Immortality

[Anonymous No.4923671]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2012/07/human-immortality-could-be-possible-by-2045-say-russian
-scientists.html

If you guys had the option, would you?

[Anonymous No.4923674]

Personally, I can see this having a lot of problems, but at the same time humans are usually able to work out problems....usually. I would go for it. I don't like the idea of dying...

[Anonymous No.4923699]

I either want my neurons replaced cell by cell, or I want to be connected to a dynamic artificial brain that takes over functions as my old brain dies.

I then want this new brain excised from my old body and placed into a robot made to look like a cute teenaged girl.

I'm really not interested in copies of me, and I don't believe that they would retain continuity of consciousness.

[Anonymous No.4923704]

>>4923699
closet gay

[Anonymous No.4923707]

That site is down now but I would go for it based on the condition that I could still kill myself whenever I decided I was done.

I just want to see what happens with science and technology down the line.

[Anonymous No.4923715]

>>4923674
thorium will give cheap near limitless energy at the same time

and advanced robotics will provide all manual labor.

We will be set for a immortal life of leisure.

[Anonymous No.4923722]

>robotic body by 2015
I'd love that. I'd also love it to rain candy.

[Anonymous No.4923739]

>>4923707
What site is down? Everything works just fine for me

[Anonymous No.4923776]

It's ridiculous to try to "transport" people into other stuff like that. One thing is to have an artificial heart, or an artificial limb (though even that is not beter than having your original organ). Another thing is to try to pass a computer for a brain, or to use terms like "personality" to something completely artificial. You may have the illusion that it is the same, but it's as fake as Polar Express. This whole Avatar idea revolves around the notion that there is "something deep inside" ourselves that can be passed on, it's a scientific twisted version of the concept of "soul". An identity, you, yourself, is not that thing "deep inside", it's the whole deal, your body, your mind, your brain, your heart, your flesh and how one thing relates to one another. You can't pass your "consciousness" to another thing.

A lot of quotemarks, because misconceptions and half-known terms all around.

[Anonymous No.4923792]

Why not just have nanomachines regulate cell division and apoptosis rates to prevent death? Fuck robots, nanomachines is where immortality will come from.

[Anonymous No.4923798]

>>4923792
Yeah, I agree with this mostly. Need to focus more on being able to sustain our own bodies better and just augment them when necessary. An entire robotic avatar body with a human brain in it is the last resort. But, that might have to be the way it is for Interstellar space travel.

[Anonymous No.4923803]

I'd put my money on stem cell therapy which could make the body younger.

[Anonymous No.4923810]

I may not agree with the way they will go about it but the social network thing could be useful to get people interested in immortality through science.

[Anonymous No.4923815]

>>4923704
>closet
>implying the people of 4chan are hiding the fact that they are gay.

[Anonymous No.4923825]

>>4923671
switch D with A and C with B.

[Anonymous No.4923836]

>human-immortality

lol

If you are immortal, you are not human. If you are human, you are mortal. This is something that won't change.

[Anonymous No.4923838]

>>4923776

If you throw out vitalism, as you are and should, the notion that the brain is 'you' becomes just as ridiculous as the ancient Egyptian belief that the heart was 'you'.

We need to give up the notion of the singular, discrete self. There is no 'you' in the sense that people talk about. The brain produces perceptions, and within our culture we interpret these as selves.

Simply copying the pattern of the brain doesn't continue you, I agree. But to suggest that consciousness is irremovable from the brain is as well to suggest vitalism.

I suggest the definition of 'you' to be the extent of the nervous system, which I suggest be defined as any physical structure of sufficient complexity.

[Anonymous No.4923841]

>>4923836

We transhuman now.

[Anonymous No.4923846]

>Russian scientists
>the article is about a rich Russian
>no mention of any name of "leading Russian scientist" or what they published until now

[Anonymous No.4923854]

>>4923836
>can't into transhuman/post-human
lyl enjoy your primitive mortal life

[Anonymous No.4923859]

>>4923836

This is accepted by many transhumanists.

I mean, if you don't share any genetic similarities to H. sapiens, and your physical structure is radically different from them, it doesn't matter if you look like a human.

This is why the term post-human was coined.

[Anonymous No.4923855]

>>4923671
It doesn't work that way. You can't transfer a conscious to a computer. It's like how they use those matter scanners to transfer rocks to high-poly game engines; it looks like the rock, but it's not the rock. If you preserve your brain, it's likely to fail within years from natural causes like Alzheimer's.

Although, cybernetic body enhancements are possible. It'd be cool to get an extra 30 years out of that alone.

