Death: Friend or Foe? (page 6)

Narkissos

sbf,

Sorry for the ambiguity: I just meant I seemed to recall BurnTheShips, who hasn't commented here so far, had also made some enthusiastic comments on the prospect of defeating aging on another thread (don't remember where). Maybe he'll weigh in -- I'm sort of curious how this fits into a Catholic perspective, among other things.

One indication of "enthusiasm" to me is jumping from a "might happen" to a "will happen". Another -- less endearing to me -- is attacking the morality of people who question whether it "should happen" -- were it possible. (Btw DeGrey may be a brilliant scientist, but he comes across as a great mind manipulator as well.)

You made an interesting point earlier about how suppressing the notion of natural death from old age would bring accidental death to front stage. This meets a thought I have often had, on how the medical advances in general have made some kinds of death (infant or confinement mortality, for instance) exceptional but also more difficult to cope with when they do happen. Again, my bet is this would make society even more obsessed with safety than it is, repressing the unconscious longing for death which I believes has a part in the individual psychè.

w007,

Wait till your time comes to "un-plug".....I'm sure you will be filled with emotion.

You're kind of making my point. Facing death in a not too remote way is what makes us "human". I haven't seen Surrogates (thanks for the tip ql) but the motif of human-like creatures (robots, androids, as in Blade Runner, or even materialised phantasms like in Solaris) growing a soul as they face extinction is quite a topos in sci-fi.

leavingwt

Narkissos,

Very interesting topic and your comments are very interesting.

I would assume that you are correct, in that generally speaking, younger folks would be more excited about life/living.

I would also like to say that we simply don't know what would happen, it seems to me. It seems reasonable to conclude that some folks (perhaps a majority) would become "monsters". However, I think we also have reason to believe that some folks would get "better and better" as the years went by. Their good traits and qualities would become more refined.

I'm not familiar with the science that has led some here to conclude that death will be a thing of the past. It's very intriguing and (at first) a little scary to think about, admittedly.

-LWT

BurnTheShips

Death: Friend or Foe?

I'm late on this thread, but it is a friend. However, 70-80 years doesn't seem like enough time.

BTS

Satanus

Nark

'a living being actually wants is actualisation of its potentiality, wasting itself as it realises itself.'

'"I love those who do not wish to preserve themselves, the down-going ones do I love with mine entire love: for they go beyond."'

Interesting. I did allude to that at the end of my post, although you stated it much more clearly. It reminds me of Toulouse-Lautrec who, on the surface seems to have led a dissapated life, yet, perhaps fits that description. Others, like mick jaggar and richard branson come to mind. Zen focusses on living each moment to the full, whether it's putting together a nuclear reactor, or doing the dishes.

S

darthfader

I conclude that death is a bad thing for it robs me of the ability to satisfy my curiosity for the future.

Darth Fader

Elsewhere

> Elsewhere: for some reason -- I may be wrong -- I picture most anti-aging enthusiastic posters here (you, slimboyfat, BTS on another thread, leavingwt maybe) as relatively young men (not so many young women, apparently), at a stage in life where the desire to live forever can be just another expression of the desire to live (period)....

No, we're just a bunch of Geeks who see everything in the context of technology and what is possible with sufficient advancements in technology.

BluesBrother

??????for individuals to (seriously!) assume they want to live forever.

I am late on here but since leaving the Borg I also see the hope of "living forever on a paradise Earth" as an extremely selfish one. Why should I live forever unchanging, occupying this space , at the expense of a new person that could be born to take my place when my cycle of life is done?

Move over and make way for somebody else

darthfader

Funny thought:

"Darth," says god, "you must die so I can make a new person. I've run out of souls."

Darth Fader

Girlie

Interesting topic and comments. For now, death is a foe to me as I still have much to learn and explore in life.

slimboyfat

Narkissos,

On the one hand you say that, for our time of life, you find our anti-aging outlook natural and in some sense simply an affirmation of life. You have clarified that you feel age should mellow one's perspective on aging and death however, and that there is something "monstrous" about older people desperately clinging on to life. But in that case, and since no aging monsters on the forum seem to be within your sights, I have to wonder what the point of the opening post was. If you think the outlook of us young Turks at this stage in our lives is natural, and that experience and maturity will do the work of broadening our perspective, why all the rhetoric about ignorance, self-centeredness, lack of self-awareness and so on in the original post? Either you think our view is fine for where we are at, and it will get straightened out by time rather than argumentation, or else it is somehow important for you to challenge our outlook and assumptions already at this stage. I am getting mixed messages.

Death: Friend or Foe?

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