Do you want to live forever?

Anyone have any opinions on Aubrey de Grey and his research, there's more to this post than just the question of living forever. I mean he has come up with a radical new idea that may cure cancer as part of his sens program.

No, I do not want to live forever. I believe a big problem with our society is that we have forgotten how to die. Yes, I know, technically everyone dies but I hope someone gets what I am trying to say.

I think that in the very near future scientists will discover "many" methods to not only extend life but physically regress our bodies (whether or not it is publically disclosed is another issue); it would be cool to be about 20 indefinitely with the only fear of death being by a severe injury like.... decapitation.

I would want to live forever:

1. because I like to observe the stupidity of the human race
2. because life is like a movie and I want to see what happens next
3. because I want to see all the knuckle-heads who say they don't want to live forever in line to get the gene therapy..... so I can laugh at them
4. because I want to see the first public display of human warp drive technology
5. because I like eating shrimp.... and I bet there's a lot of shrimp-like food in the universe
6. because death by "natural causes" (i.e. age, disease) is an uncontrollable phenomena and I don't like not being in control of the end of my life..... I want to be the determinator of the ending of my life. When I'm tired of living I'll break out the old Kimber .45 and pop a cap in my head to end it....... I don't want some lame heart attack or lung disease doing me in before I'm ready to go.

-Euclid

[edit on 20-12-2007 by euclid]

Originally posted by Argos
Anyone have any opinions on Aubrey de Grey and his research, there's more to this post than just the question of living forever. I mean he has come up with a radical new idea that may cure cancer as part of his sens program.

I agree with only one thing he has said and that is "we don't need to grow old and die". I have done much reading on this topic since I was a child. It has progressed quite a bit and I have always kept up with the literature on subject.

The problem isn't all that complicated. All the geneticists need to do is figure out a way to make the cells stop losing telomere ..... the buffer linkages at the end of DNA sections...... it's kind of like the wrapper around IP packets. We all have a set number of these telomeres that are sort of like buffers and when our cells replicate we lose a few telomeres in the process. Eventually as the cellular replication progresses there are so few of these buffers left that mutations begin to become worse. The effects of the mutations are disease and the outward appearance of old age.

If "they" fix the replication process then we can live forever....theoretically.

Here's some info on some of the latest work "they" have been up too (But these links don't have anything to do with telomeres):

Link 1

Link 2

-Euclid

it would only be fun if no one else was able to live forever, i could, over the years, create an empire and take over the world, then when im bored of that i would choose a succesor and be the leader of the resistance against my past empire, man the pssibilities.

Ive read all the post and it seems alot of people think that when we fixed the telomere problem that the only way to die would be by a tragic event. Actually ive read alot of theories on how, even if our body is completely vaporized we can come back to life. The idea is that we convert all of the information that is in our brains(chemical information) into a set code(electronic) then if your body is completely destroyed people can just get the most recent set of code you have in a database and upload it to a fresh body. The branch of science behind this was called biomechanics or bioelectronics or bio-someting. But that idea, in my opinion would be much better than just keeping our old bodies from getting old. It would be nice to have a new body every now and then.

i saw the video, and at the end they find that he did not work for the biology department at Cambridge.

If you live forever, you'd be missing out on sooo much!

That would be a shame.

Originally posted by TheOracle

If you live forever, you'd be missing out on sooo much!

How so ?

I don't believe in the "god"
of the Bible.

Or the Koran.

Or the Torah.

So, what would I be missing ?

Regards,
Lex

I only think about death when having a serious asthma attack. I can be very scary. Aside from that I feel immortal already.

To answer your question, NO I don't want to live a few hundred years. As the oldest member of my family I am expected have all the answers to the questions my family has, to solve all their problems, and maintain my life with dignity.

Can you imagine having hundreds of family members to worry about?

Also my brain would be stressed to the max. Maybe a clearing of the brain every hundred years would help. But then I would not be myself.

Unless stress and worry could be eliminated I would not want to live forever.

Why would anyone want to live forever on this earth? I want to experience more than just a life on earth. Maybe a life in another galaxy or universe. Maybe that's why we die? To learn more from different areas at different energy levels. I really don't know what lies ahead after death, but I hope it's freedom. Wouldn't it really suck to die and end up as a slave anyway.

The only people that want to live forever are the ones that have never been on top.

Unless you want to be emperor of the entire world or universe, you might want to rethink the idea of living forever. There is a ceiling in our present consciousness that does not allow use to evolve in our physical bodies.

If you are cool with the idea of being alone for eternity, then maybe you can pull it off. But we are social creatures and in no way can we survive without human companionship.