THERE IS NO ESCAPING DEATH, MORTALS.

[Anonymous No.4923856]

>>4923836
Humans are species, thus humans evolve.
Evolution is change.
If humans themselves can change, then doesn't it automatically mean that the definition of 'human' can change too?

[Anonymous No.4923870]

>>4923855

>>THERE IS NO ESCAPING DEATH, MORTALS.

Well, if the heat-death theory is true, then we must admit that in the end, we're all still mortal.

But that isn't for tens of trillions of years yet. That's enough time for me.

[Anonymous No.4923874]

>>4923841
>>4923854
>>4923859
I realize the sci-fi robo transhumanism is an impractical fantasy and all
but the fact that no one wants to die (generally speaking, as it is in our nature to fear death) and plenty of people who invested their lives to be rich snobs I'm sure it's more than possible of being fundable
then again I'm not an economist and I'm speaking out of the ass right here; if anyone can help enlighten me I would appreciate it

[Anonymous No.4923876]

>>4923874
>I'm sure it's more than possible of being fund-able
the whole post-human immortality transhumanism that is, not the robo sci-fi shit
w0w I sound like some high school stoner faggot pls don't make fun of me /sci/

[Anonymous No.4923875]

>>4923870
Even if heat death isn't true you'll still die

No ending reverses entropy

[Anonymous No.4923884]

>>4923838
I agree with your point of view on the self. What I said about consciousness is because there is no such thing that can be cutted and moved from its place like a simple organ. It is a process, an interpretation of perceptions about oneself.

I don't subscribe to vitalism in the sense that I don't see living things as something more special than something not living things, but that doesn't mean I think there is no difference between them. I don't think man is better than a dog, but I can see they are different and I find it awful to see an old lady treating her little dog like a child. Maybe that's a weird analogy, but in the same sense I don't think one should treat the idea of "living in a robot's body" as an actual thing, as an actual continuation of oneself.

As you said, the "you" can't be said to be in the brain or in the heart or anything like that. The brain is connected to all else, your nervous system is the brain, your eyes are part of your brain. Your heart is meaningless without vessels connected to it. It's the whole that counts, the integrity of this entire system. And you may lose an arm and still think you are you, but you've lost part of you and that's hard to deny.

[Anonymous No.4923886]

>>4923856
Humans are alive. Therefore, they will die. This is not that hard.

[Anonymous No.4923888]

>>4923884
I wonder how it would feel to have your arm replaced by a fully functional robotic arm.

[Anonymous No.4923890]

omg OP so it's like that new Spiderman movie omg

[Anonymous No.4923902]

>>4923838
If you froze time and made a duplicate brain to mine with every atom and particle in the exact same configuration and spin and everything, then yeah, it would be thinking the same thing

[Anonymous No.4923904]

>>4923902
If you froze time and made a poop real hard that lasted for eternity, you'd create an universe and be God.

[Anonymous No.4923921]

>>4923902

Yes, but would you experience it's qualia?

[Flibble !Prb3WfhoI6 No.4923925]

There are more feasible ways of doing this.

[Anonymous No.4923938]

>>4923904

But first you would have to create a creampie

[Anonymous No.4923963]

>>4923722

Thanks for summarizing my thoughts about this matter.

[Anonymous No.4923970]

I would have the option of immortality with a death switch if I ever wanted to die, so I couldn't keep living on after a million years.

[Anonymous No.4924021]

>>4923841 We transhuman now.
I wish my parents had told me "Study hard so you will have a shitload of money ready when they make immortality purchasable." That is some preaching that would have worked for a change.

[Anonymous No.4924045]

>>4924021
>That is some preaching that would have worked for a change.
Except it wouldn't.

You're parents should have told you that you are going to die, to accept that and cherish the short moment you have here.

[Anonymous No.4924047]

>>4924045
That would only have made me play even more games and watch more TV than I already did. Because in these moments I was cherishing the moment, not thinking about future or past.

[Anonymous No.4924052]

>>4924045
i really, i thought parents were suppose to encouraged you to go to above and beyond. That includes death. Its a barrier just like the sonic speed limitation. Beating it is inevitable.

And then we will have new problems, like mob and terrorist not dieing off from old age.

[Anonymous No.4924066]

>He has already pulled together a team of leading Russian scientists intent on creating fully functional holographic human avatars that house artificial brains which contain a person's complete consciousness
>artificial brains which contain a person's complete consciousness
>brain uploading
nope

[Anonymous No.4924067]

>>4924066
>>russians
>>russians not in america
super nope.

