We've got all kinds of amazing medical technology developing. Is there a point where Christians or the religious refuse treatment so they can finally meet their maker?

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We've got all kinds of amazing medical technology developing. Is there a point where Christians or the religious refuse treatment so they can finally meet their maker?

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This is kind of a dumb question. It's like asking them why they don't just commit suicide to go meet their maker. They have a completely reasonable response to that question, and I can't imagine their answer would change just because the length of their life was increased.

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what if we can extend human life indefinitely?

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If we could only breathe something besides oxygen...oh wait, you already are.

I think at some point most people would choose death just to see what is next. Your brain isn't an infinitely expandable hard drive. I'm not sure how well it would hold up to 500 years of memory. And if you're only able to clearly remember the past 50 years or so, was it really you that was alive before then?

The real issue wouldn't be extending life, it would be preventing the neural degeneration and death associated with aging. It these things are fixed, I believe the mind and brain would do perfectly fine with 500 years of episodic memory. No true limit has been discovered or even rationally discussed in long term memory (that I know of).

1000 years? 10000 years? What makes the human brain so awesome is its ability to make associations, not its raw storage capacity. We are still a ways from being able to create a machine that can make intuitive connections at the speed of the human brain. In terms of storage capacity, that was probably exceeded with the library in Alexandria thousands of years ago.

Even without death or degeneration, you loose memories that you don't access much--and you alter the ones you do access.

Yes. In other words, I don't think there would be an issue with people living a very long time because of that very reason. Its not that those memories go away either. They just aren't on the surface any more so to speak. I maintain that any memory can be retrieved with a really good (i.e. specific) cue.

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Yes. In other words, I don't think there would be an issue with people living a very long time because of that very reason. Its not that those memories go away either. They just aren't on the surface any more so to speak. I maintain that any memory can be retrieved with a really good (i.e. specific) cue.

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Wouldn't that require that we have unlimited storage capacity?

It's true that the memories don't go away, but that the connections are lost. Thus allowing retrieval with certain cues. Still, because neural circuits are constantly being rewired, memory is neither as static nor as accurate as we like to think. I'm not convinced that a brain could hold strong memories of a majority of events hundreds of years in the past.

Even my current brain (which is in decent shape I think doesn't remember that much from a decade ago. Make that ten decades and I'm not sure what of me I would remember. Then I think you run into something akin to the Theseus' paradox.