I have this argument all the time. I think I will live forever. Multiple different types of technology, I think, will be available in my lifetime, and they will allow human beings to live forever. Tell me I’m wrong!
(I’m probably wrong. So wrong)
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Hopefully
Immortality means nothing if I can't have my hoverboard!
I hope so. There's a shitload of games that I'm still yet to play. In fact I just counted them again the other night - 231 of them, the vast majority of which are in the yet-to-be-started stage. NEED MORE TIME.
You didn't really ask a question
so imma just say Yes.
Yeah I"m pretty sure you're wrong. You're already way too old and all the damage is done.
Your unborn kid though, he has a chance.
In 1903, the Wright brothers were the first humans to fly. In 1969, humans landed on the moon.
It took 66 years from first flying to landing on the moon.
In 1990, the Human Genome Project began.
If you think that in the next 50 years, we will not only find a way to halt ageing, but reverse it, you're not giving the human race and science enough credit.
If you're thirty plus, it'll probably be unaffordable to access the technology in your lifespan. I think anyone born after 2000 has a pretty good chance.
I think this is something everyone from Gen X and Gen Y have thought about at some point.
As much as I'd like it to be true, at the moment I have trouble believing it. It's easy to look at the leaps and bounds entertainment technology has made in the past 10 years and assume that other technologies are making that same sort of growth but the simple matter is, they're not. The technologies that will extend our lives, the medicine, genetic manipulation, cloning, cybernetics, nanobots etc, while better than they were forty, fifty, sixty years ago, are still a long, long way off from having any sort of significant impact on our lives. Those sorts of technologies just don't evolve at the same rate as the technology we use in everyday life.
Plus, you've got to remember that with these sorts of technologies there's a lot standing in the way of their progress and development. Cut funding, dozens of hoops to jump through to allow human testing and then a dozen more to get the product out on the market, religious and human welfare groups protesting certain practices etc.
I like to imagine in fifty years I'll be walking around looking like I'm 20 and have robot arms but I just don't think it's going to happen.
Huh? The past 10 years you dont think medicine has advanced a long way? You're wrong dude, medicine progresses very quickly. It may just be a case of, you don't see it, so you don't get to see how far it's come but, they have very significant impact on the lives of the sick. The fringe sciences you state like cybernetics and nanobots, you could also argue have come a long, long way in ten years - they aren't significantly impacting our lives today, but they very well may by 2022. I'd say by 2050, they'd both be commonplace.
I don't think your giving medicine enough credit. When I was six, my teacher died of prostate cancer. I'm now 26 and got to observe robotic surgery for prostate cancer at Macquarie Uni. The patient gets an organ removed... and goes home the same day. That is some futuristic shit right there.
THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!
Haha! I didn't even watch the video to realise it was highlander.
If i could have an arrangement similar to Briareos in Appleseed then I would be fine with the whole living forever thing.
I like to think I'm doing pretty well for a 74-year old.
Slow aging isn't immortality, but there's hope for you yet, Mark.
Plus you've got that great Canadian health care system to look after you now.
I've had a plan to live forever for a while now - people tell me I'm crazy.
I'm an '83 model - so I know that I'll be too old to take full advantage of some of the life-prolonging technology that will be available to (possibly) 90's and (definitely) 00's and above. I don't let that despair me though. I'm almost certain that I'll be able to transfer my consciousness into a robot/android body. So that's my plan.
Also robot body > fleshy meatbag, and there's nothing like a relaxing oil bath.
Not to mention the ability to travel in space without some awkward spacesuit. I'd do that.
Give it 20 years, and who knows what is possible!
Not if you try the superman sleeping method again. *ba-dum-tish*
While I have no doubt human swill live longer and longer with advances in medical science, I doubt we will reach immortality in this gereation.
Of all the sciences, biology is the one which moves the slowest.
But odds are, most of us will make it to 120.
Isn't the end of the world scheduled for this year? I know we already missed 2 raptures, but I've got a good feeling about the apocalypse.
HERE WE AAAAARE! BOOOOORN TO BE KINGS!
The first stage of death is denial I plan to stay in stage one for a eternity fundamentally I'm not allowed to die.
Me Grimlock No Bozo Me King
I'll give it a go.
I'd hate to live forever. It'd be buals
I don't plan on sticking around forever. It'd be cool if I could do the whole vampire thing and sleep for thousands of years and see how society evolved every so often, but only out of curiosity. Life with permanence seems too much like playing WOW forever (Even with the expansions, people are still tiring of it).
You want to live to 1000? Start here. Aubrey de Grey has got you covered.
There are some that believe we close enough that there are already people alive today that will never die ... of natural causes of course. There is still the shotgun to the head.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-m-young/do-you-want-to-be-immortal_b_1731203.html
No chance. It's crazy to think we can survive the inevitable zombie apocalypse, the robot apocalypse and the bioweapon apocalypse on top of the alien invasion and nuclear annihilation...
And back in the real world, things are even crazier..
Life enhancing technologies will always be restricted to the elites, just as military technologies are concealed for decades. The elites fear of over-population has seen them fund a variety of eugenics technologies to shorten our lives.. you've got genetic pollution from GMO, water pollution with sodium flouride destroying bones.. radiological pollution from decaying reactors worldwide leading to cancers, vaccines containing aluminium adjuvants serving as soft-kill neurotoxin bioweapons administered through vaccines resulting in increased autism.. the list goes on and on.
Honesty who would want to? The environment is in a gradual decline, deforestation continues each day, species become exctint each day, waste production increases with the drive for conveint products to make life quicker, work hours, work hours continue to increase, this doesn't sound fun and what about population growth? Does everyone get neutered? Ie if you could live for ever how kids would u produce and are they going to live for ever too? Hmm I see where this is leading cannibalism when we run out of food the hunt begins
You've been watching too much TV news. Go have a look at some actual historical trends. Hans Rosling is an excellent start.
Thanks for the link. Great Stuff!
I have to agree with Reign - If you manage to live another 25-30 years, I (choose to) believe that the barriers/challenges that exist today that currently restrict a human beings ability to regenerate at the cellular level will be resolved.
I also (choose to) believe that before that time, we will have the ability to 'back-up' the conscience of a human being (soul? not sure about that one) and therefore transmit it as data to many possible outcomes - Space Travel, Pre-Grown cadaver transfer, physical rejuvenation, possible disaster recovery method at the matter/thought level etc. etc.
For a pretty good look at the whole immortality schtick try reading Damien Broderick's 'the Spike' - he's a bit of a cheerleader for the benign Singularity but the science is pretty solid for life extension stuff
Fiction lovers should check out Bruce Sterling's Schismatrix Plus and Ian MacDonald's short story The Last Days Of Solomon Gursky for some of that immortal/deep time action...and r Scott Bakker's fantasy novels have some interesting things to say on immortality for the sword and sandal set - the erratics are particularly disturbing...