[Anonymous No.4924073]

>>4924047
And why are you not doing that? You want to become immortal so you can play videogame and watch tv throughout history?

Holy shit, man the fuck up...

>>4924052
>That includes death. Its a barrier just like the sonic speed limitation.
I know a bunch of things that break the sonic speed.

Name one thing that is not going to die.

Not wanting to die is just like never existing and not wanting to be born. There is no reason for you to hold on to staying here.

[Anonymous No.4924075]

the russians were doing cybernetics before it was cool

[Anonymous No.4924078]

>>4924073
>name one thing not going to die
that jellyfish that reverts into its infant stage and back whenever it wants

[Anonymous No.4924086]

>>4924073
every seqouia tree in existence untouched by man.

[Anonymous No.4924088]

>>4924073
>You want to become immortal so you can play videogame and watch tv throughout history?

not who you're replying to.
I'm absurdist so I believe we create our own purpose in life. I also believe there is no goal we can choose more fitting to human nature than utilising our freedom of self-determination to develop our personalities as much as possible.
With immortality I can develop my personality as much as is possible, without ever losing the fruits of my labour.
All the books, music and movies I wouldn't otherwise have time to read listen to or view, and all those that I would miss out on by dying are now in my grasp.

With immortality I can educate myself on every science I choose to, and occupy myself with a significant amount of art I would otherwise miss out on.
Mortality is that one flaw that stops us from becoming true homini universalis.

[Anonymous No.4924099]

>>4924073
the 80,000 year old Pando tree
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pando_(tree)

[Anonymous No.4924103]

>>4924099
come to think of it, how to fuck do we not have immortality or at least longer lifespan now? The tree that laughing their asses off at us. Is it because they dont move around, total lack of metabolism, thus they dont degenerate as fast?

Bollocks.

[Anonymous No.4924109]

>>4924078
>>4924086
>>4924099
Until Earth is blown to pieces.

You guys are clearly not getting the scope of it. Those things survive indefinitely, but they (and you) are not going to "survive death".

>>4924088
You are delusional and I'm not sure you've read many absurdist books, for a start. Camus take on Sysiphus would disagree with you on that, rolling the rock up and down the cliff, and being strong enough to keep a smirk on your face. That's very different from wanting an endless mountain for you to roll your rock upwards "without losing the fruits of your labour".

Wasting your time alive on searching for an immortal life sounds to me about the same as praying to have a good endless afterlife. You are definitely going to lose the fruits of your labour, so do it for the labour, not for intangible ideals.

Have you read the story The Immortal by Borges? I recommend it to you.

>homini universalis
Now you are talking like a true X-men. Not to offend, but man the fuck up and stop playing videogames...

[Anonymous No.4924117]

>>4924109
your playing the endgame card, but at the end of the day, you no idea what humanity will do in the next millions years.

And assuming we dont kill ourselves I pretty sure things like the Sun dying and the Earth being consumed by said star could be prevented.

Imagination is a delusion yes, but it also allows us to survive.

[Anonymous No.4924134]

>>4924073

>>Not wanting to die is just like never existing and not wanting to be born. There is no reason for you to hold on to staying here.

My personal experience with oxygen deprivation has taught me that when my brain stops functioning, I stop experiencing qualia. I have no reason to believe that I will begin to experience qualia again after I die. Therefore, when I die, I cease to experience qualia forever, and I am non-recoverable.

That's the reason for me to hold on to staying here. It's the only 'here' I will ever know.

[Anonymous No.4924179]

>>4924117
But why should it be prevented?

Use your imagination on what it means to live well, instead of focusing on spreading yourself through centuries. That is a great way to survive.

Adaptation is the key to nature, what survives is what adapts. Death is a natural state, just as natural as life can be and although no one wants to die, we have this incredible ability to predict the future and this gives us an amazing oportunity to forsee our own deaths.

I know I won't be around in 2200, so I won't make plans for that. I don't know if I'm going to be around here next week, maybe not, but I'd say it's safe to say I'll probably be here and so I'll make a plan for next week. Less anxiety.

What humanity will do in the next million years I don't know, I can imagine, but I sure as hell don't trust my imagination on that, it would be arrogant of my part and I gain absolutely nothing on it.

>>4924134
You're biased, you are alive. If you were not, you wouldn't think like that, you wouldn't think at all. Being alive takes resources, better as well leave a little to the grass and the worms, another scientist might be made out of that later. What I mean is: why is our experience so much better than the experience of others? That's kind of solipsistic for no apparent reason.

You came here with nothing and you'll leave taking nothing. Sounds fair.

[Anonymous No.4924180]

>>4924109

>>Until Earth is blown to pieces.

