You only live once?

[Mr Walker]

Humanity is close to giving individual humans the abilty to live "forever" (or at least for a damn long time) By combining cloning with memory transference our self aware consciousness may be extended almost indefinitely. Other possibilities include placing human self aware consciounesses into machines, like androids, or space ships them selves.

My question is: Let us suppose that this technlogy became readilly available to all, in a 95% failsafe way. Let us also suppose that the problem of population growth was solved(as it appears it will be within the next 50 years, when the worlds population will begin a long and perhaps steep decline) so there was not a moral ethical problem with extending the life of individuals at the cost of reducing many peoles standard of living.

Would you avail yourself/make use of, this technology to extend your life span for lets say, a millenium, and potentially more.

While interested in your decision, it is the rationale behind it which i am truly interested in. For example, a true believer in christianity or even in reincarnation might see this"artificial" cheating of death as interfering with the natural resurrection or stage in their cycle, which their belief predicts.

A non believer might have moral or philosophical objections on other grounds.

And if you are enthusisatically all for it (as i tend to be myself) i would also love to hear why this is so.

Edited February 22, 2009 by Mr Walker

[eight bits]

Sure.

Rationale? Even if I believed in reincarnation, resurrection, or existence after death, why would that imply any great rush to leave this life behind? If they exist, then they'll be there when I get there.

Everytime I eat lunch, I cheat death and artificially extend my life. I'm in for the duration, Mr Walker, however long that turns out to be.

[Enigmatic Ghost]

Great Thread Topic Mr. Walker...

No...

You couldn’t keep me upon this planet any longer than I have to be, one because I know where I am going after here, and I already told my Family when my Heart blows, even if it’s not fatal at that moment I am done, in car wreck I am done and never do I want to put upon Life support, prolonged life upon this Messed up Planet, is not an option for me one bit…

I would hate to live here any longer than I am naturally meant too…I don’t believe in Prolonging the Lives of Endangered species by placing then in artificial confinements, I don’t even believe Animals should be domesticated Pets…

Because I believe the Earth should be left un molested, Nature and Wildlife, that includes free from mining and damning and any disruption by mankinds Greeds…

Our Forests are infected with Pine Beatles and they are killing many trees, they are running out of control and why, because of Forestry pratices and because Man interfears with nature Forest fires, invasive species are out of control, and now they want to play God with Human Lives prolonging human life, no, Leave me out of the prospect and that includes any Chip implants as well…Man screws up everything in the name of bettering Life, and most always it is a Human Greed Reason for doing so, at the cost of Nature and the Evironments, if God wanted us to live another 50 to 100 years or walk around with Boob implants, or rubber asses and bionics he would have made us that way in the first place…

Pavot

Edited February 22, 2009 by Pavot

[Mr Walker]

wow thats what id hoped for, but not dared expect. Two cogent and diverse responses. Somehow your response, 8 bits, is what i might have expected. Rational and logical and simple.

I find your pov rational, logical, and not so simple, pavot.

I dont agree with it, because of who/ what i am, but i can understand and respect it as a very coherent argument. I suspect few people are so ready(or able) to simply give up their part in existence, but i might be wrong about that.

[Beckys_Mom]

Makes me think of that idiotic character - James Bond.. you only live twice <---they still haven't killed him off yet!!!!!! WHY???

Anyhoooo I tend to believe...well ok not beleive but think about those that believe in their faith, that we go through a re-cycle -live a life and be re-born as someone else or another creature LMAO

it does make a tad buit of sense!!

Edited February 22, 2009 by Beckys_Mom

[RobertoIlias]

Wow, I completely agree with eight bits and Pavot's view on life, except I would have to say that I would use this technology. Why? Because I am greedy and want to experieence so much that life has to offer.

[Leonardo]

Would I want to live forever?

I've found someone I love and who loves me - why wouldn't I want that to last forever rather than take the chance we might meet in another life?

[~ MacDDT ~]

For sure I would want to live forever, it isn't greedy to want to live. (isn't turning to faith just a reason to live forever in heaven?)

[Beckys_Mom]

Would I want to live forever?

I've found someone I love and who loves me - why wouldn't I want that to last forever rather than take the chance we might meet in another life?

That’s so nice Leo....so you like musketeers? lol

[Grandpa Greenman]

If they could dump my consciousness in a space ship I would go for it, otherwise I think it might get kind of boring after a while.

[Repoman]

If my quality of life would remain good then I absolutely would want to extend my life.

My worries are not philosophical or religious, they are practical.

If this technology was only available to the rich then everyone else would most likely hound them like the villagers at the end of Frankenstein.

If the technology were available to everyone then ow would the banking systems work once everyone had interest compounding to the point where nobody had to work for a thousand years and the banks were paying out millions every day to a single person because his $10,000 deposit from 900 years ago was compounding so rapidly?

