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We Need to Die

willllliam.com

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Re: We Need to Die

#21

Post by SoftTalker »

dvt wrote: post #5

I've had this (often drunken) conversation many times, I think mortality is fundamentally ingrained in not just the human condition, but the fabric of our universe. Without the finality of death, life seems to lose its meaning. Not only do we need to die, we are compelled to die, we should die. This memento mori makes every day, ironically, worth living. One of my favorite verses from the Bible is Job 1:21, where he…

Yes, immortality would be imprisonment. An eternity in this existence with no escape.

It's also the ultimate equalizer. Everyone is born, everyone dies. There's no amount of wealth, luck, work, or misfortune that happens in life that changes this. We all end up as dust.

Re: We Need to Die

#22

Post by wouldbecouldbe »

I don't think there are is an issue with finding ways to extend life. But there is an issue with people clinging to life out of attachment; part of getting older is accepting change & the flow of things.

Re: We Need to Die

#23

Post by Arodex »

bee_rider wrote: post #8

Bah, nah, I’ll take immortality thanks. I want to see where it all goes. I do think there’s a risk of societal stagnation if we all stick around forever. But, maybe we can make a deal—if we all end up immortal, we can make a threshold, maybe even as young as 80 or something, and have people retire and stop voting at that point. Let society stay vivacious, sure. Give us an end point for our toils, definitely, and a de…

>But, maybe we can make a deal—if we all end up immortal, we can make a threshold, maybe even as young as 80 or something, and have people retire and stop voting at that point.

And how is that supposed to happen once the rich and powerful who finance and own the rights to that immortality tech succeed in their research?

In a world where basic health care is barely accessible in the US and under constant attack, how is immortality supposed to be given to the common men and women? Through asinine "work requirements", like Medicaid? Through UnitedHealthcare's insurance?

Re: We Need to Die

#24

Post by waldrews »

You might start questioning meaning of life with a billion year time budget. A million years seems reasonable to cover the range of things you could anticipate wanting to learn or experience. A few thousand years, no, that's not enough, you have to start cutting corners, you can barely even visit nearby worlds and only cover a few intellectual disciplines.

Re: We Need to Die

#25

Post by weinzierl »

bee_rider wrote: post #8

Bah, nah, I’ll take immortality thanks. I want to see where it all goes. I do think there’s a risk of societal stagnation if we all stick around forever. But, maybe we can make a deal—if we all end up immortal, we can make a threshold, maybe even as young as 80 or something, and have people retire and stop voting at that point. Let society stay vivacious, sure. Give us an end point for our toils, definitely, and a de…

Me too, definitely. Should I get bored I could always go about and insult every being that ever lived and will live in the entire universe - in alphabetical order.

Re: We Need to Die

#26

Post by JellyBeanThief »

fellowniusmonk wrote: post #7

One guy with a tendency to procrastinate extrapolates his expierence as a universal truth without providing any grounding. Cool man, don't try and live forever. Maybe people who haven't had their innate curiosity beaten out of them will get more resources to explore. I just can't help seeing the same moral panic in this as I see in arguments against UBI. It's like how many people with fuck you money have you met? I w…

> One guy with a tendency to procrastinate extrapolates his expierence as a universal truth without providing any grounding.

Other commenters here are doing that too, more or less. But yeah, no one's proposing forced immortality. We have a cultural habit of assuming our right to choose for everyone else, we see people doing it even when they're actually advocating for universal rights to choose.

If you're sufficiently bored at age 450 or 45, go ahead and end your life. Your life belongs to you, not to other people. Just don't harsh the mellow of the person who's happy reading books until age 45,000.

Re: We Need to Die

#27

Post by netfortius »

To me the "revelation" came via Emil Cioran's book "The inconvenience of being born" (the actual book's title in English is "The Trouble with Being Born", but I like better the term that's closer to the French original). Excellent justification.

Re: We Need to Die

#28

Post by smrtinsert »

I don't see how any sort of immortality can be supported by the infrastructure of the world. It's based on people dying, civilization has factored it in. How could you manage resources for populations that never disappeared? No immortal organism exists, I'm pretty sure Darwin already solved this question for us.

Re: We Need to Die

#29

Post by gmuslera »

The punishment for crimes in Altered Carbon was sending you to a far enough future so you know nothing and no one. With age you get alienated in a similar way, maybe adding (lack of) understanding on the mix. Your brain have limits, your adaptability have limits, your physiology have limits, pushing them forward doesn't take them out. Eventually you get tired, bored, or want to get out. At least speaking about most and not special cases (I hope).

And having a simulation of ourselves in a different media is a different game.

Re: We Need to Die

#30

Post by munificent »

Waterluvian wrote: post #11

There have been many, many stories over the millenia that try to empart the wisdom that mortality is necessary. Some present it as being a gift. I don't think any one source made it click for me, but I think some combination of watching The Good Place , Sandman , and a lot of Black Mirror got me really stretching my imagination of what it would feel like to be truly immortal. I had a moment that felt like my horizons…

> I had a moment that felt like my horizons had been expanded very slightly when I felt this severe dread for maybe half a second. A feeling of being inescapably trapped.

Guillermo del Toro's "Frankenstein" explores this feeling.

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