And we move them somewhere else.

>>Wasting your time alive on searching for an immortal life sounds to me about the same as praying to have a good endless afterlife. You are definitely going to lose the fruits of your labour, so do it for the labour, not for intangible ideals.

If I search for immortality and get it, I've added more years to my life. If I don't search for immortality, I don't get any more years to my life.

In the same way people defer pleasure while they work so that they have more resources to enjoy greater pleasure after work, I advocate people deferring some of their life now for greater amounts of life later.

Additionally, once we can remove our hedonic treadmill and feel happy all the time, the extended life I'll lead will be far greater then the life I gave up to get it.

[Anonymous No.4924185]

Our generation may very well see the beginning of the next century. Our life expectancy is about 80 years by now (assuming of course you live in a good country) and rising. People like Aubrey deGrey are working on that.

Biomechatronics are already very advanced compared to what we are used to and just at the beginning of its growth. We are getting closer to understanding the brain with every research made.

I am positive that we will all experience the first human cyborg. The biggest challenge to face will probably be to stop our brain from decaying and not how to create a cyborg/android.

I myself will be working in this field. I will overcome every obstacle and I work day and night to make it possible. I want to create a new expierence of life and I will succeed.

[Anonymous No.4924187]

>>4924180
And what if you don't find immortality? What if you spend your life looking for it, just to not find it? And what if the next generations think they will be able to find it, and they can't?

[Anonymous No.4924207]

>>4924109
I mentioned absurdism because of my agreement with absurdists and existentialists that a preset purpose does not exist, -our nature dictating that we search for something inexistant being the fundamental absurdity of the human condition- and instead we need to either create our purpose or find it in the process of our existance, that itself not being impossible as a nihilist would argue.

That's not relevant to the central point of my argument though. I supported that the purpose that is most relevant with human nature, is the struggle to reach the unatainable perfection (I remind homer's "the creature that is reaching forever upwards" as a definition of what is human).
And that struggle manifests through the development of our personalities.
>You are delusional
Ipse Dictum
>wanting an endless mountain for you to roll your rock upwards
If their is no peak then that's all I can hope for. I don't want to reach the peak and look down having nothing more to attain. Instead I prefer to reach new heights forever. Me and my rock. The labour is worth it.
>"without losing the fruits of your labour"
That refers to how the entirety of the development you have achieved is lost once you die, with your consciousness. I never implied it negates developing your personality in the first place.
>Wasting your time alive on searching for an immortal life
Clarify. I never said anything about wasting my time. I said that mortality is a flaw and that I could achieve more if I didn't have an expiration date.
>praying to have a good endless afterlife
This transfers all expectations and obligations to the supernatural / metaphysical plane, I never argued for something like this. I argued for the opposite.
>so do it for the labour, not for intangible ideals
They are one and the same if you think of it.

[Anonymous No.4924209]

>>4924179

>>You're biased, you are alive. If you were not, you wouldn't think like that, you wouldn't think at all

And so why should I care about my then non-existent opinion?

>>Being alive takes resources, better as well leave a little to the grass and the worms

Why are their lifes more important then mine? If my life has to eventually end to make room for them, why can't their lives end to make room for mine? And if being alive takes resources and that's bad, why not end everthing's life? Are you saying that life has no intrinsic value?

>>another scientist might be made out of that later. What I mean is: why is our experience so much better than the experience of others? That's kind of solipsistic for no apparent reason

If my experience isn't any better then any other's experience, then their experience isn't any better then mine, in which case why should I care about that future scientist? After all, he's not thinking, and life is a waste of resources.

[Anonymous No.4924210]

>>4924207
Finally
>homini universalis
>talking like a true X-men
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uomo_Universalis
Not really relevant with X-men or Videogames I'm afraid. But maybe DaVinci should man up and stop playing video-games as well?

[Anonymous No.4924223]

>>4924187

Then according to you, nothing was lost anyway since life is a waste of resources and death is something to be longed for.

[Anonymous No.4924226]

I've been reading about theories of the death of the universe and jack, and I've got to ask: are they all theories or are there any possibilities out there that seem extremely likely? The idea that there will eventually be total nothingness is beyond depressing.

[Anonymous No.4924238]

>>4924180
>And we move them somewhere else.
...Until you survive heat death and figure a way to get out of the universe and then another and then another until you are a god and settle down in an immortal universe?

>If I search for immortality and get it, I've added more years to my life. If I don't search for immortality, I don't get any more years to my life.
That's Pascal wager for immortality, can you see it?