[Mr Walker]

Darwind, yes that concept has also appealled to me since childhood, and later, readings of books by many authors on this topic. I forget the author but one particular female writer of "The ship who sang" among others, brought this concept and the relationship / nature of the ship sentience to life vividly and poignantly. Anne mc caffrey springs to mind as the name of the author.

Repo man, that problem (or advantage) too, has been addressed in different ways by many authors. Personally i think the banks will always come out on top. Even though human life expectancy has increased greatly, and so has personal income, few of us manage to accumulate huge wealth in our life times, but it does create interesting scenarios.

One story i read of an "immortal" showed how one of his greatest practical difficulties in modern times was transferring his wealth from an old identity to a new one (in that case he was an individual "immortal" and had to hide this fact from others by dying regularly and becoming someone else.) If we were legitimately the one entity that would be less of a problem

In other books the whole story evolved around how society operated where no one had to work because of their wealth and yet work stilll needed to be done. In some cases wealth became something other than money. In others, some interesting scenarios painted pictures of what humans could become if they did not need to be "wage slaves" for survival., and a person's true worth was accounted in what they could do creatively or offer to society in other forms than labour.

To me, such books showed how our societies and economic models respond to physical realities, and how those models may evolve or adapt as physical realities change.(such as extreme changes in human demographics /age structures)

I think many such writers were actually motivated by/writing in response to, the lalready occuring physical changes in our population demographics ,and how they have already altered economic models of superannuation ,retirement incomes and age pensions.

In theory, the next generation should inherit a great deal of economic wealth from their parents, but in reality it has evoked responses from the older generation such as spending the kids inheritance on their own lengthened and enhanced retirement years and not leaving accumulated wealth for their children.

Edited February 22, 2009 by Mr Walker

[Cradle of Fish]

Absolutely. I owe it to my strong sense of curiosity to remain on Earth as long as possible to see what the future holds, if I could remain here for longer than my natural life I would, but I dont know if I could go on living forever, at one point it'll be too much for me and I'll just have to end my life.

[hyperactive]

we already artificially extend our lives.

through advances in medicine, diet, and sanitation we have gone from life expectancies in the 40 year range to life expectancies in the 80 year range.

How is the next technology any different?

[Lt_Ripley]

nope ... wouldn't want to be here any longer than I have too.

[Rosewin]

Quality vs quantity of life is my main concern at this stage. Just pilgrims passing through but at every stage we should do the best we can do.

[zandore]

Quality vs quantity of life is my main concern at this stage.

I would have to go with quality of life.

"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away" ~ Linda Patton

[Rosewin]

Beautiful quote zandore.

[zandore]

What kind of a life would it be if one did not enjoy it....

[churchanddestroy]

Would I artificially extend my life? Without a doubt. Why? Well... for one, I'm greedy. I love... living, to put it simply, and giving up that experience is not anything that I'm too keen about doing. Number two, I would extend my life to prolong the whole learning process. If I can learn a total of X in one lifetime, I could learn so much more if I could extend that lifetime, so that I might learn the equal of 2 or 3X... That would be nice, IMHO.

[Bender Rodríguez]

I'd hate to die having every major question remain unanswered for me and not to have been to every place on the map; so, yes, I would definitely do it.

[RobertoIlias]

Lt_Ripley Posted Today, 09:37 AM

nope ... wouldn't want to be here any longer than I have too.

You make it sound as though livings a chore.

Cheer up!

Edited February 22, 2009 by MindFire

[The Unseen]

wow thats what id hoped for, but not dared expect. Two cogent and diverse responses. Somehow your response, 8 bits, is what i might have expected. Rational and logical and simple.

I find your pov rational, logical, and not so simple, pavot.

I dont agree with it, because of who/ what i am, but i can understand and respect it as a very coherent argument. I suspect few people are so ready(or able) to simply give up their part in existence, but i might be wrong about that.

I know thats right,I am not ready to give up this life any time soon.I have only a few years left in this life and in no way am I ready to leave it,If there was a way for me to extend it I would sacrafice all I posess to obtain ever lasting life even with the way the world is now.But whos to say the world isnt going to get better, Right.

[norwood1026]

If my wife would be at my side then yes I would be intrested. If I had never met her then that would be another story I do agree with others here I think after say 500 or 600 years you would grow a bit bored. Anyone read Queen Of The Dammed? 4,000 years old. WOW! Granted I think the past offered more things to see then the least 30 years as showen us. There is a huge downside & upside to this as well. If you were able to have children would it kill you to watch them grow old & die? On the upside you would be able to make sure they would never want for anything ever again.

[momentarylapseofreason]

I feel that our lives are way too short- I also think this is why people can be so greedy in certain ways.

Yes, i would but not at any price