For those that understand societies(city/state systems) throughout history, understand that they are always predicated on lies to control the masses. Once you understnad this basic concept, you either became a slave or a slave owner. In order to live forever in this world today, you CANNOT possess a conscious. Once you gain knowledge of the world and how it works you start to understand other people, cultures, etc. You start to feel and understand oppression. You can either use this knowledge for good or bad, but either way, you are exposed to the truth. If you want to live forever under this current global system you are either a) unenlightened, b) an unblinking blind optimist in complete denial of the world in which they live, c) a christian or d) the antichrist hell bent on controlling the way everybody thinks on this planet for their own personal benefit.

reply to post by Conundrum04

What you say doesnt make sense to me, Im rather confused. How would you know what living a long time would be like, you dont seem to be open to the good possibilities.

Originally posted by _Phoenix_
reply to post by Conundrum04

 

What you say doesnt make sense to me, Im rather confused. How would you know what living a long time would be like, you dont seem to be open to the good possibilities.

I don't know how old you are but when I was in high school I was a football star. As long as I followed the status quo I was set for life.

For some unknown reason I started to question what was going on around me. A little voice inside me started to convince me to "resist" for some reason. I started my path towards enlightenment my senior year in high school. I befriended anybody I liked, I didn't care what my "friends" thought. I dated a female I was totally in love with but my peers couldn't understand why I was with her. I didn't care.

My enlightenment continued through college where due to my skills playing football and intelligence, I was able to explore who I was unhindered by any outside force. I was as free as can be within a system for a long time and had absolutely no idea how good I had it.

The thought of living forever might make sense for someone comfortable existing in the slave mentality. I was a slave but never realized it until I started thinking and experiencing things on my own with my own two eyes. The only way a slave can say they would like to live forever is if they are a well conditioned house slave. A slave that has all the "goodies" at their disposal. A good well trained slave doesn't understand that they are indeed slaves because as long as they follow their masters orders they believe they will be "okay".

How can you have "good possibilities" when you need slaves to tend to your estate?

Slavery hasn't gone anywhere it just has taken a different form. You make the slave feel that they have control over their own choices. But they don't. The slave owners are now gambling on own peoples ingorance. They can afford to lose a "slave" every once in awhile, because another slave or illegal alien will be happy to replace them.

Like I said in my post above, there is a ceiling that you can reach on planet earth. Once you reached that ceiling you have very few options: a) leave planet Earth by death of an alien spaceship. lol. b) become a complete introvert, live in the wilderness, become one with the earth. c) Learn to control the people around you by attaining power. d) "go with the flow" which of course will inevitably lead to a life that is steered by "god" or the "devil" or britney spears, or whatever people in power want you to believe in.

Bottom line is this: Ignorance is bliss... until truth rears its ugly head.

Conundrum, I Feel your words.
You seem like a smart man. Too many are sick


why would you want to live forever?
Pain and regret
An extremely powerful mind like ours will dictate some kind of survival instinct.
Moreover, I believe it is the soul that in effect dictates our forward momentum in both the ether and the anger.No more so than an angry person wanting an axe.
If you meditate you will get better.

[edit on 22-12-2007 by luckyfourteen]

I saw a documentary about stopping aging, and its coming. They have already successfully extended the life of worms by more than 5 times in a lab environment. Apparently the scientists also says that they will not only be able to stop aging, but actually reverse aging as well. And thats just whats known for the public view. I would imagine that they have managed to do much more in private behind closed doors with unlimited funding working for the governments.

Anyway, I get more worried than happy by developments like this. Keeping people alive for hundreds of years also means that whatever view the leaders have on things will be kept alive for that long.



[edit on 22-12-2007 by Copernicus]

except about god.
god is not Britney Spears, or any other tridention, but an energy source located at your balls.
She and those like her are sworn enemies to a true American home.

As a hefty tax payer, I give fake bull# a 3.0 on the richter scale of reality

reply to post by euclid


This list is most certainly the most screwed up list in the history of mankind spanning a billion years.
Listen to me: I am smarter - listen to Cindi Lauper!

Lol i love it when a thread goes crazy overnight. Euclid your list was great, made me chuckle.

I guess it gets back to what you can see yourself doing with that extended lifespan.

Conundrum i can feel a lot of what your saying. I think where are wires got tangled was the title of the thread. "Do you want to live forever?" I only called the thread that because it was the name of the film i was watching.

The main focus here is would you like to be in control of when your journey ends or do you want aging to control your eventual fate?

I wouldn't want to live forever as posted before but i would like to experience everything i want to experience without having such a short time limit already in place.

Some great posts turning up here keep em coming.