If I don't search for immortality I can achieve a happy life here on Earth for whatever time there is. That is already rare.

[Anonymous No.4924246]

>>4924223
I'm the original guy, not him. But I don't mean that it is a waste. We live for our life. Just because it has an end, doesn't make it a waste. You should not long death, but understand that it will come one day.

[Anonymous No.4924247]

>>4924238
What if my source of happiness is not in seeking an objective, but simply in living?

[Anonymous No.4924262]

>>4924226
The only right answer would be "nobody knows".

[Anonymous No.4924266]

>>4924238
What's wrong about Pascal's wager?

[sage No.4924277]

>>4924266
>What's wrong about Pascal's wager?

[Anonymous No.4924281]

>>4924226
There will never be "total nothingness". Everything would just be really really far apart. Also, there are plenty of theories that don't involve heat death. That's just the theory that makes the most sense right now, and obviously science changes. There have been promising advances in loop quantum gravity, which basically allows for a big bounce scenario, for one thing.

[Anonymous No.4924286]

>>4924277
>cant think of reply

>sage and mock

[Anonymous No.4924297]

>>4924281
But what about when every single sun dies? Without energy we cannot perform work.

[Anonymous No.4924300]

>>4924238

>>...Until you survive heat death and figure a way to get out of the universe and then another and then another until you are a god and settle down in an immortal universe?

Unlikely, but I wouldn't say impossible. And at any rate, heat death won't occur for trillions of years. That's as much as I'll get at most, and I'm ok with that.

>>That's Pascal wager for immortality, can you see it?

Sort of. The differences lay in the fact that unlike adhering to certain beliefs and practices, searching for immortality and enjoying your natural lifespan aren't mutually exclusive, and that we have concrete proof that biological immortality is possible and therefore non-biological immortality and thus greater lifespans then even those seen in nature are probably possible.

>>If I don't search for immortality I can achieve a happy life here on Earth for whatever time there is. That is already rare.

And I can achieve a happy life here on Earth while also searching for immortality. In fact, I almost get disheartened by the fate of dying after a mere 60-120 years. Only by knowing that I'm doing all I can to prolong my life can I truly enjoy it.

[Anonymous No.4924301]

>>4924297
We can use other energy sources.

[Anonymous No.4924306]

>>4924207
>>4924210
>the creature that is reaching forever upwards
That is true, but it's not a phrase for how things should be, more of a statement on how we are. It's like saying "civilization comes with religion", which is true, but that is not an excuse for me to defend religion within a society.

>The labour is worth it.
If the labour is worth it, why do you care if it falls so you can pick it up again at the bottom?

> I said that mortality is a flaw
All that ever was and is is mortal. That is no flaw, an immortal thing would be flawed. That's your survival instincts shouting more than your reason, I think.

>This transfers all expectations and obligations to the supernatural / metaphysical plane,
The future is impalpable. It is something in our heads. I'm not defending hedonism here, but a reasonable idea on how we could spend the time that we have, for tomorrow, for next year, for our entire life. All sorts of anxieties come from putting your expectations onto that unknown future.

[Anonymous No.4924318]

I'd be keen, but their year goals seem a tad too generous. I can't see this stuff completely taking off well until 2050.

[Anonymous No.4924324]

>>4924297

1. That's not likely to happen
2. We're researching fusion energy now we're likely to have more power than we could ever need before eve our own sun runs out

[Anonymous No.4924331]

>>4924306
>All that ever was and is is mortal.
>That is no flaw, an immortal thing would be flawed.

So wait, exception = flaw?

[Anonymous No.4924333]

>>4924324
>That's not likely to happen

Every star ages and dies.

[Anonymous No.4924335]

Nobody will ever be immortal. The stars will die and the universe will fade to black, you cannot stop that.

Or can you?

[Anonymous No.4924339]

>>4924324
there's a short story by Asimov about this, also heat death of the universe

[Anonymous No.4924340]

>look up astronomers on youtube

>all are atheists with huge superiority complexes

lol

[Anonymous No.4924345]

>>4924209
The life of others is not more important than yours, that's not what I'm implying. I'm saying it's normal that you'll divide those resources with others yet to come, much like they shared with you. The idea is that there is no reason to change that from its natural course and there is a reason not to change it: waste of effort.

And life is not a waste of resources. Just because it ends, it is not less valuable. This is something that I feel is deeply rooted in a lot of people, that things must lead to something else to be true or valuable. That's like saying listenting to music is a waste of time because the song eventually ends.

>>4924286
I'm not >>4924277 , dude...

[Anonymous No.4924349]

>>4924333

They isn't to say there won't be any new stars.

