is about the present, if you read the book it will take you in to the future of what IS going to be, not what MIGHT be and like I said it will scare the fluids out of you.
Click to expand...

I'm not afraid of artificial intelligence, quite to the contrary I'm extremely excited at the developments being pioneered in the field today. Likewise I welcome our increasingly symbiotic relationship with technology as a sign not only of our progress but that we are beginning to seize control of our own 'evolution' by substituting natural biological mutation with technological augmentation.

Worrying about whether a Solar Flare will hit (aside from taking steps to mediate that threat like electrical grid coordination etc, etc) is pointless. You might as well spend your nights wondering if an asteroid will strike our planet without warning. It is beyond our control and is certainly not worth derailing all of modern civilization to contend with that remote possibility. If it happened it would be terrible, just as if a million and one other things happened it could be terrible.

Michio Kaku was not trying to scare you, rather the opposite. He is an avowed technophile and his book (which I've read) is a paean to the developments of the future. In fact he is an advocate of the transhumanism if I remember correctly.
 
Goshin said:
I don't believe humans will ever be "immortal" in the absolute sense of the term.


"Very very long lived" perhaps... unage-ing perhaps... but still mortal. We'd still die of accident, violence, suicide... or ennui.


But sure I'd like to play Methuselah. Life is endlessly fascinating and I'd like to stick around and see what happens.
Click to expand...

I believe that you have confused immortality with invulnerability. Immortality, in the common sense of the word, means that you won't die from old age, whereas invulnerability means that you can suffer no harm.
 
Indeed said:
I believe that you have confused immortality with invulnerability. Immortality, in the common sense of the word, means that you won't die from old age, whereas invulnerability means that you can suffer no harm.
Click to expand...


Actually I tend to be very precise with terms. "Immortality" literally means "non-mortality"... the inability to die. Classically, it was used in reference to divinities and to the soul.

Since humans could indeed die of many causes (possibly including some non-age-related diseases) even if the aging process is somehow averted, I am loathe to use the term 'immortal' to describe such a state. It seems presumptuous... I prefer terms like "Unaging" or "Ageless", or literary and classical references like "Methuselahs" or "Howards" (Heinlein) instead.
 
Sherman123 said:
I'm not afraid of artificial intelligence, quite to the contrary I'm extremely excited at the developments being pioneered in the field today. Likewise I welcome our increasingly symbiotic relationship with technology as a sign not only of our progress but that we are beginning to seize control of our own 'evolution' by substituting natural biological mutation with technological augmentation.

Worrying about whether a Solar Flare will hit (aside from taking steps to mediate that threat like electrical grid coordination etc, etc) is pointless. You might as well spend your nights wondering if an asteroid will strike our planet without warning. It is beyond our control and is certainly not worth derailing all of modern civilization to contend with that remote possibility. If it happened it would be terrible, just as if a million and one other things happened it could be terrible.

Michio Kaku was not trying to scare you, rather the opposite. He is an avowed technophile and his book (which I've read) is a paean to the developments of the future. In fact he is an advocate of the transhumanism if I remember correctly.
Click to expand...

Of course he is not trying to scare readers but what he is doing is informing readers changes are coming and in terms of humanism some are with out compassion and that has been a concern about the role of technology for a long time. Where do we set the limits? He states in his book droids will be common place and we could marry them,that's a change!! Few people worry about a solar flare of immense magnitude but I say only IF then chaos will take on a new meaning. If you in fact read this book his view on AI is unsettling to say the least. Most think the plug can merely be pulled to avoid AI from doing as it pleases and he emphasizes the opposite is true meaning AI could pull the plug on us.
 
rhinefire said:
Of course he is not trying to scare readers but what he is doing is informing readers changes are coming and in terms of humanism some are with out compassion and that has been a concern about the role of technology for a long time. Where do we set the limits? He states in his book droids will be common place and we could marry them,that's a change!! Few people worry about a solar flare of immense magnitude but I say only IF then chaos will take on a new meaning. If you in fact read this book his view on AI is unsettling to say the least. Most think the plug can merely be pulled to avoid AI from doing as it pleases and he emphasizes the opposite is true meaning AI could pull the plug on us.
Click to expand...

I do not think we should have any limits. As far as AI and the role of technology is concerned Kaku and other transhumanists believe that we will eventually modify ourselves and merge with AI to become a new kind of human as we move forward in the coming years and centuries. It will fundamentally alter what it means to be human because well... we wont exactly be human. But it's part of our inexorable progression and I welcome it without fear.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom