Heh, all this talk about sending people to Mars. I don't know about you guys but if I was immortal or could live to be 300 years old the last place I'd want to spend those years is on Mars.

Quote from Zed

The world produces enough food to support everyone at the moment. It just doesn't always get to the necessary people.

And what happens when the immortals breed? With immortality, the global population will expand exponentially until there are food shortages again and immortals start dying this time (assuming "immortal" only extends to disease and old age. We still can't defy the laws of conservation of energy).

I don't think there's enough food to keep everyone on Earth healthy and still have a sustainable agricultural industry, no. I think trying to feed all the hungry mouths would result in more damage than we could control, but that's just me. I have no figures to back myself up on this one.

Immortals breeding I doubt would be such a terrible thing. I don't think an educated, affluent couple would start popping kids out left and right just because they'll be living forever. Pretty sure we could have some legislation regulating the number of offspring every so many years an immortal female could have.

@Myself: And of course immortal means disease and old age. And perhaps not even all disease, I mean I'm sure mutated strains and new pathogens will develop, or unforeseen problems with genetics after living for a certain amount of time, etc. I think we'll have organ farms by then or soon after, but replacing a destroyed head? Come on...

@Exilement: I feel you on the Mars thing. lol

What kind of idiot would willingly accept immortality?

Sure, it sounds tempting. Live forever, fearing no disease of even age. You literally have forever to do things.

But think about it. Forever. Eternity. At a certain point, and that point will come, there will be nothing new. Not one amazing thing, ever. Eternity is boredom, there's no way around it.

Granted. Your first few thousand or so years are going to be awesome. You'll have enough time to see and do everything at least once, and perfect all the things you love to do. But after you perfect every technique known to man and have explored all of your physical and mental limitations, what is left?

Then you have the lack of reproduction (not necessarily sex, mind you). This will rob you of what is likely one of the most fulfilling parts of life; creating and raising a life of your own. It may not be something you want to do more than a handful of times, but there's no denying that for the vast majority of people, it's one of the best experiences of their lives. Depriving yourself of that kind of joy is doing yourself a disservice, to put it lightly.

Then again, parenting isn't for everyone, and a few really do hate it.

So, we've got eternal boredom and lack of a big but non-essential part of life. What else could there be?

How about the fact you're not immortal in the truest sense? You may be immune to virtually every disease and incapable of dying of old age, but you're still quite mortal in regards to, say, taking a shotgun blast to the godd*mn head. There is still nothing stopping you from prematurely ending your forever because some drunk was speeding his hover-truck and knocks you out of the sky while you take a joyride on your speeder bike.

Finishing where I began, there is one major workaround to the whole "eternity is boring" deal.

Suicide.

Yup. Good ol' "coward's way out" suicide. When faced with that kind of future, suddenly it doesn't seem like such a bad thing, does it? And really, by that point, it shouldn't be anymore, since obviously by then it's the only escape from your self-imposed looming temporal hell. A quick shot of some anti-immortality juice, or a quick jump off a tall thing, or even good ol' fashioned lead to the brainmeats.

So, in closing, the pros and cons really balance themselves out. You deprive yourself of a family to grant yourself all the time you could ever need to do whatever you want. When everything becomes boring? Off yourself. Ultimately, it's a win-win.

Personally, though? I think it'd be a waste of time and effort. Any jackass can do anything given those circumstances. It's the people who achieve things in their naturally given life spans that deserve real immortality. And the truth is, some of those already have it. After all, we're still talking about Hitler and Alexander the Great today, aren't we?

I would want a family, myself. And while I'd love to live long enough to see my great-grandkids, I personally wouldn't want to go much beyond that. By that point, I've had more than my share of happiness, and I'd just like to rest.

Quote from Exilement

Heh, all this talk about sending people to Mars. I don't know about you guys but if I was immortal or could live to be 300 years old the last place I'd want to spend those years is on Mars.

I'd love to go to Mars and I'm probably not the only one on this planet that would like to see more of the Universe. Also, Mars is huge and if we could create an atmosphere, we could grow all kinds of vegetables that would prevent food shortage. Maybe put a huge farm with animals there, but there will be people protesting against breeding animals to eat them.

Also, eternity won't be boring.
The Universe is massive, trillions and trillions of stars and planets to discover.

That would be awesome, to discover them all, right?

it would be nice if they could find a way to make it work.

No, Cando, think about it.

No two star systems may be exactly alike, but after you've seen a few quadrillion, they're going to start getting same-y.

And even if you were somehow patient enough to literally discover them all, what happens next? What do you do?

Eternity is boredom. Whether it takes you thirty or thirty trillion years to get to that point, you will get to that point. It's only a matter of time. And you have time coming out of your ass. So it's not so much a matter of if as it is when.

But like I said, you can always vaporize yourself if get bored enough. That's probably the greatest thing about immortality; you choose how you want to die (since we're talking medical immortality and not fantasy immortality).

So your whole argument is boredom? I don't think I need to explain how weak that is.