[Anonymous No.4924351]

>>4924340

Care to name them?

[Anonymous No.4924354]

>hundreds of shitpost threads on /v/ daily
>mods do nothing
>finally a semi-related thread that EVERYONE on /v/ enjoys
>mods immediately delete it
I fucking hate /v/ mods so much.

[Anonymous No.4924355]

>>4924335

or you get eaten by a bear.

but that's not the point here.

[Anonymous No.4924360]

>>4924354

Wrong board, motherfucker.

>>>/v/

[Anonymous No.4924365]

>>4924300
What's your criteria for settling down after a few trillions of years, whether settling down for 100 is so horrible? Why don't stop at a thousand or a million? How do you measure that?

Don't you think it will be a trillion times more heart breaking to see all that life span vanishing into nothingness? It will be harder for you to accept it.

>searching for immortality and enjoying your natural lifespan aren't mutually exclusive
I agree, but this...:
>I almost get disheartened by the fate of dying after a mere 60-120 years
Is a feeling that can be avoided if you accept that you're most probably won't outlive 120 years.

[Anonymous No.4924362]

>>4924306

>All that ever was and is is mortal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turritopsis_nutricula

[Anonymous No.4924372]

>>4924351
Sagan, Lawrence Krauss

[Anonymous No.4924374]

>>4924075

I dream that one day someone removes the watermark from the top left of that photo and really fools someone one day.

[Anonymous No.4924375]

>>4924362
Someone mention it before and I've heard it about it too, but look beyond that.

A rock in the desert is "immortal" and might stay intact beyond all living creatures, but one day it will become dust. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about.

Nothing stands forever, nothing remains uncorrupted.

[Anonymous No.4924380]

"Anti-immortality" guy here. I have to go, I'l look for answers later, but won't be able to respond.

[Anonymous No.4924382]

>>4924345

>>The life of others is not more important than yours, that's not what I'm implying. I'm saying it's normal that you'll divide those resources with others yet to come, much like they shared with you. The idea is that there is no reason to change that from its natural course and there is a reason not to change it: waste of effort.

Prolonging my life and the lifes of others isn't a waste of effort. Letting them die when we could be doing something to stop it is a waste of life.

And the natural order is horrible, mostly because of that death. What's normal at current isn't worth preserving.

>>And life is not a waste of resources. Just because it ends, it is not less valuable.

I completely concur. And so since life isn't a waste of resources, we should promote and prolong it. Living for 100 trillion years is better then living for 80.

[Anonymous No.4924386]

>>4924372

Sagan and Krauss aren't Youtube astronomers, dipshit.

[Anonymous No.4924388]

>>4924375

True, I mean on a purely mathematical level the longer one lives the more likely they are to encounter events that would cause them to cease to function but entropy was already brought up so I wasn't sure that was the sort of thing you were referring to.

[Anonymous No.4924397]

>>4924386
>look up astronomers on youtube

learn to read, smart stuff

[Anonymous No.4924400]

>>4924386

I might just be being ignorant here but since when did Sagan have a superiority complex? His whole shtick was based around helping people understand science, not using it to fuel his ego.

[Anonymous No.4924405]

>>4924365

>>What's your criteria for settling down after a few trillions of years, whether settling down for 100 is so horrible? Why don't stop at a thousand or a million? How do you measure that?

Because the universe will cease to be able to supply me with energy at that point, and I'll be forced to die.

And I want to take my lifespan as far as possible because like I mentioned earlier in the thread, when I'm gone I'm gone.

>>Is a feeling that can be avoided if you accept that you're most probably won't outlive 120 years.

But I can't accept it, and I won't accept it. I shouldn't have to accept it. I can't change the fact that I may die within that time, but I'm not going to resign myself to it. I'm going to cling to every last second I can get.

[Anonymous No.4924406]

there are a lot of scary implications about this, but i probably would. dying scares me. yes im a coward.

[Anonymous No.4924408]

>>4924372
man, I was never sure about Sagan. the guy was a total genius and humanitarian who understood how stupid and materialistic most people are

but he did pot. its not like it was a shameful addiction either, he endorsed the shit. it contradicts everything else about him

[Anonymous No.4924409]

>>4924406
that doesnt make you a coward, your body is programmed to live to survive.
You are about to fall, you look for something grab onto, thats not cowardice, thats survival instinct.

[Anonymous No.4924411]

>>4924408
>>scientist dont do the drug everyone once in a while.

[Anonymous No.4924412]

>>4924409
I fucking hate hearing this "oh you want to live forever because its programmed in to you to fear death" schtick. I want to exist so I can experience life, not because some monkey alarm clock in my brain is going haywire.

