Would you voluntarily join the afterlife if we "solve ageing"?

2,991 Views | 42 Replies | Last: 4 yr ago by DirtDiver
zannlaw
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There is a good possibility that the mysteries of aging may be solved giving human beings biological immortality at some point in the future. If this were to happen in your lifetime (very doubtful, but if it did), would you consider taking your own life at some point to join the afterlife?

Martin Q. Blank
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No. Self murder is still murder.
ramblin_ag02
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AG
First, the idea of biological immortality doesn't really work. You can't fight entropy. All things degrade eventually. The most typical work arounds I've seen in SciFi involve slowing the aging process combined with organ transplantation. Though there are some species who can rejuvenate, and people speculate on applying this to humans. The big impediment to this is the brain. It's not an organ that you can replace, and who can say what effects rejuvenation would have on memory or personality?

You could throw in "The Singularity", or the point at which computers can completely simulate a human brain. Then you upload your consciousness to the cloud. From there you can stay digital or download into a fresh brain. However, even if you could non-destructively capture the entire information in brain, then you're left with two consciousnesses that both think are the genuine article. The original still dies at some point.

Let's get past that and say that you can really be biologically immortal without any intermediate steps involving your destruction or the death of your original body. Who can say what the psychological effect of grand amounts of time would have on a human mind? Heinlein tended to think it led to despair and apathy which can only be broken by increasingly more novel and taboo experiences. Not to mention the society pressures. Immortal people still take up space and resources, so they'd still need to work. Easy to see how it would be a beating to work full time for eternity, or how society would put on expiration date on people eventually to cycle the population artificially.

Personally, I just wouldn't opt for the immortality treatment in the first place. This world is great and everything, but I wouldn't want to spend forever in it. Especially not when true happiness is waiting on the other side
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PacifistAg
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AG
As ramblin said, I would simply refuse the "immortality" option. This reminds me of Ashildr in Doctor Who. Seemed great and all at first, but that kind of immortality would become torture.
Quad Dog
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AG
If immortality ever reached the point where it's cheap, easy, common, acceptable, etc. wouldn't refusing it essentially be commiting suicide?
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Aggrad08
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AG
The good place is awesome. Also true immortality could be torture. Biologically we would break down eventually or get shot or something anyway.
94chem
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Solve aging? We can't even spell it.
Win At Life
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AG
If we solved death by aging, we'd all still die in a car wreck within a few hundred years anyway.
commando2004
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AG
ramblin_ag02 said:

Immortal people still take up space and resources, so they'd still need to work. Easy to see how it would be a beating to work full time for eternity, or how society would put on expiration date on people eventually to cycle the population artificially.
Perhaps "retirement" would become a cyclical thing. You'd work (and save a bunch of money) until you get burnt out, and then take a few years off to recover.
Hyacinth
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No, it would be the same as refusing cancer treatment or any other kind of medical intervention to delay death. You can take it if that's what you want, but you can also let nature run it's course without it being suicide.
Quad Dog
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AG
Refusing today's cancer treatment isn't suicide because it isn't a great treatment. But if in the future we had a 100% cancer cure the comparison get's a little muddier. I don't think refusing immortality is suicide either, but it's an interesting thought process. Who knows how our opinions on it could change in a couple of hundred years. Refusing the smallpox vaccine in 1797 and refusing it in 2020 have two very different mindsets.

I think it's a little clearer that blocking someone's access to ubiquitous immortality would be murder.
AGC
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AG
commando2004 said:

ramblin_ag02 said:

Immortal people still take up space and resources, so they'd still need to work. Easy to see how it would be a beating to work full time for eternity, or how society would put on expiration date on people eventually to cycle the population artificially.
Perhaps "retirement" would become a cyclical thing. You'd work (and save a bunch of money) until you get burnt out, and then take a few years off to recover.


Not sure that would happen. Imagine the wealth they'd accumulate and use to buy up land with water wells, for instance, or the extreme consumption they'd drive (think bentonville with the Walmart reps that are required to be close to corporate HQ). Hard to see how they wouldn't inflate prices across the board and price out younger generations without making space for them. Sounds like a recipe for conflict without mandatory retirement.
Catag94
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AG
I would not take my own life, but that is not necessary sine there is no way we will ever "solve aging". These bodies are perishable. We won't change that.
Quad Dog
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AG
It's probably more likely that immortality would look like uploading your conciesness to the cloud than making your body immortal. That adds a whole new wrinkle on if that is even living anymore or not. Kind of similar to the "are we all living in a simulation" type question.
Aggrad08
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AG
The altered carbon method could work. Rich people storing brains on a cloud with reserve bodies.
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Quad Dog
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AG
Average Guy said:

If our Creator desires us to be mortal and have an afterlife, will he even allow it to be possible for its to solve the aging problem?
Interesting question. If he makes it impossible to solve aging, he'd be removing our free will.
God desires us to be good and love each other, but allows evil in the world. So therefore wouldn't he allow us to go against his desire and be immortal?
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Quad Dog
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AG
Good point. Almost as if there is an 11th commandment: "Though shall not travel faster than light." There could be other limits on age that we would only discover the hard way.
Pro Sandy
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AG
Average Guy said:

If our Creator desires us to be mortal and have an afterlife, will he even allow it to be possible for its to solve the aging problem?
At some point, the energy of the sun runs out. If we somehow make it 5 billion years and then we die because of the exhaustion of the sun, we still die. Whether it is 100 years or 5 billion years until we reach the after-life, we still have eternity to go.
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Ulrich
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Not yet. Maybe things will look different in 50 years.
Beer Baron
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AG
Aggrad08 said:

The altered carbon method could work. Rich people storing brains on a cloud with reserve bodies.
Or the Black Mirror (San Junipero) method. Just uploading consciousness to the cloud with no re-download into new bodies in the physical world.
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ramblin_ag02
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All the scariest Black Mirror episodes involved uploading consciousness. Black Museum, White Christmas, USS Callister, Playtest
No material on this site is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. See full Medical Disclaimer.
DirtDiver
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Solving the aging problem would not necessarily solve the death problem. If it does, it certainly doesn't solve the evil problem.

Imagine having the aging problem being solved for you and then being buried alive.

Aggrad08
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AG
Beer Baron said:

Aggrad08 said:

The altered carbon method could work. Rich people storing brains on a cloud with reserve bodies.
Or the Black Mirror (San Junipero) method. Just uploading consciousness to the cloud with no re-download into new bodies in the physical world.
This was the only black mirror I've seen with a happy ending
Zobel
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AG
Jeez dude. That's dark.
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Zobel
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Yeah that's what I was thinking. Man when you got out you'd be maaaaad
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