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Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

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Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#31
post #10
post #7

I personally like posts like this; a sobering reminder of our own mortality: memento mori . It hopefully motivates us to thrive, flourish, and cherish what really matters -- friendship, kindness, humility, love -- and to leave the world a little better than we found it. And if you're curious, the Aaaron Winborn Award is still going strong[1]! [1] https://www.drupal.org/community/cwg/aaron-winborn-award

Hopefully it also starts us on a path of treating death as a problem to solve, so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality. https://www.sens.org/ https://www.lifespan.io/ https://www.buckinstitute.org/

Death isn't a problem to solve...it's just the end of what we know and the start of everything we don't.

I don't know what comes after death but I'm not scared of it.

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#32
post #10
post #7

I personally like posts like this; a sobering reminder of our own mortality: memento mori . It hopefully motivates us to thrive, flourish, and cherish what really matters -- friendship, kindness, humility, love -- and to leave the world a little better than we found it. And if you're curious, the Aaaron Winborn Award is still going strong[1]! [1] https://www.drupal.org/community/cwg/aaron-winborn-award

Hopefully it also starts us on a path of treating death as a problem to solve, so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality. https://www.sens.org/ https://www.lifespan.io/ https://www.buckinstitute.org/

> so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality

Step one would be to allow euthanasia. Until we allow that, we cannot pretend that anyone is ever going to be allowed to die on their own terms.

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#33
post #7

I personally like posts like this; a sobering reminder of our own mortality: memento mori . It hopefully motivates us to thrive, flourish, and cherish what really matters -- friendship, kindness, humility, love -- and to leave the world a little better than we found it. And if you're curious, the Aaaron Winborn Award is still going strong[1]! [1] https://www.drupal.org/community/cwg/aaron-winborn-award

A family member recently introduced me to an app called WeCroak that's supposed to send periodic reminders of your mortality. You just reminded me to give it a spin!

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#35
post #21

Given what I would consider the eternal preciousness of a human, and the fleeting insignificance of computer software, I found it strange he opened with "I am a developer for Drupal." For example, why did he place that before his being a father? I think people too often miss the significance of their own existence, independent of their relatively brief tasks and accomplishments. I certainly do not mean to belittle or…

Why do you think being a father is anymore of an achievement?

Being a parent is difficult and you are one of (at most) two parents. You will be one of the two most important people in your child's life.

Drupal developers are numerous and not the most important people in anyone's life solely because they are Drupal developers.

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#36
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully it also starts us on a path of treating death as a problem to solve, so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality. https://www.sens.org/ https://www.lifespan.io/ https://www.buckinstitute.org/

> so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality Step one would be to allow euthanasia. Until we allow that, we cannot pretend that anyone is ever going to be allowed to die on their own terms.

Definitely agreed. Death should be a personal choice.

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#37
post #10
post #7

I personally like posts like this; a sobering reminder of our own mortality: memento mori . It hopefully motivates us to thrive, flourish, and cherish what really matters -- friendship, kindness, humility, love -- and to leave the world a little better than we found it. And if you're curious, the Aaaron Winborn Award is still going strong[1]! [1] https://www.drupal.org/community/cwg/aaron-winborn-award

Hopefully it also starts us on a path of treating death as a problem to solve, so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality. https://www.sens.org/ https://www.lifespan.io/ https://www.buckinstitute.org/

As relevant to the linked post (written by someone who later died of ALS [1]), there are a lot more mainstream medical research organizations who treat "death as a problem to solve". Treating deaths caused by ALS, cancer, heart disease, strokes, covid, etc. as a problem to solve is the focus of a huge amount of research.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amyotrophic_lateral_sclerosis

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#38
post #22
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully it also starts us on a path of treating death as a problem to solve, so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality. https://www.sens.org/ https://www.lifespan.io/ https://www.buckinstitute.org/

> treating death as a problem to solve I think that's a poor framing. Yes, cure diseases, absolutely, but mortality is intrinsic to humanity. Suffering is a problem to solve. How we should live, knowing that we will most assuredly die is a problem to solve. Treating death as a problem to solve I think is a conceit and ultimately a fools errand.

If suffering is a problem to solve, then so is death. This is evident to all who grieved.

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#39
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully it also starts us on a path of treating death as a problem to solve, so we can die on our own terms instead of being forced to do so by a cruel reality. https://www.sens.org/ https://www.lifespan.io/ https://www.buckinstitute.org/

I'm with you on your core point, but in a way, it's orthogonal: Death will continue to be an inevitability, and can arrive at any time - even after we solve senescence. (Accidents, murder etc)

The endgame (a few hundred years from now) would be virtualizing consciousnesses and distributing them across space so only a cosmic disaster could end a being.

Re: Monday was my 46th birthday and likely my last (2013)

#40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would rather we change our view on death. Death has always been a constant since life became a thing. Even the mightiest stars in the skies are destined to die one day. After you die, your consciousness fades, and so do all your desires and regrets. To me, death is the ultimate respite.

To me, death is the ultimate respite. To me, this makes a virtue of necessity. We have deep philosophies around death only because it's inescapable. But if we could change that, then we could also change those philosophies.

death is more complex than just being inescapable. Death is also a change agent that wipes the slate clean and makes place for the new. It's how all organic life adopts collectively.

The first thing that's going to be immortal when death isn't inescapable is Kim Jong Un. No thanks, if you want to see a world without death read Altered Carbon

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