[Anonymous No.4924414]

>>4924411
that was a helpful post that contributed a lot to the discussion

[Anonymous No.4924418]

>>4924412
you make it sound like its a bad thing.

[Anonymous No.4924421]

>>4924306
>That is true, but it's not a phrase for how things should be
I disagree. I don't think there can be a nobler more idealistic goal than forever becoming better. maybe we'll reach perfection this way. maybe we won't but at least we will have tried. It is how we are, and for once maybe this is how we should be. Our nature may as well be transcending our nature forever.

"And if you higher of men fail reaching god, wouldn't that mean that higher men are faillures? And if the higher of all men are faillures wouldn't that mean that indeed all of humanity is a faillure? But even if all of humanity is proven to be a faillure, So what?" Also sprach Zaratustra.

>It's like saying "civilization comes with religion", which is true, but that is not an excuse for me to defend religion within a society.
Depends how you define civilisation. You follow the relativist definition of civilisation, where it is comprised by the customs and social behaviour of a country.
I follow the anthropocentric definition. There is only one civilisation to which all of humanity gives its contributions, and it is comprised of all sciences (including the social sciences and philosophy) as well as the arts. No place for arbitrary customs here. And religion is a part of our civilisation only as far as its philosophical basis is concerned.

>If the labour is worth it, why do you care if it falls so you can pick it up again at the bottom?

Because once it does, I can *never* pick it up again at the bottom.

>All that ever was and is is mortal
That's an appeal to nature/establishment.
What is, is not necessarilly moral/just or what should be. natural order may indeed be flawed itself and we may be able to better it.

[Anonymous No.4924423]

>>4924421
>survival instincts shouting more than your reason
I gave you a rational reason for immortality. Not an appeal to emotion.
Even though maybe an appeal to emotion would be sufficient here. We created condoms to have sex for fun. The fact that nothing could ever have sex for fun without impregnating the female, in its natural state, didn't stop us. We do what we want. That's how much our self-determination, our free will made us depart from what is natural. Free will itself is a departure from what is natural. An animal operating on an instinctual basis doesn't need a free will, the term is null if the choice made is the same behaviour that the natural state determines. Our every choice is a departure from the natural state of the animal and a step towards humanity.

>but a reasonable idea on how we could spend the time that we have, for tomorrow, for next year, for our entire life
reading books, watching movies, listening to music, and working to attain the means of continually doing the same. The future is utterly predictable regardless of how much remains. This doesn't make it boring.
besides you can't predict what will happen in a thousand years, but this is just as unknown as the next 20 years so your argument is self-defeating.

[Anonymous No.4924425]

>>4924418
I take offense at it being insinuated that I am incapable of wanting to live because of a logical decision as opposed to a reflexive impulse.

[Anonymous No.4924430]

>>4924409

survival instinct doesnt necessarily mean wanting to stay alive forever. if an old cat gets sick, it often goes off somewhere alone so it can die in peace, it accepts death. i think that the desire to live forever in humans is not a survival instinct, but rather we as a species are so more advanced than others in the idea that weve found so many things to occupy our time and to entertain ourselves with. human life isnt about survival anymore unless we are placed in a deadly situation.

[Anonymous No.4924438]

>>4924425
Well sorry man, it not like we can tell our bodies to shutdown when we say so, at will. Not yet anyway.

[Anonymous No.4924439]

>>4924425

By survival instinct logical everything you do is a reflexive impulse, even not wanting everything you do to be a reflexive impulse.

[Anonymous No.4924453]

>>4924380
Ok. It's actually been fun talking to you, anti-immortality guy. I consider this one of the intelligent conversations I have had.

[Anonymous No.4924467]

The universe is soulless gentlemen. It is comprised of things that can't observe it.
We are what gives it meaning. We witness it, we understand it, we live in it and we can understand ourselves as separate from it.
Nothing else can.

Imagine if all of humanity was to one day cease. With no sapient creatures to witness and understand it, what is the value of a lifeless universe?

[Anonymous No.4924488]

>>4924467

Sapient life is just as pointless as the universe itself. "I want to be immortal" is enough for everyone else, you can't give value to that which has none just so you can justify it.

[Anonymous No.4924489]

>>4924467
>>with no sapient
A tall blade of grass to eat.
A sickly straggler of the pack to eat.

still got the wild life doing their thing.

[Anonymous No.4924502]

>>4924488
>you can't give value to that which has none
Why can't I? If I can create a physical structure that didn't exist before, If I can create the concepts of justice and morality that didn't exist before and without me, why can't I give value to something?