But for those of you with thicker skulls: If you could achieve all your goals with no timeline attached(40-60 years) then afterward do you think you'd really be bored? I'm sure there are endless possibilities, even given thousands of years. Hell you could take up teaching with all of the skills you've mastered, or you could do a long-term study of a tropical rainforest to combine your incredible health/longevity with a sense of adventure. You could become a philosopher and continue to think on the meaning of life. With an increased lifespan you'd be able to see actual progress in society in your lifetime and you'd be able to think on it. A well-learned individual could take it upon their self to write the unwritten history of generations upon generations of people. If you're an explorer or a family man, then it's probably not interesting to you. But if you're a thinking man, then being given endless time to think shouldn't sound like a bad idea at all.

Weak argument? Sure. But it's not one you can explain away.

So, you spend 1000 years as a teacher. After a while, you start to think, "This has been fulfilling, but it's time to move on."

So, you go study a rainforest for another ten thousand or so years. You see a fair few new species of plants and animals come into being, even rediscover a handful of lost cities in your travels. Hooray.

Once you've spent a good chunk of time intricately mapping the rain forests of the world, you go into space, start looking at stars... That gets old, you come back and teach for a while longer, but not necessarily as long as you did the first time, because, well, there's no new kids coming in for one thing, and for another, you've done it before.

You haven't debunked my argument, you've just lent credence to my statement that is could take 30 trillion years for it to happen.

There is a f*ck ton of things to do. But that number is finite. You are not. You will do it all. You will get bored. You will want to die. How are you not seeing this?

I am seeing your point, but you're not understanding that I see the benefits of an incredibly prolonged life as outweighing the fact that I'll get bored eventually. Better to feel bored than rushed or unsatisfied with myself before I die of brain cancer, shitting myself in a nursing home....

Here's a good example.
Some days I don't feel like animating at all, some days I crave to animate for hours. It isn't going to be boring for so long. Things get boring once you've done them a whole lot of times really quickly.

It's stupid to want death because you're bored :/
That just goes to show that you have too much time on your hands. In which case you should go meet friends and hang out n shit instead of sitting at home on the computer 24/7. Do you honestly think that if people could be immortal (excluding being killed by unnatural resources such as getting shot in the face) that they would just say "**** this" and go do whatever they wanted because time doesn't mean shit to them?

You make it sound as if you think that everyone is going to quit their jobs and do whatever they feel like doing for millions of years. That's why your argument is shitty.

Quote from Jexsam

No, Cando, think about it.

No two star systems may be exactly alike, but after you've seen a few quadrillion, they're going to start getting same-y.

And even if you were somehow patient enough to literally discover them all, what happens next? What do you do?

Eternity is boredom. Whether it takes you thirty or thirty trillion years to get to that point, you will get to that point. It's only a matter of time. And you have time coming out of your ass. So it's not so much a matter of if as it is when.

Uhmm, no.

You said there is a finite amount of things to do. *ZOOMER*. There are new things made everyday. And new things will come again and again and again. Like tv shows, movies, games, books. Endless.

Also, after those trillions od years discovering all the stars, when I come back to Earth ALOT must've changed. You say it as if the world will the same forever.

No need for name calling, Cando.

Sure, truly new things to come out every so often, but the majority of "new" things you see are just old things with a new coat of paint. After a while, all the epic heroes will start to bleed together; even the great ones will eventually begin to seem similar to the "new" great ones, for example.

Though, Arch-Angel, you do raise a point I hadn't wholly considered; that being even things that are boring for a while can be no boring later. This certainly adds another layer of longevity to everything, though it still doesn't halt the inexorable march of "been there, done that".

I still think, ultimately, with medical immortality, the human race would eventually just get bored. I just also think it will take one hell of a long time. Like I said earlier, it could take thirty trillion years. But eventually, it all just gets dull. You can't push yourself any further, you can't think of anything new, you can't challenge yourself anymore. Eternity allows you time to become perfect. And if you're perfect at everything, what is left to achieve?

Quote from Jexsam

No need for name calling, Cando.
Sorry, i was mad at someone else and got carried away.

Sure, truly new things to come out every so often, but the majority of "new" things you see are just old things with a new coat of paint. After a while, all the epic heroes will start to bleed together; even the great ones will eventually begin to seem similar to the "new" great ones, for example.

Though, Arch-Angel, you do raise a point I hadn't wholly considered; that being even things that are boring for a while can be no boring later. This certainly adds another layer of longevity to everything, though it still doesn't halt the inexorable march of "been there, done that".

I still think, ultimately, with medical immortality, the human race would eventually just get bored. I just also think it will take one hell of a long time. Like I said earlier, it could take thirty trillion years. But eventually, it all just gets dull. You can't push yourself any further, you can't think of anything new, you can't challenge yourself anymore. Eternity allows you time to become perfect. And if you're perfect at everything, what is left to achieve?

Endless celestial sex?

I don't think you could ever have experienced everything. No way in hell you're ever going to know both what it's like to be in a train crash and what it's like having your head cut off with a rusty hacksaw.

That leads neatly on to my observation that if you're alive for two hundred and forty thousand years it's odds on that you're going to fatally slip over in the bath or shower at least once. The odds of being killed by a meteor are just 182,138,880,000,000 to 1. Even if old age and disease are eradicated, you've still probably got no more than a couple of thousand years to live.

There are some stats here: http://www.funny2.com/odds.htm

Quote from Zed

There are some stats here: http://www.funny2.com/odds.htm

Quote from funny2

Odds of being murdered: 18,000 to 1

Odds of getting away with murder: 2 to 1

Is it bad if I lol'd at these stats?