And I don't really need to justify something that only affects me, do I?

Though I would argue that sapient life isn't pointless. It's just that it's point is to self-perpetuate. Life is the point of itself.
Sapient life is the thing that is its own purpose, and it grants purpose to the universe as well.
Kinda like what Kierkegaard would say about love.

[Anonymous No.4924506]

>>4924489
Wouldn't the wild life be sentient but not sapient?

How do we distinguish the living creatures that posses logic from the ones that don't?

[Anonymous No.4924521]

I'm against immortality (a different guy), here's why.
If we were now able to stop dying, we'd have a problem with over population and especially one with resources, to stop death but keep births the same would be profligate. The only, and inevitable, solution to this problem is to stop reproducing. Completely and with no alternatives.

A personal gain (which is all immortality is), you're choosing, gets in the way of the creation of life, of more people to experience life, to experience just one life time of what you want for an eternity.

I just get an uneasy feeling about that, like it's the ultimate act of selfishness..


Don't misunderstand me now, I know that whatever 'potential people' that could be born They aren't people, no rights etc. I don't think they are souls waiting to fill a body or any religious crap like that.

It still just feels wrong I guess.


Ps. I'm not really against it, like it must never happen. I'm almost neutral, but just to hesitant. Also I have no desire for immortality anyway, so maybe my viewpoint is screwed.

[Anonymous No.4924912]

Both seemed in their early twenties, both were tall and perfectly formed.

"Still," said VJ-23X, "I hesitate to submit a pessimistic report to the Galactic Council."

"I wouldn't consider any other kind of report. Stir them up a bit. We've got to stir them up."

VJ-23X sighed. "Space is infinite. A hundred billion Galaxies are there for the taking. More."

"A hundred billion is not infinite and it's getting less infinite all the time. Consider! Twenty thousand years ago, mankind first solved the problem of utilizing stellar energy, and a few centuries later, interstellar travel became possible. It took mankind a million years to fill one small world and then only fifteen thousand years to fill the rest of the Galaxy. Now the population doubles every ten years --"

VJ-23X interrupted. "We can thank immortality for that."

"Very well. Immortality exists and we have to take it into account. I admit it has its seamy side, this immortality. The Galactic AC has solved many problems for us, but in solving the problems of preventing old age and death, it has undone all its other solutions."

"Yet you wouldn't want to abandon life, I suppose."

"Not at all," snapped MQ-17J, softening it at once to, "Not yet. I'm by no means old enough. How old are you?"

"Two hundred twenty-three. And you?"

"I'm still under two hundred. --But to get back to my point. Population doubles every ten years. Once this Galaxy is filled, we'll have another filled in ten years. Another ten years and we'll have filled two more. Another decade, four more. In a hundred years, we'll have filled a thousand Galaxies. In a thousand years, a million Galaxies. In ten thousand years, the entire known Universe. Then what?"
-except from the last question by isaac asimov.

[Anonymous No.4925592]

>>4923776


was going to write something like this. thanks for already having done so.

We don't even know how to define consciousness. All we have at the moment is "working definitions". And even for those, we do not know how to operationalize them sufficiently.
I am, however, not entirely excluding the possibility of SOMEDAY humanity being at that level, regarding neuroscience.

[Anonymous No.4925661]

Oh, the shitstorm that will arrive when this is actually finalized and ready to be presented to the public. Oh, the shitstorm.

Me, I'll be on a hill, far away from the rest of humans, coming to terms with my place in the universe, my passage into the unknown, and the happiness that only I can have the will to maintain. Then I will pass on to whatever may come.

[Anonymous No.4925670]

>>4923671
In an instant

[Anonymous No.4925690]

But would it be me? Not just the sense that it is a perfect replication, will I have retained my consciousness? It's fucking scary because in my attempt to avoid death I could just be killing myself.

[Anonymous No.4925693]

I still think cellular rejuvenation is the way to go. This is risky as hell.

[Anonymous No.4925706]

>>4925690
Can't imagine it would be any different from going to sleep given the article's description.

[Anonymous No.4925715]

>>4925706
except we have no idea what sleep is and what happens during the 6 to 8 hours in the void.

[Anonymous No.4925742]

>>4923715
Oh, sure. Because that's turned out so well in the past, huh? Calhoun and his rats. Although, things may not turn the same way if we're talking about post-humans or immortal beings, it might actually work.

imo, I would go for it, but with one condition: give a robotic body, some way to replace it each time I need to and then give me a spaceshift so I can explore the universe till entropy kills us all.

That's it.